New member from Canada.

Let us know who you are, where you are, what kind of toys you have.
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PhilR
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New member from Canada.

Post: # 15355Post PhilR »

I subscribed after a friend told me about this site.

I have a few consoles, nothing fancy. A few Canadian RCA Victor solid state and hybrid consoles, a Zenith console/TV combo, two small German Saba tube consoles and a few more receivers and radios and old color TV sets.

Most of the stuff I have was made before I was born (in 1977), that includes cars, appliances etc.
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15359Post William »

Welcome, PhilR, we are happy to have you on board. It sounds like you have a nice variety of toys so please share some photos and stories of how you acquired and restored your treasures. We have a good membership here on the forum, so anything old, cars, appliances, vacuums, but especially electronics, are welcome topics. Please jump in with both feet and have fun.

Bill
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15367Post electra225 »

Welcome, PhilR. We have the friendliest group of folks on the internet here on our forum. Jump right in and make yourself at home. :D
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15370Post Hi-Fi-Mogul »

Yes, welcome PhilR !

And we love to see photos of your gems.
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15373Post Firedome »

That friend was me!
Phil is my great vintage appliance friend who's also a real car guy.
We visit each other in VT and QC a lot, he's coming here tomorrow!
He'll pick up a vintage Buick part being shipped to our camp.

He has a '65 Wildcat, '67 Riviera GS, and '75 Electra with airbags!
He's restored all of them himself and Canadian cars require a lot!
Hopefully he'll share some pics of them, they are real beauties!

I've ridden in all 3 and he knows how to make them run right!
He's done a lot including adding many accessories and features.
He even knows how to make GM auto climate control work !
He has several consoles, vintage TVs, and LOTS of appliances,
He also has an amazing MCM house once built by the Chrysler
dealer in his small town.
Welcome Phillipe!
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PhilR
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15383Post PhilR »

I have to say I'm not too good at fixing electronic stuff!

And while I did minor fixes on my 75 Buick's Automatic Climate Control, I gave up on the idea of trying to fix it on a 1967 Buick that had it (I parted out that car and the only a/c part from that car that went in mine was the evaporator!). I installed the a/c controls from another car that had manual controls in mine that came from the factory without a/c.

I have a few pictures of my stuff on two Flickr accounts.


https://flickr.com/photos/33723086@N02

https://flickr.com/photos/50488533@N00
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15388Post TC Chris »

Lots of cool stuff!! When I got to the photos of the Honeywell relays, I grinned. My boiler stopped heating last winter, during a cold snap, of course. At first I was a afraid it was the circulating pump, but then I noticed some corrosion on a gate valve directly above the relay and yes, then I saw water on top of the relay box. And inside. The boiler tech confirmed: dead. Drowned. He had one in the truck. Lesson: don't let anybody install a valve directly over an electric device.

Chris Campbell
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15391Post William »

Wow, so many photos and now so many questions on my part. I will wait though until you get settled, and you share some individual items in the appropriate threads. I'm sure curiosity is with us all, well except maybe Roger. ;) ;) :)

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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15396Post electra225 »

It is nice to have another Buick guy on the forum. I've had a '63, '68, a '71 and a '74 Electra in my day. The '68 was the fastest, the '71 was the plushest, and the '74 was perhaps the worst car Buick ever built, maybe the worst car GM ever built. It was the prettiest one, Firemist Metallic (the 1974 version of Garnet Red) with tan vinyl top and interior. It was a Limited and had every option except air bags. The '63 must be my favorite, since I still have it. A Pinto with a five-foot head start would run off and hide from the Stage 1 455 in the '74 Limited. The '68 was a Limited and it was a hotrod for a big Buick. The only thing I wouldn't try was outrunning anything its size with a 429 V-8 in it, regardless of maker. Or a 472 Cadillac. It had a 3:42 Positraction axle and would run like a scalded dog.
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15397Post PhilR »

That's a really nice car! I've only drove one 1963 Buick and it was a LeSabre 4 door hardtop with the low compression 2 barrel 401.

