New Guy With 87 GP

[87GrandPrix]

I own a 1987 Grand Prix, 305 V8.

Heres some Pictures after I waxed all the chrome.
They are a little grainy Because I downsized them to 800x533

 

[DelOhio]

Welcome, Nice car!

 

[pontiacgp]

Welcome and good to see another GP member.....nice car and the front end looks alot nicer with no licence plate....

and I just noticed....you have the rally gauge option and power locks but crank windows....it makes me wonder sometimes what people were thinking of when ordering a car and why the salesman did not convince them to buy all the upgrades since they at least bought some.... :shock:

 

[Munkey B]

seriously nice car.

i've been contemplating white. love the white/blue combo.

oh yeah, welcome aboard. 😀

 

[dogsht]

Welcome nice ride upgrades planned?

 

[85 Cutlass Brougham]

I would paint the rockers black like GM did on most G bodies with wide lower body moldings. Nice car, BTW. It's nice to see a bucket seat and console car as they are getting hard to find.

 

[87GrandPrix]

Welcome nice ride upgrades planned?

.
Well heres the story on this car,

My Uncle John always redid cars in his own garage, well he was doing paint/body work for a guy he knows, but instead of asking for money, he asked for this car 87 Grand Prix instead, well it was all brown and needed some work, so he gradually started working on it. My uncle had lots of leg problem, arthritis, and the beginning of lung and colon cancer. He worked on this for a while until he found a 1964 Chevy Impala, he put alot of time and money into that as much as he could. Then his cancer got worse, he was in an out of the hospital everyday. after a few months and alot of chemotherapy he died. So my uncles sister and her husband (which would be my other aunt and uncle) which lived near my uncle john, and my uncles both worked together on projects such as.. 1971 el camino, 1956 Chevy Biscayne, 1985 Monte Carlo, 1946 Buick special, 1985 chevy truck. Anyways they sold me this car for 500 dollars. I put a new set of BF Goodrich 215/70R/14 tires on it and a new flowmaster exhaust.

Heres everything wrong with the car that Im aware of..

Air Conditioner doesnt work (it might just be that the belt isnt on or the condenser is shot)
Im missing the little covers on the door handle (pull thing) in the inside (passenger side)
the rear left fender was hit the day after my uncle painted it. Some stupid woman hit it so he layed some bondo on it and repainted it.. its bubbling now
the rear left frame rail where the lady hit is rusted through and almost busted off.. so my bumper will probably fall off one day if I hit a big enough bump
the exhaust manifold is leaking
the right side brake lines are about 50% rust
the passenger seat doesnt slide forward or back anymore.. something came loose.
power locks dont work
power mirrors dont work
passenger side foot light doesnt work


Im pissed off now that I typed all that.

 

[supercrackerbox]

Odd question perhaps: Do you have any pics of the trunk inside the quarter panels? Thanks. 😉

 

[supercrackerbox]

Most of those problems sound like easy enough fixes, just time consuming. The brake lines, quarter panel, and frame rail are the only really difficult ones. I'd start with the easier ones just to feel like you're making more progress, but that's just me.

 

[85 Cutlass Brougham]

I will give you some tips here to help you fix the easy stuff. First, if the A/C compressor is shot, the compressor won't turn. Try to manually turn the center of the pulley which is the part that is joined to the compressor input shaft. It should turn easily by hand with no tools. The pulley will always turn if there is no belt on it as it rolls on a bearing as an idler pulley when the magnet does not pull the outer piece in to hit it. If this works, try putting some refrigerant in it that has the green UV dye in it. This will help you find a leak if one exists. Just don't put R134a in a system that has R12 in it or bad things will happen. I have a future article planned on how to do a conversion once I get that far with my car. (will be in my build thread)

As for the power locks, that is probably just dirty or worn switch contacts. I just rebuilt a bunch of these and took pictures for a later article on how to do it. Basically, it is just a rocker that hits two long metal strips. One hits an unlock contact point, the other hits the lock contact. Usually these contacts get dirty or worn and that is why the locks stop working. I would first try cleaning the contacts with a little sand paper. If that doesn't fix it, bend the contact tip down just a little and they should work. The contact bend is needed if the plastic rocker gets worn and won't push the contact down all the way.