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Coolant Overflow Container


Guest dwhiteside64

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Guest dwhiteside64

Does anyone happen to have a photo or drawing of the factory authorized coolant overflow container that was offered by Buick for the first gen Riviera? 

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There are a few aftermarket ones out there that are cylindrical and tuck in vertically beside the radiator. I came very close to putting one on my 63. For a while my 63 would spit up a little in the garage after a summer drive. I think maybe I was overfilling the radiator slightly. Anyway, it stopped and it's running cool. Regardless, check Summit or Jegs. They come in chrome or black. It makes for a nice clean addition and the black one looks little something GM might have made. PRL

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Guest dwhiteside64

Yes I realize that, but I read a thread that said there was a factory authorized container offered by Buick as an accessory at that time. My friend is entering his ultra clean '64 at Hershey and wants to at least have a correct overflow container. He's not sure if the one he has installed is an aftermarket one or not. See the below thread:

 

 

Edited by dwhiteside64 (see edit history)
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I think the thread is wrong.  I have the showroom binder that shows all accessories and no overflow container is listed.  Nothing is mentioned in the shop manual as well.  I have seen aftermarket ones installed and if professionally done they look good.  There is a list of upgrades that the BCA allows on older cars without penalty, but most are related to safety such as a two pot master cylinder.  Depending on what level your friend wants to compete at, I would do a little more research.  As Ed mentions above, it won't work with the stock radiator cap.

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39 minutes ago, dwhiteside64 said:

Yes I realize that, but I read a thread that said there was a factory authorized container offered by Buick as an accessory at that time. 

 

To be absolutely correct, he'd probably want to enter the car without the tank.  As Tom pointed out in his post in the attached, they were offered as a retrofit after they became mandatory.  To make it work, you'd need to use a modern cap and that would obviously be wrong as well.   You'd want to check the judging rules about retrofits before making any decisions.  I drove my '63 Riviera as a daily driver for 15 years and never had any problems with 'puking' as long as all of the cooling components were in good shape and I didn't overfill the radiator.

 

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On 9/29/2016 at 9:23 AM, Pat Curran said:

I think the thread is wrong.  I have the showroom binder that shows all accessories and no overflow container is listed.  Nothing is mentioned in the shop manual as well.  I have seen aftermarket ones installed and if professionally done they look good.  There is a list of upgrades that the BCA allows on older cars without penalty, but most are related to safety such as a two pot master cylinder.  Depending on what level your friend wants to compete at, I would do a little more research.  As Ed mentions above, it won't work with the stock radiator cap.

Pat, re-read my reply in the original thread. The coolant overflow container which I described and is pictured was "retrofitted to earlier cars". This is to say the kit was offered to be installed in the first gen cars after their model year. In more simple terms, the kits were offered in post first gen model year accessory brochures to be fitted to earlier cars. I am quite sure of this as I have several NOS kits in their appropriate Buick boxes with the correct part numbers.

  Tom

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Yes-as usual Tom is correct. Years ago I sourced both the Buick and identical aftermarket kits and added them to my '65-67 B and C body cars. I couldn't find room on my '66 E body Riv and used a smaller one from a Mazda B2000 pickup. I don't recall what year these became a standard production item, but my '73 Pontiac had a similar design as OE.    Dan   Mpls. Mn.

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