Moose2

Huge time delay, but still moving slowly. The machine shop cleaned/honed the lifter bores and found them acceptable. I told them to skip doing a line bore so that's behind us too. They planed the top deck on the block 10 thousandths, and the heads needed to be shaved by ten as well. Crank cleaned up fine but needed to be ground - 10 also. Piston bore is 30 over; I was expecting that. They're using Clevite shell bearings throughout. I'm adapting a switch-pitch trans from a '66 and the flex plate I received had been drilled "mirror image" to the stock mounting bolt pattern. The machine shop stalled out on getting it mounted in order to balance the rotating assembly, and were grinning at me when I went in to apologize for the flub. Took about 90 days just to get a replacement for the darned thing. I think they're still shaking their heads at me down at the machine shop. Just waiting on valves, guides (not bronze) and springs now. Russ Martin will be refurbing the rocker arm assemblies.

Sorry for the huge delay everyone. The machine shop is moving at the speed of a glacier. They still have to line bore the crank holes and attend to the lifter bores. These guys are friends and I'm trying to maintain that so their speed is my speed. Not many alternative shops in the area either....... When I know more, you guys'll know more!!!!

Thanks Tom, I'll check that spec in the shop manual, and pay attention to it. I'll talk to the machine shop guys about it too.........

I took it to the machine shop yesterday and they'll magnaflux the block, take out the frost plugs and oil gallery plugs and run it through their cleaners. I asked them to run it through the cleaning process twice. Then they'll check the decks for warping. If it isn't pronounce dead by then, they'll hone the lifter bores lightly and mic them. If it still isn't pronounced dead, I'm gonna assume it can be run through their shop along with a set of magnafluxed and planed heads and I'll get it back as a decent long block............ This machine shop has a good reputation, been in business for decades and have rebuilt a different 425 nailhead and a Cadillac 472 for me in the past.

Here are two pics of the worst looking lifter bore. In Pic A its the hole on the left before I took a quick pass at cleaning it up this morning. In Pic B its the hole at the top of the picture, and I was impressed at how well it cleaned up. Behind the oil port in the bore you can see a glimpse of the lower part of the bore and it isn't cleaned up well, but that's because I didn't put a lot of effort into doing a complete job; just wanted to do a quick partial shine to see if the corrosion was limited to the surface of the bore or had eaten its way deeper. I'll take it to the machine shop and hope they don't find a show-stopper in one of the bores. If they do, I'll probably take your advice and walk away from it as a project. Thanks to all of you for sharing your knowledge with me! Mike

One other thought in response to gungeey's post: even if the bottom of the bores are fine, aren't I losing some oil pressure anyway? I've never been real comfortable with the functional oil pressure limit of approx. 35# and hate to lose any of it if there's a better alternative........

Thanks everyone. I'll try to get a few pics to share, and I'll also clean up one of the bores that looks bad. More soon........

I just started tearing open a 425 I bought from a local boneyard. It sat in the open for several years without any heads although the valley cover, timing chain cover and oil pan were still on it. Oddly the bores don't look too bad and they mic at stock (no overbore) so I think an overbore might work out. However some of the valve lifter bores don't look good at a glance (rust issues). My question is: if I have to, is it possible to overbore the lifter boreholes and are oversize hydraulic lifters available?? Alternatively, is it possible to sleeve lifter bores?? Never said I was smart, just looking for a winter hobby and thought bringing a 425 back from the dead would be a worthwhile thing to do.

To my knowledge the seat tracks only fasten to the bottom of the seat frame in one position. Also, my experience when I was installing seats was that there was a choice of bolt hole sets on the outboard track, but no choice on the inboard track. Besides you would still have to craft a way to move the two front stirrups rearward so the front feet of the track would engage the stirrups. I hope you get additional feedback from other readers!!!!!

I'd be pleased to meet you Alex, and hope we can connect. You have my deepest sympathy with the '68 Eldorado (LOL). Mine was a true barn find and was reluctant to remember how to function. The little bits and pieces I replaced were not easy to find. A surprising amount of the Eldorado parts were peculiar to JUST the Eldorado. Stuff like gas tanks............. But yeah, what a graceful, beautiful beast it is!!

Thanks for the feedback you guys! I do have the shop manual and I've read through the cruise control section so I'll get started. I realize accessing the speedo and the parts on the dashpad support are gonna be a struggle but I've had the dash pad off so many times I can do that part in the dark............ I've never really attempted to make it work and I know it doesn't have vacuum at the physical unit on the firewall so I'm gonna do a few obvious things and hope it'll come back on line. Never was very lucky. I'll keep you posted. Thanks again!!! Moose2

I'm just working up the courage to start repairing the non-functioning factory cruise control on my '64 Riv. I bought the car as a project 10 years ago and now that its done (?) I'm tidying up some of the details I had ignored earlier. Was your cruise assembly functional when you got it, or did you personally go through the functional challenges described in the GM shop manuals, or did you use the services of a repair facility that can bench-test (and refurbish) the elements of the cruise assembly?? I was never the brightest bulb on the Xmas tree and I would appreciate anything I can learn about troubleshooting/repair! Thanks! Mike

One last comment. I was careful to paint my homemade brackets the same color as my carpet to reduce any visual contrast that might be seen in the small areas where my brackets weren't hidden under the seat or under the carpeting.

