Am I lucky , or what?

Well I still haven't won the lottery, but I did buy an old self repairing Buick wagon!
When I bought the car, I was having to add PS fluid and Transmission fluid every few days.
After driving the car for a few months, I found that I'm rarely adding fluid to either. The PS pump is a lot quieter too.
Now if the window motors would fix themselves, I'd really be happy.

Cars love to be driven. True story.

Looks like you found Christine's cousin Patricia.....

I have found that about 1/2 the time pwr steering, and trans leaks are self repairing with some use, when a car has been sitting. Oil leaks are a different story though!!!!! I have a couple of Pontiac V-8's that sat for over 10 years before I got them, and both rear main seals mark thier teritory, about 3 or 3 drops a week, not enough to tear the engine down for, but anoying!!!!

I bought a rear transmission seal from Rock Auto on a distributors closeout sale.
Theres another .88 wasted.
Nobody ever said this old car hobby was cheap!

Yep old cars need to be driven! Amen!

Here's one for you. I took Ms. Roadie to another quick oil change place to save time. They over filled the oil by a quart. This is the second time this has happened. I think it has to do with the extra oil in the oil cooler and how the car is oriented when they drain the system. Anyhoo.

She started leaking slowly again where I would have a little spot in the drive and on long commutes 30 minutes +. when you got out of the car i could smell oil burning on the hot exhaust pipe. Well I poke my head under there and she's leaking from the oil filter adapter and the front of the oil pan area. I'm like greeeaaaaaattt! I just replaced that oil filter adapter gasket 5 months ago. I pop the hood and sure enough She's overfull on the dipstick. Well I don't have the time to fix it right away so after three weeks of driving the oil spot disappears in the drive way. I look at the dipstick it's 1/4 low but still in the normal operating range. Under the car there's a little residue on the front oil pan area, but no leak around the oil filter adapter. Wow an oil leak that fixed it's self sort of. I've changed the oil two time since then on my own of course. Just can't trust these shops anymore. and I change it around every 5000 miles she uses 3/4 quart of oil between those intervals, and the drive way is staying clean. How's that for fixing itself? I was a little shocked.

OK. Yesterday, the drivers window went down and back up.
Once.
It sounded perfectly normal.
maybe I do have a bad ground- or maybe its a Festivus miracle.

cammerjeff wrote:

I have found that about 1/2 the time pwr steering, and trans leaks are self repairing with some use, when a car has been sitting. Oil leaks are a different story though!!!!! I have a couple of Pontiac V-8's that sat for over 10 years before I got them, and both rear main seals mark their teritory, about 3 or 3 drops a week, not enough to tear the engine down for, but anoying!!!!

So I'm not the only one!
Sure, the car will run happily for years with a slow drip, and the oil bath will help kill the rust on the underside of the car, but I can't stand the oil stains on the driveway.....
I think it reflects poorly on my mad old car mechanical skillz.

Not a fan of the oil drip, but I'm realistic. Between the three cars daily driven at my house, we are looking at over 600K miles, lol/ I have spots. I changed that damned oilfilter adapter 3 times on the LT1 car and it still leaks. I gave up. the other two tbi cars have othedr minor issues that cause a drip...

AlmostaBuick wrote:

Well I still haven't won the lottery, but I did buy an old self repairing Buick wagon!
When I bought the car, I was having to add PS fluid and Transmission fluid every few days.
After driving the car for a few months, I found that I'm rarely adding fluid to either. The PS pump is a lot quieter too.
Now if the window motors would fix themselves, I'd really be happy.

The PS pump may have got air in it.. we (dad and I) put a new PS box and pump in his boxy and we filled it and it was noisy until we bleed the system out.. now there is no air in it and it's quiet as a mouse.

Yeah, Randumnumber, right now its making a little more noise than I'd like, and dripping a few drops on the driveway, but not too bad.
I'm not happy unless its perfect, but I'm not unhappy enough to whip out the mastercard and the wrenches for this.
Yet.
Priority one and two are to finally finish stopping the rain from coming in so I can replace the rotten carpet, and fix the drivers window and the A/C.
I't'll be summer in Florida in a couple of months....
OK, thats more than two things.
Sue me.

We had heavy rain the last couple of days, and the RR footwell didn't fill up with water this time.
A simple fix, removing the door panel and vacuuming the junk from the bottom of the door apparently opened the drain holes, just as I thought it would.
I've given up, for now, fixing the leak that comes from the HVAC box, and just thrown a piece of rubber mat over the intake for now.
That seems to keep the R front carpet dry.......
Looks like I'll have to find the correct color of blue paint for the backseat brackets, and the next dry weekend we get I'll remove the seats and replace the carpet.
Next up: replacing the rear shocks, rear tranny seal, and servicing the transmission.

And pressure washing the driveway.