american_revolution_2005

Here are some pictures of the new Series I L67 that was torn down and the pictures of my original 3800 and cradle being dropped out of the car over the past long Easter weekend. Enjoy Pictures before winter storage and swap L67 3800 Series I, 89k miles, torn down to replace gaskets, etc. Original 3800 motor being dropped out of the car, April 3rd,2010

Hey everybody, as many of you know I haven't been online in quite a long time as life sometimes takes its toll. I have now gotten rid of my T-Type, car was rotted so I kept all specific T-Type parts. Now last October, the Intake Manifold gasket went on my 88 Reatta and the car spun a main bearing. Perfect opportunity for my Supercharged swap. The donor motor is from a 95 Bonneville SSEi and the motor had 143k kms on it, I stripped it down to freshen the motor up either way but the lower mileage was a bonus. The supercharger was a rebuilt with maybe 30k kms on it and it is perfect. I have been slowly chipping away at this project since January and finally the motor/transmission and cradle are coming out this Saturday and the new motor will go in towards the end of April. Gives me time to finish the motor, transmission and engine bay clean up. As since last seen on the site, my Reatta now sits on 17s and will be lowered 2" once the swap is done as well as a forward-flip hood modification as I utilized the hood parts from my T-Type. Should be interesting and I will have pictures up soon.

Well it has been a really long time since I have posted anything regarding my Reatta in a long while. Well I was going to drive my Reatta down to Carlisle but my grandmother had to have surgery and I had a Reatta club meeting event in Niagara Falls that Sunday so my weekend was full. I am getting the car ready now for an all-Buick show in Cheektowaga, NY at the end of July. Anyways, the car has been repainted and the body work has been done nicely. I got a few interior items fixed too like the console cover, removed the ugly purple rear window tint someone had put on and so on. Anyways, here are some various pictures from weeks past. The car has only been out of the paint booth for almost 4 weeks so it is recent. I just have yet to get a photoshoot done with the car just yet, my friend has agreed to shoot the pictures probably by the end of the week and a writer for the Canadian Newspaper, Old Autos and the Toronto Star, Jil McIntosh will be coming up soon within the next few weeks to check out my cars and she is going to cover a story on the Reatta apparently. Anyways these pictures are from a few car shows and the Reatta meeting I had been too, minus 3 other Reattas that were there and a Saab. The car now has about 275k kms as I love driving it, got it with about 256k kms. In the last while, I almost acquired a Light Driftwood Reatta convertible up here for $1000 but found out it was a Cash for Clunkers type car up here in Canada so the title had been destroyed. Too bad because the top and interior and glass were perfect. The rear quarters were not so pretty however but the underbody showed pretty clean for some reason I couldn't think of.

I really like the LH cars to be honest. As front drivers, they were a very good car, the 2.7L V6 may argue that in many cases but still some 2.7L will still go strong depending on how they are cared for as any car. However, the 3.5L and 3.2L are pretty reliable, our 99 Concorde LXi with its 3.2L was a very reliable car, decent in snow, didn't rust at all when we had it as some I have seen have been a different story. I actually do miss our old Concorde as it was peppy, roomy, reliable and very comfortable. I have known these cars very well as they are also built locally to me in the Bramalea Chrysler plant. The one car I can agree on and I still would drive one, is the 300M. I thought they had a very elegant design to them being not a total run of the mill sedan. The 300M Special I have a sweet spot for as well. Also that 500k mile 300M amazes me, yet I am not totally surprised as the 3.5L is a trooper. What year was that one Dodgefan? 2000-2002? And where did he have to drive to, racking up those numbers is also pretty amazing.

I haven't been on the forums for a while but I believe I will finally make it to the All GM Nationals this year. I plan to probably go on the Saturday and Sunday and I should have my 1988 Reatta there. The car is going in for paint and bodywork this week and I have to decide whether to get my stock 15s refinished or to put on the 17" BSAs I got in the winter which need a little bit of work too. Either way the car should be there as I am getting it ready for the shows. I am at just about 275k kms with the car now.

Here is a picture the seller took. Not a good picture and the car looks better in person. The rust on the car is surface rust but there are one or 2 small rust holes. He also has the SEO center caps and spotlights but were taken off so they would not be damaged.

Well first off I wouldn't be racing 3800s anyways lol. I know what they can do and the Reatta and Lesabre can sprint pretty darn fast. I just find the cool factor of a police wagon is better than any ricer or FWD car out there. Oh well I am on a standstill right now on it as the person interested in using it as a demo car is looking at it tomorrow. The owner of the car right now doesn't want that to happen either so he will try not to sell the car to somebody like that. That mileage isn't too bad either for a big car so I may even think of using it as a driver as I drive more than 150 km a day now to school in the city.

