1954 Buick Other

Four Door Sedan

264

Dynaflow

4A6023660

Clear

Gasoline

The first collector car that I attempted to purchase was a 1937 Buick Sedan. I was in my early 20's and would not have known what to do with it if I had been able to buy it. The owner of that car would not discuss selling it at any price. That car spent many years in the same back lot rusting away to almost nothing the last time I saw it. I have collected a lot of different cars over the last 20 or so years. I have always said that one day I would buy a 1937 Buick. Since I am now retired, I decided that "one day" has arrived. I have just managed to buy a 1937 Buick Century Model 61 Sedan. Something needs to go so my 1954 Buick Special is now for sale. The car is an unrestored survivor, it has an older exterior repaint. The interior door panels and seat covers are not original or authentically correct but they are done in a period correct style, while not in an authentic original pattern. This car is also for sale locally at a local used car dealership owned by a friend of mine, so this auction is subject to end without notice if the car is sold locally. On Nov-09-14 at 06:04:58 PST, seller added the following information: I would welcome anyone interested in the car to contact me and arrange to come take the car for a test drive and see the actual condition of the car in person. I paint looks good in the photos and it looks good from 10 or 20 feet away, but it is far from perfect. There is a small section on the left rear fender where the previous owner did some touchup painting that does not match pefectly. You can see that in person, but it does not show up in the photos. Another thing that I should add is that I have no idea if the mileage is as shown on the odometer, or if the odometer has tripped, or if it has been replaced. There are some things about the car that lead me to think that the odometer is correct but with the car being 60 years old, I would think that it is very likely that the actual mileage is 129,000, but I have no idea, since I have only owned the car since 2013. As is common on these nailhead engines, the rear oil seal leaks a little on this car. I bought an oil pan gasket and a new rear oil seal but the leak has not been bad enough to make me feel that I should go to the trouble to change the seal. The new oil pan gasket and new rear oil seal will go with the car to its new home, along with a few other 1954 Buick Parts that I have collected while I have owned the car.I will be happy to answer any questions about the car. I would love to see it go to a good home where someone will enjoy driving it on a regular basis.When I first listed this, I attempted to post a link to a discussion on the Antique Automobile Club of America's Discussion Forum where I have a fairly detailed discussion of the work that I have done to this car since I bought it in 2013. The Ebay system woiuld not let me post that link. If you would like to read more about the car you can do a Google Search on the terms "ACCA Discussion Forum MCHinson Me and My Buick 1954 Buick Special" and you should be able to find that discussion. I also realize that a lot of that same information can be found in an article about the car that I wrote for my local AACA Chapter Newsletter back in October of 2013. While it does not include any of the additonal work done since October of last year, the following is the text of that article. "In 2012, I decided that it was time to sell my 1929 Model A Ford Phaeton. I bought the car in 2007 and had shown it extensively, receiving awards up to Repeat Senior Grand National. I had also done a bit of touring with the Model A and decided to sell it and buy something that was more of a “driver” than a show car. I chose not to extensively advertise the car but to put the word out that it was available primarily through word of mouth. After I finished judging at Hershey 2012, I stopped by Class 21A to see a few of my Model A owning friends that I have gotten to know while showing my 1929 Ford Model A Phaeton. One of my friends was talking with another gentleman when I walked up. My friend asked if I had sold my Phaeton. I told him that it was still for sale. The gentleman who was talking with my friend said that he was looking to buy a Model A Ford. We discussed the Phaeton and I gave him my contact information. Shortly after Hershey, I was contacted by the gentleman, George Barnes of Apollo PA. George and his wife came down and inspected the car and took it for an extensive test drive. George called me a few days later and told me that he wanted the Model A. On 11-17-12, The Model A was picked up by a transport company and delivered to Pennsylvania. I checked with AACA Headquarters and found out that George was not an AACA member. I sent George a membership application and he soon became an AACA member. After selling the Model A Ford, I began my search for another antique car. I happened upon a 1951 Hudson Hornet Sedan near Charlotte and after a ride up to see the car, on January 12th, I made an agreement to purchase it. The seller had recently inherited the car from his uncle and the only issue holding up the deal was some family squabbles holding up the new owner from getting the title for the Hudson. I joined the Hudson Essex Terraplane Club and started researching Hudsons. After a few months of no title, I told the seller that I was going to resume my search and if I found something else before he came up with a title, I was going to buy something else. I went to the Charlotte Autofair in April and looked extensively in the car corral with an envelope full of $100 bills in my pocket. Even with the money in my pocket, I just could not find the right