Bloo

Thank you!

One of the headlight switch threads was in GaryW 's 1937 Special restoration thread. I believe Las Vegas Dave also had one acting up, and I believe the car was a 38. That may have spilled over into his thread as well. There are three triangular sliding contacts inside, and they look alike, but they are not. Getting them in in the wrong order creates all sorts of havoc. The most common failure seems to be one light going off when the knob is all the way out, and you switch from High Beam to Country Beam. I'm not sure if that is due to wear or or due to dreaded previous owners getting the triangles in the wrong order.

Or PM him. I'm pretty sure he's a member here.

Does your car have a transmission hump? I'm not talking about a huge one like you would find in a 60s car, something more like an inch and a half. I couldn't find very good pictures of the floor online, but the pictures I did find of 36 Buick 40s looked like they might be flat. Car in pictures below is a 1936 Pontiac. Does your Buick have something like this? Or is it flat?

Is Iran close enough? Many years ago I had a co-worker who was born there and had come to the US with his family when he was 12, after the fall of the Shah. He said his dad liked big American cars, and they always had one. The one he remembered most was a 1960 Chevrolet.

It is normal to put copper on before nickel. I believe copper is another metal that can be plated with ordinary non-toxic chemicals, although you probably don't get much thickness.

I didn't know you could do that with nickel. I did something similar with zinc, using non-poisonous chemicals (vinegar, sugar, etc). It works, but you really have to be able to control the current, and babysit, and card the parts a lot if you want bright zinc. It works a lot better if you just want to keep corrosion at bay, and don't care so much about looks. Keep us posted on how it goes. I'm thinking there has to be a way to plate the reflector. What is it made of? If possible without eating it, a quick dip in pool acid makes zinc plating go away. Not sure if you can do that to brass. The rings look great to me.

Run without tubes if you can. If your rims wont support that, then get radial tubes, and make sure there are no little stickers inside the tire. Grind them off if necessary.

Those 2 holes are most likely part of the factory balancing. I would try to clear any loose thin stuff that could break off, but you probably want to take as little metal as possible. The other grinding confuses me. It looks like those get pretty close to the piston skirts, so maybe it has been bored before and maybe the skirts were a little bit longer on the new pistons? I'm kind of grasping at straws. Maybe it's just part of the factory balancing, or maybe it's been balanced. If you are going to go all out on the rebuild, you might as well get it balanced. When balancing a v-8, the crank is done last. This is because the balance guy will have to put "bobweights" on the crank to balance it, and the weight is based on what the pistons and rods weigh. Any boring, piston replacement, rod work must be done first. Then, the pistons and rods are balanced. That can be done at home if you want to learn about it and set up a scale and some kind of jig to weigh the ends of the rods separately. You just make everything match in weight. Or you can send it out. The crank you have to send out anyway, and it is spun with the bobweights to balance You don't do it until you have made a decision on boring, bored if necessary, and have the pistons and rods you are going to use in your possession, and either balance them yourself or send them along with the crank. This is because the guy spin balancing the crank will need to know exactly what they weigh after balancing.

He'll probably quit when he figures out you are looking....

Dave Tachney (contact info in MCHinson's post on page 1) is widely regarded as the best source of used parts, big or small, for Buicks of the period. Bobs Automobilia is a good source of new parts to assist with a restoration, reproduction, consumables and so on. Look around on their website, it is pretty amazing what they have. French Lake Auto Parts is a recycler in Minnesota who have prewar car parts, many makes.

Pushrods too long could cause the engine not to start, but shouldn't cause it to crank slow. Does this have solid lifters? If so, you shouldn't have been able to set the valve clearance if the pushrods were too long.

Terne plated steel was the default metal for gas tanks for decades.

It might, but "bad" water pumps are usually worse than anything that might potentially fix. It is usually severe erosion of the packing surface combined with (perhaps more importantly) the shaft being undersize where it runs on the bushings. If the shaft can walk around there is no way to stop the gushing with packing or a seal. Packing type pumps do have to leak a little or the packing will burn up from friction and ruin the shaft. It doesn't take much.

Although I would get it running first and said as much, I can't believe we are discouraging the idea of restoring this when the original poster has been warned about the time and cost of such an undertaking, and still has his mind set on doing it. Is this not a restoration site? A 1936 Buick is a WOODEN body, with a metal skin. The wood, if bad, is really a bigger problem than anything else I see here. I don't mean to be discouraging, it is certainly possible to fix. I am learning how as we speak. Where are the 1936 Buick owners? IIRC there are a few who frequent these forums.