The seller told me that somebody else was going to look at it this week for a demo derby/parts car so I am trying to battle it out to save it. The seller was even willing to go lower so if my friend is slow to decide I may just take the hit and save it from an unneeded death. I always kind of liked the wagons anyways and the fact that it is the police 1A2 makes it even better. Toesuf94, yes it does actually have the power rear quarter windows. They even work because the owner of it now has a bunch of 9C1s etc and he used this one because it was great for hauling his dogs however they did damage interior panels. As far as I know this car was an unmarked K9 car for the special task force of the OPP from what I heard but still not 100%. There are a few items missing such as the push bar, emergency lights were of course taken off for legal reason but spotlights were left. The owner did take them off, however, so they would not get damaged or stolen by teenagers or whoever. I will keep you guys informed as I am trying to still push my friend to buy the car, but I may want to save it for myself or at least resell to somebody who would not demo it. There are a lot of neat cars for sale around here now including a 1970 Electra 225 4 door hardtop with 60k miles. The guy wants $1000 for that one even tho it is complete and body has little to no rust. Some of these cars are so cheap that they fare an unneeded death.

I was talking to a guy the other day about a Caprice wagon and the SPID sticker said 1A2. The 1A2 RPO code was the special service code for fleet/police vehicles. However, this wagon was used for police service in Canada and was 1 of 8 imported that year. Only 70 were made for total production. The car still has the ticket reading light and everything but this was an unmarked car in its day. I am looking at this car for a friend who wants a sleeper car as his driver. Does anybody know what kind of fuel mileage it would get? 3rd seats are deleted, no speed limiter, still has the police spotlights and SEO wheels and center caps? The car is in decent shape with some rust but is a Maroon on maroon car for $900. The car has high mileage but the LT1 isn't unusual for that. Any opinions, let me know so I can pass them on and convince him to buy the car as I think it is cool.

Ted, what time period is that GM Motorsport ad from? That white Camaro looks exactly like his 1LE and it was believed to be a GM promo car as we we able to determine it wasn't raced. The car was built late 1991 so if that ad is from late 91/92 that could very well be the car as there were only 32 cars total and a couple promo cars from what I have heard.

A 1960 Pontiac Laurentian hardtop coupe with an Astro-Jet L36 427 mated with an M20 four-speed Muncie. A guy up the road is selling the parts from his 1969 Pontiac Parisienne hardtop 2+2. The car was one of 10 4-speed 427s 2+2s made that year as they were only a Canadian car. Our Pontiac full-size used full-size Chevy components so it was called an Astro-Jet 427 rather than a Turbo Jet 427. I can get the 60 Laurentian for free but the motor would cost me.

These Lesabre GNs are indeed rare but I actually prefer the T-Types to these. I can even say that these were not worthy to the Grand National name. The car doesn't even have bucket seats or leather nothing like that. It's pretty much a Lesabre Custom coupe cloth 6 passenger car. I still have my Buicks and the T-Type is all mechanically redone now. I have actually been offered a 1960 Pontiac Laurentian 2 door hardtop for free as my friend had no use as it sat in their field for a year or so and they moved. He said if I wanted the car I could have it so I am thinking it might be worth it to put it aside until I finish my other cars. Not everyday you can get a 1960 Pontiac hardtop for free so I may take advantage.

There is an 87 Grand National for sale fairly local to me and the owner wants $5000 for it. Needs a fair bit of work but as far as I know it is complete. Needs bodywork, interior is decent needing not too much work, has T-Tops, rockers rusted through is the worst part, needs headliner, has GN rims, needs rad, injector(s), powermaster, rear springs.

It is a white 1991 1LE R7U car. Not just any 1LE, but one built for the Canadian Player's GM Challenge Series. I figured out today that it was never raced as it was a 1991 built after the 1991 season. This was a 1991 car built on October 25, 1991. I find that weird because they should have switched over to producing the 92 Camaros by then. GM owned the car from October 25, 1991 to July 17, 1992 when Dean Myers Chevrolet acquired the car. That was the first dealer for the car as it never left GMs ownership until then. Personally, I think it was a promotional car used on the Canadian Auto Show circuit as it was produced after the 1991 season and sold a month into the 1992 season. This car brings up a lot of questions and we believe it had the roll cage in it as well. It did have the R7U side exhuast as the subframes were clearanced for it but they were switched out.

