2007 Spring Extravaganza

[Guest imported_Thriller]

Or, the Gopher State Chapter Strikes Again.

I got home a few hours ago from a very interesting, fun, and draining weekend. I'm working on a beer and I'm off my feet, so I'm recovering.

I brought Ewing with me and we headed down Saturday to St. Paul, MN. We had some fuel issues, which delayed us, but we got checked into the hotel by about 7:00 or so. Wildcat62 had gotten a group together to meet us for supper and, although some we having dessert when we showed up, Wildcat62 treated us to supper...thanks again! We had a few laughs, filled our bellies, wiped our fingers, and had a good evening. Eventually even the die hards started to realize they had to be on the show grounds (or at least getting up) within 8 hours, so we called it a night. All together, I think there were 11 of us with a total of 5 semi-regular forum members.

We got up the day of the show, had breakfast and drove over to the show site, which was perhaps a mile(-ish) from our hotel and got registered. Ewing was practically giddy - he'd never seen so many old Buicks in one place before...usually it is up to us, and one or two other locals, to get any Buicks out to a local show. Of course, having something on the order of 4 times the population to draw on doesn't hurt.

Anyway, after going through the Buick area initially, we drooled in the car corral (again, more Buicks), and headed over to the swap meet, which is probably 3 times or so larger than our local swap meet. There was a lot of neat stuff, tempting stuff, including project cars, but I managed to get away with just a few ads that I don't think I have already.

Following that, we headed back to the Buick area, hung out with the crew, and did some vegging, yacking, and that sort...oh yeah, there was more eating.

The weather was interesting to say the least...there was the odd sprinkle, but it wasn't really wet...the story was the wind...the swap area was sort of gravel/dirt, and was quite the dust storm at times. Also, at one point, we saw one of the vendors holding down some of his stuff and watching helplessly as his license plates started flying away...happily, nobody was decapitated.

Anyway, I'm sure you're all thinking, "shut up and get to the photos". Well, I didn't take very many...sorry. At any rate, here are some of the ones I did take.

Buick Street:

A nice '57 hardtop

'58 Super

'61 Skylark. I was pretty interested in this car, as it is the same paint code as my Invicta - N for Cordovan. However, this was a pretty poor paint job (orange peel and dust, although it looks nice from a distance), so I'm not sure how close a match it is to original.

'69 Wildcat

Super Sedanette

Here's a portion of the swap meet

Not Buicks, but some professional cars

I had to resist temptation not to procure a Wildcat convertible.

So, what's this about fuel problems? Well, there were several, although they may not entirely be unrelated. My original intent was to fill up in Fargo, but thought we could make it to Fergus Falls, and combine a gas fill with a belly fill. Just after turning the corner onto I-94 and starting into a wicked head wind (did I mention that poor Ellie got soaked?) when there was a bang that sounded a lot like something had landed on the trunk...we couldn't figure it out as we couldn't see anything, the car was running OK, and there was nothing on the road behind us. So, after close to 30 miles into the wind, Ellie started bucking...turns out I'd messed up in my head between kilometres in Canada and miles in the US, so we'd run out of fuel...that's not so bad, I have CAA (Canadian affiliate of AAA) and we had a cell phone. On top of that, we'd stalled basically on a county line near a mile marker. So we call up AAA...I swear, I spent over 20 minutes trying to get this gal to understand where we were...she said she had county lines on her map, so I don't understand why it took so long. Anyway, eventually a tow truck is dispatched, said he'd be 45 minutes, so we thought we'd be OK. I got off the phone about 1:30...did I mention we hadn't had lunch? The tow truck operator brought us 2 gallons of gas ...and we'd be bucking a head wind. By our map (not very good detail), we were over 20 miles yet from Fergus Falls...I was nervous...it turns out there was another town about 12 miles away. We get there, and gas splashes out after about 8 gallons...I'm perplexed, but hungry, so we decide to head on to Fergus Falls for lunch...we can only put in about gallons, so we continue to be perplexed. At this point, we look under the car and figure out what the bang had been...the tank had collapsed. The tank venting wasn't working, so in cool weather, when the tank got low enough, there was enough vacuum created to suck it in...I'd heard of this, but never seen nor experienced it before...sigh. So, after lunch, we called in to let Wildcat62 know we'd be in later than planned, especially since we needed to stop every 50-80 miles or so for fuel. There's no leaks, so that's good.

