1938 Buick Century Model 61 - Four Door Touring Sedan - Trunk Back

[MCHinson]

Yes, 

 

The best information that I have leads me to believe that the engine only has about 1,000 miles on since the car was put in excellent condition. Due to it being left outside for over 20 years since the previous owner's death, the body is in bad shape but the engine does not appear to need much more than paint. I will open it up and do some checking before I am done, but I think that the engine will escape significant work. I plan to replace the front engine mounts but even the rear engine mounts look like they are good. 

[MCHinson]

Last night, I finished loading the chassis and other parts about 10PM. Today was a long day for me, but I did less work personally on the car today than most days. My day started at 6AM. After taking care of a few things that I had to do at home, I delivered the project to Sam Thompson with Blast It at 8AM. We taped up the engine components that we wanted to protect from blasting. For the next Several hours, I mostly watched Sam and Joey work. We unloaded the chassis and they pressure washed it and blasted it. My only significant work there was to remove and replace the wheels, as well as winch the chassis back up onto the trailer, so that Sam could finish the lower portions that could be reached easier while it was on the trailer. They also blasted the front fenders, hood, front nose, and the best rear fender. I decided to skip blasting the bumpers and the other rear fender since I actually think that they will be replaced with better parts. After the loose parts were blasted, I loaded them back up. 

 

I got home a little bit after 1PM and we had lunch. After lunch, my good friend Stafford Brister of Classic Memory Lane Hot Rods and Classics and I unloaded the project and then we went to buy the painting supplies. I became the paint mix guy as well as continuing my role as wheel remover and reinstaller. Stafford did the real work of priming the chassis. We finished about 7PM and after a much needed shower, I took my wife out for dinner. 

 

Tomorrow's plan is to apply the Chassis Black paint to the chassis.

[Taylormade]

Not trying to be a know-it-all, but I would recommend wearing a mask when spraying any paint, especially two part, activated paint.  That stuff can kill you.

[ILIKECARS53]

not just a mask, but some skin protection also

[MCHinson]

I will be the first to tell you that I am not the painting expert. I am sure you guys are right. We had good ventilation set up, and Stafford is the experienced paint guy so I did not try to tell him how to do what he does.

[39BuickEight]

That's the first time I've seen this all done with the car still together.  I guess you can get it all done at once that way though, and depending on how they charge, that may make a lot of sense.  I don't see how you could ever get all the sand out of the cracks and crevices though with it still put together.  Do you know how many bags they went through?

 

I too let painters use whatever safety equipment they choose.  I'm not going to tell them how to be safe as they are the "experts," not me.

[Taylormade]

Again, not trying to be a know-it-all, but I would strip the frame down before I painted it with the final black.  Once you're down to the bare frame, you are going to find areas that the blaster missed, mainly under the parts you will remove.  Leave that rust under there and it will bleed out over time and stain the painted frame.  Everyone has their own way of doing things, so this may not be the way you want to go, and that's fine.  Just trying to pass on a few lessons I learned when dealing with the same problem.

 

As far as the paint issue, take a look at this.  Not everyone reacts to things the same way, just like everyone who smokes doesn't get cancer, but this may make you think.

 

https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/bad-urethane-experience-need-info.308529/

[MCHinson]

To answer your question, the purpose of this was to blast the majority of the frame and engine. There are certainly parts that still have to be removed and those areas will be properly cleaned, derusted, and painted at that time. For example, the front end will be totally disassembled, but I certainly preferred to have the major dirt, grease, and rust removed by a professional sand blaster, so that I will only have to deal with small amounts of that crud.

 

Stafford is not a morning person. This morning, while waiting for Stafford  I removed the push rod cover to take a peak and clean out a bit of sludge. It was not nearly as bad as I might have expected for a car that had been sitting for over two decades . I also removed the spark plug cover and got rid of the spark plug wires. While I had those two covers off, I went ahead and put a quick temporary coat of paint on them by brush to get a bit of an idea of how the engine is going to look. I removed the Generator in preparation of rebuilding it.

