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AllTorque's 1970 Buick Sportwagon


AllTorque

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I could here a rumbling coming from the engine bay. Flicked the fan belts off and found the air con pulley bearing was super noisy. Seeing as the A/C has no gas anyway that belt can stay off for now.

The alternator bearing was a bit noisy too so I whipped the alt out.

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Replaced the front bearing and the brushes. The rear bearing is a needle roller bearing and was sweet.

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The battery cable from the alt has lost some of the insulation and had some tape on it, so I splashed out on some brand new insul tape. No expense spared.

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Success

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You'll notice the lack of sway bar link in the top pic. I have no idea how long that has been missing. We are taking the wagon up to palmy for Xmas tomorrow, so I managed to cobble together this junk as a temporary link using a long bolt, some tube and the washers and bushes from the old front shocks.

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Road test/Xmas road trip went well. So much better with new shocks and a connected sway bar. No bottoming out thanks to the air bag helper thingies.

Since then I have swapped around the tyres. I did have 225/70/15 front and 235/70/15 rear (7 & 8 " wheels) BFGs look cool but are rubbish, especially with a huge sidewall. I got some 205/70/15 8 ply tyres cheap from work and put them on the front. Moved the 225s to the rear. No more sidewall bulge. No more rub at full lock. A lot less sway around corners. Plus, a little lower at the front.

Difference in tyre height.

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First drive like this, unloaded, it's like a different wagon. Still a boat, but so much better.

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Hey I did something.

I noticed a driveline vibration at 100kmh. Checked the UJs and noticed a little side to side play. I ordered the best I could get from Rock Auto.

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Had them for a while. Finally got my arse into gear today. It went far to smoothly.

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It came with these wierd grease nipples that have a tiny thread, so I'll need to find some proper ones.

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Coming home from Swap Meat the other day, as I was getting close to home, I heard a little belt squeal come and go. When I was nearly there I saw the temp gauge pinned to max, so I gunned it up the hill to home and this happened.

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Water pump bearing collapsed. Had a little boil up but not too bad. It didn't loose much coolant until the engine was off. So I was straight onto RockAuto to order a new water pump.

Pulled off the fan and shroud. Plenty of room to work now.

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/\ check out the size of that radiator and double thick A/C condenser (I'll get the A/C going one day).

\/ Look at the state of it.

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Old junk off.

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While it was apart I flushed out the block, radiator and heater core. It's all pretty clean really.

New stuff on

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Put on some new fan belts too and replaced a little hose from the water pump to thermostat housing. Once I'm confident I haven't created any new leaks I will put some new antifreeze in.

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Dash lights have not worked for ages. I bought a new headlight switch a while ago but have been putting off doing the job because it's a bloody mission to get the instrument panel out.

I was stoked to find this page with some instructions and a clue to where the hidden dash pad bolts were. Because it needs to be removed.

http://www.buickperformanceclub.com/cluster.htm

Dash pad off

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Two hidden bolts at the top of instrument panel.

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Steering column needs to be dropped too.

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