"Fly Low" 1964 Buick Skylark revival

[tim222]

Here is the story behind this project, my 1964 Buick Skylark:

The Buick had lived "version 1" of its life as a family car until the factory engine gave up and the car was retired "out back".
My Grandpa found it while looking for a car for my Mom to use while she went back to college.
So he bought it and installed a replacement buick 300 and had a family friend repaint in the original 2 tone paint scheme.
The car came back from paint 2 weeks later with the base-coat only and the clear was still in the trunk "you can put that on" he said...
This would be "version 2" of the Buicks life, Mom put on about 100k in the 5 years she drove it until her new job in real estate dictated she upgrade to a newer car.

At this time I was a senior in high school and it was a perfect candidate for me to hot rod, the year was 1992.

This is what she looked like when I negotiated a deal and bought it from my Mom:

[tim222]

During "version 3" I may have been pretty rough on the old girl.
I ran the car thru every sort of shenanigan from 1992 thru 1997 very much embodying the reason for high teenage male insurance rates.
I ended up replacing the engine and trans over the years until shelving the Buick sometime in 1997.
It was relegated to the back corner of the pole building until a few weeks ago.

This is what I found after digging the Buick out of home renovation remnants and kids bicycle parts:

[tim222]

First Order of Business, Clean the car to figure out what all is going on.
Stinks like mice, not good start.

Outside after a quick rinse:

[tim222]

What I know so far:

1. Rust in trunk pan.
2. No Brakes
3. Right Rear brake frozen
4. sway bar knocked loose from frame
5. right rear lower control arm bent
6. quadra jet non-functional
7. 20 year old fuel
8. mice have been at interior
9. mis-match wheels
10. missing wheel studs 4ea.

Not real sure where to start just yet so I took a scotchbrite pad to the primer to clean out some of the misc. debris/chemicals from 20 years storage.

[tim222]

Rolling the car around on 3 wheels and one caster dolly was pissing me off so I decided to pull off the wheels and make car roll.
Plus I found some bitchen' 1990's wheels on CL.
The car now rolls!

[tim222]

Time to see whats going on with this drivetrain.
Engine code indicates 1972 buick 350, that's pretty much the same as I remember from the old timer who built it for me in the early 1990's
I wired an electric fuel pump up to a can of gas and got it to fire

[tim222]

Not sure if I will be keeping drive train, so on to interior.

Pulling it out:

[tim222]

Interior Floor Pans really quite good.
Look closely and you can see the reason for "fly low"

Remnants of 1995:

[tim222]

Gas smells quite bad after 20 years, so I decided to check out the tank.

I had forgotten that a had "farm fixed" my gas tank after a rock liberated my fuel on a back road many years ago:

[tim222]

This gets us caught up to about a week ago.
I have been working on the Buick about a month in the evenings after the kids have had dinner, household chores etc.

Gut Punch, the frame is broken at the joint of the upper control arm x-member passenger side:

[tim222]

Anybody who is good at this will have to forgive me, I'm learning as I go.
I dont think you can fix the frame with the body in place so....

Front clip is loose:

[tim222]

Lots of penetrating oil and dirt in my eyes later.

Body is loose from frame:

[tim222]

This gets me current to today.
I have never had a car this far apart before, I hope I can get it back together!

Looking for suggestions in the Spokane Washington area for frame blasting/coating?


Body Off:

[64G-lark]

Hi Tim,
Welcome to the forum. Looks like a great starting point. Glad to see another Skylark.

[chpr1972]

nice history! While the car and frame is separated put on new fuel and brake lines. Use the small brake lines . I made the mistake to use the large 1/4 bigger brake line to the rear and with Wilwood brakes I had to redo the lines. Also if you plan to later go big motor or fuel inject the car, put at least a 3/8 fuel line on it. I would put a 3/8 return line on it also. Point is think ahead on what you will do at a later date. Also when you have the frame repaired, have them weld all the rear mounts at the rear reinforced and welded solid.

[tim222]

Got the frame out where I could inspect it.
Sorry for the blurry picture

All damage appears to be limited to crossmember, it is totally separated from frame on right end
https://youtu.be/G9UIsYDhURA

Anyone care to chime in with similar findings on A-body frames?

[Dr. Evil]

Just keep at it. Always glad to see another early skylark on here.

[tim222]

Cleaned the frame a bit to find extent of damage:

[tim222]

Talked this over with a race car builder I know about stiffening repairing the frame.
He had some food insight, and concerns for metal fatigue where the crossmember had been flexing.

After some brief searching on ebay and CL for a new crossmember I decided to proceed with repair on existing parts.
I tried all kinds of abrasives to clean the frame, on every sort of tool.
What worked best for me was a 4-1/2 angle grinder with a norton blaze rapid strip abrasive.
These things are great:


Once the frame was clean I welded all the cracks and cleaned them up:


Now that the frame is back in one piece I will need to beef up the weakened areas.

[tim222]

I think that plating over the entire area where the flexing occurred is the best plan.
So I used some wrapping paper and a carpenters pencil to make a rough template of the repair plates.
I taped the paper to the frame and determine how far repair will extend.
Plates will leave enough room for weld bead to be just inside bend radius: