Buick Reatta from a mechanics point of view

[Ronnie]

Over the weekend I ran into an old friend at a car show. He had retired from the local Buick/Chevy,Cadillac/GMC dealership after working there for 35 years. I had my Reatta at the show and we got to talking about what he remembered about the Reatta when they came to the dealership where he worked.

 

Bill said the salesmen were really excited about having something new and different to offer from Buick. He said they thought the Reatta would be a hit but it didn't turn out that way. Bill, like most people, think of a Buick as a car your grandparents buy that is dependable and easy to work on. He said all that changed when he started hearing about the Reattas that would soon arrive at their dealership. Like most people during that time the mechanics were scared to death of a computer.

 

When Bill and the other mechanics took training on the Reatta they all agreed that working on one was going to be a nightmare. None of them had ever worked on a car that had so many computers and electronics. He said ECMs were in some of the cars back then but they mostly controlled fuel and emissions - not the whole car like the Reatta (and most new cars today) do. Bill said the dealership spent big bucks for a huge Sun diagnostic machine about the size of a clothes dryer to help them work on the Reattas. When all the electrical cables, vacuum lines, and hoses were connected to the Reatta it was supposed to tell you everything you would ever want to know about the health of a Reatta. He said it took forever to hook all that stuff up and when you did it was all right in your way. He said the only thing harder than working on a Reatta was learning how to use that new diagnostic machine. He said once he found out how to access the Reatta's on-board diagnostics the Sun diagnostic machine turned into a dust collector. :)

 

Bill said that they didn't have to work on many Reattas due to the low number of them that were sold. He said most of them brought into their garage for repairs (all he could remember working on were under warranty) needed electrical work or had brake problems.

 

Bill told me that troubleshooting the electrical problems was a lot easier that he first thought it would be. As we all know, once you learn how to use the on-board diagnostics the computer will usually point you in the right direction for finding your problem. He said most of the electrical problems he fixed were usually just a bad connection or replacing bulbs. He remembered replacing one BCM and one ECM on the handful of Reattas he worked on with electrical problems over a period of about 8-10 years. He said he thought once the Reattas got some age on them people probably took them to smaller shops to avoid having to pay the high hourly rate charged by the dealership.

 

I was hoping that Bill would share with me some of his secrets about repairing the Teves master cylinder since he had been factory trained on how to work on the Reatta. I was also hoping he would know how to rebuild them. Nope, they didn't train them on rebuilding the master cylinder. He said they told them to test the system pressure first - then test the pressure switch, pump and relays much the same way we do. If that didn't fix it a new master cylinder was installed and the old one was sent back to the factory. They were told not to try to repair the master cylinder. Needless to say I was disappointed. I wanted him to teach me how to take the master cylinder apart and fix it. He said he had never had one apart. He told me he thought he still had the pressure gauge and a booklet on testing the Teves that he was given as part of his Reatta training. He said he would give them both to me if he could find them. I have my fingers crossed. I would love to have them.

[Philbo]

I stumbled on this post. I find it very interesting.  At least so far for me, working on my reatta has been like most other cars. Maybe more complex in the electrical dept. But nothing that can't be handled.

 

One of these days I'm going to do a supercharged series 2 engine with manual transmission swap on one. I think that would be a lot of fun.  I also think it would be kind of fun to do an Electric Vehicle conversion on one.

Edited January 27, 2021 by Philbo