Johnd1956's Buicks

I like the rims-black-tires. Caps & Whites gave it my Grandfathers look.

Best Wishes,

Dale in Indy

Nothing changes the personality of a full size Buick like chrome road wheels! Car looks great. Agree once you get an old car that doesn't have rusty seized bolts after that you never want to go back.

New definition of a sport luxury vehicle. Looks so different and really good with the rallys.

Ed

Very nice, John! I dig.

John, you should be able to pull a couple mpg better from the car, 1 always pull 16.5 with the 455's traveling. I am a purist, the wheels just don't work for me, but it's not my car lol. As i am sure you already know, you will love the 72.

Thanks all, and thanks for the information and the honesty Keith. I know not everyone will be a fan of that look. To each his own I guess. But you are absolutely right. Linda and I BOTH love this car.

I learned a LONG time ago, just YOU and the BRIDE need be HAPPY.

Enjoy,

Dale in Indy

I thought only the bride had to be happy

Awesome looking car, John. Great find! Love those big coupes, nothing like them have been made in a long time.

Keith

John, this car would even look great with no wheels and tires. While I'm partial to the grandfather look, the rally wheels and blackwalls are great. I've had a couple of West Coast cars - my dd Valiant is one - so I know what you mean about nuts that just spin off. It adds real pleasure to otherwise mundane mechanical work.

John, as you know, I've had my '56 almost as long as you've had yours, and after always having and working on Ontario cars, it was amazing to work on a California car, and just have all the bolts come off as if they were put on the week before!

I think the rally wheels look great.

Keith

Thanks Rob and Keith... I appreciate your comments on the Queen. When I first saw the caps and whitewalls I really liked the set up. But my wife was not that enamored with the car at first. Actually, this was one of two colors she would have never picked. But just the other day as we pulled up next to it from an errand she blurted out, That's such a pretty car!

We are two steps away from buying a premade shed, which will be put in the back yard for storing it. I hope we have it in by October.

The rally's really transform the car! I, like Keith, prefer the look of white walls and I think those would have looked great with the rally's. I am surprised how much I like the look of the car with the blackwalls though... just gotta keep em clean! Glad you got the PS to stop chirping.

John, the car looks great. The style of these cars was outstanding, and, as you've discovered, they are remarkably comfortable for long-distance touring.

It was great to meet you in Portland, and I apologize for not connecting beyond our initial greeting.

Dan drove the car up to the Tacoma area a few years ago, and we managed to shoot some photos of the '72 with my '71 Centurion. Thought you might enjoy seeing these:

Thanks Brian! Dan did mention he brought it up for a show once. Your car is absolutely beautiful. I like the grill on yours a little better. It is too bad we did not get a chance to have a parking lot pow wow at Portland. I' m still trying to figure out where the time went?

What a Buickful car John! Was great to see it in person. Was a great afternoon!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yes it was a great dinner with terrific friends! We really enjoyed having a chance to get together with you and your wonderful family. Sorry it rained on you on the way home. It did rain on us too, just as we pulled into the driveway. Meanwhile the bugs were plastered all over the front of the car. A small price to pay for a good time with Buick friends. Till next time...

John,

I love this car. The white walls and stock covers were great but the Rallys look great, too. I'd love to find a nice Electra, 68 - 72. It will probably be my next Buick. You are going to have a lot of fun driving it.

Dan

I love the "Queen" and really enjoyed seeing her at the Heartland regional. I think we met, John, but I have a better memory for cars than faces.

Maybe you should mount the whitewalls on your rally's, like Mr. C!

Thanks for the kind comments guys. Rob, We did talk briefly about the headlight dimmer on your car. I was surprised to see it. I thought that was out of production way before 72. You never know what will show up at a Buick show.

Meanwhile, there's no chance of putting white walls on the rally's in my view. To me white walls go with hub caps, Rally's should be blackwalls, except for instances of raised white letters on muscle cars. I know GM sold them with white walls and advertised them in the catalogs that way too. But I think white walls on the mags detracts from the wheels, and to me the rally's are some of the nicest factory rims out there.

I had the opportunity to change the heater hoses yesterday. The block heater looked like it was leaking and the heater control valve also was very rusty. Plus I was dinged for the red hoses. In the process I found the passengers side valve cover needed to be tightened, which appears to have stopped the leak. It was a crappy day today but I hope to have some nice weather next week to try and clean some of the engine compartment.

Got the shed ordered, and the building permit, and have been working to open up the area where the shed will go. Can't believe the summer is over already.

One more reason to regret not being able to attend the Buick Nationals this year; would have loved to see 'The Queen' IRL. I'm partial to 71/72 Electra 2dr HT's :cool:

We, the Queen and I, would have loved to meet you too Rob. Your trips were such an inspiration to me.

Ok, the dust has settled. The Queen is resting inside her new home and I am glad to report that it is dry as can be in New England.

We had a few trees removed, a stone pad built with a rodent screen barrier throughout. The "Shed " is 12 X 30 and we had the floor insulated with Rigid Styrofoam board, aluminum foil clad. The insulation was installed on cleats that kept the insulation tight to the underside of the floor, foil face down for a vapor barrier. Then the entire bottom of the shed was enclosed in a rodent barrier to prevent anything from digging up or under the building.

We had a 9 foot wide steel garage door installed which has been a blessing, and three single hung windows, with a six foot wide access door on the far end. We have a lot of space and I was able to move some stuff around in our regular garage so now we have some space around the 56 and the GS besides. So we are calling this stuff quits for this year right after I replace one more thing on the Queen. The battery is leaking and it has to get out of there. Pictures to follow

GOOD FOR YOU. Pictures would be nice, when you can!

Happy for ya,

Dale in Indy

Sounds nice, John.

Keith

Thanks guys. Right now a computer issue is causing delays in posting pictures. Hope to fix that this week. .

As promised, here's a photo journal of the new shed installation. This is the before pictures. This shed is pretty much at the minimum clearance from my property line. We don't have a large lot so size did matter.

This is another "Before" picture, taken from the vista of the road. 4 pines to the left of the driveway will be removed.

This is the last Before picture. The 8 x 12 shed will be removed after virtually all the trees in this picture are cut down. I hated to cut them all, but while the crew was here we decided better to do it now than have them working on top of the septic system in the future.

In prep for the tree crew, and the future driveway, we had to remove half of this dog kennel.

We also had to move this pile of firewood, which is what is visible in the first picture above.

I also had a pile of mulch that had to be moved out of the way, and some of the smaller trees I actually dug out instead of leaving the stumps under the new shed.

The tree company at work, and the space gained after 3 of the first 4 pines are eliminated.

A second shot where the bucket and crane are in position to remove the larger oak and maples. Those things were really tall.

Now the shed company will come to retrieve the existing unit and transport it to my son's home.

The base of the stone pad was laid and the 1/2 inch galvanized screen was put about 6 inches below the top layer. This is intended to stop rodents from digging under and coming up in the middle of the shed. This area has a deep layer of sand below the surface, and it is great for self leveling, but very inviting to tunneling vermin. So there's no guarantee this will work, just an expectation. We'll see.

Also you can see my next project, splitting the firewood. I've already started with some of the largest pieces. It's not fast doing it by hand but it gives me something productive to do while trying to replenish car playing funds.

The shed is a fully constructed unit, minus the garage door, upon arrival. 12 x 30 is the largest they can deliver this way. Cost explodes if they were to build on site.

We had the floor insulated with Rigid foam boards, clad with aluminum. Without any guarantee, the expectation was that it would provide a vapor barrier , and rodent deterrent, and insulation if we ever want to complete the inside .

Backing into the location. This was delivered by one guy with the help of a trick trailer. The trailer can move forwards and back on it's frame, side to side on a second set of wheels tucked into the center , and tilts. This unit was dropped in place without damage to the stone pad in less than 20 minutes.

Voila instant garage! Well, not a garage to work in per se. We really plan to just use it for storage.

The rodent barrier is installed between the building base and the pad of screen in the middle of the stone base. Note the opening under the length of the building. We wanted to keep that air flowing.

So a simple 2 x 6 with a 2 x 4 topper and spacers to rest against the main 4x4's were employed.

Once the 4 yard stone driveway was built we checked and on a windy day you can feel the air moving under the shed on the opposite end of the unit.

I'm pretty much done with it for this year. The Queen is high and most importantly, dry! And we picked up lots of additional storage space.

And the bonus is it's right at home, so I can run it anytime I want.

It's not the same as a real garage. I could have gone 2 to 3 feet wider if I had built on site. But one ridiculous rule this town employs is the roof on an auxiliary building is not supposed to be more than 15 ft high. Now I'm sure that is overlooked in rural areas where homes have multiple acres surrounding them. But in this development I'm sure that would have been a problem.

Anyway, it's done.

Well done John - looks great nestled right in there and look sharp with the road wheels. Pretty smart to do the 6 foot doorway at the other end of the shed. Gives me ideas...

Watch that bicycle hangin so ya don't bump yer head

Yes, well, regarding the bicycle, I went and bought a hangar designed especially for bikes and put that up there. Then I could not sleep that entire night cause I kept imaging the hangar broke and the bikes fell on the car. The next morning I went right out and took those bikes down, and stashed them in the extra space at the end of the shed.