Thanks I really appreciate that. Player's Challenge Series info seems to be pretty scarce as well as information on the R7U specifically as well.

My friend recently acquired a 1991 Camaro 1LE from his dad and he is trying to restore it back to factory specs now. The 383 currently in it will be removed and sold off while the original 305 will be dropped back in. However, the 305 needs rebuilding and apparently the 1LE (performance package) motors were tuned differently and sealed differently in Van Nuys. Anyways, the R7U was a special code for 32 Camaro 1LEs that year to be converted slightly to racing spec to compete in the Canadian Player's Challenge Series. I am trying to find out any other information for him as he wants to put the roll cage back in it, needs the side exhaust of the R7Us again, and he plans to get the decals again for this car. His car specifically has a racing past either way, but we are just not sure if it was a primary race car or just the back up. Car has no rust on it whatsoever and he even has the build sheet. Any info would be much appreciated as he wants this resto to be spot on.

I told my teacher about this and he read the article. He WAS a huge supporter of Toyotas and always told everybody to buy them. We always had arguments as he didn't like GM but he is also into social justice. The day after he read this, a fellow teacher and him both sold their 2008 Yaris' and he bought a Cobalt and the other teacher bought a Malibu. I got a kick out of that after he always complained about GM but so far he loves his new Cobalt.

Happy Canada Day! Good day to get off work and cruise around in the Reatta and hopefully see my friend's LS1 fire right up in his IROC today.

I was hearing that Chrysler was more interested into using Chery's platforms and not their actual cars.

I don't know if this has been confirmed or discussed much yet today but while I was going to the W.P. Chrysler Museum today, I got lost at the tech center. While we were trying to find the Museum again, we drove by a holding lot of their test cars I believe and what comes to my attention, a lime green Chery A1 sitting with all of the other Chryslers. However, I saw at least one or two more sitting there so Chrysler is indeed testing the possiblities. It doesn't appear they want to hide the car as there was no camo and and lime green stands out in a sea of silver and black cars. Also I saw a new Challenger today going north on I-75 between Squirrel road and Crooks Rd.

You guys will probably see me at the show if you are there just after noon. I will be wearing a Buick Club of America 100th anniversary hat and a Turbo Time Buick GN shirt lol. I am too obsessed with Buicks. Looking forward to the show and may see some of you guys there.

I will be in Detroit from Friday the 18th until Sunday the 20th. I am staying at the GM Tech Center Marriott. I am so excited as I haven't even been in Warren before, I was always in Auburn Hills. I will be at NAIAS on Saturday the 19th probably around noon. You will probably see me sticking around the CT coupe as it is stunning lol. I have to go down on Friday to the Buick Gallery and Research Center in Flint and then I will be going to Southfield for a meeting and tour at the university. I will also try to convince my dad to buy an Enclave. I want an all Buick driveway or at least an all GM driveway.

Nice. I always loved the B-bodies. Have you considered Impala SS replica rims? They look extremely nice and there is a site that sells the set of four for cheap.

These Reattas get very good mileage. If you get an 88 or 89 it will work out your average mileage on the CRT as well for you. Plus you can read diagnostics through the CRT. There is a 1990 Convertible for sale in Michigan and it is only $4500 but has higher mileage around 190k miles. The Select Sixty or 91 Convertible would be the rarest ones to buy. Parts are easy to come by now as Mike in Arizona has a yard of 150 or so parts cars and he delivers cross country. These are pretty heavy cars but they get great mileage. My 1988 worked out an average of 28 MPG on the way to my house and that was after 4 years of sitting.

Don't worry XP715, I understand exactly what you are saying. This one is actually going to be my driver as I like the other 2 too much to drive. I am just fixing this up a bit so I can drive it and then once I am done driving it, I would either sell it or fix it up. This car is cheaper on insurance for me as it has the engine immobilizer and the alarm. I would love a Select Sixty Reatta or a Grand National but I plan on waiting for those. I always liked my neighbour's Grand National and we are really good friends with each others families. He is a little bit older but he had no kids so he put me on his will as the inheritant to his 1987 Grand National. He has owned it since new and doesn't want to get rid of it in his lifetime so he figured that since I liked it so much, he wanted me to eventually have it. If it wasn't that way, I would probably already have bought a project GN. His car is always kept in climate controlled storage somewhere in our town but I can't remember the name so I only see the car in the summer months but he sees it once a week and makes sure it runs and drives.