Dashmaster

Dave You are correct about being much Brighter after the Relay install. I did my car about 3 months ago and WOW what a difference from before. They are brighter then the ones in my Truck. I was looking for an light upgrade and considered the led's. But after the relay install with direct battery power to the lights solved that.

Items that I hope to work on in 2018. Have seats redone due to dry-rotting stitching. Rewire the Keyless entry. Trunk release works good but doors are intermittent. This is a GM keyless system Dealer Installed in 88. I will have to take some picture on the module and key fobs when I rewire it. Plan to continue to dive it more and attend as many show events I can. Happy New Year !!!

After all the work done to make this car road worthy, safe and reliable. The cost on my budget went higher then I wanted. Since I have more in it than I could sell it for I decided to just drive it more. I planned to put no money into this year. I did try to keep the car out of the weather as much as I can. The year started early for the new drive it more. I have a 97 Ford F250 7.3 diesel truck which is my main commuter vehicle. This turned out to be truck problem year. I had 4 events that brought the Reatta in as backup. The Reatta stared the season dealing with spring snow and salt due to Truck Trans failure and 2 other mid year events and one last week on the 4 degree morning. The Reatta performed perfectly on all the forced backup drives and my regular driving and events. Drove it at least once a week on my commuter run of 50 miles round trip. 2017 Events Attended: 2017 Spring Auto Fair, 12 Reatta's attended. Meet some great people. Kudos for Marck Barker who arranged this event. Plan to go again this year. Mason-Dixon Chapter show, June 3, 2017. Great smaller show my second year going. I like to support Buick events if I can. Car actually won First Place In Class Award ( It was the only car in the class attending so it won by default LOL, Every Dog does have its Day!) Rockville MD Fall Car show. My 3rd Year going. Great 200 plus car show, Non judged, Only Reatta present last 2 years, Get lots of comments and questions at this show. Car has been a pleasure to drive and have enjoyed using it more. It still needs Paint and now seat work. Stitching is dry rotting. Get Out and enjoy your cars in 2018. Some event and other pictures for last year.

Congratulations Ronnie. Thank You for taking up this job. Great Choice Mr Earl. Ronnie I know you will do a wonderful job moderating.

This suggestion is out of the box thinking, But had an issue with my car that seemed to be trans locking and causing driveabilty issues at Higher speeds, MAF was causing a De-fueling issue . On my car it turned out to be a MAF Sensor. It costs nothing to test. Just unplug the MAF and give it a drive. Car will be running on default ECM vaules when unplugged. Also ,The CRT will display gear changes an TC lockup if you are in Diag. ECM mode. I have had 3 other GM front wheel car Transmission rebuilds donein the past. In my area a good shop I use cost between $1500 and $1800 with removal and reinstall.

When I did my Struts last year, I took the car to a good Tire Alignment shop. Car when back 3 times to get it into spec. They never charged me anything until it could be aligned. They gave me printouts and the recommended changes needed each time. Once the front was sorted I had to add shims in the rear to get it completely in spec. The Rear Shims install at rear hubs. Manual also say the car must be full of fuel for alignment.

Great Write Up Daniel !!, Thank you for your Service also!!, Daniels early research on the Cradle Bushings was my inspiration to try them and he gets the research credit for my write up. Its is a great community. We all help each other and come up with new things to keep these cars road worthy. I would love to have a manual trans in my car.

The term dashlights, Do you mean the background lighting of the switches or are you referring to the main dash display? The back lighting is controlled by a photocell sensor in the top of the dash, You need to cover it so it thinks its dark outside to see if its working. If the senor is bad they will not work.

Daniel, Here are some picture when I was trying to get good matched set for my 88. The Large Rubber part looks different on the 90-91 picture and there was no small thin bushing as show in the 90-91 picture. Here are some of the 88 Mounts I got. I could only get one Monroe last year, a couple of sites said they had them but did not. I then tried to match them with other mounts. The last mount I got that showed them in stock were from O'Reilly .

I give you all of you lots of credit that have pulled only the trans out the side. But for me I would pull the engine\trans combo from the top using a engine hoist. Not sure on these cars which way may be easier. Best wishes on the trans repair.

Jerome, You need to get your car up on a lift or up in the air so you can examine the Engine Cradle Mounts and other suspension components, Bad struts and rear shocks usually won't make a clunk unless they are loose. I had a cracked spring in my car even with that I had no clunking. It you are going to do to the front top mounts then you might as well do the Struts the same work is needed.