I much prefer the Electra from that year to the B bodies, the rear quarters and taillights are much nicer.
I really like the looks of the 1974 Electra, unfortunately, 1974 wasn't the best year for power and the quality had dropped significantly from what it was in the early 1960s. I guess not many Electras came with the Stage 1 option that year. The great thing about the Stage1 package is that it also included the HEI which was otherwise optional that year. I had a 1974 LeSabre, a $500 base hardtop coupe that I was driving in winter, It had no power options, no a/c and and a 350 with the 4 barrel carb (one of the few options it had!). It was painted Sand Beige when I got it but I couldn't stand that color and I repainted it red which was one of my favorite 1974 colors. I also like the dark blue but I thought it wouldn't look too good with the tan interior so I went for the red! Being a Canadian car, it didn't have the "seat belt starter inerlock" like most 1974 and early 1975 models had in the USA. While it felt light and well balanced and it was nice to drive, but the engine was underpowered and the emission stuff didn't help. And the 1975 455 isn't better, but at least the catalytic converter allowed to get rid of a few of the other anti-pollution stuff they had in 1974!

My first car was a '68 Wildcat Custom hardtop sedan. It also had the performance axle option, 3.42 posi. My '67 Riviera GS also has that but it was standard on the GS.

My current 1965 Wildcat has the posi axle too but with the standard 3.07 ratio which I like for highway cruising. It has the standard 401 with a single 4 barrel Carter AFB with the ST-400 which was also standard in Canadian Wildcat models. For 1965-67 the ST-400 also had the variable pitch torque converter (the 1964 400 transmission didn't have it and after just 3 years it was again replaced with a fixed stator on the 1968 ST-400). The Electra has the 2.73 posi and even less power than the 1974 non Stage1 model! It also has the "Firmride" package which does improve the handling.

I took those pictures years ago but I still have the 3 cars on the first picture. None of them are show quality but they are nice drivers and I like when every accessory works! Since we're on a HIFI forum, I've included pictures of their radios! :-)
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PhilR
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15398Post PhilR »

TC Chris wrote: Tue Jun 20, 2023 9:35 pm Lots of cool stuff!! When I got to the photos of the Honeywell relays, I grinned. My boiler stopped heating last winter, during a cold snap, of course. At first I was a afraid it was the circulating pump, but then I noticed some corrosion on a gate valve directly above the relay and yes, then I saw water on top of the relay box. And inside. The boiler tech confirmed: dead. Drowned. He had one in the truck. Lesson: don't let anybody install a valve directly over an electric device.

Chris Campbell
When I bought my house, I had already ordered a few replacement RA832A relays as two were not working anymore and two of the 3 zones didn't work (the previous owner of my house was just plugging electric heaters instead of fixing it). I didn't bother replacing the old covers but the original relays with the hard brittle wires are gone, I didn't throw them out! I also had to fix the aquastat that's on the (newer) gas boiler as the heat failed just a few days after I moved in January, it was just a bad solder connection for the relay, I got a replacement one but never had to use it. And since I got plenty of NOS spare relays but the very old ones usually have bad wires. I also got a few NOS circulator pumps and a complete spare boiler of the exact same model in case mine ever fails.
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15399Post William »

OK, I'm trying to figure out your Avatar. It has a tuner, push buttons, and a joy stick????

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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15401Post PhilR »

Here's a larger view of it.
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15402Post electra225 »

1968 Buicks did have the variable-pitch torque converter. That was the last year. IMHO, the 430 was the most potent Buick engine ever built. Couple it with TH 400 and the 3:42 axle, it was a potent drivetrain option. My '63 is probably as fast as the '68 was, but wasn't as fast off the line, due to the Dynaflow transmission. The 455 never was the performer the 430 was. Buick loaded the 455 with all kinds of go-fast goodies, but I was never impressed. The '71 Limited coupe I had was ALMOST as peppy as the '68. The '74 was a huge disappointment. The sales manager at Bob Catterson Buick in Indy ordered the '74 I had, then his wife didn't like the color when it came in. When I was in the restoration business, we did a '69 Skylark convertible, sourced from our favorite junkyard in California. It was only a body sitting on a frame when we got it. It had the top mechanism, but no clip, no drivetrain. We made it a GS tribute car. 400's back then were spendy. I found a '69 Electra four door sedan that had been hit hard in the right side. We put the 430, TH400 into the Skylark. We put "400" decals on the valve covers. We used the rear end out of a Chevelle, 3:36 Posi. We did it in red with white interior and loaded it with all the goodies we could find. Air, power windows, power antennas, the whole shot. THAT was quite the car. The Skylark guys in the club wanted to know how we made that 400 run so well...... ;) ;)
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15403Post Firedome »

