Just a thought on your engine choice. My humble opinion is that the original drivetrain is the best, most interesting, and most worthwhile for any car - especially these Buick straight eights. They are wonderful things.

But, if you decide to drop in something else, why not consider an inline six, like the ultra dependable Chevy 250? These should be readily available, and at least have the right look in that long, narrow engine compartment. With an overdrive transmission, you may also end up with reasonable cruising economy.

Yes, please, please, please don't put a cliche in the engine compartment if you don't go original.

That said, at local cruise nights with a lot of rods and only a few original cars, it is the car with the original engine that gets more attention than a chromed-out small-block Chevy in a '32 Ford. Straight-8s are always an attention getter. Most folks have never seen (or even heard of) a straight-8.

OK,OK, you guy's win straight 8 it is (buick of corse) but what size and what year? It has a 233cu with babbeted rods, The cylenders have thick scaily rust in them, and I don't know how long the plugs have been out. It's cooked. You guy's know more about these engins than I do. So what do I build,that I can bolt a manual overdrive trans to and have multiple carberation or even injection ? Don't worry about mounts I can figure those out. And performance is the other question. Thanks for helping, Scott

A 263 from a later straight-8 would probably fit pretty easily and give you better performance and still keep it all-Buick. I think all the 263s have insert bearings. You could even fit it with a factory dual-carb setup from a '41 or '42 small series for some extra zip. Rebuild parts for these later engines are readily available and although they're not screamers, they can be made to run pretty well, especially in a relatively light car like yours. I put a 3/4 race cam, raised the compression, ported the head and a few other things on my '41 320 and expect it to run with modern traffic without any issues.

I'll look up the website when I get home--there's a great discussion board that covers modifying these engines and there's one fellow there who really knows his stuff when it comes to making the 263 run.

Hey Matt, Could you give more information on your engine,and did you find the web site you were making refrence to. I have been looking at engine sizes and now i'm realy lost. Does anyone have a book on just the straight 8. I want one that I can build up. Is the 320cu. the largest one and how different are to outside dimentions from the 233, Thank's Scott.

Hi Scott,

Here's the website I was talking about (thanks for reminding me to find it):

http://www.teambuick.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=91

I don't think the 320 will fit in your engine compartment. It is significantly bigger in every dimension than your block, though it looks very similar at first glance. This is one BIG engine. It also weighs 750+ pounds. A smaller engine will obviously be lighter and less weight is the same as more horsepower and the car will handle better to boot. I think a good-running 263 could deliver similiar performance, and perhaps much better if you don't need to keep it original-appearing.

On my own 320, I did things that will work on any engine: more compression, a hotter camshaft, ported head, , a 3- or 5-angle valve job, lighter stainless valves, better piston rings, balanced rotating assembly, things like that. I didn't do anything radical because of the limitations of the intake and exhaust manifolds on the engine. But like I said, if you're going to hot rod it and original appearance is secondary, you can build something much more effective to take advantage of these things and more.

Pick up this book, too (it has a lot of hot-rod straight-8 Buick info in it):

http://www.californiabills.com/books/chevyspeed.php

was a nice car, but what a lot of work to restore!
What amazes me is the hood ornament is still on the car... or did you add it after you brought it home?

John, you see her as I got her. So far total investment
$53.67. I have been geting great imput on how we are going to build this car. Matt has convinced me we have to keep the straight 8 probably a 263, Joel has me straightened out on using oak and cyperus in the frame work. Alot of people are contributing. We are on our way to building my first 30's buick!!! Thanks, Scott