photo of stock chin spoiler area?

Well its not exactly the chin spoiler, but what I'm looking for is a photo of the plastic cover that goes on the underside of the car below the radiator. A few weeks ago, when I was doing a bunch maintenance, I saw some of the plastic push in expander retainers that are supposed to hold that piece on, but there was no such piece on my car.

Do any of you have a photo of this area on a factory unmodified car? I just want to see what I should be hunting on my next trip to the junkyard. I'll have to add it to the shopping list.

Thanks!
VegasScott

I can't get any for you right now but if no one has answered your question/request by the first of the week I'll see what I can do

This piece?

Actually -- you might not wanna bother with that junkyard trip. GM leaves these underbody plastic unfinished parts relatively cheap. what you are looking for is called the Air Deflector and is part of the "cooling" component group, think of it as a component to the radiator.

It's $37.- (not incl shipping) from Monsterpartsonline.com; I bet if you get any kind of price break from a dealer your best bet is to just buy it at that dealer. List on it is $54.

You can see the part on Monster if you look it up. Cooling/Radiator Support/Air Deflector. And while you are at it you might want to order some of the nice re-installable GM retainers...

Albertj

EDIT: yeah, Scott got a pic of the air deflector.

Yup! That would be the piece that is missing. Wow, I didn't expect it to look like that! I would have thought it would have been higher/closer to the body, and only have a deflector extending downward. Hmm... Interesting!

Albert, that's good to know on the cost of a new one. For that price, a new one would be worth it since the ones in the junkyard will most likely be beat up from bashing them into parking curbs and other sorts of abuse.

Thanks again fellas!

VegasScott

They are worth it. When I was traveling 1,000+ miles a week I hit a retread that took off the bottom piece. I did not think much about it but over the next 10 months I seemed to take a 1/2 to 1 mpg hit. I had it replaced and the mileage went back up. This was really only detectable when I compared highway only tanks of gas.

That's interesting about the MPGs.

When I redid the cooling system hoses and thermostat, I put the stock stuff in and at full operating temperature, my needle sticks straight up at 200*. I wonder if that will move to just left of the 200* mark with the deflector and traveling at highway speeds.

VegasScott

I hope Albert is right. I bought my first replacement from the dealer for only $16... Several months ago I went to buy another, and it was offset to an aftermarket "close-out" company and cost me $80 with shipping.


Also, Scott: When I first bought my car, the gauge was always 200 minimum as well... After I removed the radiator cross-tie/bar/whateveryoucallit and cleaned out the crap between the radiator & condenser, and blasted through the fins of both with a garden hose, my 'regular' temp dropped 5 degrees to the left of vertical...

Just thought I would add to Scott’s picture.

This is what it looks like off of the car:

Air Deflector Part #25614704:



There are 11 of these fasteners holding it on:



When I bought my spare several years ago I think it cost me like $7.50, I was buying several parts from a local dealership at the time and they were giving me 25% off of list.

I stopped by a buick dealer today. They said the air deflector (25614704) isn't available anymore through them. You have to get it from Vintage Parts out of Wisconsin. They were going to charge me $77.66 for the part.

Albert's suggestion of monsterparts is looking really good right now!

Any other suggestions? I may be hunting the yards soon.

VegasScott