Some of you may remember a while back when I was putting a flathead engine in my 1925 model-T coupe. I had completely rebuilt the flathead engine and made a special custom intake manifold for it. I was only able to drive it for a few months last summer because of a problem of getting water and oil in the #2 cylinder on the p***enger's side. I did manage to put 2,003 miles on it before the engine problem got so bad that I couldn't drive it anymore. This is the only proof I have that I actually did drive it at all. This photo was taken by one of my son's friends who just happened to come up behind me. The problem of trying to figure out how water and oil was getting in the 2ed cylinder nearly drove me nuts because we ( my son and I ) couldn't find any cracks in that cylinder or the cylinder head. I even went so far as to change heads anyway ! Finally, the leak got bad enough that it left a oily smudge where it was leaking into the cylinder. You can see that smudge flowing out from the chamber behind the intake valve. A crack has opened up inside the intake valve chamber pocket. So I pulled the flathead engine out and sold it for parts. When I had first started building this car back in 1978, it had a 354 Chrysler hemi with a blower on it. The car had ended up going into storage not long after that photo was taken and didn't come back out for 30 years. At that time, being retired and on a fixed income, I sold that hemi engine to raise the money to finish the car and put the flathead in it. I have another 354 hemi that had been put in storage about the same time that the model-T was. Here it is with 30 years of ac***ulated dust and dirt on it. The reason I did not use it instead of the flathead was because I had intended to put it in my 1947 Plymouth convertible that is still storage. We drove this Plymouth from 1969 through the mid 1970's. This photo was taken at a beach in Florida in 1973 while we were on vacation. