KAD36

Cool shop towels…appropriate for the job? 🤣 x2 on 55 AVGs pushrod advice The adjustables will compensate for rocker arm wear, milled heads, etc etc so you can get a good consistent preload on the lifters and they stay quiet at all temperatures. They are more expensive but IMO are not really necessary if you’re already replacing badly worn valve train parts. Visually check the lifter preload when you have it bolted all together and then you can decide if more accurate measurements or different parts are needed. Mind Bernies advice on the cam - the base diameter compared to stock isn’t known - so when the lifter is sitting on the base circle (valve closed) while the valve train is all bolted together, if you can still wiggle the pushrod up and down something is needed to take up that slack caused from component wear (assuming no one milled the heads down). If there’s slop either new rocker arm, shaft, pushrod or you’ll have to go adjustable to get the preload on the lifter plunger and get rid of the slop to avoid the valve train noise. Personally I have kept “best of the parts” and only replaced a handful of worn components as required and gotten the stock setup to work fine for many 10s of thousands of miles. FWIW Engine 3 in my car has all new parts in it with adjustables, the other configurations worked successfully same as Chris on the prior 2 engines. Remember to observe compression of the valve springs so they don’t bind at max lift since we don’t know the specs of the cam.

Keep at it. Eliminate the external easy stuff first -beats tearing into the carb. What work was done to the carb prior?

Bill - 1) yes sir - followed you in moving it +/- 2 points from the index. The reason for pointing you to Jon’s links was to get a starting reference point based on the butterfly just starting to move at cold then adjust from there if necessary.vs starting from the center index mark, My reason for suggesting the adjustment in this manner is your situation sounded similar to mine from back in 2007 even though the carbs are different, and this procedure corrected one of my annoyances and have not looked back. Remember also to verify correct fast idle speed - the engine speed and the choke position are a balance and need to be “in sync”. 2) There is a vacuum pump on that engine somewhere, either on the fuel pump, near the oil pump, or some bolted on accessory, that is before the wiper or washer to augment manifold vac and provide more consistency in the vac source under varying engine loads, assuming the vacuum circuit routing is still stock. Ensure your vac source comes directly off the intake manifold for a true reading. Check your shop manual for specifics or go to Hometown Buick if you need reference material. Try spraying a little carb cleaner around the carb to manifold mounting surface and if engine fluctuates there’s a leak. 3) Remember to check the procedure for setting the mixture screws as it sounds like they may still be out too far - and while it’s methodical to increase 1/4 turn increments, if you’re already too rich at 1.25 turns out there will be no improvement going more. Do you have that procedure to reference? FWIW my gut feel is that setting needs to be closer to 3/4 to 1 turn out assuming your engine is in good shape but follow the procedure - the link referenced corrected another of my annoyances which was a too rich off idle bog that I would have never suspected and sounded similar to yours. Am approaching the fringe of my knowledge base after this and need to turn you over to bigger guns. 🙃 Emtee - apologize for the confusion - my bad. My intent was to parallel the choke and mixture setting process to the WCFB. OP has an AFB.

Yep been there done that. Thank you sir!

Good feedback. So cold start - it bogs from cold all the way until warmup. What’s the history of the carb - recently rebuilt or sitting awhile or… Have you seen these tips - : https://www.thecarburetorshop.com/Troubleshooting.htm#Chokes https://www.thecarburetorshop.com/Troubleshooting.htm#Bog I know a WCFB is different but my results improved dramatically when leaning out mixture to 7/8-1 turn out on non Ethanol - mistakenly had ran too rich at idle for years and had a minor stumble off idle and this resolved it.. Although I don’t think that’s your cold problem because if you are still on the fast idle cam, the throttle plates are open enough and the RPM is high enough that you’re probably bypassing the idle circuit - just a hunch, hoping an expert will weigh in.. Understand the settings on the choke - what were your observations on where the butterfly timing was and how the butterfly moved or was set (in other words assume the index point is no longer accurate). For a comparison, my choke “operates” properly set 1/2 notch back from full lean IAW the advice in the link above. If I put it on the index it burns so rich you’d think it was a diesel - not saying that’s for true all for all but it’s why I stopped following the manual. BTW the thermostatic spring integrity is fine and original to the carb. There was another shade tree eyeballin trick passed on to me you might try that just came to mind. Put a few fingers over the top of the carb to artificially richen it up, blip the throttle see if it responds better or worse. If better then it’s too lean for whatever reason, if worse than it’s already too rich as covering made it richer. Can tell you which side of the mixture setting you need to go to. Am wondering if there are any air passages that are open while the choke rod is moving that shouldn’t be. Seems like this fix could be getting beyond external adjustments. Another thought - vac reading was taken at the manifold? No leaks around the base of the carb? Hopefully someone with more hands on AFB knowledge can help out.

