fave automotive A/Cs 1955-85 yrs

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He absolutely still has the car and in the last few years has spent a fair amount of time and money upgrading it. It now has a rare optional woodgrain steering wheel normally seen on Rivieras but his has a Buick or Wildcat emblem - can't remember which - that took some time to track down.

 

IIRC the car wasn't sold new in Canada, I believe it was delivered in Florida then the family moved to Vancouver at some point. The Wildcat shares the garage with a really lovely, low mileage '66 Coupe de Ville. He wanted that bad enough to sell his exceptionally nice '60 Coupe de Ville, but I believe the Wildcat is his favorite to drive.
 
Nice car, PhilR !

Love the 65-69 cars, and the '67 Wildcat was one of them, but now these 65-66 Wildcats are looking better to me today than when they were new.

Not many Wildcats compared to all the muscle machines I used to see on Woodward Ave. - classy ride...the Buick Wildcat. I remember a friend's parent's 66 Buick Electra - he sort of "borrowed" it for one night when his parents were away. We all chipped in to buy gas - that was a thirsty machine. Very smooth and not too slouchy for its weight/class.

Here's someone's 67 Wildcat - it's cool, but your interior, PhilR, is classy.

ovrphil++5-8-2013-13-20-44.jpg
 
The woodgrain steering wheel was available on the Wildcat in 1966 only. I have seen a few 1965 Wildcats with this steering wheel but it partially hides the speedometer and clock/idiot lights on the 1965 dashboard. This wasn't an issue on Rivieras as they still had the 1963-64 style dashboard.

In 1966, the gauges were changed to the style shown on the 1967 above and the flasher and tilt steering levers were moved up pointing at 9 o'clock instead of being angled down at 8 o'clock like they were on '65 Buicks.

 

Phil

I had a '67 and a '68 Wildcat in the past too. My first car was a '68 Wildcat that I got while I was at high school, a few months before I had my driver's license (at age 15!) in 1992... 
 
PhilR - Not that I couldn't work and have a car like yours in high school - my friends had Vettes, Super Bees, Road Runners, and new cars...but I'd take your Buicks over those muscle machines...and sigh later, when they reached six figures and more in the auctions of late.

Absolutely cool - the cars you drove! wow.
 
I have Dura-Cool in my car Honda Civic and you would not believe the shear difference in cooling power and also it does not

bog the car down nowhere near it used to.That Dura-Cool works great and I only have a little over half as much refrigerant as

there is suppose to be in there and the head pressure have dropped big time.My Aunt put it in her Heat-pump and it cut 

her bill by 40% and her heat pump is a old 1983 Coleman.I can't use it till my warranty on my Trane goes, which is going

to be a while..It really does work better than R-12 or R22 in cars or home unit's..People just freak out that it is a mix of Butane and

something else.They don't seem to mind furnaces that burn something but get paranoid when you use it to move heat and there is no fire at all.
 
I have a '67 Chevy panel van. Think Scooby Doo.

There is a fair amount of discussion on my favorite classic van website about how to retrofit A/C to one of these vans. Remember, the drivers sits BESIDE the engine, which is between the two front seats - sort of like an RV layout. Chevy calls it "Forward Control". Which it truly is, as the steering wheel, brake and gas pedals, shifter, are all forward of the engine.

This means there is precious little space inside the "doghouse" where the engine lives for a compressor or even an extra radiator for an A/C system. Not to mention where the hell to put the evaporator and how to route the ducting.

Apparently some people have done it but they resorted to an electric powered system.

I think.
 
Re: Resorting to an electric powered system.

Which would be a best idea: you don't use your gas running the engine if the van is used as an R/V & A/C is needed while parked...

Likely how a lot have solved "the lack of A/C-adaptable" problem, in vintage vans!

-- Dave
 
A/C retrofit into older vehicles

there is a company called"vintage air"that makes A/C systems for street rods and other cars with limited A/C mounting options-small,slim,but effective condensers and compressore that are even smaller than a sanden 508 type-i recon the '67 chevy van would be pretty easy if you have the ability to custom make an evaporator housing.
 
10 years ago, I bought a 1967 Buick that I parted out with this Automatic A/C system. The car was still running but it's body was in poor shape and almost every part of the automatic a/c was bad!  I did keep the refrigerating system from it which is now in my car and still working but I got manual controls from another parts car.  It also simplified the installation as I didn't need to modify the wiring harness in my car to add manual a/c while I would have needed to replace the complete harness to install automatic a/c.

http://www.oldcarmanualproject.com/manuals/Buick/1967/Climate Control/ACC 2nd Type/index1.html
 
PhilR - that's a cool link with car ads...seems like there a few of these kinds of websites, but this one looks pretty extensive. Slick that you could just incorporate the refrigeration system from the 67 to your older Buick. But it did take some investigating, didn't it, to see what you needed to get the job desired, done....and again, I like that Frigidaire frig in your kitchen..but still wonder about the brushed chrome, if it was an option back then?
 

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