car. After not finding anything at the Charlotte Autofair, I started checking eBay, craigslist, the AACA Discussion Forum Buy/Sell sub-forum and a few other online sites on a daily basis to fill the extra space in the garage. One of my friends and a fellow Moderator on the AACA Discussion Forum, Lamar Brown of Athens GA is widely known as an expert on 1954 Buicks. Lamar and I started emailing back and forth about Buicks for sale. I used him as my expert to evaluate a lot of Buicks that I found for sale online. On July 3rd, Lamar sent me an email with the following text, “I'm attaching pics of a 54 Special a good friend in Tennessee has. Can't believe I haven't thought of it sooner. He offered it to me a year or so ago but I have two too many already. He has several 54 Buicks including 2-3 estate wagons. I have not seen the car in person, only these pictures. It appears to be a nice driver. I do recall he said it needs new tires and battery. Let me know if interested and I'll put you in touch.” Lamar’s friend is Dave Collins of Lawrenceburg Tennessee. Dave and I exchanged a few emails and phone calls. I made an appointment to go see “Buford”, named after the original owner, on Friday July 12th. For those who went to the 2012 AACA Grand National Meet, Lawrenceburg is about an hour and a half west of Shelbyville Tennessee. I scheduled the trip for July 12th because I wanted to combine the trip with a trip to the Grandfather Mountain Highland Games on July 13th, to avoid two different overnight trips. My son Timothy was living in Raleigh for two months while working an Internship. My daughter Maryellen had been visiting with her brother for the week and we had planned for me to meet them to pick her up when we all went to the Grandfather Mountain Highland Games. On July 11th, I borrowed Jeff Oaks’ open trailer and had the truck and trailer ready to head to Tennessee early the next morning. Here is my summary email of the day to Lamar , “I set my alarm clock for 3 am and was on the road at 3:30 am and got to Dave's about 12 hours later. Bought it, loaded it and headed back to Marion NC, about 6 hours, so I can get up tomorrow and head up to the Highland Games. Trip started out in the dark and in the rain. Cleared up after about an hour and was overcast for most of the trip. Ended up the last hour in the worst thunderstorm ever, on 6% grade in the NC mountains at 15 mph in a line of tractor trailers with rain flowing across the interstate. That was probably the most scared I have ever been driving. I was not sure if I was going to end up using a runaway truck ramp or not. It was almost zero visibility and that was scary. Other than that, it was a good day. Enjoyed meeting Dave and I will probably get home with Buford late tomorrow night. Thanks and Take care. Now after I get home, I will have to join the 54 Buick Forum, get me some literature, and start making a parts list for getting Buford in tip top shape. Talk to you soon.” I met Timothy and Maryellen at our motel in Marion NC late the night of the 12th. On the morning of the 13th, we got up and took Timothy’s car up to Grandfather Mountain to the Highland Games. After lunchtime, we left the Highland Games and headed up to Spruce Pine to visit with some relatives for a short time. After our family visit, we headed back to the motel, where Timothy dropped us off for the return trip home while Timothy headed back to Raleigh. We got home late on the night of the 13th. I unloaded the car and backed it into the garage. On the afternoon of the 14th, after returning Jeff’s trailer, I started going over the car to try to learn more about my first 50’s car and figure out what needed attention. When I bought the car, known issues included that the speedometer, horn and windshield wipers were not working, and that there was a noise that sounded like a bad wheel bearing that sounded like it was coming from the right front. I went to the License Plate agency with the Tennessee Title on Monday July 15th. Knowing that out of state titled antique cars have to be inspected by a NC DMV License and Theft Inspector, I was expecting to have to wait to for the inspection before I could get a license tag. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that DMV procedures now allow you to receive a license plate immediately, but the title is delayed until after the Inspection. Now, you can apply for your new NC title, buy your license plate, and you just have to visit the DMV Inspector’s office before you will receive your title. Within a few days after I got home with the car, I checked on the Windshield Wipers and found out that the vacuum hose for the wipers had been plugged. I reattached the hose, lubricated the wiper mechanism, adjusted and lubricated the control cable and got the wipers working. One of the headlights had a burned out low beam element. I checked the bulb and discovered that it and the working headlight were both original Guide Brand bulbs, apparently original Buick headlights. I removed both headlights and stored the good original bulb, and installed two new headlight bulbs in the car. I started reading everything online that I could about 54 Buicks. I bought a factory service manual on eBay. After I received the service manual, one of the first orders of business was to find the source of the suspected bad bearing noise. I checked the front wheel bearings and they both seemed to be OK. As soon as I jacked up the rear end and spun the wheels, it was clear that the problem was the right rear wheel bearing. I figured it would be best to only have to do this job once, so I ordered a set of complete new seals and bearings for the rear axle. I decided to get the speedometer working. The