Sounds like the “WCFB goes flat on left hand turns” problem 🙄 Cool. Interested in what you find out.

Agree with checking the pump. Don’t have experience with an AFB but here’s some ideas FWIW Curious what are the initial settings for choke and mixture and about where are they now? As thermostat springs wear over time or are replaced by aftermarket sometimes the choke “index” setting becomes less accurate. If so consider setting it so the butterfly just starts to move at about 70 ambient, cold, engine off, maybe 1/16 of an inch preload, while holding the throttle off the fast idle cam to ensure free movement of the butterfly. Also the note as written reads as if the fast idle is off and the choke is still not yet fully open? Run just until fast idle is off….behavior continues until engine is warm and choke is open. That sounds odd or perhaps it’s my misunderstanding - choke is still partially on and the throttle is off all the fast idle steps - could that cause a too rich bog? If its been apart consider checking the procedure to synchronize the movement of the choke blade to the fast idle cam. Usually there is a clamp at the end of the choke rod linkage that can be loosened and repositioned. Five minutes’ warmup and the flat spot disappears. Car runs and accelerates fine after that. Seems to suggest mixture and ignition timing are close enough and choke timing is off. My hunch if not the accel pump. Just a few thoughts. Following….

Isn't that called yelling…. As long as one end of your broken wire is still soldered to the brass ring it sound reasonable - the bend stress on the wire right at the solder joint at the brass ring is usually where the break happens. If the loose piece you have is shorter than the distance to the wiper button in the column you might get lucky…..

^- X2 on good results. The plumbing part that fits on a 55 is a 1 inch “through” sleeve or 3/4 - 1 inch reducer with the 3/4 inch end cut off, then cement it to the insulator after the wire is soldered to it - helps it stay in position and align with the “wiper” button that mounts to the steering column to complete the circuit to the horn relay. If the insulator is dry rotted or has shrunk so the fit inside the sleeve isn’t snug, you can make up the difference with some tape or piece of thin inner tube or card stock.. The copper is overkill sturdier than the original brass factory part if that part is unsalvageable. Beastly R&R job but you have a number of documented fixes here and it’s worth it if original horn ring operation is important to you. Personally after going with the easy button under the column for quite a few years (short in the column made it stay on all the time) it was nice to not have to reach down to hit it. Good luck! Correcting my post. JDs post was a reminder that your car has a rag joint which makes R&R much easier than 55 and earlier models that had continuous shaft from gearbox to steering wheel.

Or let us rewrite it for you…..

Yes well written John thank you for documenting and organizing us for the trip - was good to get out and see old friends again. I didn’t take any pics on the drive up. After fueling up, my trip up route 12 was behind a dump truck trailer most of the time from a far distance to avoid flak hits - go figure. I shoved it to the floor when there was finally enough distance to close it up plus get around him and he put his turn signal on to pull off lol. All engine parts stayed attached this time which met my bare minimum success criteria. Clocked 150 miles for the day 80 of them round trip to Norwich. Here’s one of the display rooms and a placard from the Buick on display which was interesting.

Also anything special to do with the carb to manifold gasket? Or just install it dry and bolt down the carb? Have seen a couple different versions of these gaskets. My manifold and carb are early 55 without the heat passage milled in the base of the carb - the gasket that has always sealed best for me has been a relatively thick paper material with a stiff metal mesh bonded in the middle, assembled dry and lightly and evenly torqued down. For whatever reason if I didn’t use that type of gasket I had leaks around the middle between the front and rear bore but maybe it was my lack of experience at the time. If you can’t get it to idle out at 450 to set it up just go up in 50 rpm increments until it does. You really should be able to get decent results at 550. If youve been to carbkings site mind his advice to not set the mixture to get max idle or you’ll get an off idle hesitation like when leaving a stop sign. I fought that for a few years thinking it was the accelerator pump, read his advice, thought it the craziest thing I ever heard then figured what the hell, and leaned it out and presto - right he was!

