buick5563

Satellite dishes?

I dig the interior. Those seats are plenty comfy, too. They are the same buckets I had in my 63 Wildcat.

Sid, I put some in with those taillight housings. Have you already tossed the box?

Hi Chris, Yes it did. I got it shipped here on one of the nicest tractor trailer rigs I have ever seen. Since it couldn't start or stop, I had to pay extra for shipping. Plus I had to get a bunch of friends to help me push it uphill into my garage. What do you know about it?

That dude is unreal! Looks great.

This one is in response to Mr. Earl's comment on what small hands can do automotively. Merry Christmas from the Middleton's

Did I mention that the convertible top mechanism was really heavy?

I was expecting the rust in the rockers and under the the sill plates. I was very bummed to find rust through under the back seat. The rust repairs that were done before were even worse than I initially thought. I believe the car may have been taken out of service due to electrical problems. This could explain why the car seems to be very solid mechanically, but taken out of service in the early 70's. I removed the two wiring harnesses from inside the car today. The main harness that goes from the fuse box to the taillights, and the power window harness. My buddy Rich sent me his old main wiring harness, but I was hoping the window wires would be good to go... NOPE! There were splits, splices, and burn marks all over. Shucks. Oh well, it looks pretty straight forward to fabricate. I am not sure where to start as far as the floor repair goes. Clearly, I am going to need all of this spare floor pan.

Hey Pete, I got my additional Bugle today, before my "official" copy. Thanks for sending that along. The rest of you will find out why, soon.

I'll think about it Lamar, I'm plenty manly, though . I believe I have a good amount of time until I will be spraying color. I got the top mechanism off last night, and boy that sucker is heavy. Just trying to prove manliness to myself, I guess. I got a lot of pics last night, but I'm posting from my phone right now. Stay tuned...

Right now it is 46 degrees in my garage, so I figured I'd do some more tearout. As I was pulling the trunk material out, I found a 1956 wheat penny. I also found a Shell Oil door service tag from: xxxETRICH'S xxxxLINDA SHELL xxxne 254-5264 xxxinda Way xxxCalif. It says oil change on 6/10/70 with a mileage of 48667. The mileage currently showing is 48667. Back to the demo, I want to get the top mechanism off tonight. Pics and scratch awls are going to be my friend

Thanks Rich, Working on a (Buick) Century sure is taking it easy compared to riding a century (100 mile bike ride). Bob, I am probably going to add power steering, but I like (or at least am used to) the manual brakes. I have the HCC magazine spread on my workbench as inspiration along with buickrestorer.com . (my heroes )

Sid, I just did this two weeks ago without fear of scratching my paint (disassembling car for resto). It is pretty obvious as far as all of the bolts. There are two nuts behind the kick panel and two under the car at the rear of the fender (these are probably the bolts Lamar was referring to). The electrical has to be disconnected to the headlights and parking lights. THAT is the easy part. Once you have all of the bolts off you have to jimmy it back and forth, up and down, all the time trying not to scrape the paint off the front of the door or rear of fender. Ohhhh, this is all assuming that you haven't reinstalled your front chrome yet. If you have, you will need to pull that stuff first. I would tape the rubbing points and really take your time. I know it is possible. Good luck

The car was originally Cadet Blue with a white top. The red leather interior probably set it off nicely. I am currently veering toward either Condor yellow or Gulf turquoise with Dover white and a white interior. I have thought about Black with red interior, but think it is overdone. Red and White looks great, too, but I (ummmm) don't want to follow Willie and Bob THAT closely. (Yes, I know Bob's car isn't two-tone, just trying to make a point). The other interesting thing about the car is that it has manual steering and brakes, but a two way power seat. I thought all Century convertibles came standard with the power steering.

Here is a great example of the quality of factory paint jobs. This car has no undercoating at all except on the cowl vents. It also has the blue-est apple green engine paint I have seen on ANY nailhead. Forgive the picture quality, some of these pics are taken with a phone since my technical deficiency was apparent when using (and losing) several camera pics. I promise that will get better, too.

Here is a picture of my son Woodrow saying goodbye to my 63 Wildcat.

I finally got around to starting on this project. I purchased it about a year ago on ebay. It should be an interesting project. The mileage showing is 43,000. I started it up just to see if it would run. I stuck a known running carb on it and it started right up. It ran very smoothly and shifted into drive and reverse. No brakes, so I checked it up in the air first just to see if the wheels spun. When I put it back on the ground, I stuck it in drive with a 4 x 6 in front of each wheel. I swear, it tried to jump over the chocks! There are no drips from the engine or transmission which really surprised me when it ran so strong and jumped right into gear. The floors were done (poorly) at some time in the past. I was lucky enough to get a full floor pan from Rich (Special55) so I will be breaking out the welder. Other than that, it is a very solid (relatively complete) car. This should only take me.....months and cost me.......dollars!

There is also a great pic of a cascade blue and white 55 in the summer show review!

First Born, you KNOW there isn't a Sanity Clause!?!?

Hey Rich, That is a cool modification. I thought about doing that to my 55, but couldn't find a decent one in time for my restoration. A bit of advice. Keep the Special speedo. It is MUCH easier to read in the bright sun than the Century version. The reflection off the redline plastic has to be shielded if you are wearing a white t-shirt.

About the only way you can do what you want to do (quick swap) is to find a used MC unit from eBay and get it rebuilt first. Then you have two. I don't know of a direct bolt-on from another manufacturer. Good luck

I'm glad it worked out, Sid.

I have never seen the 5 lug pattern measured like Philippe's chart. For a five lug wheel, you are supposed to measure from the center of one lug to the outer edge of the third lug (every other one). that will measure either 4.75 or 5 inches as stated above.

I took my drivers test in my dad's woefully underpowered 6 cylinder beige on beige 1977 Olds 88 in Washington, DC. I had to wait until I was 16 and a half (bad grades). :eek: Failed it the first time for going straight from a right turn only lane. Never had a ticket since!

It should go without saying to anybody who has been on this forum for more than a few days, that I must wholeheartedly agree with this nomination. Willie was the main reason my 55 received a Senior award my first time showing at a National.... AFTER DRIVING IT 1800 MILES! Thanks Willie. Pic of Willie during my restoration.