1958 46R 3SPEED (The muddy adventure)

My interest in cars started a long time ago. My interest in Buicks started in 2008, and yes I'm hooked. After a number of conversations with my father about his 58 olds I decided we needed a project we could do together,,, This is were it starts during multiple trips to visit my sister in Mississippi I kept noticing an old car in in the back yard of a house about a mile from her house. On one such trip I decided to stop and inquire about the car.

The people were nice and said that they did need to get rid of the car. We looked it over and 95% of it seemd to be there. however I found the pedal arangement to be a little strange, 4 pedals with the second from the left being 4 inches wide, which I dismised as just a strange old car thing. At this time it had become dark so we we invited inside to talk about a price........ they confirmed that it was a 1958 buick and said that we could have it for $500.00.

My response was that I would be back with a trailer the next morning. This is were the fun starts. I did not realize that there was no way to pull the trailer into there yard so we droped the trailer at my sisters house and went back to get the buick and pull it to her house.

We need to pull the buick around the back of there house to get it out of the yard. 4X4 truck no problem, or so I thought. The pictures tell the rest

The first two pictures were day one, then it rained that night the third picture is day two. After a lot of diging and jacking and stuffing boards under the tires we did finaly manage to get the truck out. I went and bought a long chain and took a little different approach from higher ground and finaly pulled the buick around the house. We checked that the brakes worked and they didn't, so in order to tow it to my sisters house my brother in law used the clutch as a brake. It was a very long slow drive.

We then promply went back to the house we got the car from and filled in the ruts we left in the yard and I gave them another $100. for the trouble we caused they were happy and I thanked them again for the car.

Are we done? Nope I still had to get the car on the trailer, Uhaul trailers don't have wenches on them. We tryed pushing it three times no luck (Buicks are heavy)

Finally My brother in law pulled his truck next to the trailer and hooked the chain to the buick and was able to pull the buick onto the trailer.

Two days and $600.00 later dad and I were on our way home with our new treasure. That was in 2008.

Scott

MORE! MORE!.

Ben

Use "hell or highwater" in a sentence. "After being told that price, I don't blame you for going back the next day and getting it, hell or highwater" Man you stold it. That 4th pedal is worth what you paid for the whole car. Looking forward to hearing more of this story. Can't wait to see that 4th pedal.

Well we finally have her in the garage (still 2008). The trip home was uneventful, So it's time to inventory the parts in the trunk and interior an see what we have. Great news we are only missing 4 pieces of trim and a jack, every thing else is present and accounted for. Time to pull the seats and carpet to check fo rust. Yep there is rust as well as a strange pedal configuration.

Ok so we have holes in the front floor and tar patches in the back. We need a floor, at least all four corners of it. How about the trunk you may ask??

Yep we have rust in the trunk as well. The inner rockers are rusted as well.

Yes sir Mr Earl, Thats why i hi tailed it to the local U haul place to get a trailer. I was not prepaired to get a car that weekend, but I was not going to miss out.

So we got a mud find instead of a barn find.

Scott

That is a strange pedal combo. Looks like a homemade stick shift conversion? Still, a very nice car!

John D,

I did later find out that someone started to work on the car and apparently they could not find the correct pedal pad, so they added some metal to the pedal and used a pedal pad from an automatic. I have since restored the pedal to it's correct size. About 3 years ago I sent the correct pad to Steel Rubber witch they copyed and now carry for all of us standard guys. It is a true standard car that still needs alot of work.

Scott

Anyone else think the OP looks like Mr Clean.

No offense meant, Scott.

None taken, LOL

Well back to 2008,

We decided that before we tore the whole car down we should check to see if we could get the engine running. It turned over by hand, a good sign. So after checking for any loose wires I hooked up a battery turned the key on, we have lights!!!! Then I pushed the button to start the car and nothing happened, so I pushed the button again..............Nothing. I then noticed my Father laughing his butt off. This is the button I was pushing.

This is my first car from the 50's. He then explained that I needed to push the gas pedal to the floor. OK, why not. The engine cranked over just fine and I felt stupid. That was the good news, the bad news was there was no way it was going to start. After tinkering for a while I found we had some water in two cylenders on the drivers side. Ok, we knew we were going to rebuild it any way, So back to the tear down.

We decided that the trim should come off first and we could restore it as we removed it.