I feel really bad about mistreating Ellie this way, especially since it wouldn't have happened if I'd stopped in Fargo for fuel as I'd originally thought to do. At least we got home and now I can look into addressing the root cause as well as the overal tank shape issue.

[imported_buick5563]

Wow, I've never seen that before. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Mike

[Bill Stoneberg]

I can tell you why the girl had no clue where you were, when you are 7000 miles away in India,its hard to understand American roads.

Surprised ?? Not really, AAA & all those place have a big call center in Bangalore. We send them to school so they sound American and teach them American Customs.

As you can tell, they did a pretty good job.

Sounds like a great weekend for you, lots of nice cars and an adventure to boot.

[Guest imported_Thriller]

And here I thought she was just blonde. That's still no excuse for not being able to read a map.

Oh, I expect Ewing will be able to add some photos as well once he's had a chance to recuperate and remove all the sand from all the orifices from the dust storm.

[The Old Guy]

Derek

If the tank sucked in that easy, you may be adle to apply enough air pressure to blow it back out. Just plug everything but one orfice and give it a shot.

[Guest imported_MrEarl]

I sucked one in once with a shop vac while trying to clean and air dry it prior to sealing. Duct tape a shop vac hose over the inlet pipe and blow. You may want to drain it first. good luck

if that don't work, let me know, I have an old girl friend that may can help....

[Guest BJM]

That's amazingly easy collapse - never heard of that - that bad anyway. It's even, all the way across. I would see if a local service station with shop can assist a traveller in distress and put shop pressure into the tank to "pop" it out. With or without gasoline, shop rag over the outlet will prevent spray upwards I would think.

[Centurion]

Derek, thanks for sharing the great photos. With spring arriving, it's great to see new photos of the old Buicks out at shows and on tours.

[Guest imported_Thriller]

I got a few more photos from Ewing today...it's late, so I'll deal with them tomorrow or Thursday.

As for the tank, I'm hoping it can be expanded back out...we'll see. After that, we'll have to figure out what is going on with the tank vent as well...sigh.

[Guest unclefogey]

Derek,

I want to thank you for including a picture of my car in your group of photos and having it appear on this website for the first time. It was not the subject of a photo, but appeared in the background of the 69 Wildcat photo. As my friend and I sat in our lawn chairs in the grass after spending the three plus hours walking around the fairgrounds, we came up with a nickname for my car. We named it the "Old Fart Magnet" (we are not that young either). There wasn't a man in the 70+ age range that didn't stop and look, but those younger just passed it by. When the father in a young couple with a four year old son picked up his son to look inside, I got up and thanked him for bringing the average age down.

I wanted to open the hood and leave it open so the sight of the 248 mill with dual carbs would draw them in, but thought the wind would deliver the hood to somewhere in South Dakota. Was hoping the guy who last year told me, "Nice car, engine color is wrong", would show up and look after I had the engine rebuilt and painted correctly.

Was watching your car out of the corner of my eye as we were sitting there, but in the hour plus in this watch, no one showed up who seemed to be explaining something about the car and could be identified as the owner. I wanted you to give my fishing buddy your "Don't pollute the water with spraying bait minnows with WD-40" lecture. Just as not everyone got to meet the Queen during her visit to the Derby last weekend, not everyone got to meet the Buick owner with rock star status from Winnipeg. Maybe next time. Your new interior looks great.

My gas tank story began with what was explained to me as a static guage reading caused by a sticking sending unit. It was additionally explained that in the old days, the cure for this was to drive on a bumpy gravel road. Not wanting to do that, I thought what would be better than giving the car a big bump by jacking the car up to the max with a floor jack and then quickly releasing the pressure so she came down with a thump. Well, with the added problem of totally shot rear springs, she came down alright, but down so far that the bolt holding the the jack handle in the jack made a very deep impression in the tank. I was lucky it didn't make a hole in the tank. All of this for a problem caused by a bad ground.

