1958 Buick Caballero

New Year's update

Update 2015.01.05

I have made some progress recently...

I pulled the intake manifold and the valley pan; everything looked very good.
No stuck valves, all lifters looked clean and appeared to move smoothly, but I could only get about 90 degrees of rotation on the crank before it came to a hard stop.






I used a borescope to look into the cylinders, but I could not get a good look at the combustion chambers and cylinder walls.
I figured I had to tear it down further anyway, so I pulled the heads.



The obstruction was rust in the #8 cylinder.



A few minutes with some Marvel Mystery Oil and a soft wire brush and the engine was spinning smoothly.



Next step is to get it to a professional for cleaning/magnaflux and re-fresh.
It doesn't look like it needs to be bored, but I won't know for certain until it's cleaned and measured.


Picked up a parts car just before Christmas. It has a lot of stuff that I need, and some stuff I wanted.
It had a split folding rear seat; the only one I've ever seen; pretty cool!




Started cleaning and prepping the grille inserts. I haven't decided if I can live with the original chrome or if they need to be re-plated.
There is a little bit of pitting and some "desert sand-blast" spots on the faces of the grille diamonds.





Hubcaps off the parts car look very nice when they're cleaned up. Still need some TLC/polishing, but I'm going to be able to use them.





I took the opportunity to try out my recently-acquired ultrasonic cleaner.
Here's the carb as it was being disassembled:





Into the tank:




After 25 minutes in hot water & Pine Sol:





On the third batch of parts, the cleaning solution was less effective, but I'm very happy with how it worked.
The internal passages are clear and I only need to do a little "touch-up" where the varnish was thickest in the bottom of the float bowls.

More soon!

 

Joe..looking good my man. Ultrasonic cleaner? Where the heck did you pick that up? Very cool..let's try to get together soon. 1957buickjim

 

For the pits in the grille, this guy has the right stuff and DIY videos:

http://muggyweld.com/

I've bought stuff from him. Good products. good service.

 

Nice update. Looking good so far. The ultrasonic cleaner is doing a great job.
Tell us more about it.

 

I have been thinking about getting an ultrasonic cleaner for a while now. I've seen how well they work on jewelry and have been reading about their use for cleaning auto and motorcycle parts. They are popular with weapon restorers and ammo re-loaders, too.

I programmed a search on eBay and I bid on one that was big enough to handle a carburetor throttle body.

I got a bare-bones Branson unit. It's got a 9 or 10 liter tank and just a simple on/off switch. No heater or timer, but I was willing to go without any bells and whistles.

When it arrived, I used a recommended function test. Fill the tank with water, suspend a piece of aluminum foil in the solution and run the unit for 60 seconds and then for an additional 30 seconds. After 90 seconds, the foil should be full of holes. It worked; check out the picture.


I tried using it on a few engine accessory brackets. It worked OK, but it took a long time. I don't want to use any flammable solvents or strong alkaline detergents, so the greasy brackets took forever to clean.

You can damage/destroy the sonic heads or the attachment to the tank if you let the parts rest on the bottom of the tank, so I use wires to suspend the parts in the cleaning solution. Works well.

I think it's going to be a great tool.

 

Thanks!
I poked around their website; looks like good stuff.
Did you do any die cast repairs? What kind of torch/heat supply did you use?

 

I've seen how well they work on jewelry and have been reading about their use for cleaning auto and motorcycle parts. They are popular with weapon restorers and ammo re-loaders, too.

Thanks. Forgot. I've heard about this.

 

Great pictures, Great text.

Hi,
Thank you for posting details of the project. What a great looking wagon and good luck with the work. I wish there were vehicles like that here in the UK that were available for restoration. Please keep up with the posting if possible I've really enjoyed reading it so far!
Rusty1

 

Using my visual micrometer, there's not enough of a ridge for requiring boring. One sees it clearly, on that cylinder you scrubbed. Either the engine's already been redone or it's been well maintained. Glaze breaking should be enough for that rusty cylinder

 

I love it...visual micrometer!
Yes, it appears to have been well maintained.

 

Excellent thread Joe, thanks.

 

Thanks, Jennifer!

 

September, 2015 update

My, how time flies....

Wow...summer's essentially over and it's almost embarrassing to admit how little I have accomplished on the Caballero.

Inspection of the engine revealed corrosion that was too deep to clean up with a hone, so it needed to be bored .030".
The heads checked out great.







Engine assembly will be beginning soon (September).

Re-built starter and generator



All engine brackets and tin parts (air cleaner, rocker covers, heat shields, etc) were bead blasted and prepped for paint.

The air cleaner base will require some additional work to repair some rust pitting and pinholes.

The oil pan drain plug area also required some repair due to a significant dent just ahead of the drain plug.

I removed the fuel tank and got a very unpleasant surprise.

Apparently, someone tried to tow the car when the transmission had been removed. That let the rear axle basically stay at rest until the front of the gas tank crashed into the differential case.

At that point, the gas tank became the push bar for the body and the forces were sufficient to put a nice imprint of the differential into the front of the gas tank. Ouch...


I haven't cut it open yet, but the plan is to cut two large windows in the top of the tank so the damage can be worked out from above/inside the tank.

The dash has been removed and the steering column comes next.


Speedometer needs to be rebuilt. Cool piece; it shows a traveling red band in the slot to indicate vehicle speed.

I bumped out the dents and creases in the front fenders and they are at the media blaster to be blasted and primed.

Had to drill out all the spot welds and remove the front fender reinforcements due to corrosion below the headlights. I've seen much worse, but I was hoping this would not be this bad.



All the front end sheet metal (core support, fender liners, fan shroud, etc) was disassembled, media blasted and powder coated satin black.
Looks great!





The radio was refurbished by Kim Kusluski in Grand Blanc, MI. Works great!

More soon.

 

You may have not done much. But it's coming along great. Too bad about the fuel tank. More work!
Did you know that after the speedometer gets all the way over to the right it tips on it's side?
After awhile it flips upside down. Not sure, I think it's silver on the back.
Have no idea how fast that is but the telephone poles become a blur!

 

Great work. Thanks again for posting. Once again, I am really enjoying the thread!