That should take you back to the pre-1910 era when things like tops, windshields, and lights were optional. The dashboard would have been... a board, in front of the driver's feet. A speedometer, if equipped, was probably screwed to the surface of the board. It may have included an odometer. Any indication of RPM would be extremely unlikely. I doubt that existed until much later. The speedometer would have been brass, as was most automotive trim until about 1913-1915. There was a company called "Neverout' that made a miniature brass light to light your dash. It looked like a sidelamp and probably burned kerosene. I imagine those came later than the speedometer, and they were never common. Quite a few cars didn't even have headlights in those days. There were hundreds of automakers before World War 1. I think it might be pretty tough to nail down who did it first.

The Studebaker suspension had almost no changes after 53, and was similar back to 51 at least if not further. Steering bellcranks are often shot due to lack of maintenance. That causes huge amounts of slop. It is also a kingpin suspension, so bad kingpins are fairly common. Studebakers drive really nice when they are not all worn out.

I vote it's a Renault 4CV, an early one because of all those grille bars. Maybe 1949-1950-1951.

If you mean the 2 small screws, they are not the contacts. They are the trigger coil of the relay. One feeds 6 volts from the vacuum switch or carburetor switch (depending on year). The other one is the ground, and it gets ground through the charging system (maybe, depending on year). For instance on a 1937, both the 6v feed and the ground are interrupted when the engine is running. 6v is interrupted by vacuum (when running), and ground is interrupted by a contact in the voltage regulator (when charging).

Also some of the later Metros may have more than one mark on the upper pulley. Older Metros have a vacuum port on the runner to #1 cylinder that if leaking will cause a miss. It was connected to the distributor on the old ones. You probably have electronic timing on that car, but your manifold might still have the port.

RIveted ring gears are impossible to get re-riveted today. Also, as gear ratios change the pinion size has to change, and the ring gear has to get thicker or thinner. There is usually a breakover point, or ratio, in most axle designs, beyond which a different case is needed to attach the ring gear to. This is because the ring gear flange needs to have a different offset (right/left). I don't know where this change happens in the Buick axle, or if it even does, but it wouldn't surprise me. At the very least, you would want the case (still riveted to the ring gear) and the pinion. Then, you will need the tool to set the pinion depth. There is a J-681, a J-681A, and another one I forget the name of. All are for Buick, and any of the three will work (check the shop manual). I bought my j-681 on Ebay for about $200USD. Brand new tools that can do this are also available for about $500USD including the necessary adapters. Then, you will need to find a source of shims, probably from an NOS dealer (if any NOS shims exist). Otherwise, you'll have to make them. I hate to be such a downer, but I just did all this on a Pontiac with a riveted ring gear and I know exactly what you are getting into. If the whole pumpkin will fit, replace any questionable bearings and put it in. It's the best way. Really.

Can you measure the wheelbase? That would be a huge clue. All 3 models are different as far as I know. Some quick (unverified) searching produced this: Special: 118 inches Century: 122 inches Roadmaster: 131 inches There are several 1936 Buick owners in here, hopefully someone can confirm.

I agree, not Buick. It's a B&M Hydro-Stick, a high-performance manual-shift Hydra-Matic for drag racing and hot street cars. Those are indeed based on Olds-Cadillac-Pontiac Hydra-Matics. They were retrofitted to all sorts of cars, maybe even Buick, but unlikely due to the torque tube. Such a conversion would have involved all the same sort of modifications that 700-R4/200-4R conversions do today. I'll bet a few wound up behind Buick Nailheads in drag cars and Ford hot rods.

It depends.... Back in the day I used to leak check with carb cleaner or brake cleaner a lot. Today, some of it is not flammable. Results can be sketchy at best. If we assume the carb cleaner is still able to be used as fuel, then a tiny leak should cause the engine to speed up, and a bigger leak should cause it to slow down. That also assumes that we are idling, and the carb was set with either the old "lean roll" method, or a gas analyzer, and is running at about a 14.7:1 fuel mixture. A little more fuel will speed the engine up (just like backing out the idle screws would), and a lot more will cause a rich loading/miss and slow the engine down. If the engine was tuned to max RPM with the idle screws (not advisable IMHO, but many people do it), then any extra fuel you add will slow the engine down. One exception: If the vacuum leak is causing a lean miss somewhere, and adding fuel at the point of the leak brings a misfiring cylinder or two back to life, then the engine will probably speed up regardless of the overall mixture. That last thing is less likely to occur with PCV because PCV systems are a constant vacuum bleed, and 98% of the time are arranged to mix with the fuel/air coming out of the idle jets. They don't usually kill just one or two cylinders when they leak.

The end of the PCV hose must seal absolutely to the PCV valve (and the hose nipple at the other end of the PCV hose!). Tape wont do the trick, nor will clamps usually. The hose must be pliable. It must stretch over the nipple and seal on it. Clamps are sometimes used for longevity, but wont help if the hose doesn't seal in the first place. The connection to the crankcase vapors (via a grommet) is less critical. If it leaks, the engine won't know the difference, although it will probably ooze oil vapor.