John

[Guest imported_Thriller]

Keep your eyes peeled John...John Ewing took a nice shot...I'll try to get it up tonight.

[Guest ewing]

is this it?

I'll edit and re insert the picture shortly.

[Guest imported_MrEarl]

If you only have one or two pictures to post I usually do it through AACA. After you've made an attachment to your post like you just did and go back to that post post, open the attachment and go up to the top of your screen and right click the "Address", and Copy it. Go back to you post and "edit" your original post. In the Instant UBB Code just below the text field click on Image. A box will come up in the top of your screen. Put your cursor/pointer in the left side of the box, right click again and Paste the address you just copied. click OK and your attachment picture will become viewable the next time your post is viewed. It's really more simple than it sounds ( or at least what I made it sound like)

Try it on that beautiful 41 attachment and see if you can get it to work.

Otherwise yea you can post to something like Image Shack.

[Guest ewing]

that worked. Kinda big view. Guess I can also go back to image shack too.

I noticed that image shack has deleted about a third of my images there. Do they have an expiry policy, if images aren't viewed for a period of time??

I wonder.

[Guest ewing]

This kind of summed up the trip home, this view times about 12. haha, but the Wildcat ran very smoothly, ( when it got fuel to the engine).

Fantastic weekend. Gotta go back again. [/image]

[Guest ewing]

another nice 38 [/image]

[Guest imported_Thriller]

John, if you don't mind, got back and edit that photo of the sedanette to bring it down a bit smaller...then it won't distort the entire forum view.

Here's a few more that John sent me.

A rare beast.

It was just a young fella who had this car out:

Back in John's driveway in Winnipeg...finally.

[rivgs]

Derek and John, An update on the green 49 that would not start. The OMG ( old man group ) ran a jumper wire from the starter switch to the starter to get the old girl up and running. They also found out that Amp meter was coming apart internaly which caused the charging system to quit working. Both items are being addressed now.

[JohnD1956]

Wow! What a great show, and super pictures.

Thanks for posting. Reminds me of why I'm in this game .

JD

[Guest imported_Thriller]

Yes, it was a fun show. And to think...I was able to spend the entire day just with the Buicks, the car corral, and the swap meet (OK, the professional cars too, but there weren't too many of them). I met a few folks, got to spend some more time with folks that I've previously met, had some decent eats, and came back home smiling. That's pretty much what it's all about.

Actually, now that I'm thinking back, there's a couple of other pieces that are worth sharing...around the table at Famous Dave's on Saturday night, suddenly it was pointed out that I was the only one there without a Riviera...before you knew it, the pressure was on...to sell or find me one that is. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Of course, semi-related to that was everyone seeming to think that they could convince either Ewing or myself to purchase a car last weekend. It was almost comical...mind you, if I had a little less self control, it could have happened, although I wouldn't have been able to bring it directly home due to border crossing issues...the 49th parallel saved the day <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I'm not sure I should mention it or not, but I was also tempted by a non-Buick. Suzanne and I had Torinos for wedding cars. There was an outfit in Saskatoon that rented a variety of classic cars...when we went to check them out, they told me I didn't want the green one in the corner - I told them not to tell me what to want...they could tell me what I couldn't rent, but not what I couldn't want...that green car turned out to be an unrestored Buick...memory is fuzzy, and it takes me back to when I only had one Buick, but now I'd say it was a mid-60s Special / Skylark convertible. I was looking around when The Boss said she liked the red one...turned out to be a Torino convertible...turns out I knew someone with a Torino hardtop of the same year (I think '71), and so we had our wedding cars. In the swap area Sunday was a red 1970 Torino hardtop with a 429...sigh...drool. Ah well, I'm currently thinking my mid-life crisis car is either going to have a 455 or a Turbo V6 <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

[Guest imported_Thriller]

I'm not sure if anyone really wants to know, but it turns out I hit something with the Wildcat. Don't ask me how I didn't see something in the road...there was a bunch of blood around the tank, so it must have been something significant like a groundhog, or perhaps a dog <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" /> It must have gotten caught up in the tank straps after contact since we didn't see anything behind. Since there was no other damage to the car, it must have been hit with the differential and bounced up into the tank.