speedometer cable was broken. I found a cable on eBay for a reasonable price. I installed the cable and the speedometer still did not work. I pulled the dash out of the car and pulled the clock and the speedometer. I disassembled the clock, lubricated the mechanism, reassembled it and powered it up and was happy to see it worked. I disassembled the speedometer and lubricated it and reassembled it. It is not quite accurate, but it works so it will be okay for a while. While I had the dash out, I removed the radio delete plate, as I plan to install a radio. I bought a radio from a 1955 Buick parts car from another AACA Discussion Forum member from Charlotte, but when I tested it, it did not work. I bought a pair of new Radiator Hoses because I was not sure how old the hoses were, and the bottom hose looked like it really needed to be replaced. I installed the new top hose without any problems. When I crawled under the car to remove the lower radiator hose, I discovered something unusual. The bottom hose looked like it was in much worse condition than the top hose. It was clearly much older than the top hose. The engine end of the bottom hose had an aftermarket hose clamp like the top hose had. The radiator end of the bottom hose had an original tower style hose clamp. The tower style hose clamp also happened to be located directly above the front anti-sway bar, so there was no way to remove the hose clamp without moving the anti-sway bar first. I soaked the hose clamp with solvent and moved the anti-sway bar in an attempt to remove the hose clamp. The bolt sheared off of the hose clamp, so I used a dremel tool to cut the hose clamp to remove the hose. I am convinced that the hose clamp happened to be installed so that it ended up under the anti-sway bar when it was installed at the factory. I am convinced that the bottom hose was the original hose installed by Buick in 1954. This car has had a repaint in the past, the door panels have been replaced, and the seats have been recovered with aftermarket seat covers. In spite of this, the more I examine the car, the more amazed I am at how many original parts are still on this car. I did a little bit of driving and discovered that the gas tank was providing lots of ugly stuff that was showing up in the inline fuel filter. In the first week or so, I drove the car a bit and paid close attention to the fuel filter. I got pretty good at removing, cleaning, and reinstalling fuel filters. I ended up pulling the gas tank and got quite a bit of rust out of it, but clearly still had a problem with rust in the fuel system. I debated if I wanted to buy a new replacement tank or if I was going to eventually be successful in getting the crud out of the original tank. Between the fact that the car had not been being driven regularly before I bought it, and the rusty stuff being pumped through it, the fuel pump soon decided that it was tired of pumping fuel. I did a bit of research and decided to simply order a rebuilt fuel pump from a supplier. I got the fuel pump in on Friday, July 26th and installed it. This was good, because I had an appointment for Monday July 29th, to take the car to Robinson Alignment to have them install the new rear wheel bearings and seals. As soon as I got the rear wheel bearing fixed, I called DMV and set up an appointment to take the car to the DMV Office for its inspection. I drove to the DMV Office on Station Road and had a pleasant visit with the DMV Inspector. He was courteous and the only problem he saw was that the VIN tag was affixed with screws instead of Rivets. He called the National Insurance Crime Bureau to check their records on the car’s VIN and to obtain more information on 1954 Buicks. They had no information on how the VIN tag should be affixed, but he suspected that it would have originally been attached with Rivets. He filled out his required paperwork, took some photos and explained that he would send it off to Raleigh and that basically if there was a problem, he would let me know and we would go further in attempting to locate a hidden VIN location on the car. We had a nice conversation and I explained to him that I was not worried as I had faith that DMV had made significant strides in being reasonable with the antique vehicle inspection process because I had actually been appointed as the AACA representative of the NC Vehicle Classification Review Committee about a year previously and the committee had never been called to meet in that year. In any case, I told him that I planned to do some research on finding the hidden VIN just in case he had to do a further inspection to keep the folks in Raleigh happy. I went home and within 2 hours I got a call from a guy with DMV in Raleigh. He told me that he needed my email address because they had several appeals to the Vehicle Classification Review Committee and he needed to email me information regarding the appeals. That did not seem like a very good omen for my efforts to get an NC Title for my new purchase. I did my best to examine every inch of the frame of the car and could not find a stamped VIN on the frame. While examining the frame, I did find some interesting paint stencil markings on the left rear frame rail. The paint is faded but still legible. The markings read: “PPS 1162003 40 6-17-54”. I didn’t know what PPS 1161003 refers to, but the car is a 40 series and 6-17-54 is obviously a date. I guessed that this may be the date that the frame was assembled, as the car was assembled in July of 1954. My 1954 Buick expert Lamar was able to tell me that what I suspected was correct. PPS 1162003 is the part number for the frame assembly for two and four door small series 1954 Buicks. The markings indicate that the