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Definitely make sure you check those spring seats. GM's awful water-retaining design + GM powdercoat + road salt = almost certain failure after a while. And the cartridge design unfortunately allows one to get away with, at least for a while, not even taking the strut towers apart to inspect the seats properly. They're cheap parts to source (like $4 each side from Rockauto w/bearing), but when one of mine went it cost me $700 because it was in the middle of nowhere in northern Montana :(. BTW, welcome to the club! Lots of great people here, and most things on the W-bodies are idiot-proof fortunately. Stock brakes rather suck on the pre-1994 models. And the rear disc brakes are prone to seizing and aren't the best design either. Replacing ball joints can be a nasty affair as they're riveted on -- if you have the strut towers off the car for any reason (perhaps to inspect/change-out the spring seats), do give consideration to replacing the ball joints or at least grinding the rivets and replacing with good quality high-grade bolts. 3800's run forever -- that's the least of your worries with the car! Check to make sure the pads on the rear fiberglass leaf spring are intact, and if they're missing, repair/replace accordingly.

Sorry, false alarm. So, i was working late on it. I was tired. I didn't have the battery connected properly. Thought when i saw some sparks from a little earlier that it was from that. After some sleep everything is okay right now. If you want to delete this so not to waste peoples time in a search that'd be fine with me.

I've been thinking the same thing. I hate to scrap an STE but yeah, it's pretty rotted so I don't think I could restore it financially and I already have my unicorn. Gotta think about it.

Honestly, now that you have a storage space, it might not be a bad idea to make a run up and grab it, then pull all the parts you could need and store them with your car and scrap the rest. I can't see this be worth restoring with the current rust situation, but it's an amazing parts car.

Just thought I'd introduce myself. I'm partial to A-Bodies, particularly coupes. I own two 1988 Ciera coupes but I recently picked up a 1989 Regal coupe. I hope this forum will be as useful to me as the A-Body forum is. Thanks for having me.

Buy a service manual specific to your vehicle. I usually get mine from eBay, used, at advantageous price.

When inspecting the underside of my 'vert', I've found that some incompetents' lifted the car incorrectly, and crushed the frame gussets under the floor pan. I straightened them out, as well as I can, and find that the car is much more stable, with less scuttle shake. If you have a convertible, I suggest you look into yours.

Weird. I’d think you’d get a lot of sparks and a very hot wire rather than electrical damage. Need more info though. My first thoughts are to check fuses. Check under hood and interior as well. If it’s not that maybe you buggered the ecm or possibly the icm. Will the engine turn over? Does it try and fire? Have you checked for spark?

Also, I am such a fucking idiot, I'm sorry. I had Cutlass Calais in my head. The Ciera is an A-body; they still have a somewhat active community over at A-body.net.

I think there used to be an N-body forum somewhere. I guess I forgot that much like these cars, no one really cares about them anymore. You're welcome to hang out here and ask these sorts of questions, but things move pretty slowly over here. Also check out the www.60degreev6.com forums.

I took my wife to dinner tonight in the vert. It was a nice evening and we had the top down. Took the long way home just to drive lol.

Finally figured out what the issue was...it was the vacuum modulator. A $22 part from AutoZone held in by one bolt easily accessable on the transmission right under the air box. So glad to have it back up and running again!

Then there's this gorgeous low mileage 90 CS International coupe for sale right now for just $2500!!! It's a Quad 4/5 speed car!!! I believe these have the High Output version. https://tricities.craigslist.org/ctd/d/elizabethton-1990-oldsmobile-cutlass/6939640577.html

Subscribed, because my '92 has stiff steering, and some memory. I suspect the bearing(s) are seized or nearly seized. I'll be dicking with it some time in the future.