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Pontiac of the Month

FBIRD69's 1969 Firebird

2024 March
of the Month

Last Indian

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Everything posted by Last Indian

  1. Well, you could get a catheter bag, alien tape it to the side glass & run a line to the carb!
  2. Can you only drive it if you get a birdie!
  3. Well you could always drive it with a gas bottle hung from an IV pole!
  4. JustA, the Indian has hush panels that have foot well lighting. So I pulled that panel on the drivers side popped a hole in it the size of the body. Machined a couple large plastic washers to use on each side of the hush panel, as they are JustA pressed mat material, pretty flimsy with regard to strength. In those panels are a 194 bulb & socket. So I crimped these type of connectors on the lights wiring, pulled the bulb then on the backside of the socket pushed these into the socket & electrical taped it up for a secure assembly. This way the light works with all the other interior lighting. The other light has a bad led so I’m going to do some work on this light & see if I can build a brighter image, one that might be seen in the day light. As well as be readily replaced. I’ll keep you posted.
  5. Well hasn’t been much play time this year, but ’finally got around to JustA’s gift from way back when! Only got one side in so far and not sure how often I’ll see it! It’s kind of invisible in the daylight, but pretty neat at night or a dark garage!
  6. You can find them on ebay. Not a place I go to, but you do what you have to. The part # is 19207392. It fits “01” - “05” Aztec, “95”-“05” Sunfire, “99”-“05 Grand Am & “04”-“08” Grand Prix. So you might also try so bone yards. With so heat & patients you can extract one of a front cover. Then you’ll need to replace the two sided tape on the back.
  7. Thanks for sharing Paul, beautiful cars! Always nice to see what’s going on over on the other side of the world! Your girls are beautiful too!
  8. I will say this about your top question! Not always, but more the rule than not, there is usually more that one way to skin a cat as they say! So while I do not the the top & it’s mechanisms very well I would say there is a way to lower or raise the top with out power! And the switch that Frosty speaks of might be able to be changed to another type of device. Presuming this to be true now would be a good time, before a failure, to determine what those two things might be. For example, the top has to have some type of scissor arrangement. That must be connected in some manner to a drive of some kind. Disconnecting that drive & or it’s components might release the top to enable it to be moved manually, give you have the right force. For example, a small 12v gear drive with the right connection or a simple breaker bar with the right interface connection & the right leverage. The sensor might be able to be replaced with micro switches that would need brackets made & attached in proper locations + whatever wiring that would require. Hopefully you see the point here! If you plan to keep the car long term now is the time to figure out what those things need to be or start acquiring the needed parts to replace bad ones if you can. My two cents!
  9. Unfortunately there is no provision to operate the top manually. So much so that if the top is in between full up & full down the vehicle must towed by flatbed & must be facing backwards to prevent a lift effect resulting in damage.
  10. Looks great Nathan! The MS2000 platform is the most underrated of the modern era FWDs. Yet specifically the Grand Prix is even more so, as there are specific parameters that are different from the other divisions. With the right modifications the car, I call the last Indian, the Pontiac Grand Prix 1997-2003, can rival many of the muscle car era cars, both in looks & performance.
  11. Frosty, to be clear I never did this repair so I don’t know what the dealer did. My daughter owned a 91 Grand Prix 3.4 & her car suffered the vacuum leak! What a headache. Her car did the the high rpm on startup for about a month. Every time she took the car to the dealer, by the time she got there the issue had resolved. Finally I went over to her place two different weekends to try & figure it out. Second weekend I took some ether with me. Took about 5 minutes in zero temps to find. I could actually see the small gap in the intake once I found it. Finally got the dealer to keep it overnight outside, but the car was under warranty so I don’t know what they did. Also had two different friends that had 3.4 who had coolant leaks from the intake, but again while I found their leaks I didn’t fix them so I don’t know what the outcome was. Sometimes I just assume that folks do the easy checks, hoses, fitting connections, radiator, etc. So I often don’t mention them, but of course those should be checked first.
  12. I believe you mean 3.4L & the 3400 are notorious for intake coolant leaks. Very difficult to find most of the time as the engine is really stuffed in. Lots of times in the very cold weather if the car sits out they will go into a very high idle because they also will get a vacuum leak because the intake is actually warped. So until the engine equilibrate to temp it stay high. Often times it’s simpler to just redo the intake.
  13. I believed you on the 1”, It’s just been a long long time & I had it stuck that I remember 7/8”. That said the 9” is the right size, but the 8” should be good too. On your brake pedal there should be two holes for the celvis pin. Which hole do you currently have it in? Also, how much free play do you have?
  14. One last thought. I know you say your is standard at 1” for 4 wheel drum power, but that’s not what I remember. I believe they were a 7/8 piston period. The upgrade was a booster on a 7/8 master cylinder. 1” piston was for disc front drum rear & 1 1/8 for 4 wheel disc, which was only available for the Camaro Z/28 j8 option.
  15. Have you tried removing the vacuum line from the booster to make it a manual system to see how it brakes? A 1” bore is a big bore. And the 1 1/8” is huge, that’s in the realm of 4 wheel disc brakes duel piston!
  16. Anything is re-buildable, but there comes a point where cost out weighs desire! I think your there! Cheaper to find a new carcass & start with that.
  17. Are you sure you have the vacuum line connected? If so are you sure you have it connected to the correct manifold vacuum not Venturi vacuum? And have you put a vacuum gage on the hose to know what vacuum it is pulling? Have you checked pedal free play? There is much more, but start there.
  18. It looks like your booster is an 11”. That’s to big for 4 wheel drum. You need no more than a 9” single diaphragm booster for that application.
  19. Beautiful Tim! Love the commitment to detail! Love to see that no matter how twisted this world gets, there are those who understand that the pinnacle of design is just that! Can’t be improved on! Only repeated perfectly! Which is often more difficult than the original concept!
  20. If it was mine, I’d JustA put in a Cloyes timing set! Noise coming from the timing gear/chain would be the last thing I would hear over the rumbling exhaust! JustA kidding!
  21. Not cool Kiwi! My prayers are with you & hope you recover quickly! Sick is never fun no matter the ailment, but things like sever diseases, extreme pain, heart, stroke & breathing are always of utmost concern! So take care of you first! Than you can play!
  22. Simple explanation also is pcv system replaced a draft tube. Cylinder blow by pressurizes the crank case. This needs vented. Tree huggers wanted those emissions captured instead of releasing them to the atmosphere. So they took the draft tube, in a manor of speaking, connected it to the intake manifold through a valve. In doing that you create negative pressure & in time would suck all the oil that became vapor out of the crank case. So they needed to equalize the pressure to zero or as close as possible. The fresh air supply originally came from the air cleaner to the valve cover & down to the crank case. Most hot rodders disconnected that connection & put in breathers. Sometimes in one sometimes in both. The main problem this caused was engine sludge & carbon buildup on various parts. These problems precipitated major changes in engine oil chemistry.
  23. Still need to decide on what I’m using for a backlight & how I might install the Pontiac light JustA gave me. My idea is it will illuminate the trunk floor or side wall. Not sure yet or if I can even get it to work the way I want. This is the cover installed in the trunk.
  24. Thanks guys! This whole thing isn’t much of a deal, but that’s all I real have time for right now. As crazy as that sounds being retired & all, but it is what it is.
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