Leaderboard

I've done it both ways. Doing a factory vacuum swap is a gigantic pain, but possible if you want to pull the dashboard apart and most of the engine bay. It also comes with issues of its own. the factory non ABS master is at a different angle to PMIII and comes VERY close to the turbo. I've thought about this and in my junkyard trips it looks like J and N cars of the era used the same master but angled up slightly, that may help the issue of it being close to the Turbo but it may also bring its own set of issues. never done it but its been on the back of my mind. Also you'll need to run 2 new rear brake lines. making absolutely sure to not get them backwards since you'll no longer be running a Front-Rear Split setup but a Cross- diagonal so the Front left needs to be on the same side of the master as right rear and front right needs to be on the same side as left rear. You can't get away with just one as the factory rear brake line is 1/4" or something like that and standard are much smaller. What I did on my Red Turbo GP was remove everything PMIII off the firewall and use a 4th gen F body booster and master. It has the advantage of also being Front rear split so you don't have to mess with the brake lines to the rear of the car and it can be done in a day or 2, not weeks. What I did, and I know others have done it differently I made an adapter plate of aluminum to bolt to the factory bolts then put my own holes in for the F body booster. You DO have to cut holes in your factory firewall plate for this. and in the future i'd do it a bit different and cut most of it away so I could access the booster bolts easily from the inside of the car I did have to cut and extend the pushrod from the booster so it was the same length as PMIII Was. Just cut and welded that. I considered threading the rod and putting a turnbuckle on it to get it proper. Now the fun part is the brake lines. Since we live in america getting metric fittings is a bigger pain then it should be. I changed everything to 1/4 fittings, took the front brake lines and put them into a t fitting, and then made a brake line to go from that to the master. For the rear I also changed the fittings to SAE but then put it into a reducer to get the size of the line down to fit into the master, again just made and extension tube to get it how it needed to be. Not the cleanest part of the install but it does work quite well. If I ever get around to working on TGPs again i'll be doing this same modification to my Black TGP as I fully believe PMIII is not fit for purpose at this point. I'll revisit the modification at that time and fine tune it then.

What a touching story! You painted a very vivid picture of how important this car is. I believe buying a car is a very emotional thing and owning and taking care of them as well. So happy you found her again and that you put the work into tracking her down and keeping tabs on her. It paid off and now restoring your first car can begin! Very few people can say that! Congrats Kody and look forward to seeing her get better and better!

Wow, what a great story!! Congratulations on finding Cutlass Charlie again, Cool! The story isn't short, but I highly suggest that everyone read the whole thing. Imho, the details are what make the story unique, interesting, and personal - verses, "I looked for my old car, I found it". So, you pick an Olds. Then, your parents kick you out of the house. You turn to a life of crime and grift .... Olds story, heard it a million times. Of course, there's the perfect song... Peaches & Herb - Reunited Congrats again on being reunited with your first car!

I talked with the transmission shop late yesterday afternoon and it needs another rebuild. How many times can a transmission be rebuilt before it needs to be junked and replaced? The cost will be somewhere between $1,600 and $1,900, depending on what they find when they get inside it and it will have a three year / 30,000 mile warranty. This has been one helluva triple-whammy between my home HVAC system, the Buick's A/C system and now this. My bank account is taking about a $10,000 hit in the space of two weeks. I guess my next decision when I get the car back is going going to be whether to go ahead and get it inspected and renew the registration to keep it or cut my losses and sell it on to someone else.