Beemon

Drew sorry for late response! Hope this helps. The top of the air filter needs some modification to fit. We had wild fires pretty bad last year when I went out to WSU so I put the oil bath filter on. It didn't matter how much you drove over there, I knew some guys who changed their paper filter three times!

Matt, I would not worry too much about carb icing. Not sure your whereabouts, but with modern fuels I have never experienced icing and I've blocked off the heat riser on my intake manifold and deleted the hot air choke stove. I realise the 322 is a completely different beast from there 320 but I drove my car in 15 degree weather without issue this past year. Headers look nice! Hope they serve you well!

The POR15 kit I used was a 3 part system: heavy acid, degreaser/ wash, dilute/ sealer. Pretty good stuff! After three years I have yet to see anything in my fuel filter except clean corn fuel. Any leads on J bolts?

My package from the Brillman Company finally arrived after they sent it to my old dorm on accident. It's a Corvette dual point distributor cap. I'm a sucker for abuse I guess! What can I say, I tried electronic ignition and it left me stranded every time (in the winter, too) and i just like the idea of having a little bit extra coil saturation. Setting this up was a breeze. The breaker plate is a used Accel kit I got from a SBC distributor. For this setup I went with heavy duty vented breaker points and a Mallory .28 MFD condenser for a little bit extra kick. The rest of the ignition system is stock. Since I've been waiting for this cap, I pre-gapped the secondary set and had been driving on the primary set. This cap is awesome. Just like setting a single contact point set, you set the secondary with the other window. You have to remove the cap at least three times (once to block off the secondary set, another to block off the primary and the third to unblock both). With no effort at all, I started the car, verified at least 12V at the battery, and set the dwell on both sets to 27 degrees. The final dwell came in at a rock steady 32 degrees. When I hadthe distributor checked on a reliable Sun machine, we noticed even with the HD contact set, there was point float at 4000 RPM. Even though I'll never see it, having the points not open as far will definitely help with any chance of point float. Plus the extra few degrees of dwell will help coil saturation. Running the .28 MFD condenser is no concern either, considering the charge is shared across two sets of vented points. It's definitely a placebo effect, like adding aluminum valve covers, but the car feels like it has more natural pep in its step. After 100 miles I'll recheck dwell. If all good, I'll push it back to next oil change. If I ever have to upgrade the ignition system again, I'm definitely going to get 8 LS coils and a coil driver and run them off the spark plug cover. Hopefully not for a while more, but seeing what the NAPA warehouse had in stock for points was a bit shocking!

Just went through the process of swapping exhaust manifolds. My valve was free spinning (the spring fell out) so I replaced it with my old one (shaft fused to manifold, so I cut it out). I also had my coolant professionally flushed with a vacuum pump to ensure no air pockets and I had my waterpump replaced with the one I had rebuilt by the Dutchman. I've noticed significantly cooler operations as a result (not pegging on the freeway unless I hit traffic). I drive my car at 80 when I can on the freeway. I did also put new gaskets between the head and the manifold. I know it's a big no no but the manifolds had exhaust leaks from the original configuration. Not only is the ticking noise gone, but the manifold is more isolated so heat isn't being absorbed as much by the cylinder head (in theory).

If you're still pretty flexible, you can get at them from the floor. Look for the wiper transmission cables, then follow them to the wiper transmissions. You can't miss it.

Thanks for the offer, Chris! A lift definitely would have been helpful Haha. I leave for school on the 16th I believe so I've only got a few more weeks at home. Hopefully I won't need a lift between then and now!

55 was the last year for the low sweeping spear over the rear wheel well.

Here's the video! I'm not sure what the break in time is so I'll check again after 100 miles. The odometer rolled over again today so looks like I'm at a little over 2000 miles this year.

Funny you say this John. When I first got the mufflers hooked up, there was a loud rattle noise coming from the muffler and a nasty burning smell. All gone now and smooth as silk. I'm going to have the phone camera out and snap some footage later today. In all honesty, I've been holding off since my dad paid for the Magnaflows as a grad gift and I just threw them in the car port like a hunk of junk. lol Still thinking about how to break that one to him.

1956322's is oriented the same way, there the adjustment ear is in the wrong side of the case, hence my observation.

They must be based on the Chevy generators that sit on the driver side of the engine.