What's really unique about the Canadian RCA SS consoles is there were 4 or 5 turntable options: iirc BSR, several Garrards, Dual. I think Phil's has a Garrard A-70 and the Lab 80 he's looking for was a top option? I don't think any US consoles had choices like that, although I have seen several different TTs in the same model of certain early-mid '60s higher-end Fishers. I like how they labeled the headphone jack as "Personal Sound" lol

Phil's Electra looks runs and drives really nice, a few years ago when he was visiting here we took it to leave off my maroon '79 Electra at a shop for tires. Mine had the Olds 403 and would move pretty well, as well it should since it had lost something like 800 lbs from '76, but his 455 is strong too, maybe the cat con that year helped, and his 'ministrations" no doubt did too. The new paint job in dark metallic green he put on it looks darn good too!! It's a beautiful car, I love all 3 of his.
I think he'll drive his Tacoma today but hope one of the Buicks will come to VT on a later visit!
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15462Post PhilR »

1967 was the last year for the variable pitch transmission. Both the 300 and 400 transmissions lost that feature on the 1968 models. I owned both a 1968 LeSabre with the two speed ST-300 and a 1968 Wildcat (an early production model made in 1967) with the ST-400 transmission, I have the shop manual that also details it and I have opened a few of those transmissions! The 300 transmission got the switch pitch from it's introduction on 1964 models to 1967, the 400 lacked the variable pitch the first year but had it after. The kickdown switch on the 1964-67 cars with the switch pitch transmission also have the variable switch and there's one more in the joint of the accelerator linkage under the hood. In 1968, all that was replaced by the sliding kickdown switch above the pedal inside the car. The 1968 transmission also changed it's filter style from the box filter to the flat filter. Also, your 1968 Electra had a fairly rare option, Not many came with the 3.42 limited slip axle, the standard ratio on the 1968 Electra was 2.73. The Wildcat and Riviera got 3.07 as standard that year (in 1965, the Electra 225 also got 3.07 as standard). My 1968 Wildcat also had the 3.42 limited slip differential, fairly rare on Wildcats too. My 1967 Riviera has it but it was standard with the GS package on the 1965-72 models.

As for engines, I have never driven a 1963 Electra and my experience with the Dynaflow/Twin Turbine is very limited as I've never owned a car like this. I know that if you want good acceleration with those transmissions, you have to start on "L" as these transmissions don't shift gears by themselves. On "D", they start on the high gear and stay there. All the work is done by the torque converter which is more complex than the later ones that had just 3 elements. Axle ratios and transmissions do a lot to how an engine feels. The most potent stock Buick engine was the 1970 455 with the Stage1 package. It did have improvements over the 430 in the valvetrain oiling. The 1969 400 Stage1 also had those improvements. in 1971, most GM engines got lower 8.5 to 1 compression and lower HP as they were required on regular gas. That included the Buick 455 that went from 370 HP to 315/330. Number got down the following years too. In 1972, they also changed the HP from the gross to net figures which made the numbers less impressive, that's also the year where the EGR valve was added and the A.I.R. pump required on cars that didn't have California emissions (lots of them are gone from cars that originally had them now!). The standard and optional performance axle ratios were also changed to improve highway economy throughout the seventies. The anti pollution devices also kept lowering the HP numbers in 1973-74 and for 1975, they got the compression down to 7.9:1. The Buick engine blocks were supposed to be made stronger for 1975-76 and the addition of the catalytic converter allowed removing some of the complicated emission stuff of 1974 (the A.I.R. system and other stuff like the idle stop solenoid which were gone for a few years thanks to the catalytic converter!).

My favorite Buick engines are the Nailheads. Here's a video of a guy driving a 1964 Wildcat with a Borg Warner 4 speed T-10. 4 speed transmissions were only offered on the 1963-65 full size Buick models (1963 LeSabre and Wildcat, 1964-65 Wildcat). https://youtu.be/fMFeLvlzBwc
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15466Post William »

Thanks, PhilR. I find it interesting on how many times the steering wheel gets turned to go around a corner.

Bill
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15477Post hermitcrab »

Welcome to the forum!
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15482Post Firedome »

Man that 4 spd Wildcat sounds like a truck! Kinda primitive for a banker's hot-rod but a blast to drive I bet!

I'd thought abut Pertronix for my Olds but think I"m gonna keep it stock. At least points will always get ya home!
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Re: New member from Canada.

Post: # 15524Post 19&41 »

Welcome Phillippe. That is quite a collection! That will qualify you as one if Greg's good friends. :) The electronic repair will come easier as you gain experience and get plenty of questions asked. Thanks for sharing the pictures. We love pictures.
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