 

UPS delivered a few packages today. I recently purchased a rebuilt carburetor for this project as well as two wheels from a fellow 36-38 Buick Club member. I am happy with the new parts.  I can't take a good photo of it, but one of the oddest things about this car is that the inside of the gas tank appears to be almost perfect. It appears to be shiny steel inside but there was something obviously sliding around inside the tank. I was able to shake the tank around and was able to shake out three pieces of lead. I can only guess this was excess lead inside the tank from a lead repair of the tank inlet pipe in the past. Upon close examination, it looks like there is a small crack in the lead around the inlet pipe to me. 

 

Stafford came over this afternoon and we finished priming the fenders that we did not prime yesterday. After that, he applied the Chassis Black paint to the chassis. We left it to dry overnight and called it a day. The black paint certainly looks good on the chassis. Unfortunately I did not realize that the batteries were dying in my flash unit, so the photos get darker as the day goes by. I took the last four photos with the camera's built in flash after I realized that the flash batteries had died. 

[r1lark]

Wow, a lot of work, bet you are glad the blasting and painting is pretty much done on the chassis. I understand what you are saying about working on a clean chassis. I've seen it done both ways - blast the whole chassis together like you have done, versus taking everything apart, painting each piece, and reassembling. Painting each piece separately is very time consuming.

 

Looking forward to more updates.

[MCHinson]

Today was a day for me to catch up on a few non-Buick projects and tasks so I did not accomplish much on the project today. This morning I did reinstall the wheels and lower the car back onto the wheel skates. I cleaned up and swept the garage. I rolled the project back into its space in the back of the garage, and organized the current storage location for the project parts.  I got a little bit more space in the garage this afternoon when a recently sold engraving table got picked up this afternoon. 

 

UPS arrived with a recently purchased 1937 Buick Radio. It is looks much better than the radio that I took out of the 1938 Buick. I am not sure if the 1937 and 1938 Buick radios are interchangeable or not. They are very similar, but I have to do some more research to see if I can use this radio in the 1938 project or not. If not, I have been wanting to replace the aftermarket radio in my 1937 Century with a correct radio, so it will end up in one car or the other. 

 

This afternoon I dropped the Generator off at a local shop that works on Starters, Alternators, and Generators. I am not sure of its working condition, but they will check it out and should produce a nicely working Generator that looks correct.  

[38Buick 80C]

Matt,

37 radios have a square hole in the dash for the dial, 38's have a round hole...so (I think) you can and thus need to interchange the dials so you are literally not trying to put a square peg in  a round hole!

[MCHinson]

1 hour ago, 38Buick 80C said:

Matt,

37 radios have a square hole in the dash for the dial, 38's have a round hole...so (I think) you can and thus need to interchange the dials so you are literally not trying to put a square peg in  a round hole!

 

Thanks. I know that one of the knobs is broken off of the radio from this 1938. Hopefully it can be fixed and I can just put the new radio in my 1937 Century. If it can't be fixed , I guess I need to find a 1938 Radio now, so both cars will have a radio. In any case, if I find either for a good price, it probably would not be too bad to have a spare or two around anyway.

[MCHinson]

This morning I took my 1937 Century to our AACA Chapter's annual display at the Wilmington Christian Academy. Each year,  their 5th grade students study automotive history as part of their regular history studies. Each year, our local Chapter takes cars from different decades, today we had cars from the teens to the 80's on display for the 5th graders. We line the cars up chronologically and the group goes from car to car for a brief presentation from each owner followed by a chance for questions from the students and answers from the owners. 

 

After lunch, I removed the window moldings from the doors of the 1938 Century. I initially thought I would simply leave the old ones on the old doors and obtain new ones with the replacement body. I decided to salvage these, since all but one are actually in good shape. The replacement body is expected to be from a Special instead of a Century so the side window moldings will be different. The 1938 Model 41 and Model 61 body shells are identical except for the configuration of the front fender attachment points. Changing those will certainly be much easier than doing all of the rust repair on the body of my project car.

 

The window moldings all came out easily. I had previously applied solvent to the screws and every one of the screws came out easily using a common screwdriver. After removing  the screws, you simply have to tilt the top of the window molding away from the door and then lift up to separate it from the door. 

[r1lark]

8 hours ago, MCHinson said:

I initially thought I would simply leave the old ones on the old doors and obtain new ones with the replacement body. I decided to salvage these, since all but one are actually in good shape. The replacement body is expected to be from a Special instead of a Century so the side window moldings will be different. The 1938 Model 41 and Model 61 body shells are identical except for the configuration of the front fender attachment points. Changing those will certainly be much easier than doing all of the rust repair on the body of my project car.

 

Matt, I guess I missed the point that you are going to use a better body. Do you already have that on hand?

[39BuickEight]

Replacement body????  Oh no!!!  Fixing the body is the fun part   Form, cut, massage, weld, patch, sand, fill, sand, paint.....over and over again 

[MCHinson]

I don't have the replacement body on hand so I am holding on to the old body until I do have a replacement. I have spoken with Dave Tacheny and he has a 1938 Model 41 in basically rust free condition that he is probably going to part out soon. He had a couple of people interested in buying the car but he gave them a deadline to buy it or he was going to part it out. That deadline sort of passed but he relented and gave one of them an extension. In another week or so, I should know if that one is mine or not. If not, Dave can provide all of the patch panels that I will need, but this body is more rust than steel, so it would be much easier to start with a better body.

[MCHinson]

I spent most of this morning doing some reorganizing in the garage. I recently had one extra engraving table picked up by an ebay buyer. Unfortunately, a second machine that I had also sold on ebay looks like it is not going anywhere. The buyer failed to pay attention to the shipping details on the auction and backed out when he figured out what truck freight for a 150 pound machine shipped from NC to NM was going to cost. Hopefully I can find another closer buyer who will actually buy it to free up more space in the garage. I managed to free up some work bench space and one table top that should enable me to add a small table top sand blasting cabinet to the shop tools in the near future for this project. 

 

After finishing in the garage, I removed a bunch of screws from the dash in an attempt to remove the dash from the body. I either need someone to tell me the secret to removing the dash, or else it just needs more time for solvent to dissolve a lot of rust that is still holding it in. I also decided to pop the windshield out in case removing the windshield made it easier to remove the dash. It did not help.   I then decided to remove the sun visors. I was able to easily remove them but decided to hose them down and hang them on a fence in the sun to dry before adding them to the parts pile in the garage.

 

 

[MCHinson]

I had better luck this morning with removing the dash. With some better light this morning, I was able to determine that a couple of aftermarket switches had to be removed from the dash before it could be removed. After locating the remains of a couple more half rusted away screws to remove and being able to remove the cowl vent handle attachment from the dash after it soaked in solvent over the weekend, I was able to remove the dash.  Some of the hardware could be removed with screwdrivers, some of it required vice grips, and a couple required an angle grinder.  I now have the throttle cable soaking in solvent in hopes of removing it from the dash soon. After removing the dash, I was able to remove the wiring harness connector that was behind the driver's side of the dash.

 

While I was in the area, I decided to remove the windshield wiper assemblies. They came out fairly easily. 

[MCHinson]

This morning, I was able to remove the rusty nut holding the hand throttle cable to the dash. I put have placed the cable in a ziplock back with ample amounts of solvent in an attempt to free the cable up so that it might be reused.  I also removed the windshield wiper switch and the two small vertical bright trim pieces from the dash. The dash is now bare and in need of cleaning and replacement woodgraining.

 

Yesterday, I sent a 2 page list of parts needed to Bob's Automobilia. I just barely made the deadline for Hershey delivery. I am looking forward to picking up many of the parts needed to restore this car next week. After I have those parts, I should be ready to complete the restoration of the chassis. 

[MCHinson]

Yesterday,  a regular doctor's checkup visit in the morning and several other things conspired to keep me from doing anything with the Buick. Today, I had a few other projects to work on, including helping another local friend with an issue with his 1937 Buick Coupe. These kept me busy today as well. but I did find some time to do a little bit on the 1938 Buick project today. 

 

Even though the shade will not be able to be reused, I removed the rear window shade from the body. I might be able to reuse the hardware if I don't find better examples. The interior light falls in the same category. I hope to find a better one, but could reuse this one if necessary. The four machine screws came out of the wooden interior light support without any problems, allowing me to remove it from the body. 

 

Wanting to do something more on the chassis, I removed the bypass valve assembly. The bypass valve looks good and seems to operate as designed. Now I will be faced with deciding if I want to keep the bypass valve assembly or do I want to do remove it and do the usual conversion to a freeze plug with a 1/4 inch hole in it instead of the bypass valve. 

[MCHinson]

Since it will be next week before I pick up my parts order in Hershey, I am somewhat limited in what I can do for now. This morning, I removed a few parts from the front of the engine. I pulled the fan and fan pulley off, cleaned, primed and painted them. I pulled the water pump off and disassembled it. The bearing seems to be in good shape. The impeller looks OK to me, although I don't really know what I should be looking for. I am debating if I want to clean it up, reassembly it and reuse it or if I want to replace it because it is easier to do it now rather than have to change it some time in the future with the car assembled. Suggestions based on experience will certainly be appreciated. 

 

I removed the Torsion Balancer and removed the time chain/gear cover.  The timing gear/chain has a bit of obvious slack upon inspection. I found a little bit I of sludge but it was not nearly as bad as I expected. I know that it was running quietly so, like the water pump, I need to give some thought regarding replacing it as well.  The service manual wording is a little bit confusing to me so I am not sure how loose is too loose. I need to clean it and check it a bit more and figure out exactly how much chain movement is OK to assess if it needs to be replaced or not.

 

The service manual states, "Initial slack in the chain when new should allow from 1/4" to 3/8" finger movement of the loose span between sprockets away from the centerline. Permissible slack can be as high as 1" outward before it should be necessary to replace chain". I am not sure if this means a total of 1" in only the outward direction from the center line, or 1" total back and forth from the centerline. This one has slightly over 1/2 inch outward or inward movement from the centerline, so the total movement is slightly over 1 inch, but the "outward movement from the center line is much less than one inch". Any experts  want to chime in here? 

 

The bolts on everything are in remarkably good condition, but it is clear that I need to buy several boxes of locknuts. There are quite a few broken locknuts on this car. I am not sure how well the photos show it, but the water jacket is really clean inside. I don't know how it is that clean after sitting for over two decades. I cleaned, primed, and painted the Torsion Balancer. I primed the timing chain cover and called it a day. While I did not do that much work, it is encouraging to see a few parts cleaned and painted. 

[Spinneyhill]

If you clean up that timing chain and then try the play, you will probably find a fair bit more. The little tubes in which the pins run will be full of dirt and limit the slack you can feel. I used to wash my m/cycle chain in petrol (outside!) with plenty of swishing around to wash out the particulate matter (usually beach sand and chain oil, from tooling around on the beach). Before washing I could hold it up on its side and it didn't sag much. After washing, they might sag 90^o. They were stuffed at that stage so time for a new one. (The main drive seal, triple lip, also failed at about this time and it leaked oil.)

 

That impeller looks pretty good on the ends. What about the other side against the body of the pump? If you put the end cover back, what is the shaft end float? There is usually a specification for that.

[MCHinson]

I figure after cleaning, it will have quite a bit more play, but I am not sure how much yet. I already have a new timing cover gasket and seal in my parts order that I will be picking up next week. Do both the chain and gear typically need to be replaced, or is one or the other usually the problem? I will have to check out the water pump a bit more.  

