my 1997 riv sc

heres a few pics of my new brakes, powerstop, and some riv sightings in cheyenne wt














in plant parking lot



another red riv downtown cheyenne


this is from inside my trunk. any ideas??

aa any ideas on the dave thing? this was up under my carpet in the trunk. drivers side panel area. looks to be wrote at factory in the inspection pen?

wow...

...thats cool

how you guys like the brakes? 160 for the whole set for all 4 wheels

That will depend on how well you like the brakes.

AA wrote:

That will depend on how well you like the brakes.

Word.

my poor riv is sittin at home with a bunch of new parts waiting while im down in georgia workin. did hear from the boss tonight that im goin to another job in ohio soon maybe i can at least grab her on the way. on a side note my nephew admitted to racing my car stop light to stop light on the way home from droppin me off against a firebird. he smoked it lol so i wasnt mad

well i didn't do a very good one of these when i first got here so i figured id do another, i bought my riv at a car lot for 2500 bucks. im the third or fourth owner ( cant remember). it had 131,xxx miles on it when i bought it. someone had rattle canned the trunk and a couple other spots but it had a clean and clear title and i fell in love with it instantly. there are 2 things im passionate about. 1 my job, 2 cars. it had a couple lil probs like a leaky radiator ( got the dealer to put in a new one before i bought it) and a slow leaking tire besides that it was in great shape. the first time i took it home i saw and stopped for a buck ahead of me in the road. as i watched him a doe ran up and i kid you not head butted my drivers fender then swung her head back and clipped the mirror! leaving a big dent in my fender and me without a driver mirror glass. i searched for 3 months before finally finding one online thru eBay. installed it, got a fender painted it as close to the color as i could get with a rattle can and could not for the life of me figure out how to get the fender off! i ended up cutting it in half with a grinder to figure out how to get the headlight off! boy i could have used you guys then! well that had me good for a while then my nephew and lil brother decided they wanted to "help" me paint my car. ( i had planned on doing it in all black) they sanded it down( not very good) and painted it with rustoluem oil based paint. i came in as they started and figured what the hell and helped them. it looked good till the poorly sanded areas started peeling. i sanded it down then and had to go to work in north Carolina before i could prime it. while i was there a semi side swiped my passenger fender destroying it, my bumper, and the whole head light . luckyily no frame damage was done so i got the parts and fixed it and primed it. now as it sits its in primer and ive slowly started modding it. ive put new plugs, 180 thermo, and gutted the airbox. i will be installing crossdrilled and slotted rotors very shortly and trying to tackle my carbon fiber vinal im doing to the interior this week. also putting in new rear hubs as ive already changed the fronts. hoping that gets rid of my abs trac light.ill be posting a lot of pics later on so bear with me

Wow, sorry to hear the car is a bit of a magnet for damage, but hopefully it has that out of its system now!

in the midst of the front powerstop rotor and pad replacement along with painting the calipers. takin lots of pics as i go too. will do a full write up of the powerstops front and rear as i finish them. the current front right up i found didnt list any of the tools needed or have many pics so im gonna do my best to top it. in the mean time while im waitin for paint to dry.... heres some pics of my riv when i first got it







in black.....



the semi damage



when i primed it



a lil mystery i found inside the trunk

after my rear skyjacker air shock install

and before it

i did a write up on the shock install and they definetly improved handling.
more to come as i get it

I'm really interested in that "Happy Anniversary Dave" in the trunk

Where exactly was that in the trunk, and do I see a portion of a date/year to the left that is cut off in the photo?

Might be fun to get a Carfax and track down the previous owners and give them a quick call to see if you can find out the story. Would be neat if the car had been a gift from "Dave's wife" for their anniversary or something...

Al

ill pull all the carpet out again tonight from the trunk and take some more pics of it. its up under the carpet and looks like the grease pens that they use at factory

So what do you want to know about the markings? I'd guess someone in the factory congratulating a fellow worker.

That's my thoughts too but it be interesting to know for sure

im home for another week or so so i need to update this and the thread for my car. expect pics soon.

Well I think its safe to say I have a very tough riv. Guy ran a stop sign and I clipped him in the side of his Toyota corrolla. Spun him all the way around  and blew his tire. Plus it looks like a shark bit his door. On my riv it looked like it messed the bumper up but because of the body work I've done to the riv I was using zip ties to hold it on at the wheel wells instead of the brackets, got it back to shop bumper is ok. Unfortunately the hood is bent just enough for me to notice and it cracked the grill at the top. I have an extra grille at the house now I just have to find a new hood. Hopefully won't be too hard to do. I think I shall name my car indestructible. That's 1 deer, 1 semi, 1 fence post, and one compact car its taken on and is still alive. What do you guys think?

Btw I got a ticket for failure to yield and he got a ticket for running the stop sign. How does that even work? Fml!

When i took off my bumper cover, i was absolutely blown away by how solid the bumpers are. Werent these cars rated as having the best structural integrity of any car when they were made?

Sorry to hear about the accident!

I don't think they were officially rated, or at least I've never found a "star rating" for Riv/Aurora, but we know the shell was the most rigid GM had at the time, on the order of about 2X the fed standards for frame strength. The cradle was hydroformed, rare and expensive at the time, and something later used for the Corvette chassis. According the Olds brochure, the Aurora actually broke GM's chassis test machine, so they used a truck-rated machine instead.

My Riviera has survived 2 separate side impacts to the driver door with little effect. I drove the car away in both instances - it tracked just as straight as before impact.

My first Riv took a direct hit to the drivers side wheel well by a 2012 Taurus at ~40mph. Cracked the mounts off the transmission.
Maybe our beasts are especially rigid and safe but after that incident I dont want to know what a drivers side T bone collision would be like at 40mph.. scary is all that comes to mind.

AA wrote:

I don't think they were officially rated, or at least I've never found a "star rating" for Riv/Aurora, but we know the shell was the most rigid GM had at the time, on the order of about 2X the fed standards for frame strength. The cradle was hydroformed, rare and expensive at the time, and something later used for the Corvette chassis. According the Olds brochure, the Aurora actually broke GM's chassis test machine, so they used a truck-rated machine instead.

My Riviera has survived 2 separate side impacts to the driver door with little effect. I drove the car away in both instances - it tracked just as straight as before impact.

They only tested the Aurora. It held up pretty well and got a decent rating. Notice how the drivers compartment stays really rigid.