Link to the topic from What did you do to your Reatta Today

My setup is to be stealth as it can be.Sound control is from the CRT Radio I used the instructions on Ronnie's site to gut the power amp side if a Factory Radio module and wire in preamp outputs. I installed Crutchfield Sound Ordnance P series separates in all locations, using the factory tweeters with SO Crossovers. Ran this setup with small old Sony 18W amp sounded good but not much low end. Sony amp blew a cap so I just installed a Sony 444 amp wired 2 channel Left, Right, Mono to JL audio 8 inch sub. I now have good balanced sound that can get somewhat loud.Trip to the Charlotte Auto Fair was my first long run with it. Running a Bluetooth FM modulator. I had hours of clean music for the trip. Loved the Google Map directions coming thru the audio system too.

The Charlotte Auto Fair is the 6th - 9th, I am arriving in to town Friday and will meet up with the local Buick Club for dinner, Saturday meet up with the Reatta Group and go to the show, The reunion group displays ours cars on the Show Field. The Reunion is put together by Marck Barker. I went last year and had a very good time.

I will play with this more when I get back from the Auto Fair.

Bass is really good inside car, Distance matches the lower wavelengths very well in this position. I am also not getting any rattles or other odd panel vibrations, Lost very little trunk space and can remove the spare tire. The Human Ear can sense bass 2 ways, direct vibration of the eardrum and or able to hear the wave lengths. Lower Wavelengths are very long. This is why Subs in trucks sound better outside the cab is due to not enough of the wavelength for you ear to pickup will fit inside the cab, inside the bass you hear is more from the Vibration from the sub. When I Installed Car Stereo's professionally, we had deaf customers that would buy large amp and only subs, they could not hear it but could pickup the direct vibrations.

My deck was dead and had no plans to fix it. I took the Face off it and mounted a ABS Blank Panel over it with Cell phone mount. Since I just finished my sound system, I can now do Bluetooth from Phone to FM Modulator Bluetooth adapter. Now that the car has a sub it sounds good now. I was hoping to remove it so I could mount another power port there.

Been working on several things last couple of weeks, Solved the random Misfire, it was an induction issue with OX sensor even thou they were not very close to anything. I did the radio pre-amp mod last year and had a very small Sony amp wired to it. The Sony amp decided to blow a cap and burnt up, what a smell. My Son gave me a bigger amp last year so it was time to install it with a sub to add some low end. Here are some pictures. The Sub is an 8 inch JL Audio made for small enclosures. I am getting ready to go the the Reatta Reunion at the Charlotte Auto Fair next weekend. I will post some picture when I get back. Had a great time last year.

When I remove the Cassette Deck, I loose power to Power antenna and no sound from Radio. I would like to remove it completely, Do any of you know what wires need to be connected to make the Radio and power antenna work ? I did search for this information and checked ROJ and have found nothing on it.

Finzel, Jim said Good Used Pumps and Motors. I purchased Pump and Motor from Jim about 2 years ago, I have not have had any problems with what I got. If you get one from Jim, ask if it has the pressure switch on it, if not you will need to remove the one from you current unit. Removing the pressure switch can be hard.

Bad TPS ( Throttle Position Sensor ) will do this. Not sure how you can check this on a 90 without CRT.

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Harry all good. On my 88 all I see is green but I am sure you are correct. I have had my Gas Tank out 2 times in the last 2 years and do not remember the color codes back there but know there is a gray in the back at the tank.

Based on what you said about it not starting well before and fuel issues and what Harry wrote above, You can unplug both the Ignition module and the fuel pump install fuse, if it blows with both unhooked then you have a wiring short, If Fuse does not blow hookup the ignition module first, if fuse is still good plug in fuel pump to see if it blows the fuse. You can usually unplug the fuel pump/sender from under the car. You could also check the Fuel pump Green Wire in front left engine compartment near washer pump and tank for short to ground.

Welcome to the forums. Use the ECM Diag to see running ECM Data. A bad Oxygen Sensor will cause rough idle and stall. The MAF and OX sensor are the 2 sensors that control fuel flow. In the ECM data screen check the OX. Voltage should vary from about 1.2 to 8.3 up and down. If there is no data or is not changing sensor is bad. Check The Reatta Owners Journal for Diagnostic procedures for just about any issue.