[Spinneyhill]

Usually replace all three at the same time. As a chain wears it lengthens and you will notice the teeth on the sprockets become narrower (pointy). It all needs to be clean to tell though!

 

I think that engine is going to need a good clean out; it is pretty dirty, the result of non-additive oil.

 

By the way, I have seen a chain in a late '20s Hupmobile that was a greater pitch than the timing sprockets! It only sat in a few grooves in the sprockets and they were heavily worn to fit. The sprocket points were sharp and very narrow; it had been like that for a long time. I would have thought the oil removed at change time would have a nice metallic sheen from all that metal in it but the shade tree mechanics changing the oil clearly didn't notice or realise the significance if they did notice.

[Gary W]

Matt. I bought a brand new set of gears and a new chain.  The chain had to be assembled at the master link and quite frankly I didn't like the idea of trusting  that small cotter pin to keep the chain intact, and wasn't a big fan of the aluminum gear so I sent it all back. 

My original chain had some slack, probably within spec, but I wanted to try to get it better. 

I found an NOS chain and used my original gears and it's the best solution.  Timing marks are right on and she is whisper quiet in operation.  

If your gear teeth are in good shape, I feel you can't beat the original stock.  

 

Just my .02

 

[MCHinson]

Thanks. I need to clean it all up and take a better look and do some measuring. I know that it runs quietly, but I want to make sure I do anything now while it is easy instead having to go back into it sometime later after the car is back together. 

[MCHinson]

I had several things I needed to do today which kept me away from home almost all day long. This evening, I was finally able to get home and clean up the timing chain and gears. I think the gears look good for a 79 year old car. After cleaning it all up, I used a straight edge to determine the center line of the timing chain and taped a small ruler on the assembly so I could measure the slack in the chain. It looks like there is almost 3/4 of an inch of outward movement of the chain from the centerline after it is cleaned up. The service manual says that up to an inch is acceptable. With 3/4 inch of slack developed in 79 years, I think that it is likely that I could leave it alone and it would probably not cause a problem in my lifetime. The next owner can thank me. I am going to see if I can find a NOS timing chain and replace the chain. If anybody sees anything in the photos  that I am missing about the gears, please let me know.

 

I was also able to get a photo of the flywheel ring gear. From my limited observation through the starter opening, I think that the ring gear is going to be salvagable. I do need to drop the inspection cover and do a good cleaning and total inspection of the flywheel ring gear.    

[Ben Bruce aka First Born]

 

 Matt, for what it is worth, I agree with you on the timing chain and gears. If a NOS one can be found, go for it.  Why not?  Repop?  After the ones I saw when building my engine,  no way.  With the oil available today they will probably never wear appreciably.

 

  The starter ring looks "cleanable".  I used a small grinder [ dremel?] on mine. A lot easier than replacing. 

 

  Keep up the good work.

 

  Ben

[Matt Harwood]

NOS timing chains show up on eBay all the time, so that's easy. The gears I have seen, but not as often, so you may have to be vigilant. The usual suppliers might also be able to help, of course.

[ILIKECARS53]

The timing chain and gear should be ok.  But I would rebuild the water pump. They usually seem ok at first, but once you start to put a few miles on them, the bearing will let go.  Been there done that twice.  Just my opinion.

[MCHinson]

I do plan to rebuild or replace the water pump. If I can find a NOS timing chain, I will replace it but if not, I will probably not worry about it. 

[Mark Simmons]

I was told by a wise old mechanic many,many years ago you don't replace just the chain or sprockets/gears in the timing setup on these old Buicks. Nothing wears in the same, new against old. The 3/4 of an inch is far from where I'd like to see that set up if it were me. Remember those chains stretch two ways length and width wise.  So if it's me I'm replacing the whole set up sprockets/gears and chain. Just my opinion.  Good Luck with project........  