Yes we found more rust. as well as bondo in the right rear quarter ):

We spent the next 6 months polishing and removing dents from stainless steel as well as looking for new trim clips. I did find some of them and restored alot of the orignals. I'm still looking for some. (we made it to 2009)

MORE! MORE!

SCOTT, you do have a gem there, a hardtop Buick with a manual gearbox. Wouldn't you have been surprised if the windshield washers and wipers had activated when you pushed the "start" button?! Thanks for sharing a good story. As the man says: more! more!

Rob,

The wipers would have been a surprize. More, More is comming, I have to scan all of my pictures then reduce them.

Scott

I am so glad you are publishing this story for us. And also glad you were able to save this lady! Looking forward to the rest of the story!

I am so glad you are publishing this story for us. And also glad you were able to save this lady! Looking forward to the rest of the story!

I like well chronicled stories like these.

Keep up the great work Scott.

Scott,

I'm following your thread with great interest (see my signature and you'll know why).

I wanted to chime in and concur what MrEarl said, you got a great deal there! Even at 2008 prices, you could have doubled your money for what appears to be a solid rear bumper alone. Good useable lower bumper rails go for premium bucks let alone none dented ends etc. (ask me how I know)

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Also, the fact it is a standard shift is awesome too. I have never actually seen one in person all my Buick (antique car) ownership and will be curious to read when you get us up to 'once you got to actually drive her'.

Can't wait for the next update.

Sorry Scott but none of your attachments show up.

I just noticed, I messed something up:mad:

Well as far as the stainless goes I will give you a teaser (still in 2009) Here are a couple of pieces that are done except for the final polish, that will be done just prior to the installation.

Ok no dents................most scratches out.....white polish................green polish...............Camera guy got in the way. The final polish will be with diamond paste. Every thing is polished and packaged except the eyebrows (one cracked, one bent.. saving for a tig welder) and the parts I am still looking for. I have seen the on E-bay just didn't like what I saw. I will get them

Ok time to pull more apart, Interior yuck!!!!

Ok well the door panels are done, the rear armrest panels are not much better, but the rear arm rest shells are still good. I found a small mouse condo in the left front corner of the headliner.

The sunvisors are compleat and solid, so we can just recover them. The folding backrests on the front seats had covers on them. Under the covers one was blue and one was red (more mouse condo's). I called the people at SMS upholstry and they sent great matching samples....and an estamate of about $1500.00 (I now have a collection envelope for the interior)

Parts missing or broken: one broken window crank, two arm rest's (cracked and broken) Not to bad, the seat tracks actualy worked, and I have lots of interior trim to strip and paint.I also have a shoe box full of small chrome parts to be re-plated. (I better get a bigger box and another envelope)

OK the second times a charm,

Sweet project! I agree It was a steal at that price. That standard option just puts the cherry on top.

It must be a very rare car with the 3 speed, I don't think I've ever seen one, it's a nice project.

Keith

We interrupt this blog to bring you some seldom seen pictures. You gentlemen have convinced me that she is much more rare than I thought, so I thought it was only right that I give you some pictures of the trans, as well as a question or two.

The first image solves the mystery of the wide pedal. Second is the clutch cable pulley on the frame. Third and forth unique clutch linkage. forth and fifth the trans itself. Sixth is the blank plate were everyone else has P,N,D, and last is the pedal lever attachment for the clutch cable.

I do need to give a special Thanks to Sean for loaning me the correct cable, so that I may duplicate it. (five years ago) sorry I'm a little behind.

The question that I have is Identifying the trans itself. I found a blog about identifying the transmission, please correct me if I'm wrong. Since the trans has a 6 bolt cover that makes it a Borg warner in stead of the 5 bolt Muncie Correct? If so does any one have a parts connection, or is most of the trans standard Borg warner parts.

Thank you, Scott

Can't answer your question about the transmission, but wanted to thank you for posting those pictures of the clutch pedal mechanism. I am sitting here besides myself looking at that!

If it's a Borg Warner it would probably have "Warner Gear" cast somewhere into the case. It's an interesting thread. Good luck with the car.

Greetings. Just found your story. If you still need parts for your trans, I have a couple parts trans and some clutch linkage. PM me if you would like, Greg

Scott what a project .. Have fun is all i say , that is the most important thing when restoring and old car ... this is going to be a beauty again, i am for sure!

keep going

Paul