Fixing up a '71 Grand Safari

Wow, Brandon! What a magnificent looking Safari! Incredible job!



David :2_thumbs_up_-_anima

 

Brandon, I've said it before, and I'll say it again. That car is simply stunning, and the work you have done is beyond beautiful! I can't wait to see it completely finished with the moldings around the wood grain. I bet you feel the same! That is certainly a car built to be enjoyed!

 

Amazing Brandon : what a pains-taking effort and beautiful result! On the woodgrain inserts for the front door handles:you'll probably want to change to a light oak color for those two because that will blend better with the surround moulding. Can't say enough about this project!

 

Beautiful work, Brandon!

 

Dam! Beautiful Job!


Were you not looking for some wood trim? Check the pasts section, a member may have what your looking for.

 

Yanno Brandon all that work? You could of simply driven her up here and left it in front of my house for a week or 2! Ya may not like the color(they are tard like on the choice) but hey free paint!


JK bud looks kick azz! not a fan of green but I do like that dark metallic green with the woody look! NICE JOB!

 

Hey, thanks everyone. Green probably wouldn't have been my first choice either, but April really loves it and it's her car, and I don't hate it so it works out. I think it works well with the interior/woodgrain color. I can't wait to get some Pontiac Rallies on there; I think that will really set it off.

You know, Merc, I hadn't even thought about the fact that the door handles are part of the woodgrain trim and they'll be off color. I'm not sure I'd be able to get any woodgrain that will match the color. I spent quite a while going through books of color charts at the powdercoater's and I finally found one color that somewhat matched the original, kind of. I'm almost scared of how it's going to turn out.

I sincerely hope I don't receive any custom pinstriping or I might blow a gasket.

I'm anxious to see how the woodgrain will look. I still haven't ordered the clips to mount it and I still haven't found the missing pieces.

Today I attempted to find the ticking/knocking noise. It is definitely coming from the dust cover area. I took the cover off and tried the converter bolts but they were tight. Tomorrow I'm going to try the flywheel bolts. If that isn't it then I'll try to slide the converter back. If that stops the noise, I know I'm going to have big ole problems.

I also had some issues with the rear window tonight, but I'll post that in a separate thread...

 

The car looks awesome!!

 

Brandon, it seems like you could just prep, prime and then paint the front door handle insert sections with what your powdercoater used - that way it's an exact match just like the vinyl inserts for the rear doors is an exact match for the side panels.

 

61 that's gunna be one sweet lookin ride top job :2_thumbs_up_-_anima

 

Brandon: Check out this thread:

http://www.stationwagonforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25547

It may be a 74, so the rear moldings may be different than your originals, but if you got the ones for both sides, it would still look right! It may be a chance to get the moldings done on yours, and the ad says he has all of the moldings! Worth a look, maybe.

 

Hey Mike, I actually already bought the moldings from that car. The rears won't work at all. The end pieces sit further forward so the moldings don't line up with the tabs to attach them. The only parts that interchange are the doors and the one bottom piece on the front fender behind the wheel. I replaced a few of mine that were dented. Also, the rear tailgate ends are different.

 

Brandon did you start it with that cover off? it should be a metal cover? that could be it had that many times. slowly turn the engine over with a big screwdriver/prybar that "ticking" would leave marks on the flywheel if it is hitting anything. If it's not real loud it may be hard to see the bare metal unless u fresh painted the flywheel also so look real good.

 

The top of the tailgate has a rubber weatherstripping that was rotted on one end, allowing water to enter into the interior. Since this rubber is no longer made I searched the internet to try to find something I could use as a replacement. After searching several larger companies known for rubber products I finally found a couple I thought would work at Napa. Before I could install the new rubber I needed to deal with the old metal track that the rubber mounts into. The old track had rust inside of it that even the steel brush drill bit couldn't get rid of. That meant I had to get out the wretched sandblaster again. I had thought I was finished with it, but I was wrong. I truly hate using the thing.

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Napa didn't give any measurements on their website so I called my local store and had them order two different ones that looked close. The first ended up being about half the size in diameter that I needed, but the second one was as close as I could have hoped for. Here is the old shape on the right and the new on the left.

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I think it's a pretty close fit. Here's a piece of the old and a piece of the new installed in the track.

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Using the sand blaster meant I had to go to Lowe's one more time and buy some play sand to use in the sand blaster. I got this bag half off since it had a hole in it, which I then patched with duct tape.

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After sand blasting, primer and paint the track ended up sealed and protected.

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This is how the original weatherstripping was supposed to lay.