I did manage to get the bad battery out yesterday, without cracking the casing open. (( YAHOO)) The area underneath is bare and coated with rust from the acid leak, But the metal is all there and appears solid. I'll be addressing that area before the end of the month.

Nice looking building, and a good home for "The Queen", I'm sure. Zoning bylaws can get kind of strange at times. We have some here too, the wierdest one still on the books, says that you cannot drag a dead horse along Yonge Street (a major road that dates from the beginning of the city) on Sunday.

Keith

Yikes!!! Apparently you could do it on any other day of the week?

A little wood stove and you are set for winter. I'll bring some Killians and a folding chair and be right up....

Just bring yourself. I already have the chairs and the Killiens is on ice.

Nice John, now when is the extension being added lol

I'm looking at next summer Keith.

Finally, today I had no excuses to put off looking at the horn issue in this car. I had been having some problems before changing the steering gear last year. The horns worked intermittently and they sounded fuzzy. I pulled the horn ring and contacts and cleaned up everything and it was only marginally better. So I suspected the wire running up the steering shaft to the horn button/ring. Then, when we changed the steering gear, the horns stopped working altogether. I determined it had to be in the column cause grounding the wire to the column connector caused the horns to ring clearly. So I again suspected the wire in the steering shaft.

With a mirror I was able to see the brass ring around the column, and where the wire in the column connected to it. It appeared to be in good condition, but just a bit dirty. But after a wipe down, the horns still would not work. I began to suspect the one part we changed when we installed the steering gear, the rag joint. There is a copper coil attached to the rag joint which obviously forms a bridge from the end of the steering shaft to the steering gear side of the rag joint. I figured that was not making contact with the steering shaft.

Today, after some testing with jumper wires I quickly discovered the rag joint was not the problem. So I went back to the connector and the brass ring. Grounding the connector itself to the bottom of the dash worked. Then I tried a jumper wire from the tip of the connector to the brass ring and the horns did not work. After cleaning a spot of the brass ring with some 2000 grit wet/dry sand paper, the horns worked with the jumper wire to the brass ring.

I proceeded to clean the rest of the brass ring. It was then that I noticed that the connector was set into a 2 inch long bracket, and it appears that the connector was not hitting the brass ring when installed. Even though there is an oblong hole cut into the steering column for this horn connector, there is no adjustment to this bracket, just a pair of screws holding it to the opening in the column. I flipped the bracket and installed it with the connector towards the steering wheel side of the opening ( as opposed to the floor board side). The horns worked great. But I soon found out that the shifter was hitting the connector and I could not shift out of park.

So I pulled the bracket off again and did my best to take some measurements. It was obvious the connector had to be installed towards the floor board side of the oblong hole. And it that position it seemed like the connector was not hitting the brass ring at all, but was instead riding on the black plastic insulator that is under the brass ring. Somehow the brass ring shifted and rode up on the steering shaft towards the steering wheel, losing contact with the connector. I wedged the brass ring back into position with a small screwdriver and some light pressure and now the horn is working again. But I suspect this will only be a temporary fix and that the brass ring will eventually ride back up the shaft.

If anyone knows how that brass ring should be secured I would appreciate the information. Right now I am thinking when/if I have to go back in there, I would use some silicone adhesive to hold it in position. But it's obvious that is not what they did at the factory.

The rubber sleeve and brass ring are an interferance fit and should be difficult to relocate while in the column. If I recall correctly, the brass sleeve should not be able to slide down the rubber sleeve to expose the rubber, I think the brass sleeve is slightly crimped on the upper end, it also has the notch stamped in it for the wire to be soldered to. Your alternative might be to loosen the column and slide it downward to better align, not positive about that because the 56 design has rag-joint and the 55 shaft is captured in the steering box. At any rate, if you could re-position the brass sleeve that easily without damage it is obviously not tight enough. These observations are based on my experience with the '55, I have not had a '56 apart.

I am assuming your contact is patterning above the sleeve, if below the brass then column would need to be pulled upward to align.

Thanks John, I believe you're right. Yes, the 56 is different from the 55. Sounds like the parts are reversed here, as the brass ring rode up towards the steering column. And there is some sort of step in the steering shaft that I was able to use as a block to wedge the brass ring towards the steering box. I don't think there is any repositioning of the shaft inside the column, but it was the tiniest bit of repositioning that made the horn work.

Since we installed the steering gear without loosening or removing the steering column, I am inclined to believe the shaft got pushed upwards and now I need to adjust the steering box that fraction of an inch towards the front of the car to let the shaft resettle into it 's normal position.