Grandfather's '87 GN

Just hand wash it. It's not that hard, honestly.

Don't run it thru a car wash. It's a half assed wash, at best, where you come from.

New, automated car washes don't recognize a G Body.
 
Just hand wash it. It's not that hard, honestly.

Don't run it thru a car wash. It's a half assed wash, at best, where you come from.

New, automated car washes don't recognize a G Body.
Think you misunderstood- I've always hand washed it, but I want to try to simply soak it with my foam cannon a few times and rinse it. Had a couple people tell me that scrubbing it in its' current condition isn't the best idea. Of course, if soaking it doesn't work then the wash mitt will come out but on a nice day with nothing else to do, why not right? No automated car washes for this thing. Ever.
 
All cleaned up!
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Used Meguiar's Gold. Foamed it and rinsed it 3 times before using the wash mitt on the 4th foam, then foamed it again. No kill like overkill!

Took it up to work afterwards because one of the detailers wanted to see it all shined up. He's got an '84 Monte SS. Decided to let him attack the shift handle and steering wheel (I thought the handle was worn through and that the wheel was clean. Guess not lol)\
Before:
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After
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He's itching to let me unleash him on the whole car and the other detailer who buffed it 5 years ago wants to do it again too so by the end of summer that'll happen. Still waiting to get it checked out mechanically.

But I'd wager this car hasn't looked this good in over 20 years.
 
What's your detailer's opinion on a ceramic coating for that original paint?
 
Ceramic coating is seriously nothing but a "wax on, wax off" product.

Don't get me wrong, it's great stuff, and worth a price, but paying more than $600, $400 if you know someone, to get it done, you're getting ripped off.

I used to get it installed on 10-15 new cars a day. We get stupid money for it through the finance department.

Now, I re-install it on auto body shop repaired/restored vehicles for silly money the insurance companies are willing to pay as part of a claim.
 
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Yeah I was honestly considering just doing that in my garage with CMX or something which I've heard good stuff about. I think it was in this thread (It's been split for me- anything prior to last year is a separate thread now) someone recommended Turtle Wax's Acrylic Black (or Jet Black at the time) kit so we'll give that a try when they hit it and see if it covers up any of the numerous imperfections you can't see in the pictures.

I'm probably going to be ridiculously anal about the car before long.
 
I used the Turtle Wax black acrylic approach. I'm happy, car looks better than it did before, and it wasn't hard to use.
 
Sometimes the smallest fixes make the biggest difference. This car has been hard to cold start for 10 years now and we never figured it out. Thought it was the fuel pressure regulator. No. Thought it was some sort of position sensor on the front. Never got around to messing with it. Maybe the charcoal canister? Same as last.

Until now. Last weekend, my uncle's poking around and making a kajillion mental notes, and he sees this.
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That's the hose from the canister to the throttle body (at least I think that's where it went I'm mechanically challenged at the best of times).

Pap left spare hose in the garage so I flushed it with MAF cleaner and popped it in. The car roared to life immediately and trying 3 more times in 24 hours all yielded the same result.

What got my wheels turning was my buddy had to replace the purge valve for his canister on his 2012 Cruze for similar symptoms.

Sometimes it really is that easy. The car also idles a thousand times better, too. Unfortunately we're not really driving it right now because the master cylinder has a slight leak, and it seems to be leaking an excessive amount of oil and or gas up near the intake, and certainly oil from the front of the engine. I know these cars leak no matter what, but I want it thoroughly inspected before it gets driven much more. I did have to drive it to work 2 weeks ago because the Ram I just bought blew the torque converter., and decided after work (early day) to snap some actually good pictures of it. Here's one of em. It hasn't been washed in over a month, by the way. Just a feather duster every once in a while.

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