Well,when I was a kid some 50 yrs ago, my lst car was a 53 Custom, at $175. Now last year, I purchased what I thought was a 53 to relive my childhood, but found out after buying sight unseen it was a 54. Anyway, stored for 40 yrs and not bad condition, but have done a lot of work, not me, since my last actual mechanic work was when I had no money, back then, but it has been running as a driver off and on mostly off the last year or so. She does no longer look like the Plain Jane. JeffB has provided lots of advice along the way and he asked me to join this group. Anybody from New England out there? FordNut
4 door cool i'm realy into 4doors right now just because it's different! Welcome, these are some realy cool guys in this group!
Thanks for the compliment.... course 4 drs. weren't my lst choice, but looks a lot sharper with the new paint job, and the white walls...so she is pretty much like I bought her, which is my aim to not make her into something she wasn't.
Hey Dennis! glad to see you are here,any luck on getting her running right? If not maybe some of the guys can help,just let them know what you have done so far.
Thanks, but please don't give me credit for the photo posting information. That all came from Scott, Skoh73. Thank him, not me.
Welcome the the "club". You'll find a bunch of great guys on here to help with advice and ideas. Pictures????? We love pictures!
Thanks to Eric and Jeff....My Avitar is up Eric, and JeffB. she is still at the shop. He got it to idle without a choke, and now to get it from not breaking down esp. when you give it the gas. Still have an option...get on list of a guy who has a reputation and may solve the breaking down. Just doesn't seem to get the steady gas. I appreciate the welcome from all you guys!!
I posted some pics, don't ask me how...anyways, one of our frozen 72 sq mile lake, one of Model T with Skis, lst snowmobile, and the others before and after.
My '51 (see my avitar) was cranky when I got it, too. It's all stock (V8) except for a low-pressure in-line electric fuel pump. It would nearly die when I gave it gas, just like yours, but it would run and accelerate almost normally with the choke partly on. I rebuilt the original carburetor, cleaned the plugs and replaced a lazy vacuum advance (bad diaphragm) and it runs like a champ now. It had fresh points, etc. so I didn't need to replace that stuff, but did re-set the timing which was off, but not badly. A lot of times a car that has sat for a while will respond very well to just draining out the old gas (don't forget the gas in the line and in the carburetor float bowl) and putting in new gas. You can chase your tail for a long time trying to get the motor to run right, but it never will until you put in fresh gas. (Don't try to cheat by just adding new gas to the old gas, that doesn't work.) These old motors do not require rocket surgery to fix or tune, but many of today's "mechanics" just don't have any common sense or old-fashioned "figure-it-out" know-how. Just remember, always take it one change at a time, and try the simplest, cheapest thing first. Try fresh gas first. Sometimes that's all it needs. Good luck! Eric
Excellent advice from Eric. These old motors just need a few things to run...spark, fuel and timing are the biggees...yeah, you can get into compression, and some other things etc but if you chase down these big three, you can fix 90% of the troubles with a non-computerized engine. Like Eric said, just chase one at a time until you find the culprit. In an unfamiliar car, I too always tend to start with the fuel...make sure it's fresh, then make sure it's actually being delivered to the carb in sufficient volumes. Fresh fuel and a fresh fuel filter are cheap and easy things to check off. Then, pull the fuel hose from the carb and turn the engine over (point that fuel hose into a can, etc) and see if the pump is pumping a healthy stream of fuel. Checking whether you have spark at each plug is super easy and setting the timing is also extremely easy. Once you've cleared all of the above, and you still have trouble, the next logical culprits to clear are a possible gunked up carb (from old gas) and your points, condensor, etc. Doing a tune-up on your distributor is not only easy, but very cheap, and rebuilding an old gunked up single barrell carb is something that just about anyone can do as well. Hope this helps...these are all the things that my dad taught me early when I started getting in to old cars, and they've saved me tons of time and frustration in the garage and out on the side of the road. Don
Oh yeah....dean....you may want to give us a look over at www.1954ford.com There are some guys on there that probably know more about this model than even the engineers who designed them.
That's great Dean....I hope to see you there. And, if all stays on track, I'll be driving my 54 from Houston to Branson.
Yesterday 03:55 PM densanbean Thanks, Don I am a member of your club, under FordNut. Dean...just to be clear about the 54 Ford Club...I'm just the guy who was foolish enough to donate m***ive amounts of time to get the website and forums set up. I can't take any credit for the club itself.
Thanks Eric, Don and Jeff....found 2 fouled plugs with closed gap on p***enger side, so now she is running a lot better. I would have known better if this missing happened back in the late 50's with my 53. Guess I have a carb for sale.
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