rocketraider

If it's a 4-door sedan they don't open. All that opens is the rear door vent windows. Most Broughams had power-operated ones.

The Oldsmobile Club of America judging guidelines stipulate that the car should be presented "as it would have appeared in a dealer showroom". We take this to mean a car that was specially cleaned and detailed for maximum customer impact. Wow factor, if you will, which was important at Oldsmobile in the Wolfram-Metzel-Beltz years.<P>I can see how wording confuses people. As long as the car is presented in best light, and as authentically as possible, there should be no trouble in AACA or marque club judging.

With all that damage, I think you'll be better off getting a junkyard steering column. A loose steering wheel is not safe.<P>You can find the wiring diagram in the factory service manuals for your car. Starting around 1980 a lot of GM divisions had a separate electrical manual.

In the case of a Starfire (or any other low production car with a lot of specific trim items) I'm inclined to get the best car available to start with. It's less expensive and less frustrating in the long run, and I speak from experience with a 1964. I have realised I can buy a nice car for a third to half what it would take to restore the one I have to comparable condition.<P>That said- on a 62 you have the side trim to find, a leather interior that will have to be custom dyed to match the metallic finished original, and bumpers which are almost always rusted out behind the brackets. Plus these cars have a lot of unobtainium trim pieces that are not shared with any other car, even other 1962 big Oldsmobiles.<P>Then there's the mechanical end of it. The Starfire 394 is powerful but should it need rebuilding parts are expensive and cams have to be custom ground. They have SlimJim HydraMatics which are quirky and tough to find competent servicemen who understand them and will guarantee a rebuild. <P>I probably sound discouraging, but I am a realist and I know what it takes to restore one of these beauties. A rough Starfire would be an ambitious project for a first timer.<P>So- my advice if you haven't already bought the car? Go find the best one you can find and then upgrade it as needed. That way you can drive the car and enjoy it, and you won't be arse deep in a disassembled car that you can't find needed parts for. You'll be ahead financially too. The 62 is the most popular of the six year run and nice ones are advertised every day at reasonable prices.

Tommy, I'll look in the 72 Fisher Body Manual and see if there's a good drawing of the top frame. I'll be glad to xerox it for you.<P>The actuators are at the corners of the rear seat back and are driven by cables from the top motor/transmission. What Centurion is talking about has to be done every so often because either the cables or actuators get sloppy and the top frame will cock during operation.

Color and build date?

Can't furnish dealer codes but here's a few from around here:<P>Wyatt Buick, Danville VA (in business since 1924, VA dealer license #5!! now a Buick Pontiac dualled dealer)<P>Powell Motor Company, South Boston VA (defunct)<P>F.E.Watkins Motor Company, South Hill VA (now Sadler GM- yes, owned by NASCAR drivers Elliott and Hermie Sadler)<P>Sadler Motor Company Olds-Buick-Pontiac, Emporia VA<P>Royal Buick-Pontiac, Roxboro NC (changed to Center and now Boyette)<P>Galloway Buick, Greensboro NC.

Notorious is an understatement! These top frames are also sensitive to lubrication and the second bow pivots wearing out is usually what causes jamming halfway. If the top fabric has pulled loose from the second bow (notorious for THAT too) the end of the bow will pivot around to the outside of the top frame and cause a jam. It has to remain inside the siderails to operate properly.<P>Every once in a while I get the notion of wanting another 71-76 GM B-car convert. Then I read these posts and realise why I sold the one I had! and I talk myself out of it.

You can put Supreme hardtop quarters on a ragtop, but you'll have to do some heavyweight massaging in the pinchweld area. Fortunately, you can piece the lower part of the HT quarters to the convert and not have to go thru all that, if the pinchweld area is good.<P>I believe the trunk and floors are the same on the HT and convert those years.<P>Hee-hee... now someone else knows about the common-as-dirt 4-door sedan decklid interchange, and these rapists who advertise "Cutlass Convertible decklid" for $500+ will get their comeuppance. Sorry- I had to say it

Let me dig thru some files and make some calls- there was a guy in NC who rebuilt those Dana cruise control regulators but I can't remember his name.<P>Have you tried getting a remanufactured one thru NAPA or other parts store? I know you can get those damned vacuum transducer junk regulators all day long, and almost every GM dealer has one or two of those on the parts shelf. <P>Conversely, you rarely hear of a Dana governor type regulator going bad.

First thing is to check the rubber drain tube on the engine side bottom of the heater/AC case. It often gets plugged with debris and lets water in. Rubber nipple-looking thing.<P>If that don't solve it, you'll have to do one of two things. Either pull the heater case out of the car and reseal it with some dum-dum, or pull the passenger kick panel, remove the AC duct or blank-off plate that is behind it, and reseal that to the car body.<P>I've also seen the body seam sealer break off and allow water to enter thru the seams where different panels join.

Try an ad on 442.com. Or join the Hurst/Olds club, somebody in there will have one. <P>Tops and Trends in Kernersville NC can probably supply one very similar to the original, as they installed them and the hood scoops on the Cutlass GT conversions they made for the NC Olds sales zone. They still have enough stuff that they refurbish a couple of GTs a year.<P>Here's an idea. Yank the 307 and save it for the day you decide on an originally restored car. Then go find a 350 or 403 and build the snot out of it and have fun. You won't be the first to do that with an 80s Hurst. They were woefully underpowered for the name they carried.

