DAVES89 Posted December 28, 2023 Share Posted December 28, 2023 After selling my '88 Black to 2 seater's son I was without a winter car. My original thought was just to drive the Red until January [it has "Collector" plates which are 11 month plates and cannot be used in January] and then park it as we winter in Texas staring in February. I could have waited a year as so far our winter has been very mild and we leave the 10 of January for an extended vacation to Asia to celebrate our upcoming 45th wedding anniversary. But I digress. I cannot drive the Red in the winter. It has been my all time favorite car and I refuse to chance driving it in snow/winter/salt especially with the liquid deicer they now spray on the roads. So the search was on. My mom owned a 2001 Supercharged Buick Regal. I drove it a couple of times and liked the ride. She no longer has the car, so I started looking for one and just picked up a 1999 Regal, red in color, light gray interior with a sun roof. There is no rust on the car which has 98,000 miles. I believe it was used a a summer car for the owners who wintered in a warmer state. It does not have the supercharger which is fine by me as I don't like the price difference on the gas price because of the miles I still drive in my business. I bought it in Detroit and drove it back to Wisconsin. That's about 500 miles and I got a good feel for the car. It is pretty comfortable, has good power, but does not have some of the creature comforts I expected. Has dual heat, but not heated seats. Cabin storage for "things" is not as much as I expected. However I bought the car for winter driving and it will fit the bill nicely. 10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted January 9 Topic Author Share Posted January 9 After driving the Regal for about 3 weeks and a bit over 1000 miles I have had to do some "fine tuning". Started with an Idle Air Control, Then on to a Mass Air Flow sensor. Then yesterday I stopped in at Gibson's a local You Pick yard to get a back up battery. [This was after lunch with 2 Seater] Came out to the car and it wouldn't start. It would grind but not start. So I first checked fuel pressure, that was good. Then said to myself " Either Ignition Module or Crank Sensor". The obvious easy answer was to start with the ignition module. I know I was at Gibson's but I had a back up in the car [always carry extra parts and tools]. Had it swapped out in about 15 minutes. Hit the key and it started. I decided that I needed to do a tune up and checked my inventory of Reatta replacement parts. The Regal is a Series 2 so I knew the Delco upgrade I had done on the Reatta would give me pretty much what I needed. I checked online for spark plug wire length and plug number and checked what I had in inventory. Sure enough I had a wire set that was close in lengths and the correct number plugs [#14]. Called up Kendall [my mechanic friend] and invited myself over for a tune up party. Plugs and wires and clean up the plate under the ignition module. About an hour later the old original plug wires [in poor shape] and the old plugs [badly worn] were out and the new ones were in. Drive home was much better as the acceleration was noticeably improved. 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted February 11 Topic Author Share Posted February 11 Yesterday with nothing else to do I decoded I would revisit the failed original ignition module and coils that were in the Regal. I cleaned up the plate [top and bottom] of the ignition module, got 2 coils from the parts bin to replace the old rusted ones and reinstalled them. The Regal started easily, ran good when revved with no load, then I took it out on the highway where it performed flawlessly. Got back home put one Delco setup in the Reatta for emergency repairs and another in the Regal. No more left in the parts bin but that's okay as they are now where I may need them. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2seater Posted February 11 Share Posted February 11 And, Dave gave me two complete Magnavox coil/ICM setups as spares for my sons two cars. Can't beat that with a stick👍 Mine runs the Delco style. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted April 11 Topic Author Share Posted April 11 Lately I have been having an intermittent ignition failure where the engine would die while I was driving. On attempting the second start [after playing Pickleball] I had a total failure. As most know I carry extra parts and 15 minutes later I had the pretested Ignition Module/Coil Pack installed. I believe the failure was the Ignition Module, the original one to the car. I had thrown away the old coils as the terminals were badly rusted/corroded, but I reused the ignition module. That got thrown away too. I then went to a You Pick yard and got another Ignition Module/Coil Pack and installed it taking the prior spare and once again put it in the trunk as back up. While I had a break down I was not stranded as I carry both tools and tested parts. To me this is a requirement when one attempts to drive 25 year old [and older] cars on a daily basis. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronnie Posted April 11 Share Posted April 11 I still carry my tools and test equipment in the 25 year old car I have now but I don't know what parts to carry at this point. I put the old belt in the toolbox when I installed a new one but that's it so far. Maybe a MAF would be good to have. I guess a cellphone and a AAA card are the best things I can carry that will help me get back home if I break down. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ship Posted April 12 Share Posted April 12 13 hours ago, Ronnie said: ...... I guess a cellphone and a AAA card are the best things I can carry that will help me get back home if I break down. Those two items saved my butt in 2014 in the middle of eastern CO when my '92 Riviera's transmission decided to let go. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted April 12 Topic Author Share Posted April 12 I'm going to get an alternator and serpentine belt and have them in the trunk as well. Thinking about a crank sensor also. Don't believe I need a MAF sensor as I replaced that with a new one about 3 months ago. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted April 28 Topic Author Share Posted April 28 On 4/11/2024 at 3:42 PM, DAVES89 said: Lately I have been having an intermittent ignition failure where the engine would die while I was driving. On attempting the second start [after playing Pickleball] I had a total failure. As most know I carry extra parts and 15 minutes later I had the pretested Ignition Module/Coil Pack installed. I believe the failure was the Ignition Module, the original one to the car. I had thrown away the old coils as the terminals were badly rusted/corroded, but I reused the ignition module. That got thrown away too. I then went to a You Pick yard and got another Ignition Module/Coil Pack and installed it taking the prior spare and once again put it in the trunk as back up. While I had a break down I was not stranded as I carry both tools and tested parts. To me this is a requirement when one attempts to drive 25 year old [and older] cars on a daily basis. Still having intermittent ignition issues and believe it is not the ignition module or coils. After doing a bit of online research I have determined that there is a short harness that goes from the main harness splits to go to the ignition module and ignition module ground, goes on a bit farther and splits again ending at the crank sensor and cam sensor. It is discontinued by GM but Dorman makes a replacement. I have one on order and every indication is that this is the issue. I had a no start situation yesterday and rather then swap out the module again I thought I would jiggle the wires between the harness block and the loom protecting the wires. Tried a start and no go. Then tried jiggling the harness block that igoes to the module that the wires run through. That did the trick and car started like nothing was wrong. So I think that is my issue. Hopefully the new harness will do the trick. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted May 1 Topic Author Share Posted May 1 Yesterday the car threw codes again so over by Kendall to get it read and cleared. Fortunately my Dorman harness arrived and I replaced that as well. Cleared the codes and once again they are gone. Took a close look at the removed original harness and saw that where the harness goes to the crank and cam sensor it goes between the heater hose and engine block. The loom was melted away and the wires were very stiff and partially melted together. So I really think this is it and hopefully I am good from here on out. I did cut off the plugs making extra short pigtails because as Kendall said it never hurts to have extra pigtails laying around on a 25 [Regal] year old car and two 30 plus [Reatta] year old cars. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronnie Posted May 1 Share Posted May 1 35 minutes ago, DAVES89 said: So I really think this is it and hopefully I am good from here on out. I'll bet that was it. I had a similar thing happen on a Chevy Cavalier. Wires going between the ECM and the ignition pickup inside the distributor (same purpose as crankshaft position sensor) ran under the battery tray. Battery acid had run down and got into the wiring harness underneath the battery where those wires were. The battery acid had soaked the wires and discolored them shorting them out even though the insulation was still intact. The voltage from the pickup in the distributor was so low (0.9 volts I believe) that almost anything will short it out and cause the engine to stop running. I worked on it every evening after work for a week before I figured out what was causing the engine to randomly quit running. I replaced those wires and the problem was fixed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted May 1 Topic Author Share Posted May 1 It really wasn't until I put my known good ignition module on that I thought it was something to do with the wiring. Before I was swapping first coils and then the ignition module and old coils and finally a known good module/coil set up that I knew something else was wrong. First test was just disconnect the harness and reattach it and it would fire. Next time wiggle the wires at the ignition module without removing the connector and it would fire. I then took a close look at the harness and saw it was only a 3' harness with 5 connectors. Went to the Buick dealer and one left in the country at $200.00. Went to Rock Auto and a Dorman was $85.00. Amazon was $110.00 for the same Dorman. The Dorman was a nice replacement, looked to be of good quality. Only connector that gave me trouble was the crank sensor. It started going on so hard that I had Kendall make the connection as I didn't want to damage the pins on the crank sensor causing more work. Only things I had to remove to get at everything was the engine shroud, serpentine belt, and water pump pully. Front to back time about 45 minutes. Gotta love the 3.8! 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anthony Posted May 2 Share Posted May 2 13 hours ago, DAVES89 said: I then took a close look at the harness and saw it was only a 3' harness with 5 connectors. Went to the Buick dealer and one left in the country at $200.00. Went to Rock Auto and a Dorman was $85.00. Amazon was $110.00 for the same Dorman. Wow, I wish I'd known that. I spent $140 on just the ICM pigtail, and all the wires were white 🤦♂️ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2seater Posted May 2 Share Posted May 2 1 hour ago, Anthony said: Wow, I wish I'd known that. I spent $140 on just the ICM pigtail, and all the wires were white 🤦♂️ To the best of my knowledge, only the 90 and newer use the short harness. The touchscreen cars have a different wiring scheme. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted May 17 Topic Author Share Posted May 17 The Regal has been running great. Hate to say it, but I like the extra room the Regal has so I use it more and more. One of my cars has to stay outside [the Regal] so I only drive the Red when I know the weather is going to stay nice. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anthony Posted May 18 Share Posted May 18 Same here. I had an old Sebring convertible and considered scrapping it because the water pump went out, but decided instead to tackle the project. Now it makes a nice beater car to get around and I just take Reatta out as a special treat Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronnie Posted May 18 Share Posted May 18 59 minutes ago, Anthony said: Same here. I had an old Sebring convertible and considered scrapping it because the water pump went out, but decided instead to tackle the project. Now it makes a nice beater car to get around and I just take Reatta out as a special treat I've got a 2001 GMC pickup that serves the same purpose. The wife's Equinox is for serious driving and the Mustang is good for evening drives before sundown and weekends. Raining here on and off this weekend. I just had time to pull the Mustang out and wash it between showers. Not a good weekend for driving anything but the pickup. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAVES89 Posted May 21 Topic Author Share Posted May 21 Just installed a compass mirror from an Olds. It has the map lights, auto dimming and compass. It was a direct plug and play. No harness adaption needed. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronnie Posted May 22 Share Posted May 22 I like the auto-dimming feature. I wish my Mustang had it. Although I rarely drive at night with my weekend cruisers if I can avoid it, (too many dear on the backroads where I drive), it's nice to have when I do drive at night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anthony Posted May 22 Share Posted May 22 I had that mirror with the motor inside in my '87 Olds Troféo. I'm surprised that the Reatta with the $4,000 higher price tag did not even have it as an option Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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