They are going to try to repair the tank, with no guarantees. The rad shop doing it is concerned about the strength and structural integrity of the tank. The other option was to find a replacement, but considering these cars aren't generating the aftermarket parts like some others, they couldn't locate an exact replacement and it would have been considerably more expensive.

[imported_buick5563]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I'm not sure if anyone really wants to know, but it turns out I hit something with the Wildcat.

Since there was no other damage to the car, it must have been hit with the differential and bounced up into the tank.

</div></div>

That makes much more sense. I have never seen that kind of implosion.

I was making a trip home from Wheatbelt ( 8 hours north) about ten years ago in my 55, just to kind of sightsee and pick up some spare parts. I hit a coyote on the way back... didn't stop, just hoped I hadn't messed up anything which I hadn't just gotten a replacement for. <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Mike

[Guest wildcat62]

Derek & John, thanks SO much for coming down to the show and for coming out to dinner after a long drive Saturday. It was great to have you both down and spend some time yakking about Buicks. (And have you found a Riviera yet?) <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

Too bad it wasn't a nicer day and the car count was down but I hope you both had a great time and we hope to see you both again soon!

Say Derek...it wasn't a gopher that you hit by any chance, was it? <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

[Guest imported_Thriller]

No Riv, but a '41 Special....

If a gopher could do that much damage to a Wildcat, you grow a lot bigger gophers down there than I grew up plinking with a .22 in central Saskatchewan <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

[Guest ewing]

I (we) had a great time.

And what do you know, Derek got another car. Its been an excellent week all around.

Gee, got me thinking about that 64 Riv again... almost called. But I really need to get the 58 wagon going... I need to stay focused. But those 63, 64 Rivs really look nice!

[Guest imported_Thriller]

Well, my guy called this morning...I was bitter...the rad shop that has the tank disassembled it and, with damage to a baffle and sending unit, they are saying it can't be repaired...nice of you to decide that after taking apart my perfectly good 9 gallon tank. Now I can't drive the car at all until I get some flavour of tank underneath it.

The one thing though is that they did confirm that it imploded from vacuum...hitting a critter may have been the catalyst for that is what I'm thinking.

Sigh.

So, anyone know where I can find a replacement gas tank that would be reasonably correct?

[Dandy Dave]

Does it look like the Wildcat that I posted in "Diamonds in the ruff or cream puff"??? I think that one was a 1969. There may be a tank in that salvage yard some where if there are others that would interchange. Would be glad to ship it to you if there is. Dave!

[Guest imported_Thriller]

I looked it up in my parts book - the same part number is given for 1966 LeSabre, Wildcat, and Electra. Part numbers were different from other years...unfortunately I don't have an interchange manual to be able to verify. I sent an e-mail to Wheatbelt.

I'd have to dig up that thread again to take a look....

[Redrob]

I'm glad to hear you enjoyed the show, Derek and ewing. It's the highlight of the year around here. It wasn't a show I'd place in the top 10, but it's always a good one. My brother and I were checking in cars at the gate for 4 hours, and we froze almost complettely solid. We watched traffic cones blowing around, trash barrels rolling away and our fence blowing over, but we remained in an upright position. We love working the gate and checking in all of the cars, it's a preview of the show itself while we're working. We showed the '65 Sportwagon behind the '57 hardtop in your picture. We weren't in the most social of moods, but I'm really sorry we didn't have the chance to meet you. Maybe next year, or let us know of a Winnipeg show and we'll drive up!

[64BuickCat]

I'm disappointed in you Derek. Not one picture of the '64 Wildcat convertible parked across from the blue Super Sedanette... <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

[Guest imported_Thriller]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I'm disappointed in you Derek. Not one picture of the '64 Wildcat convertible parked across from the blue Super Sedanette... <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> </div></div>

You mean this one?

Admittedly, I just played with the original again so it focussed on this.

Those sedanettes sure are nice....

[64BuickCat]

That's it! Admittedly, I tried the same thing, but got nothing but a blur... <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" /> Thanks!!!!!

[Guest imported_Thriller]

I still have the original, unmodified photo, so I had something better to start with.