couple questions about 79 TA

I may be buying a 79 TA to restore in a few years, just drive it this summer though, and i am wondering if anyone knows any good websites to find information on this car. You would think it would be easy, but i am having some difficulty with it. I am mainly interested in researching the engine, the 403 olds 6.6L, but any information would be helpful. I dont really know much more info on the car. I am going to go look at it this friday so i may be able to provide more info later. Thanks

-DJ

What kind of info are you looking for? I used to own a '79 T/A and know quite a bit about them.
The Olds 403 in them was rated at 185hp and around 210 ft/lbs of torque and was a smallblock engine. The 403 is not a good choice for a high HP rebuild unless you have one of the heavy duty ones. The standard 403 had "windowed" main webs and therefor couldn't take a lot of stress. There were some "heavy duty" 403's produced with solid main webs and they were mainly found in trucks.

that helped because all of the info i could find on it said it had 185hp, but 320ft/lbs of torque. Obiviously you know about the engine though if you had one. I wouldnt be going for a high horsepower rebuild, i'm a fan of factory correct restorations. I read that they had overheating problems, is that correct? The T/A i am going to look at is $3000, but the body work is pretty straight from what i can remember (i looked at it in august), but i still really need to inspect it for rust, however i work in the body industry, so rust repair and replacing things dont really worry me. I guess if you could just give me any information in particular to look for when i go look at it, as in problems mechanically would be very helpful. Thanks.

OK. For over heating (not bored over, .040 is max without overheating problems), never saw it on mine and I drove it 5,000 miles one summer, from ND to ID to MO to PA and then back to ND, all in a 3 week period. The car performed flawlwssly (it was only 4 years old then) and got 26+ MPG on the highway. Cheyanne WY to Omaha, NE on one tank of gas (nothing open in Nebraska late at night back then). The tank's capacity is 21 gallons and the engine runs fine on regular unleaded.
My car was a little modified...Cyclone headers, true dual exhaust, thrush turbo mufflers. A "scoop kit" from J.C. Whitney that has you cut open the back fake grill on the shaker. Then there is a motorized plate system that bolts into the top half. The plate will seal off the cut open scoop, then with a flip of a switch the plate is drawn back into the scoop to open up the cutout and let air in directly to the carb. Sitting inside the shaked scoop assembly was a 9" velocity stack with air filter built in.
With my mods I was hitting just a little over 200hp.
The 79's wern't geared for quickness, they were geared for top speed (had mine up to 160 several times) with something like 2.71 gears. 60 MPH was 2k RPM with a 3 speed auto.
The only "problem area" I know of would be the lower front fenders behind the wheels...liked to rust there.
The biggest drawback for me was that the seats do not recline.

For engine performance look no further than here http://www.mondellotwister.com/Art403Olds.htm Mondello is THE name in Olds performance.
After the exhaust the next thing to ditch is the stock cast iron intake manifold (keep it in the garage in case you enter the car in shows). The stock Rochester Q jet is MORE than enough carb for anything you want to do with that engine and can be set up to run like a raped ape.
The published torque rating for the engine was 320 ....I missed the 3 key (sorry)

thank you for all the help and aiming me to that website, very very helpful!