1983 Cutlass Calais “The Cripples Cruiser”

[fleming442]

Set the intake in dry (no gaskets) and slide it to one side. Observe the gap on the other head. If it's jacked, get the intake valley angle corrected; you'll be much happier. My BBO Performer was out .013 (measured with a feeler gauge) with the above method from the top to zero at the base. So, I had the machine shop take. 0065 from the bottom to the top off each side, and it was golden afterwards.

 

[Stupidquestionspro]

Don’t have a feeler gauge I should probably buy one though and I just did it by eye and feel as well as bolt hole alignment I’m fairly satisfied with how it finally sat in dry fit and believe it fits correctly now.

Also thanks for the kinds words let’s hope it’s fun otherwise why brave the stupid Florida weather and get bad gas mileage [emoji16]

Though no matter what I do it’s gonna sound nice and be a turd on the street with one wheel burnouts and terrible rear gears I think.

Oh well can’t wait for it to run better and to have time to start cutting on the interior for my stereo equipment. So sick of riding around listening to one head phone

Intake and valve covers on and torqued! Homemade advance bushing removes from the distributor and replaced with the lowest I can find for MSD 18 degrees.

I am in love with these felpro metal gaskets worlds better than the Mondello fiber ones though I may have gone slightly overboard on rtv hopefully that just means it stays sealed. For me RTV is like liquid duct tape.

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[Stupidquestionspro]

So today started out again finished painting the water pump had a few minutes so I repainted the oil tube and cap and radiator cap attempted to surprise my dad by painting the air cleaner lid black and gold ran out of gold paint and did an all around terrible job so I attempted to wipe the paint off then had to sand it and repaint it black and it looks terrible on one side so my intention is to put on a couple coats of black so it hides my bad work clear coat it and hide the ugly side at the back apparently I didn’t get as lucky with painting this time. Water pump is back in and tight with Teflon tape on the lower bolts that go into the timing cover to prevent any possible leaks starting to put the accessories back and and hoping and praying I bought the right water pump and pullies and it doesn’t take too much work to align everything.

Here in a few when the Florida weather stops screwing me over I’m going to attempt to drop in my first distributor ever so wish me luck on that one and then gonna start trying to button everything up and hope and pray that nothing leaks. I also have to change the oil because I’m an idiot and managed to accidentally get some stuff in the valley luckily small pieces and lucky me no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t keep coolant from seeping into the valley dang driveway on a hill! Luckily I had already bought the oil and filter for the change then I have to find out if the lower radiator hose fits or if I have to buy one and see if the belts that were purchased to make the wrong alignment and pullies work will still work with the car.

Unfortunately if I have to replace any of that I won’t be lucky enough to take advantage of rockauto because I kinda need this car tomorrow for my new job so guess I’ll have to pay more for convenience.

Pictures to come.


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[84dragcutlass]

Gotta give you a lot of credit at least you are diving right in there and learning. Ive always found thats the best way to learn how to do things is to tear into it and give it a shot.

 

[Stupidquestionspro]

Yea I usually figure things out fairly quickly and if not I ask all the stupid questions I can think of here if you don’t have knowledge you better at least know how to find it.

Very large setback at least in my opinion I didn’t consider now that all of my pulleys match the ac compressor in no way lines up so because I need the car running ASAP I’m going to leave the compressor belt off temporarily and space my alternator and put the rest together until I can come up with a new plan [emoji58]


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[Stupidquestionspro]

Today was one of those seemed like a good idea at the time moments. Started in the car around 8:30 or 9 am with my standard interruptions told my wife no matter what I’m driving the car to work tomorrow and I may work past 5 on it. I apparently underestimated by a lot and must be super slow at this plus of course being interrupted often but I didn’t finish and clean up until 11:40pm mind you most of that time was spent in the Florida sun in a wife beater and jeans so I’m down 10 lbs I’d sweat and have one hell of a redneck but the car is running idle set screws were vacuum tuned and base timing was reset to 22 because I changed the advance bushing. Idles weird to me though so I have a video for your opinions of what the hell.

in progress this was probably 10:30am prior to the discovery of my compressor fiasco.

starting to come together

Then after my huge time waster if getting the accessories lined up minus the compressor it was time to change the oil and fill the cooling system and that about the time I realized I ****ed up. Because my coolant was essentially running out of the water pump as fast as I poured it in the radiator. So fast forward probably being dramatic but 2 hours of cussing almost throwing things and multiple other frustrations. I grabbed my trusty rtv ultra black and used it like liquid duct tape it can fix anything which eventually I was able to fix it I think we shall find out in real world testing tomorrow.

now it was time to start it up and wouldn’t you know it it started and was running ok next thing I see if my fuel light pissing fuel so I obviously shut it down immediately and fixed that.

Then came time for tuning

Video of idle for opinions and knowledge collection will be in a separate post.

Finally it was tuned enough it should get me to work and back so I cleaned everything up

doesn’t look too bad I don’t think especially considering I lack experience,motivation and patience.

And now I’m writing this while I wait for my back to stop aching so I can sleep for work tomorrow.


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[fleming442]

It looks good, anyway! Stretch your hip flexors out after working under the hood (bent over). It works wonders for the lower back.

 

[Stupidquestionspro]

Thanks you should see the timing cover and underside of the water pump RTV everywhere

Yea a little sleep does the body good. I’m just glad I got it done I can’t believe how long I spent trying to get the pulleys lined up and the water pump sealed now I just have to figure out how to make the ac line up


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[Stupidquestionspro]

Here are the promised videos opinions on what the hell is up with my idle and sounds like slight miss would be appreciated also when I start the car or restart it will pop off but then die as if it’s out of fuel unless I give it gas and rev it a couple times then it will finally start to idle what’s up with that?


First start up once everything was together 22 base timing with the carb I think 3 turns out in park

https://youtu.be/HoZMSlBf46A


First start exhaust note for giggles and to see if there is any strangeness. Same settings as above vids true duals straight back not sure the mufflers at the moment
https://youtu.be/_df_ZS9ZjFE



After warming up idle is not great tried other timings 22 base seemed best. Also adjust fuel on the carb seems to be set too rich because the motor doesn’t try to die at all when a vacuum is left open also idles even worse with vacuum advance on full manifold vacuum. Yet again the motor has me very confused and never does a damn thing I expect or to me makes logical sense [emoji2959]

https://youtu.be/AxUio9L8I5s




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[Stupidquestionspro]

And this is why I hate doing dang gaskets and leaks the back of my intake is slightly leaking oil so time to bust out the RTV and I have a small oil spot under the oil pan so I’ll have to look into that [emoji58]


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