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@Bertimus, nice pics. I almost bought a black one but someone scooped it up out from under me. That said, I am glad I got my red one :) I just submitted these photos of mine for a RockAuto magnet :) I will let you folks know if they pick it.

Around here a guy is switching golf carts to 48v packs from wrecked EVs. They do wheelies.

I like the idea of electric cars. They have a lot of advantages over gas powered cars like no fluids to leak out. Very quiet. Instant torque when you hit the accelerator and they are probably economic to drive if you don't factor in the cost of buying it. What I don't like about them is the purchase price, battery range before recharging, and the emissions coming out the exhaust pipes. Here is what the exhaust pipe looks like. People usually don't consider the exhaust pipes when they talk about electric cars being pollution free:

You will probably feel a little play due to the small offset in the chain from the tensioner, even with a brand new chain. This is a brand new Morse brand chain with a new old style tensioner:

Ok so a little update on this issue. So while that terminal was bad, it was not the root cause. The root cause ended up being a short in the turn signal switch inside the steering column, which in turn caused that lead in connector C202 that I showed above to get hot and melt the insulation. I did a little digging and apparently it is not an uncommon issue for GM cars from that era (which in typical GM fashion all pretty much used the same turn signal switch.) Attached is a quick and dirty write up of the procedure. Maybe it will help someone else out some day: Reatta Turn Signal Switch Replacement.pdf

Hello Ronnie, The brakes are just fine. My mechanic liked the Reatta so much that he had to take it for a second test drive.

The jack arrived this morning. The box was a little roughed up but acceptable. I was able to carry the box into the garage with one arm by grabbing the plastic banding on the box. Not bad as far as weight goes. It would have required both arms and walking in a strain with my old jack. When you do a comparison of the new jack and my old Sears jack it is easy to see the old jack is much beefier (and much heavier). Everything from the wheels and casters to the frame is much more heavy duty on the Sears jack. To the credit of the new jack it is much easier to move around and I really like how fast it goes up without a load. It goes sown about 1/2" lower and raises about 3/4" higher than my old jack. The new jack handle is about 9 inches longer than the old jack. I'm not sure I'm going to like that but I do like the padding around the bottom of the handle. The new jack has a large handle on each side to help with positioning the jack under the car. I like that and it would have really been handy on the old Sears jack. I was always worried about having to grab the frame of the old jack to move it and taking a chance of pinching a finger.. To get the old Sears jack all the way up took 16 full pumps of the handle. To get the new jack all the way up took 6 full pumps. I really like that. That is one of the reasons I bought it. I have not tried to lift a vehicle yet. I'm going to let the new jack sit overnight before bleeding the air out of it tomorrow. Bleeding out any air is recommended before using the jack.

The new style has been pretty much the only thing available for many years. I have my own opinions on the tensioners which I have stated several times. That said, from the several engines I have opened up, the original tensioner seems good for 175k-200k miles. I did have a bad experience with a combination of a Cloyes chain and the new style tensioner, which is why I have recommended the O.E. Morse brand chain if at all possible. It is my belief that it will make the combination of chain and tensioner last as long as possible. When installing the tensioner, carefully observe where the chain rides on it. It is usually right on the edge of the tensioner and I have shimmed the tensioner outwards in extreme cases but there is precious little room to do so and careful measurements are important.

Excellent write up. I will add it to the how-To guides here on ROJ when I get time. With your permission of course...

I have seen on Youtube a young man who converted a Fiero to electric. Seems like the Reatta would require a little more battery capacity with it being a heavier car.

Thanks, It's good to know the engine is so reliable and long lasting and there's nothing like hearing from the man who's been there and done that. However, so far it hasn't happened and I'm focused on rebuilding the brakes but I'll keep watch. It's getting late in the season here in Michigan and I'm hoping to finish the brakes, clean the injectors and fill it with ethanol free gas before tucking it away for the winter.

Yeah mine has about 145k on it now and still runs like a champ. To me that's just getting broken in for a 3800 . The other thing you do have to keep an eye out for on the GM V6s is the intake manifold gaskets failing. That gasket can fail so that coolant leaks in the oil and that is obviously no good for the engine. Keep an eye out for any white foamy stuff on the underside of the oil cap. Personally I would recommend just doing it when you get the chance and not wait for it to start leaking. It is not a terrible job on the Reatta V6. I've replaced intake manifold gaskets on my Reatta, on the Series 2 3800 in my other Buick, the 350 V8 in my Suburban, and on a 3.1L V6 in a Buick Century that I no longer own. So far the Reatta engine was the easiest. But the OE gaskets just were not very good and just go bad with age. The newer Felpro gaskets are much better. If you browse FB marketplace and other similar places for older GM cars you will see quite a few that say something like, "it looses coolant so I think it needs a new head gasket." I would bet that more than half of those are really the intake gaskets.

Interesting statistics. I am curious where you got them. Not that I doubt them but curious to learn more. Personally I question the whole battery thing as well as I have heard they are not easily recyclable and will end up in landfills. Also you have to charge them with power mostly produced by burning fossil fuels as well. Maybe I'm old school, but I just think internal combustion engines are really cool too. That said, I have thought from time to time that an E-Reatta would be a cool project :)

Sounds like we should start building more landfills now so we will have enough in 2050.

Just got an update from Amazon saying the jack has been shipped and will arrive earlier than expected on Thursday instead of Saturday. I hope it's packaged better than the last to shipments I got from Amazon.

The search for a floor jack is over. I decided to add the Torin 2.5 ton jack to my Amazon cart but didn't intend to buy it tonight. When I added it to my cart a message popped up saying I had a $25 dollar promotional credit for being a long time customer. I thought with that discount it was a good price and decided to take a chance on it being a good jack. If it will last half as long as my old Sears jack I will be happy. It should be here Saturday.

Only multiple time Darwin award winner.

Night ride in socal 🌙