Yaaah- it'll be easier to run the wire from the fuse block under the dash, thru the firewall and to the distributor than it will to unwrap and splice into the engine harness.<P>Really, as long as you can find an adequate 12v power source that is controlled by the ignition switch, you can power the HEI from about anywhere. One guy on 442.com swears by tapping into the windshield wiper motor power lead, but I think that's a really mickey-mouse way of doing it. I don't mind running an extra stand-alone wire to power something, but I don't like cutting wires without a good reason to do so. Good way to invite an electrical fire if you get into something you shouldn't.

You probably won't be able to shift into Low manually, but that's no great loss. I'm wondering how you're gonna fool this computer controlled transmission into shifting properly. I'd lean more toward a properly built 200-4R or 700 since I know they will work without computer reference.<P>On the shift quadrant- you'll need to remove and disassemble the dash cluster, then you can remove the PRNDL quadrant and use a piece of thin plexiglass to make a new one for PRNO321. Get a sign shop to make your letters out of diecut vinyl. Their computer vinyl lettering machine may even have a font that closely matches the original style. Have them make a reversed image so the sticky side is to the front and install it from the back side of the new plexiglass piece. We did that on a 2004R installation in a 64 Pontiac and it looks great.

Jim, young friend- you have a 15th Anniversary Hurst/Olds and you have paper backing up what happened. Nuff said. <P>Try to not get hung up on the car's value, otherwise you'll never enjoy it- I know too many people who have never loved an old car for worrying about whether they'd make money on it, and passed up interesting cars because they weren't the most popular thing at the time.<P>Done properly, it's hard to tell if a 350-403 has been swapped into a G-body Cutlass if you decide to go that route for a little Import Surprise, and you'll sound like a car instead of a weedeater on crack.<P>Two places to check out are the G-Body webring which I think the OCA site still links to, and <A HREF="http://www.hurstolds.com-" TARGET=_blank>www.hurstolds.com-</A> the Hurst/Olds Club website.<P>Enjoy yer Hurst! It's what they were made for!

Go to the Olds Club site and then link to the Oldsmobile Cutlass Coupes page. Those guys will know more about where to find 73-77 parts than anyone.<P>The plastic parts you mentioned are premium stuff. It's always rotted and everyone doing one of these cars is looking for it.<P>Mark- odds are a dealer parts department would laugh if you asked for stuff for this car. It's a "window" car- too new for reproduction parts and too old for dealer stuff.

You're lucky. That's the only application listed for that part number. 399682, pipe, hot air, 1968 F85 400 engine, if the info helps. It cost $4.20 in 1974.

My parts book shows it to be a one year only application, p/n 587260, 1965 V8 A/C or special cooling, 3 grooves, 6-3/8" diameter. So it could come from any air conditioned 1965 Olds with 330, 400 or 425 engine.<P>There's a few other 3 groove pulleys listed thru the years, but they're different diameter and more importantly, probably have different hub to groove depth spacing which would throw yer belts out of alignment.

All the K-M tools I've ever seen had a J prefix. Burroughs Tool also made some of GM's special tools and were identified by BT prefix.<P>I have Kent-Moore catalogs listing the specialty tools all the way back to early 1950s for every make they supplied and I cannot find T-25047.<P>There was a fellow in Tennessee who had a stock of older K-M and Burroughs GM tools a few years back but I'll have to dig thru my files to find his name- think it was Bill Sawrey.

Will- your latest artwork is VERY appropriate for the BCA forum since Jayne Mansfield died in a 1967 Electra.<P>Where do you find this neat stuff, esp since it's all way older than you?

The only thing I can find in my 1960 sales folder and chassis manual is they used a heat resistant backlight on all series SceniCoupe hardtops. It had a reflective tinted band at top of the glass since rear seat passengers' necks were right under it. This reflective tint was later used on 1966-70 Toronados.<P>But I swear I've seen it somewhere that these rear sunvisors were available on the Sixty Holiday coupes as well as the 59s.<P>With that huge wraparound back glass and roof overhang, rear visors would have made little sense for the 4d HT.<P>Here's a tidbit: opening page of the 60 sales folder blares "Radiantly styled... for the Rocketing Sixties!" Further in at the Dynamic 88 Fiesta wagon page: "Designed for the Dynamic Decade!"<P>Gawd- what happened to advertising like that?<BR>Made you want to BUY cars!

A-O-C: does this yard have much in the way of 60s-70s Olds? Up here in the hinterlands of the Piedmont, we still have to jack 'em up and put a stack of tires under 'em, and hope the snakes are hibernating.

Limited, your vinyl is the Doeskin grain I referred to earlier. Very smooth grain in a satin finish and one of the best vinyls Olds ever used IMHO. It's tough, soft and looks good for years.<P>This is a drastic step, but have you tried lacquer thinner to clean off the stains? My CC wagon has light gray vinyl seats which also stain very easily and every so often I have to swipe them with the stuff.<P>Delta 88, be aware that there was a running change in the 1973 convertible seat pattern early in the model year. They changed from using 14 trim buttons in the backrests to 10 with corresponding change in pleats.

I've never seen a 1970 S car with colored b/s molding inserts. All I've ever seen were stamped metal that fit behind the S insignia. Supreme and SX used heavy diecast chrome, lower on the fender than the S. <P>Does your car perhaps have aftermarket b/s moldings?

Henry, wasn't this about the time Buick came out with their Accu-Drive front suspension geometry? Could that be the difference in the Olds and Buick rotors? Sure thought they'd have been the same.