frame was assembled on 6-17-54. On August 1st I discovered a slow leak in the gas tank. While I was not really happy about the expense of replacing it, it made my decision easy. I ordered a new fuel tank. A few days later, I got a call back from the DMV Inspector. The folks in Raleigh had overruled him and he had to examine the hidden VIN on my car. I went to my online friends on the AACA Discussion Forum and 1954Buick.com to find out where to look for the hidden VIN on a 1954 Buick. Within a short time, I had a new friend who furnished photos of the frame that he is restoring, showing exactly where the VIN was stamped in his frame. I crawled under my car, took a small brass brush to the frame in the area shown in his photos and found the VIN. I called the DMV Inspector back and told him that I had found it. He came over on August 9th and I showed him the VIN. He confirmed the VIN and took some photos of it. I also took some photos for him. Photographing a VIN with a flashlight and a small mirror in the inch or so of space between the floorboard and the top of the frame rail is not easy. I told the Inspector that I intend to reinstall the VIN plate with rivets so the next owner will not have to worry about this process. On August 16th DMV issued my new Title for the car. It arrived in the mail a few days later. It took two long weeks for the new fuel tank to arrive. I installed it the afternoon that it arrived. I was back to driving my Buick that evening. It drove fine and the fuel filter now stays clean, but it developed a nasty habit of occasionally stalling on stops, with signs of major carburetor flooding. I suspected that the float was sticking. On Friday, August 16th, I dropped the carburetor off at Carolina Carburetor Specialists for a full rebuild. The good news is they have an excellent reputation. The bad news is they have a two week backlog, so it looks like I have another two weeks that I can’t drive the car. With two more weeks of the car stuck in the garage, I decided it was time to fix all of the little items that I have discovered wrong with the car. The original tail light lenses were showing their age, so I purchased a set of four reproduction tail light lenses and installed them. I went over all of the lights on the car and replaced the missing glove box light bulb, one burned out backup light bulb, and fixed the interior dome lamp fixture so now all of the lights on the car are working as they should. I also installed the hood ornament that came loose in the trunk of the car when I bought the car. The Horn issue turned out to be a fairly well known problem on Buicks of this vintage. It would be very easy to hook up an aftermarket horn button, but I know that I would never be happy with that modification. The horn button is connected to a wire that runs down the center of the steering shaft. The horn button wire exits the side of the steering shaft and is connected to a brass cylindrical contact around the steering shaft inside the steering column jacket near the floorboard. The horn contact on the shaft makes contact with a spring loaded contact mounted on the steering column jacket. The brass contact around the steering shaft is the weak link in this system. It was apparently only engineered to last 50 or so years. It is however, really easy to replace the brass contact with a copper plumbing joint. What is not easy however, is you have to remove the steering gear and column assembly from the car and totally disassemble it to make this simple quick repair. This job also involved a lot of greasy caked on dirt being removed from the steering gear, most of it seems to have fallen off and into my eyes while I was unbolting the steering gear from the frame. I don’t think that anybody has ever attempted to clean up the chassis of this car. The caked on oily greasy dirt does appear to have done a good job of protecting the chassis from rust. About 6 hours of work over a two day period resulted in the horns now working with the original horn button. As the list of items needing attention is getting shorter, I installed the wheel covers on the car. I touched up the paint on the “Special” Emblems on the rear fenders and trunk of the car. The emblems are not perfect but a fresh coat of paint really improved their appearance. I cleaned up the Windshield gasket and applied some RTV Silicone to replace the deteriorated original production sealer used between the rubber channel and the pinchweld flange" as described in the Fisher Body Manual. On my way back from an unrelated trip out of town, I stopped and bought a correct sized battery from Tractor Supply in Whiteville. When I got home I installed it in the car. The heater, vent and defroster dash controls are connected by “Bowden” cables, which are solid wires inside a coiled wire sheath. Some of the controls were difficult to move and some would not move at all. Crawling under the dash and generously applying lubrication to the length of these cables returned the controls to their original operating condition. Now that the heater controls will move, next on my list was to replace the Heater Hoses. A 1954 Buick has over 30 feet of Heater Hoses. This is because the defroster is mounted in the now traditional cowl location, but the heater is actually mounted under the driver’s seat. The Dynaflow transmission also is cooled by water lines coming from the water pump. The heater hose replacement also involved cutting one more tower style clamp off and the old hoses were hard as a rock. I wonder if they were original to the car. Their removal was not fun, but it was all accomplished in a few hours on Saturday, August 24th. I also removed the VIN tag screws and replaced them with Rivets