Great minds think alike Frank! I did almost exactly the same brackets you created, and the end result added 70mm of legroom. I felt it was important to NOT drill new holes in the floorpan and you used the same strategy. It was sort of a mouse-around to get the correct orientation for the brackets, but I cheated and used an old barnyard trick - I made the mounting holes somewhat larger than necessary and used class 8 washers below the bolt heads to compensate for the sloppy fit. Can't tell to look at it now. I agree with you that any additional legroom would be difficult to conceal with carpet at the front mounting brackets for the assembly. Thanks everyone for the input!!!!! Mike

I gotta get busy - Taking my Riv to the "Back To The FIfties" car show at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds. Approx 12,000 hotrods/cruisers/full classics/ratrods on display. Talk about a candy store!!!

Thanks Kevin! I feel very lucky - there were so many fine Rivs at the Branson meet. Like yours for instance - which was on display in the winner's circle!!!!!!!

Thank you all for the great feedback and the comments on my '64 too. It took ten years of "onagain-offagain" work to get it on the road, but I'm sure everyone knows that story by heart! I found a thread on "Adjusting seat position on first gen Riviera" started by SurfGreen64 on 5/14/2020 and it gives me the courage to get up off the couch and get started. If I think I have a new twist on the subject when I'm done I'll make sure it gets on the forum. Being at the ROA meet in Branson was like a kid looking in the window at a candy store. Every car there made me want to get closer and admire it in detail. The members and staff were easy to meet and eager to share their experiences. I think one of the most charming parts of the meet was that we all had the ability to laugh at the goofy mistakes we made as we struggled up the learning curve to improve our Rivs. Happy cruisin' and thanks for your support!!!! Moose2/Mike

Thanks Ed.

My '64 Riv has a power seat on the driver's side and I need more legroom! I want to move the seat back at least two inches and have not yet examined the situation critically. I realize the floor pan under the seat is not flat/level and that the mounting brackets on the seat frame are probably not all equal and "square". So I suspect that moving it will not be as easy as it might seem when I'm sitting in the living room sipping a brew. Does anyone have any advice or "tricks" or other experience that would make this job a bit less painful? Thanks for any feedback!!

Thank you both for pointing me in the right direction. I've joined the Studebaker Driver's Club and I've saved the other tags you've sent. Enjoy the coming summer!!

I have a chance to buy my first-ever Studebaker. I'm a barnyard mechanic and have rebuilt GM, Ford, and English cars over the years, but this is new ground. I'm looking at a '57 supercharged Golden Hawk (automatic transmission) that needs total restoration. It's complete and not a rust bucket, but has been sitting (inside) for 50 years. Haven't spoken with the current owner yet, but what am I getting into? What are the general areas of "weakness" in this year/model? Are there parts for the supercharger? Are internals available to rebuild the engine? Suspension rebuild parts? Can I get new glass if needed? Door/window/trunk moldings? Not asking to get specifics, just need to know if parts can be sourced.........

I forgot - I also upgraded the distributor to a new HEI, with hotter coil. I'll need to bypass the resistor ignition wire, but that's no problem.

Thanks for the feedback Carl, I got very good feedback from Paul at Cadillachighperformance.com. My feeling is that those folks really know what theyr'e doing and I wouldn't hesitate to use them for work moving forward. The engine didn't run when I bought the car and was in rough shape - a lot of water in the crankcase, the timing gears/chain were falling apart, the cam had one totally rounded lobe and it looked to me like the engine had run way hot at some point. My rebuild was modest, more like "freshening" the engine rather than a rebuild. I wanted the car to run reliably but didn't want to plow a lot of money into it. I did not replace the pistons. Here's a list of what was done (at an expierenced machine shop): Magnafluxed block/heads (no cracks), boiled/cooked/cleaned the block (doweled the oil galleries as much as possible, checked plane on block/heads. Line-bored the mains and ground the crank to .010 under all the way around. Miked the bore/pistons and they met specs, so had the minor ring-ridges removed and honed the bore. Fitted new rings, rod bearings, main bearings, new cam/cam bearings, lifters, cam gears and chain. Checked valve spring tension (met specs), ground valves, new frost plugs and oil gallery plugs too (I think?). New mechanical fuel pump, starter, water pump, oil pump. But I cheated - I did not replace head bolts, main bearing cap bolts, rod cap bolts, or push rods, and didn't do anything with the wrist pins, so this isn't really a decent rebuild........ Too much information, but I usually do a more thorough job and I feel a little guilty about this one!!!! Now I have to figure out a way to flush the gas tank. I'm reluctant to take it off the car and was thinking about trying to siphon it down and flush repeatedly with small amounts of gas (with more siphoning) but I've never attempted that sort of thing before and don't know if it would work. Any opinion?? Thanks again for your interest and feedback!

I'm struggling with the harmonic balancer during the assembly of my rebuilt 472. There is a special tool set J-21052 referred to in the service manual but nobody seems to sell the several parts of the set. Kent sells a couple of the several parts, but not all, and thats all I can find. Can anybody tell me where the tools set can be purchased? Alternatively, I always wonder whether other, more common tools can be used whenever the special GM tool doesn't seem to be available. Help? Anybody? Buehler?

I'm looking for GM differential tools J 09744-5 and J 9744-2 to help disassemble the posi in my 64 Riv. Does anyone know where I can get them, or how to fabricate a tool that will perform the same function? Thanks for helping.