[MCHinson]

Thanks for your input Mark. In 79 years, the slack has gotten to about 3/4 inch. When the car was new and for probably many years, it was driven as a daily driver. As a collector car, it will get much less use. I doubt it will stretch out another 1/4 inch or so in my lifetime of limited use. I don't trust the modern replacements to be nearly as sturdy as the originals. If I can find a NOS chain, it will go on it. If I also find NOS gears at a reasonable price, I will install them too. I suspect that the chain will be easier to find. If I don't find any NOS parts, I think that leaving the original chain and gears on it would be better than trusting the newer replacements. I know that the engine runs quietly now. It will probably continue to do so for many years no matter which way I end up going on this issue. It all depends on what parts I can find.       

[MCHinson]

I had to spend most of my day today taking care of things around the house and running errands in preparation for an early morning departure for Hershey tomorrow. This morning I had just a few minutes to work on the Buick but was happily surprised by what I did. On Friday, I had made an attempt to remove the trunk hinges from the body. They are in rather poor shape, but could be restored if necessary, so they might have some value. On Friday, I gave up and figured they were going to require the angle grinder to remove. I soaked them down with solvent again on Friday or Saturday to soak over the weekend. This morning, I decided to give a screwdriver one last try before pulling out the angle grinder. To my surprise, the screws all came out.

[chistech]

When I took down the motor in my 32' olds I found that at one time someone had replaced the timing chain with a chain a 1/2 link too long. The car actually ran pretty well other than low on compression. The chain in my olds made yours look tight! 

[MCHinson]

Today, I was able to pick up my parts order from Bob's Automobilia. I was able to pick up a new timing chain today. I enjoyed meeting a few Buick Parts vendors today.   

[MCHinson]

I am home from Hershey. Here are some photos that show some of the stuff I picked up in Hershey. I got a 1928-54 Buick Master Parts Book, a Book of different paint chips and codes as well as original Dupont 1937 and 1938 Color Charts with Paint Chips. I picked up a 1938 Buick Radio and a spare 1938 Speedometer and Instrument Panel. I have enough parts to keep me fairly busy restoring the chassis for a while. I also picked up a few 1936 Buick Parts for Jeff Oaks, a local 36-38 Buick Club and AACA Cape Fear Chapter member. 

[ILIKECARS53]

Matt,  Some nice finds at Hershey.  You know the old saying......  if you can't find it at Hershey, it does not exist.  I only went to the show this year, I thought overall attendance  was light.  The show had some outstanding cars as usual.

[MCHinson]

I pulled the oil pan this morning. There are a lot of bolts holding the oil pan on a 320 engine. Removing the 34 bolts on the oil pan and removing the 4 bolts holding the sway bar, allows the sway bar to drop out down enough so you can remove the oil pan. As expected, I cleaned up a bit of sludge from the bottom of the oil pan. After significant cleaning, I wiped it down with acetone and primed the outside of the oil pan. Tomorrow I plan to clean up the bottom of the crankcase and do a bit more of an inspection to see what else I need to do while I am in the area. 

 

[MCHinson]

This morning, I decided to drop the flywheel inspection cover and take a look at the flywheel ring gear. I used my air compressor to blow out a bit of sand from the sandblasting as well as a lot more old mouse nest materials. I cleaned off the oil pan gasket and cleaned up a small amount of sludge from the crankcase. I dropped the oil pump and opened it up to take a look. With the oil pressure when running, I expected that the oil pump would look good inside. I was not disappointed. I need to clean the oil pump pickup screen and clean up a bit of sludge from the outside. The cover over the gears barely shows any wear from the oil pump gears. The flywheel ring gear is not perfect but I think I can dress up the small imperfections with a file or dremel tool and it will be fine. I cleaned and primed the flywheel inspection cover and took a few photos to show the condition of the crankcase.  I still have quite a bit of cleaning to do, but I am feeling fairly confident of the mechanical condition of the engine.