Here’s a stream of random consciousness What problem is being chased - a slight miss or rough running? Is it something steady you can hear or feel at idle at the tailpipe, in N and in D, or more random? Unless the vac gauge has some kind of damper adjustment on it the needle or in the line it will oscillate 1-2 divisions like crazy, you have to eyeball the center of the oscillations and that’s pretty normal. Mine has a rotary damper to attenuate the “reverb” reading in the manifold that makes the needle vibrate. These cars don’t have seals on the valve guides unless they are added later. Even with a fresh tight rebuild with valve guides that have seals on the intake added and everything else perfect you’d still see oscillations of an inch Hg or two at idle - my humble experience FWIW. A consistent rhythmic definitive drop at low idle that corresponds to what you might hear at the tailpipe in idle in D w wheels chocked might help you get closer to a root cause. Those plugs look way new, what is the integrity of the wires, points, dwell and cap. Set the timing to 5-7 deg normally. Have tuned up with a vac gauge for timing and mixture purposes before and fell back on a timing light and tach. If you really want to try to time it with the vac gauge its fun to do but can get tricky - the rpms have to be pretty low and after finding the peak vacuum then back off an inch or two of vac - if your gauge is bouncing all around it will be hard to get a good relative reading. The fuel pump pressure sounds reasonable - is it only on electric or both mechanical and electric? How much do you trust the carb settingsWhat’s the carb status? How quiet is the valve train - any stuck lifters? Lastly is your compression gauge one you hold against the port or screw it in. Latter is obviously more consistent, and what temp was the engine when you took it? Noticed one of the wet readings is lower than dry - how much do you trust the data set? Concur with the good feedback you have received it needs to run it more so you personally get the feel of it and can methodically isolate for the miss. FWIW my old worn out engine had 105-110 lbs on compression and it still ran and idled decent. Check off the simpler external subsystems - carb, ignition, fuel - and run it a lot first before you start pulling off heavy duty stuff like heads, rings and valve train/cams. Unless it won’t run then we’re in different territory.

Looks great! Just wear shades, keep the bugs out of your teeth and head on down the road…..🤣 Good for you to go the self taught route. Looks like you are diving in and doing good work. Thanks for showing your project and interested in following along.

^- best approach. question 2 - What carb do you have - maybe some one knows something specific to the WCFB or Rochester rebuild would have something to check. If you think it’s together right and running well, then how much opportunity have you had to drive it and is the exhaust gas actually coming out black? Drive it more. That grey burn off is usually on the plugs. It takes long, fully warmed up runs like on the highway to get the tan/grey burn you may be thinking of. If you really feel the urge to do some quick “trust and verify” settings without tearing into anything major my thought is check in the following order the choke setting to make sure it’s coming off closed quick enough, mixture screws “generally” fall between 1.5-2.25 turns out but every situation is unique, verify plug temperature range correct and gap set right, and dwell and timing - you can go 7-8 deg advance no issues. A lot of us run it there. Pertronix opinions and experience of “more better” or “burn it where it sits” will vary across the forum team. It’s never been on my car but others run with it and will surely chime in. Get the choke, plug temp and mixture right and drive it more than 30 min at a time - if the carb is built right those are the biggies before you go looking for that burn off pattern JMHO

No gaskets is factory correct, make sure your manifolds mating surface is straight and true and it should work fine. That being said my 55 engine had gaskets for many years and xx thousand miles to seal a manifold leak with no issues. I barely torqued the bolts though and just checked them at oil changes. The French locks had disintegrated. If you choose gaskets do not torque them down or there is a high risk of cracking the ears on the manifold - you’ll just have to manage that interface. When the 55 motor blew up and the 56 motor with 56 manifolds went in I mindlessly carried the gaskets forward but if I had to do it all over again a skim coat of high temp sealer as suggested would be my preferred approach. Run them along piece of sandpaper or emery cloth glued to a flat surface to get an idea of high/low spots, assess the situation and pick your approach. Good luck

If memory serves correct unhook rod from pedal, the bottom lip of the accel bellows goes through the hole in the metal floorboard and the bottom of the first large bellows sits on top the carpet. That’s how the original one on my 55 came out FWIW and can’t guarantee a 50 is the same but the design looks identical. My car never had a brake pedal grommet on the carpet side so can’t help you there. My thought was might they go on the engine compartment side and seal the brake rod to the toe board hole when the pedals are up? On a 55 that’s just a round cup looking seal from a comparative perspective.

Glad it sealed up sometimes a little running will swell seals and slow leaks down to seeps. Sometimes. Keep a lot of beer on hand. The whole car will simply fall together. You’ll see….😆

My W.A.G. is it’s an extra part someone put in or a gauge that fell in. Seems odd a dynaflow piece-part would say pat pending on it to me. If it’s not in an exploded parts list or PSB why would it belong anywhere….what happens if it’s left out? Just thinking out of the box no pun intended 🙄 FWIW it wasn’t obvious from any shop manual picture. https://www.hometownbuick.com/1955-buick-variable-pitch-dynaflow-transmission-maintenance/ Scroll to bottom of above link - there are 3 exploded diagrams of various subsystems within the 55 transmission. Didn’t see that part anywhere but please verify. Me thinks so it’s a tool or gauge of some sort that fell in and went along for the ride….