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The new weatherstripping was coiled into a circle in the box it came in. When I took it out, part of it unraveled and knocked one of the screws for the weatherstrip track down into the tailgate. I eventually had to remove this access panel to retrieve it. The screws to this panel were very difficult to remove and it took quite a while and involved several different tools, including an impact driver.

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As I began to test fit the new weatherstripping I found that the driver's side of the window was not meeting with the rubber. After determining that the tailgate was raised as far as it needed to be and that the weatherstripping was adjusted as it needed to be I found that the window itself was the problem. It was not lowering far enough on the driver's side, though the passenger side was fine.

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I found that I could take the window and pull it down by hand to where it needed to be, but there was play at the end of its travel that doesn't allow it to close completely. The first picture shows where the window rolls down to and the second picture shows where it should roll down to.

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It was getting dark and dinner was ready so I had to give up on the window for the day. The next day I moved on to a more pressing issue, the engine noise.

Because the engine had begun making a ticking noise which was getting worse I went ahead and installed the starter brace, hoping that might remedy the problem.

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Pictures I found on the internet showed the brace going from the starter to the motor mount. Because the bolt to the motor mount is right next to the rubber of the mount it took a very, very long time to get it out. I then found out that the brace was not supposed to use this bolt, but rather the hole next to it, which is seen in this picture, to the left of the motor mount bolt. This hole did not have a bolt in it when I first looked, so it was difficult to tell there was an empty bolt hole in this location.

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The starter brace didn't solve the problem. After crawling under the car while it was running I determined the noise was definitely coming from the dustpan cover area. I checked the converter bolts and they were tight. I wasn't able to check the flywheel bolts because the converter was in the way. I couldn't get the converter back far enough so I had to take the transmission loose and pull it back to check the flywheel bolts. They were also all tight. I called Gary and explained to him the issue I've been having with the transmission not going into gear when it is first started and about the noise. Hearing about the problems with the transmission and hearing that it was a Pontiac 400 transmission, he said it was time for a rebuild. Given the noise and the shifting problems I decided to go ahead and pull the transmission. If I am going to have to spend money on a transmission rebuild I decided to go ahead and put an overdrive in the car. It was supposed to be a future plan, but given the circumstances, it makes much more sense to go ahead and do it now. I was really, really looking forward to being done with this car, but now it appears the finish date has been prolonged.

For the transmission to come out, first, the brand new exhaust system had to come out. It was made so that it could be unbolted in front of the mufflers, however I wasn't able to separate the pieces where they were bolted together so I had to cut the hangers and drop the entire assembly. Getting this piece shoved under the '37 in the garage by myself was a chore.

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I spent the morning crawling under the car and checking converter bolts and flywheel bolts. When I did finally decide to pull the transmission and got to the transmission lines, they were frozen solid with age and even with a line wrench were trying to round off. I soaked them a few times with PB Blaster and went to lunch. When I returned the lines came loose and I continued working on the transmission removal. Dad happened to stop by and he helped me. It's a good thing he did because as most transmissions tend to be, this one was messy and tricky to deal with.

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After crawling in and out of the car the day before and all morning long the concrete started to make my arms and back feel as though they had been rubbed down with 40 grit sandpaper.

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I removed the driveshaft, thinking it might be tilted far enough back to not leak any fluid, however I was wrong. Fluid poured all over the driveway. I put a bucket under the tailshaft and dad and I worked on removing the yoke. Neither of us had experienced a U-joint such as this. We tried and tried and could not hammer it out. Dad called a mechanic at one of the shops and the mechanic told us that these U-joints have plastic in them that must be heated so that it can melt away. We did this and once heated the plastic shot out small holes on each side like a snake-in-the-candy-jar prank.

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First we heated, then we hammered. I almost lost an eye when part of the U-joint broke, so I got the old safety goggles out.

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It had been raining on and off all day and I actually got caught in the rain on the motorcycle when I went to lunch. It finally cleared away, but right as were were getting the transmission on the ground it began to come a flood out of nowhere. It only last long enough for us to get the transmission securely on the ground and out from under the car, but by that time we were already soaked. Then it stopped raining as quickly as it started.

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Now I have a lot of research to do to see what type of transmission I should install. It's hard to know because some people swear by the 700R4 and others swear by the 200R4 (or 200 4R as some call it). I suspect it will take quite a bit of searching and reading to determine which will best suit out needs.

 

I meant to add the part number for anyone that is interested in the weatherstrip molding I used, but it's out in the car. I can get it later if anyone is interested.