I haven’t done much wrenching on the car, but I’ve been driving it. I had some free time and went to a cruise night tonight, had some other nice cars there.
On my way home from the cruise night the car started running very poorly, spitting and sputtering. I limped it to a gas station and tinkered around a bit. I believe I have a fuel issue, I took the carb off and cleaned it up. New fuel filter. I pulled the plugs which were a little black, cleaned them and re gapped them. I also noticed, what looks like a crack in my exhaust manifold. So hopefully it’s alright for the rest of this season and I can try to search for a new old exhaust manifold or header that would fit the car.
Time for a downdraft intake, and a split Y cast header. You will be amazed how much a Holley 94 or Stromberg 97 will wake the banger up.
That's my goal, to find a header, intake and a single downdraft carb. I don't want to order new parts online, but whenever I see an old manifold or carb semi local for sale it gets scooped up very quickly.. If I did order new, do most people prefer a cast exhaust manifold? The Reds Headers look cool and are half the price of the cast split Y's.
I think its mostly a matter of looks for the header choice. Ive ran both, and both have cool factors. The Reds header one is a good performer for sure, and for budget its a good deal for sure. Yes used banger stuff gets picked up pretty quickly. Its a matter of laying aside money for pulling the trigger when you find it. Honestly the repop Burns intake is almost as good as orig and comes with linkage. And normally not any more expensive than real deal normally. Ill keep an eye out for banger intakes.
It was an eventful morning heading to the Jalopy Jam Up. A couple hiccups, but better to show up late than not at all. I met a few guys from the HAMB, it was nice to put a face to the username’s and avatar photo’s. I’ve seen photos from the show and wish I stuck around later to say hi to more of you guys. My photographer friend tagged along and snapped a few photos, hopefully he edits and gets me some more.
Hey guys, been a while. Life’s been busy and my garage isn’t heated so not too much has happened lately. Now that the weathers getting nicer, starting to think about getting the car out. I finally got a windshield back, took forever but it’s done now and installed. A few more updates to come. Hopefully as the weather gets better, more things will get checked off the list and more updates will come to the thread. I hope everyone had a good off season!
I found someone semi local selling a rebuilt flathead V8. I thought I was going to purchase it, I got jerked around a bit for weeks and wasn’t able to buy it. So I kept looking for banger parts (header, intake etc). But ordering anything from the states right now is sort of out of the question. The current USD dollar is $1.41 CAD. My next step is removing the carb to give it a good clean, so I’m going to try cleaning out the crack on the header and get a weld on it? Hopefully that will be sufficient for this summer or until I decide on banger parts or a V8.. A V8 will be a big learning curve for me which could be a while to install and to collect all parts necessary. Big decisions for a small budget..
Haven’t had much time to get stuff done lately. My basement flooded in a wicked storm we had a few weeks ago. Dealing with insurance and contractors is awful. So I’ll be redoing the basement starting shortly. Won’t be able to work on the car for a bit, but it still runs and drives so I’ll be cruising around town every now and then! I was able to get out in the garage for an hour today. My dad surprised me with a column drop he made so I had to get that in. He did a pretty damn good job, fit perfectly and does what it needs to do! You have to go for a ride after doing any modifications of course.
Question guys, I was in the garage last night tinkering. Looking at the column drop I installed, when I unbolted the original bracket holding the column in place all I did was push the steering wheel down and slid the dropper in place and bolted it up. It took a bit of force to make the opening large enough to slide the spacer in there. Is this concerning having the extra force placed on the steering box? Should I have loosened something before adding it? The steering feels very similar to how it did the last time I drove the car...
The steering box/column is all one unit, right? I'd be a bit concerned it's under stress, but I'd temper that with how much force, how much use and how much effort to change. Can the mounting holes be filed oblong to allow more tilt? I looked at '29 steering boxes and it looks like they are 2 bolts horizontally through the frame. I'd want to weld them back to round so there isn't slop, but with the column supported at the top, that may not be an issue.
Thanks @RodStRace, I think that's what I'll try. I just want to relieve a bit of pressure from the box/column. Hopefully this weekend I can get out there and widen the holes a bit. With some lock washers, loctite and the column mount to the tank I think it should be alright. If not I guess the box comes back off and I'll weld the holes up to reduce the slop. I will report back.
Maybe you can just loosen the bolts and there might be enough play in the holes to let it seat in better? Or use a dremel type tool and ream the holes a bit,shouldnt take much to get it to tip back.
Thanks @37 caddy, I'll see if the holes are already ovel'd enough to just loosen the nuts and tighten them back up. If not, dremel a bit and go from there. Thanks guys!
I haven’t messed around with the steering box yet, still driving the car though! I got out in the garage for a bit the other night. Someone gave me a box of sound deadening material. Man that stuff is heavy.. was it worth the little bit of quietness for the extra weight? I’m not sure yet.
I set out for a drive to some friends Saturday morning, about 50KM one way. That’ll be the furthest one way distance this cars travelled since I’ve owned it. A little ambitious, but I thought I had done a thorough once over this past week before taking off. I made it 49 of the 50KM’s and it died. I tried some things, realized there’s no spark. Got towed the last 1KM. I found that the distributor isn’t spinning while cranking the engine over. I have already replaced the timing gear on the camshaft, but maybe that’s it again? I got towed home the next day and it’s in the garage now. I’ll dig into it this week to try and find the problem. Until then..
Got the car ripped apart tonight, sure as shit it’s the timing gear on the camshaft. I replaced this two years ago. I’d be surprised if I’ve driven 300km’s since.. Does anybody know what would cause me to shred another one? This time I’ll be putting an aluminum one on I guess.
My understanding is that the softer gear is akin to a fuse. Something is causing excess pressure between the crank and the cam, causing this. Better to track down and fix the root cause than to just stick a stronger gear in. Check cam bearings, spring pressures, sticking valves, dist drive, etc. If the gears lasted a normal amount of time and miles and this one didn't, it's pointing to something.
You make a good point. I will do more investigating before putting another gear in and driving again. I'm hoping nothings really wrong, I wouldn't mind driving it this summer then tearing it down in the winter. Long term plan is a V8, just waiting for a good deal to come along.
There are 2 qualities of fiber timimng gears. One is maserated and the name of the other escapes me. One is acceptable, the other is junk! I went to aluminum gears in Model A's. Dave
I thought all fiber gears were the same, all aluminum gears are the same etc.. I'm going to order an aluminum one, but am going to dig into it a bit more to see what else I may need. The last time I did it I did not replace the crank gear, maybe they didn't mesh well and caused this? If I remember correctly I think the crank has to come out to press that gear off, but I could be wrong. I really just want to slap another gear on, cross my fingers it lasts two more months and then take the engine out. But I know I'll be playing with fire..
You may wish to contact Dan McEachern as he manufactures what some consider the best cam and crank gears fro brass aluminum and steel his email is dmcgears@yahoo.com
The Jalopy Journal
