In late May, I was finally able to get the Buick back to the house and clean it up for the summer. It took about 30 hours of work broken up into miscellaneous nights and weekends to get it back to how I always keep it during the normal driving season.
Then I was I was supposed to drive it a few hours away for a weekend excursion at Lebanon Valley Dragway's Muscle Palooza. That never happened. I went to the event anyway, but the Buick stayed home. Two reasons kept me from taking the Buick. The first was the possibility for rain that weekend. The second was that I had not had the opportunity to road test the new TR-6 setup and breather assemblies to the point of confidence. So instead, I covered the car and tucked it away.
Soon after Muscle Palooza I left for Italy. I spent nearly two weeks in Europe before coming home to the construction industry madness of school construction and renovation in the Summer time. This weekend the temperature in New York soared into the high 90's with "real-feel" temperatures well over 100. Most people use this as an opportunity to remain indoors and air conditioned.
NOT ME!
I used this weekend to finally take the opportunity to test the Buick under the worst driving conditions possible.
Yesterday during the hottest portion of the day, I let it idle, spent time in stop and go traffic, took it out on the highway, and then drove it to a cruise night before finally getting it home around 8:30 p.m.
Today, it was even hotter. So I took it to a car show and won a trophy for Best Engine. Afterwards I cruised it up I-684 and leaned on it pretty hard for a few data logs. I even had the balls to turn the boost up!
Afterwards, I reviewed the data logs and I returned to the garage and conducted a close inspection.
This is what I found............
It appears as if my breather assemblies have truly performed flawlessly! The tubing does not appear to be stressed or softened by the vibration or heat. Crankcase pressure must be venting freely because I am no longer blowing my dipstick tube up and I am no longer blowing oil out of my rear main seal. I was afraid I would smell oil vapor in the car because the vent breathers are so close to the windshield. This has not happened. No oil smell!
My Individual EGT monitoring is showing me the smoothest cleanest lines it ever has. I assume this may be due to the fact that in previous recordings, with the stock coil pack, there may have been slight missing and cutting out. With the TR-6 and Holley/Pantera coils this is not happening.
Not that any of this has anything to do with the TR-6 install, but I also noted the following.................
My hot idle oil pressure hasn't changed in 12 years.
My coolant temperature never climbs above 171. And that's only for about thirty seconds after the fan comes on. Most times, even in traffic, it sat at a solid 168.
Tranny temperatures can quickly climb above 220 degrees. But after turning on my tranny cooler fans they never again went higher than 185 degrees.
Highway cruising air temps were in the 115 degree area. 3 seconds of boost and alky was bringing the air temps to near 70 degrees. I'm okay with that on a 98 degree day.
And now for the one concern I have................
I am noticing that the bolts holding my coils on are loosening very slightly after a few hours of driving. When I give the coils a wiggle I can barely feel they have become un-snug. A quarter turn with the nut driver seems to alleviate the situation. However, I'm not sure if a split lock washer will do the trick, or if the copper is just too soft to grip the threads, or if the solder is giving up, or whatever. But I'm certain that the current set up will be more than adequate for the remaining season. Either way, I have already figured a quick fix for this problem. If they continue to show signs of loosening I will just install longer bolts that thread through the coil bracket to the bottom and then install lock nuts there. This only slightly changes the design because now I will have to remove the coil bracket to access the lock nut at the bottom to remove an individual coil. No big deal though. I can live with that.
So in conclusion, life is good for now. The Summer has begun. And now all I need to do is drive it and keep it clean until the Fall. Then it will be time to take some more shit apart and create some new nightmare project that will need to be completed for next Summer.
Here's a few pictures from today's car show.