By the way, someone mentioned about bleeding the air out of the coolant system. I thought these systems would self bleed; how do I bleed the coolant system of air?

If your able to, do it this way...

Leave the thermostat housing off and the thermostat out.
Fill the radiator with coolant until you see coolant come out of the thermostat hole. Put thermostat back in, put t-stat housing back on and bolted down, put hose on and secure it. Done.

By filling the engine without the t-stat in, it prevents large air pockets from forming inside the engine due to pressure lock from the t-stat. I've done it many times and it works well with no issues.

Much easier to do with this:

I thought I would post the follow up of getting everything back together. I started her on Christmas Eve but did not drive it out of the shed. It started fairly easy considering. I did not drive her on Christmas Day because I was unsure and if it needed towing back home it might be harder to get someone on the holiday. I had to work on Boxing Day and drove my old 93 LeSabre. Today I started her several times, looking for leaks and making sure the air was bleed from the system. I noticed the upper radiator hose looked like it had a bulge in it so I will be replacing it. I took it for a quick drive down the street and back and still not indications that I did anything wrong. I then drove it for a longer distance, making the big loop where I live, and again checked for any leaks. The engine idles well and is a quiet running engine compared to my old 93 with over 330K miles. My new-old Buick has 190K on the odometer. I am going to take her on a longer drive tomorrow and see how it goes.

I did not plug the coolant ports on the intake; I did not have the plugs and so skipped that. As someone else pointed out, with the new Dorman intake and smaller EGR stovepipe, there should be no reason for it to leak again.

Thanks for the update Kim. From the sounds of it, you did ok.

I drove the car Sunday for approximately 50 miles and it seemed to be doing fine. I kept a watch on the temperature and the oil pressure (this car had a problem with the oil pressure that was repaired before I acquired the vehicle) and did not see anything unusual. I stopped a few times and opened the bonnet to check for leaks; oil, water, fuel, and looked under the car for anything dripping down. I saw nothing. The upper radiator hose appears to be bulging a bit and I had attempted to get a replacement Sunday, the shop was out and had to order. The check engine light set and a check of the code was PO442. small Evap leak. I am sure this is the fuel cap. The previous owner brought an aftermarket and it cleared the code only to return sometime later. I noticed the cap almost fell off when stopping for fuel; it is not staying tight. I have ordered an ACDelco fuel cap and it should be here in a few days and I am sure that will fix the PO442 code.

interesting thread

glad it is working

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