60FlatTop

Maybe I am too simplistic or live in a too technically capable are. Couldn't a non-ferrous foundry cast a new one from a one-off mold? When I was a lot younger we had some small induction furnaces for brass and aluminum for rail road switch boxes. It wasn't hard to make a belt buckle if you wanted one. Out in the other room we had the big Bessemer furnace. I remember changing the roof on that between pours. To keep the foundry busy the marketing guys got us some short runs of International truck axles and odd jobs to run. If I needed one I would be shopping for a friendly shop. Back around 1990, some of you might remember Joe Galina from the Rochester area. He was selling unfinished brass horn bars. He borrowed my original and had a mold made for casting the repops. Bernie

Maybe in Crayville. Just listen and imagine a lost shovel and an unexplained dent in the bumper cover: Bernie

Nope

Dave, you just reminded me of where I left my shovel!!!!! Bernie

Yes, that's the car. My Uncle spent WWII in Texas shooting jack rabbits with a tank. After the war they decided to tame it down a bit and use a Buick. The six rifles were for visiting statisticians. Three statisticians go hunting. When they see a rabbit, the first one shoots, missing it on the left. The second one shoots and misses it on the right. The third one shouts: "We've hit it!" Bernie

The Lucerne is a good choice if you want similar to what you had. It is close to the platform the final Riviera used and I really liked driving the '95 Riviera I had. I'm still not a big fan of inibody or crosswise engines OR stuff that advertises horsepower at 6500 RPM. Too bad about Cadillac, just when I thought they might have got the Northstar durable a friend called, on Saturday, and asked how much to fix a head gasket on his 2006 or 07. My '93 Park ave was a nice enough car, although it did convince me that separate body and frame construction, 8 cylinders, a longitudinal engine, and rear wheels pushing was the epitome of design. Call me anachronistic, too many compromises are crammed into the front two feet of the current cars. I have 145,000 on my '05 Silverado. Three years ago I bought a 1994 Impala SS for Sunday go to meeting use. And when the truck gives up I will be looking for a Tahoe or Escalade. Oh! I do have one FWD, unibody, cross engine car. I had to thoroughly inspect it first: Bernie

My Dad's two year old 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 2 dr fastback; black, red interior, 289, 3 speed. Bernie

Just a side thought, I had a 1953 Jaguar delivered from Federal Way, Wa. to western New York and they used the southern route. I met the hauler around midnight at a crossroads about ten miles from me to guide him in from a pretty rough trip. He was in his mid to late 50's and wore a shirt with MOPAR acroos the front. That model has very little badging or identification. He told me he had never hauled a car that attracted so much attention and everyone asked what it was. He started asking them what they thought it was. He told me most said it was a Bentley. Then he looked at me real serious and asked "What's a Bentley?" My fist thought was that maybe people were asked "What's a Bentley?" and if they didn't know they were told to take one of those MOPAR shirts over there. Bernie

Check out New York's S.A.F.E. act on Google. I think it stands for Strategically Armed Freeway Express, just in case you commute. But be careful, convertibles kill. Commuter lanes on the east coast, HOV on the west coast..... High Ordinance Vehicle? Early '50's too: Bernie

Interesting, maybe we can pin down what OBO means. I know it is or best offer, but I never found out the terms. Does the seller collect offers over a certain time period and let the best offer have the car, or is something else implied? Is there a time limit to take offers? Is the a minimum offer allowed? I've never used the term myself. Bernie

I had a '93 PA Ultra in the mid 1990's. In the salt belt other cars were already showing rot. Mine was solid so I took the cowl grilles off and let about a quart of transmission fluid run down and soak the drain passages in the rockers. The car was great when I sold it. Tranny fluid has a high "creep" factor. Put a drop on the garage floor and see. Bernie

Just find a switched wire, one that has power when the ignition is "on" and run that to the exciter wire on the plug. Everything should work fine. Bernie

Enlarge the pictures, you will see a round rubber cushion on a steel pad with a squared wire spring. Those are the tensioned hold downs. Take the screws out of the lip. Then lift and pull the pad toward the rear of the car. Raise it to access the speaker wire and the auto dimmer, if equipped. Remember how easy it comes off. sometimes removing the pad is a great alternative to reaching under the dash to work. Bernie

If I had been born less than 30 years ago I think I would ease into collecting watches. Collector (not Classic) cars are too expensive for the last couple generations. Bernie

If the dysfunctional collection of jack asses on TV makes their family feel less screwed up I guess they get the audience. Fongoola Garage or Auctions, if I am looking for reality on TV I'm switching to professional wrestling. Bernie

Here are my taillight grounds: Nice and bright! Bernie

Here is the October 1962 Cat Life magazine introducing the new 1963 Riviera: And here is the mailing label to me as a subscriber: I was 14 and one month old when that magazine came in the mail. Lucky enough to be working in the Tire Shop and able to buy magazine subscriptions and car books. Being from western New York production cars were more realistic that a subscription to Hot Rod. Conservative? Reading about Buicks at 14, I still have the same address, and the magazines are out in the garage on the shelf. And 16 years later I bought the car. Bernie

1#. Any time there is a problem ALWAYS check what was recently done, ESPECIALLY if someone else did the work! 2# If something doesn't work as expected, remove the improvements and restore the original design. Bernie

Whoever relined the shoes may have used the wrong thickness lining. I had that happen to me once. I think it was only 1/8" but it had me tearing what little hair I have out. Our cars are the foreign cars of today. Remember all that Euopean stuff they used to screw up in the '60's? That's us today; furin cars. Bernie

Chilly and hopefully getting warmer; after farting around for about a year some progress is beginning on the major redo of the Riviera. 1981 was the paint project; 8 coats of lacquer. 1994 the frame came out from under and all the mechanics were done. This morning my son, who I have had for less time than the Riviera, and I took out the halo effect 50 year old windshield. The '70's installed vinyl top came off last fall. The new windshield is in a crate in front of the car. The 2014 job will be removing the rear window, putting in a silver headliner with the glass out and new tack strips, painting the openings, painting the roof, hood fender & quarter tops silver, and leaving the sides maroon. Correct '64 standard seats and door panels in silver gray (not the tinny color) with maroon stitching, cut and fitted leather dash cover in silver gray with maroon stitching,and gray carpets. That should get me through the next 15-20 years just fine. Bernie

I was thinking the same as Randy when I read it. Check the dimmer switch. Bernie

Here's the easy way to check for a bad motor mount. Put your foot firmly on the brake pedal, put the shifter into drive, them press the accelerator pedal "power braking" the car. If the mount is bad the torque will raise the car almost vertically about 4" (really neat at stoplights when a lower car is beside you), as the torque lays the engine over, it will reach a spot where the accelerator linkage w will be suddenly pulled to full throttle. Then you know the left mount is bad and once the torque is released your wild ride and panic are over. Bernie

This is my '64 and I have also had a '68 apart: My cars didn't have the stiffening fish plates on the top or bottom. There is much more boxing than the Chevy X frame. In the forward area there were many welds and triangulated filler pieces. In the 1950's GM was designing cars on an 8 year lead time. In 1958 when the LaSalle II project was floated to the divisions Oldsmobile was already working on the Toronado. That Toro/Eldo frame was conceptually similar to the late '30's Buick abbreviated frame that ended at the coil spring mounts. I wouldn't put a lot of faith in lawyer's speculation on engineering. The unitized construction of my Riviera is stronger with less fracture and stress points than the GM or Ford Coke bottle frames, especially in the torque box area. The Coke bottle ones will fold easier from a side hit. Recently, some sort of activists wrecked a '59 Chevy to demonstrate how safe new cars are. They "just happened" to find a X frame car to hit head on in the left front with a high center of gravity car. They found the weakest impact angle and folded the old Chevy up. Hit from the side there would have been a mess but much less dramatic. Maybe they did that first and it wasn't bad enough. Be careful about referencing lawyers and law suits if you are maintaining a credible report: Then you are prepared for this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJrXViFfMGk Bernie

The investment in the design and manufacture of the Buick X chassis was significantly greater than the lesser GM cars. When I had my Riviera frame out from under my car a local Chevy collector had the frame out of his 1964 Impala. Just the number of inches of welding was amazing. The massiveness and number of sections was a lot more on the Buick. Those around at the time may remember how Chevies would fold in the top of the quarters when raised on a bumper jack. There were some long faces on those who left the car on a jack over night. Buick, with such a robust frame probably didn't want to give it up for the flexible flyer perimeter frame of the 1965 B and C bodies. It was pretty much hand made anyway. The body mounting is really interesting. It is basically suspended over the frame. The mounting at the base of the firewall and the rear kick up carry the weight. Most cars have 8 to 12 longitudinal mounts that settle in and transmit frame vibrations with age. The Riviera squishes the load bearing mounts down pretty good but always have some insulating effect. Mounts at the rear wheel house and the oval rear ones generally don't show the effects of weight at all. In fact, a lot of wheel house mounts have rotted away. I like the design and the extra rigidity of the rocker panels. A pretty good design in my book. Bernie

A thought on these lifetime collections of books; I thought it would be great to donate them to a public library. I read my first car books there an one of the actual books is sitting about 4 feet away from me now. To my disappointment, I found out most donations that are not current novels or NYT Best Sellers, go into the fund raiser sales at 50 cents to a dollar each and $2 for a shopping bag full on the last day. Just looking around the shelves in this room makes me glad I kept them. Maybe I will pull down Elbert's Duesenberg book and read it again this weekend. Bernie