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My first Buick was a 1964 Le Sabre coupe, Tawny Mist, 300/2bbl, ST300. Got it for $300 in Houston TX in 1976.
Second Buick I bought from a good friend when I was in the USAF at Eglin in 1978. 1964 Special 2 door post with 300/2bbl, ST300 and those really long peg leg 2.78 gears. Paid $750 for it.
It was his dad's car, and it had just been repainted (original black) and had the black and white interior.
I could not find a good (affordable) Buick mill to replace the 300, and just had the "need for speed", being in the "high speed, low drag" world. So I found a 1965 Olds F-85 with a 3 on the tree and 3.08 posi and figured, for $125, it was a good deal.
I had no idea...
Turns out the lady I got it from had a "head job" done, and withing a month, it started burning oil worse than before, so she decided to sell it and move on. I bought it, drove it home, pulled the engine and took it to a friend who had a machine shop to inspect and tell me if it was usable.
Found a few things.
1. Block was in great shape, and he did all the machine work.
2. Found the heads were not the original, the "head job", was knurled valve guides on a set of heads that the shop the lady took it to, swapped, to "save her some money", but did not last long before the engine started sucking oil again (and she parked it). But, the good news! The heads were "F" heads from 1970 W-30 engine. Now I did not realize what I had, but was looking up any and all numbers I could find in every Hot Rod mag, and library article, and talking to everyone I knew about cars, and realized I just lucked out.
Had a friend that did porting and polishing work in a machine shop, before he joined the USAF and he took the heads and a 4bbl intake from a 1970 Cutlass junk car I bought for $50 and did the porting and gasket matching for me for free.
I was also working part time at the local salvage yard and was able to get parts for nearly nothing. (more on this later...)
During this I had gone to a local auto parts store that a retired USAF guy and wife just built and opened, and he took a liking to me and asked if I wanted to open a 30 day account with him. I was happy that he offered this to a very young kid and accepted. So, I picked his and his counter guy's brains and learned a few things, met some people that helped me find information sort of the "perfect storm" (now that I look back).
After discussing things, I decided to build the Olds engine to W-31 Olds 350 specs.
Bored the engine .30 over, Sealed Power Chrom Moly rings. TRW 10.25:1 pistons, Melling .475/328 cam with 108 overlap, and once I bought that 1970 Cutlass, not only did I have the intake matched to the heads, I rebuilt the Q-jet, took the disk brakes, spindle, booster, master cylinder and a few other parts.
Pulled the rear end from the f-85. #.08 posi, and three speed Saginaw.
Had a "road warrior" welder guy come out and cut the Z-bar bracket from the f-85 and weld it to the Special for $25.
I pulled both rear ends form the Buick and Olds, and put the Olds stuff in the Buick.
After having all the block work done, I brought it home, carried it into the house and started putting it all together. Then the wife and I carried it out to the car, laid it on a sheet of plywood and I used a cherry picker to lift and stuff it in the Buick. (I just did a similar thing with my 1964 Skylark with a 401, T10, Strange Dana S60 and all new suspension) and let me tell you, 40 years ago, I was a badass strong sumbitch, and I cannot believe how much these parts have gained weight! Wife and I carried a short block out of the house, down the steps and 40 feet to the car, and now I damned near broke my wrinkly old man balls just trying to lift a bare 2x4 intake and set it on the engine in the Skylark! Got to be some increase in gravity due to global warming, fake news or Rooskies hacking...
Anyway, got the pig all back together and fired it up, engine stuck at 1500 RPM and I could not adjust the Q-jet below that. Dicked around for about 10 minutes and noticed the temp getting to about 210-220 and I started getting worried, So I grabbed the garden hose and started hosing down the radiator, and got it down to about 200 and popped the cap and stuck the hose in the radiator. (still had the stock 300 downflow, with inlet/outlet on the same side).
After about 20 minutes, and not able to get the RPM down, I shut her down.
Pulled the radiator and took it to the local radiator shop and they built me a custom crossflow (pretty much a GS clone) and I modified the top plate to hold it in place.
That fixed the "heat" issue.
Pulled and found on the carb, that when I reassembled, the primary plates were not aligned before I tightened the screws on the shaft and the plates were not closing. Fixed that.
New radiatior, carb back on, and fired up and it settled down to 1100 RPM, and ran like a sewing machine.
I tried lower RPM, but it just "felt" like the engine was loping too much and not a "good" gut feeling.
Some people really like that heavy lope, but it just seemed to be "lugging" rather than running "free and easy" so I left it at 1100 and drove it like that for 5 years, and it seemed "happy" enough.
Drove it around to "break it in", and after a few weeks, realised that the 3 speed was just not going to cut it.
And started "looking at options" (none withing the budget of my young and meager military paycheck...)
But one day, at my "part time junk yard gig", in rolls a truck dragging a 1974 Vega and it was a 4 speed! So I did some checking with the cross reference and found it would work. So I paid $25, pulled it and took it home and swapped it out. Then I had to go buy another "Mr. Gasket" comp (Hurst clone) shifter and I took it for a spin.
OMG! Ran like a scalded dog! Found the Saginaw had a 3.50 first gear and I could pull about 45 in first about 7k RPM (well, the red line of the tach was at 7k, so I figured, WTH, let's see if it will do that).
That was about all I did in the "motorin' department" and drove the car like that (except I put in a heavier clutch and pressure plate behind the 4 sp, just to be sure...)
Drove it hard and had fun for several years, then gave it to the first wife when we split. (And, yeah, I miss both of them, to be honest...)
The ex fared better than the car. About a year after we split, she tried to "push start" a dump truck, her doing about 45 and shifting to second, when the 20 yard dump truck turned out form a side road and she tried to "PIT" the thing (she really tried to get to the other lane, but just did not get enough zig in her zag).
She sold the car, and I saw it about 6 months later with a blue front righ fender and no grill. Yeah, had dreams about that car every once in a while over the past, nearly 40 years.
So, I went and bought me another 1964, this time, Skylark, white, Convertable.
300/2bbl, ST300 and them damned granny gears, so....
401, 2x4, T-10 wide ratio, Strange 3.54 S-trac, and all new UMI suspension and Wilwood discs....
If you ever get bit by the 'cat, your done for life.
It's only a matter of time (and money).
And the 'cat, will take all you have of both...