that evening. I got a nice care package from my friend Lamar on August 31st. I now have a wonderful looking Windshield Washer unit sitting under the hood. I have to get some new vacuum hose soon and replace all of the hoses for the Windshield Washer. It looks much better than the empty Windshield Washer jar holder that was there. I also installed a set of correct original hardware to attach the hood ornament to the car. I installed a few other small pieces and painted my newly acquired battery hold down hardware. I picked up the carburetor on Thursday, September 5th. I installed the carburetor on Thursday night but did not have time to work on the car any more until Saturday, September 7th. After a little bit of tweaking of the steering column to get the transmission linkage and the neutral safety switch adjusted correctly (after my horn button repair) it runs. I discovered that the neutral safety switch is actually broken and will need attention later, but I was able to set it to where it needs to be so the car will start. Unfortunately now that I have it running again and with nice new heater hoses, it appears that the defroster valve is leaking. I bypassed the valve and then I pulled the defroster valve out. I found a guy who rebuilds these valves and sent the valve to him for rebuilding. I ran the engine a bit and got it all warmed up, drained the oil and dropped the oil filter. The oil filter canister has clearly never been repainted. The original markings on it are still mostly readable. I installed a new oil filter and refilled the oil. The service manual says to check after 5 minutes to see if it is leaking. I did not have to wait 5 minutes. I think I know why there was no oil filter gasket on the car before I changed the oil. If that little gasket gets a little bit off center as you are installing the oil filter it is amazing how fast the oil pump will pump oil out onto the ground. I sure am glad I did that outside instead of in the garage. After cleaning up and re-installing the oil filter it runs good. On Saturday, September 14, 2013 I tackled another common 1954 Buick problem. The front seats have a plastic panel that surrounds the ends of the seat and hides the seat tracks. These are commonly broken and are not reproduced. The preferred fix is to repair with fiberglass, sand them down and paint them the correct color. It has been many years since I worked any with fiberglass and I was just the helper back then. I bought a fiberglass kit and repaired the plastic seat panels. If I ever need to do any more fiberglass work, I think I will be a little bit more careful not to put it on too thick, since that would save a bit of sanding. On Friday, September 20, I made a one day trip to the Charlotte Autofair. While there, I picked up a new set of correct 2 ½ inch white wall bias ply BF Goodrich tires that I ordered from Coker Tires. I also dropped off the radio with a local friend, Stafford Brister, at his swap meet space so the original radio supplier can meet with him and exchange it on Saturday, September 21st. On September 22nd, I picked up the replacement radio from Stafford and installed it. The original AM radio actually sounds pretty good! On September 28, the mailman delivered the rebuilt defroster valve. Reinstalling the valve took a couple of hours. I also installed a recently purchased reproduction glove box liner as the original cardboard glove box liner was about to fall apart. On the afternoon of September 29th, I completed one other small job. I removed the neutral safety/backup light switch and reengineered a small threaded rod to replace the broken piece of the switch that connects to the shifter linkage. I replaced the backup light bulbs, installed a new fuse, connected and adjusted the switch and now the neutral safety switch and backup lights work Although this is my first car from the 1950’s, armed with a Service Manual and with today’s resources available online, and the help of good friends in the hobby, this car is now mechanically ready for touring, less than three months after I bought it. On October 24-26, I drove the car on the Buzzard’s Breath Touring Region’s 3rd Annual Tour. The tour was based in Fuquay Varina. With the trip to Fuquay Varina, three days of touring, and the ride home, we put over 600 miles on the car. I still need to clean the exterior up. My friend, Stafford, also details cars so I will have him give it some attention soon. I plan to install carpet and eventually may replace the aftermarket seat covers with a correct reproduction seat kit, but the car is ready for some driving." On Nov-12-14 at 07:38:05 PST, seller added the following information: There are quite a few people watching this auction, but I am a bit surprised that nobody has asked me any questions about the car. I did think of two other minor things that I should mention. Like most, if not all Dynaflow transmissions, this one leaks a little bit over time when the car is parked. I have always simply kept a piece of cardboard on the floor of the garage under it to soak up the oil and transmission fluid leaks and to keep the garage floor clean. The second thing other thing that I want to mention about the car is that I don't have a good photo of the headliner so I did not post one in this auction. The headliner is original and it has one small hole near the top of the right rear door. This is believed to have been made by a mouse that got into the car while the previous owner owned the car. The rest of the headliner is in good enough condition, and original, so I never did anthing with the hole, although it should be fairly easy to patch it. If there is anything that I have not covered, feel free to ask me questions. Thanks.