Not running H4 anymore. I think the GE bulb just has a more crisp pattern and beam from my personal experience. Without changing the aiming of the headlights, they seem brighter and shoots further. I wish I could find the Nighthawk Sport, its it's a more natural white light versus yellow.

Bump

This past weekend I hack sawed the then current exhaust out of my car and installed NOS mufflers and new pipes. What a world of difference. You can actually talk at highway speeds without having to talk over the exhaust andthe radio doesn't need to be turned all the way up to listen to it anymore. The annoying undercarriage noise went away, too, which i assumed was the Magnaflow muffler hitting the floor board. No more of that! I also replaced all the rubber strap hangers with FLAPS exhaust hangers. I just cut off the metal hanger part and then cut to length. I also bought the generic loop hanger to hang the rear pipes over the axle. Overall it was pretty easy to swap out, although it took me 5 hours to do one side each day. Most of the time was hack sawing the existing pipes on my back... lol Thankfully I kept all my old hangars for reference! The first movie i saw that showcased a dual exhaust 50s muscle car was Christine. It had this interesting chugging noise on acceleration in the film and it was my ideal sound for the car. These new mufflers sound exactly like that 58 Fury. Now all I really have left to do is check out the front brakes and repack my bearings. There's an awful grinding noise coming from both sides. These drums are second hand and barely have any surface to them so I think the shoes are expanding too far and causing issue. I was hoping someone would chime in with some 45 fun drums since a huge inventory was advertised recently but I can't wait much longer and I'm probably going to order some repro drums. My next big project is definitely going to be buying a steering box conversion. This gear box needs to go and I'm not going to spend another huge amount to pay an expert to rebuild another old box (spoiler alert, they just replace the gaskets apparently). I might do some research into a steering rack conversion, but these 50s Buicks have huge A arms and the steering rack pivot needs to be at the centerline of the upper and lower control arm pivot. I was also teasing the idea of taking 57-58 A arms and adapting them to the 56 to eliminate the king pins, but that's more of a pipe dream. Oh, I posted a while ago about an H4 conversion bulb, but it just didn't feel right. At the FLAPS, all I've been able to find for seal beams are Wagner and Sylvannia - both leave something to be desired. Yesterday I found some GE Nighthawk bulbs and thought I would try them out. To my surprise, they are a quality bulb! It's a shame GE is selling their bulb business, because i highly recommend them! Anyways, today a dragon fly landed on my antenna. It must be good luck or just good vibes for the exhaust swap!

Thank you all for getting me in touch with Martin Johnson. I can't be more happy with these factory original mufflers!

I wonder why it's on backwards

GoWanted to revive this thread because I just got a package from a Mr Martin Johnson. I'll be installing tonight! I'm really excited about this one. 60 percent of the noise driving down the road was no weatherstrip and 40 percent was the muffler. I'm ready for my quiet ride!

Trans cooler might be difficult if there aren't any cooler lines. You've already bought the radiator but I would suggest getting an external cooler that's ribbed, not finned.

Geeze! Good guy Greg! Did both of them come with masts? If the nylon cable is pulled out (or not yet), save yourself some trouble and JB weld it in place. Just went through this. These units are really easy to rebuild. If you had no issue with your power window motor, this will be even better. When you play with the set screw after you get it running, make sure you start with it completely out. Run the motor in the up position and tighten the screw until the antenna goes up. If it doesn't come down in the down position, tighten it until it does. You're looking for just enough tension to bring it down but not excessively so it slips when the antenna is either fully extended or fully retracted, otherwise the motor will try to rip the cable out the end of the antenna.

"Made in America" doesn't even imply what you think anymore. Most parts are made off shore and then shipped and assembled in America. Take modern Buicks for example. A lot of them are assembled here, but China is the #1 buyer of Buick and almost all their components are made there with some automobiles being manufactured there.

That is the license plate lamp bracket.

You will never find anything for your car made in America unless it's special application or custom made. Just how it is. I shop at NAPA because their stuff comes from Mexico or Japan or Europe, where the standard of manufacturing is higher than the Chinese junk.

Not sure what the purpose of the relay is other than it opens the circuit when the alternator starts charging.. which means you don't need the extra relay at all since that's how the generator worked. Its basically just another redundant relay to open the starter circuit. Unless the alternator terminal is not internally grounded when off but i can't see that being the case.

They are still different drums that are not interchangeable. I put lug bolts instead of studs because there's a quarter inch difference in width between early and late 45 fin drums.