1955 Buick Special Custom - 03
4/18/13 - cruise night
After work, came home, changed clothes & took the car over to pick up the kids at taekwondo. Rode with Evan over to Freddy's / Firehouse Subs for cruise night. It was even a little chilly with all the windows down. Was able to pull right through into a facing-out place. Someone Carol knows posted that turn-out was kinda low, but I thought it was pretty good having not been there before. I could see people walking by the car and even heard some comments, but with the kids (and we were looking at the other cars), I didn't talk with anyone about it. Brought Lila home in it, and she asked for the windows to be up. I got to driving a little and still felt a healthy breeze - the climate control vents were set on "summer", so the firewall was open. Closed that and it stayed reasonably warm even with no heaters connected in the car.
In this side view, I'm surprised at how much longer and lower the roof line looks compared with the angled view above. To get a truer profile, I need to be back farther and use zoom on the camera lens - that should capture how far the front bumper cones really stick out there. I couldn't do that here because I was already backed up into a tree on the edge of the parking lot.
Oh yeah - finally saw that bullet hole sticker on the rearview mirror...
There's someone taking a picture right there (in front of the car)...
Somebody likes that car...
Ok, so that's just getting silly...
4/19/13 - wheels/tires
Went to Discount Tire, where the previous owner told me he had originally gotten the spline-drive lug nuts. Yes, they had the driver for the lug nuts, no problem. But they told me the tires are from 1994 and 1995 - old enough where the tires need to be replaced. Obviously not very many miles on them, and the side walls are not cracked probably due to long-term inside storage, but I looked between the tread blocks. There is cracking there. So I had them price out a set of tires with all their warranty and such. Figured I would get tires at some point, but may as well get it over with. They didn't have the tires I wanted in stock, so I need to call them a couple days ahead so they can bring the tires in.
Before I went to the tire place, I had put a charger on the battery - not sure if the battery is old or if the alternator's not making power. The ammeter in the original dash instrument shows Charge (barely) when it's running, but the voltmeter hangs between 12.5 and 12V. I would expect at least 13 for a reasonable charge, and 12-12.5 may just represent the battery on its own. So add battery & possibly alternator to the list...