What shop in Batavia did you use and how recently?

As an aside, FWIW my stream of thought of an abbreviated “Top 5” list if your objective is get it to run then see what it needs….lots of different COAs and experience on the forum. This just reflects my approach on a student budget when this was my only hand me down ride in the 80s. Disregard if you’ve already thought it all through or done the steps. 1) my recommendation would be resist the urge to run the engine much until you replace oil and filter, replace the fuel pump and flex line (avoid fuel on hot surface when diaphragm or top seal goes), flush cooling & block so sediment doesn’t foul the radiator, ranco valve, heater core, water pump. Replace radiator and heater hoses, check rad cap so they don’t let loose from dry rot under pressure and scald someone. You can do the panty hose trick in the top hose to catch sediment also. Replace fuel filter, drain tank and fresh gas so sediment/varnish doesn’t foul the carb. Consider a tank sealer to slosh around in there if you decide to drop the tank. 2) Fix the exhaust so you don’t asphyxiate yourself from leaks into the garage. Yeah the old car exhaust smells great and fans work but you get the point. Make sure your exhaust heat riser valve is free and not frozen closed (pass side manifold on your car). Could warp something or cause high engine temps/ poor response if rusted closed. Follow on to 2- Since my crossover pipe was good and the nuts would not budge I did not drop the oil pan to clean it right away. The oil and filter were changed every few hundred miles then every 3k. Did not motor flush. I did drop the pan to clean it many years and miles later when the y pipe deteriorated. During the y pipe removal cracked one of the exhaust manifolds irreparably. The engine had about 80k on it then and I didn’t rebuild it until it had about 100k on it. My pan was full of dirt, rocks and sludge because the car primarily ran the strip mine dirt roads daily between Shamokin, Mt Carmel and Centralia as it’s livelihood but even so always had good pressure. Yours may not be that extreme but likely sludgy. If you choose to drop the pan here’s a link for a look ahead, anticipate its same for 56, it was straightforward when y pipe and idler arm were down. https://forums.aaca.org/topic/67190-55-roadmaster-oil-pan-removal/?tab=comments#comment-273553 3) sounds like you are going through the brakes. Hoses and cylinders all around, don’t skimp, lines too or as needed. Really stand on the pedal before you head out. Check the e-brake too. No reserve hydraulic cylinder on these cars. One leak and your downshifting, ebraking, pumping the pedal and doing fast mental math on rate of closure to obstacle or find an escape path. Obviously you’ll check the shoes, hardware, drums for reuse/replace. Clean and repack front wheel bearings inner and outer while in there. Grease the chassis, look for anything excessively worn. You’ll be getting ready for a drive. 4) if it’s running good assume you can check the charge with all the electrical loads on so you don’t kill the battery as you run it although it will run quite awhile on just the battery alone. Make sure brake lights and signal systems work. 5) it’s easy to drain the trans and torque converter via the drain plugs, drop the pan and wipe it out. I ran it a bit and then changed it again and gtg. Yeah the trans leaked for many years until I had it rebuilt but not so bad that a viscosity improver and a sheet of cardboard worked out fine. 6).Tires and diff fluid level. Nuff said. 7) Assuming it’s a fair weather daylight car at first and wipers check out. They run off manifold and fuel pump vacuume. Check the hoses and the vacuume motor on the firewall if sluggish. Rain X is your best friend. That ought to keep you busy enough to hit the high points and get it a few laps around the block or the backyard, get some time on it before you venture further and see what it needs. Lots of fine tuning to go from there. Like I said the above was just my approach - if I missed something or got it wrong am sure the forum team will help fix it. Back to JDs driveline thread not to hijack it. Have fun!

On a side note - maybe we could make this a yearly thing...someone else with a Buick can enter the contest, and we can all try to get a Buick on the 2023 calendar! Just a thought. Agree - that was fun.

Nice job on that research and write up JD. Enjoyed the read!

‘Bout time you joined the party…..😎👍

You can also lay into it like Ben says until you skin your knuckles real good going counterclockwise, then try going clockwise until you bust your fingers up real good going that direction….then sit on the pavement with your hand wrapped in a dirty shop rag and take stock of the situation….just make it look like you know what your doing at all times. Ok that wasn’t helpful - enough from the peanut gallery. 🤣. Mine were not so encrusted being from the same town 5 miles away such that what Ben advised worked fine and didn’t snap the bolt. I only remember the wheel bearing nut being backwards. Sorry.