Hello everyone!
I'm happy to have finally found a forum for my car!

I am located in London, Ontario Canada. 21 years old, just out of college.
I Just got an 86 parisienne Brougham that I'm going to be slowly working on. 127000 kilometers, old lady driven .

Here's what I (think I) know.
LG4 305 Motor, the high output (for a 305) version.
From what I can tell 2.93 rear gears, non posi. 4 speed (overdrive) Th-200 tranny.
I'll only be driving it in the summer.

I'd love to hear any other parisienne owners' stories and experiences working on this car. Just put new hankook whitewall tires on it. Here's what I will be doing on it this season:

-Thorough cleaning top to bottom.
- Work on rust. (mild undercarraige surface rust)
I'm thinking of cleaning the crap off the bottom, using rust converter, coating with black rocker guard and then undercoat before winter. The previous owners took good care, evidence of undercoatings underneath, under hood and trunk, and in door frames.

-New headliner. (grey colour)
-Fix cruise control. My guess is broken servo diaphragm? I took it out and plugged the vacuum holes, but moving it in and out air was escaping.
-New front wheel bearings, coil springs and shocks
-Putting in a chrome air cleaner + breather.
-Fixing radio. It works but a cassette is jammed and won't come out.

Future plans
- Exhaust work. There is a leak, I believe it's the passenger manifold gasket. I'm thinking of putting in an entirely new system, possibly a full dual exhaust. The heat riser system is completely toast, wouldn't mind deleting. Gonna delete the cat too, the car's old enough for that to be legal here. Trying to decide on new manifolds....Long tubes? Ram horn?
-New weather stripping on door frames
-Need new bumper fillers for front and rear
-New front grille and rear trim around the license plate (not sure what it's called)
-fix dent in trunk
-Paint job... a couple years down the road, it'll be the last thing I do

Performance.. I'd like to get to get a bit more get up and go out of the thing. I understand the limitations of a 305. I'm not expecting to build a 10 second car but I wouldn't mind being able to dust some civics at the stop light. (I'm not that far off from that goal now ). I understand the value of dropping in a 350 but I want to keep it fairly stock. The new exhaust ought to help but I'm wondering if an intake manifold would be worth the trouble/ is the bottleneck at this point.
This is my summer daily driver. So my goal is to keep the fuel economy as good as possible but add a bit of kick to it. Any input would be great.

Concerns

-Idles low on cold starts. Fine once things warm up. I'm guessing the carb (quadrajet) is tired. Did a seafoam treatment and sprayed it with carb cleaner... helped a bit. Any advice on tuning? I think a rebuilt replacement is on the horizon. Perhaps there is a vacuum leak too. With the car running I sprayed carb cleaner in and around the carb. It surges a bit When I spray on the driver side of the outside of the carb. Could that mean there's a leak in that area?

-Jumps a bit when going from P or N into Drive or reverse. I check the driveshaft and there doesn't seem to be any play when I try turning it by hand. Is this normal on these trannys?

-Steering wheel is "loose" Steering is fine but I can move the wheel/shaft up and down if I lift the steering wheel.

Thanks for taking the time to read my first post. Any advice on anything I've listed here is greatly appreciated.

All the best,

Patrick

 

Just to add...
A friend is giving me a new Distributor and wires, and an Edelbrock performer intake manifold. Is it worth installing the manifold? Will low-rpm performance/mileage suffer?
Also If I change the exhaust system I'll have to do something about the O2 sensor as it is attached to the Y pipe.

 

I like those cars. If your exhaust is good i would not change it, The RPM will help you out with power and mileage. Good luck Randy.

 

Hello Patrick and welcome to the community! Great to have you here. Congrats on your purchase, it looks like exciting and promising project. Good luck and keep us posted!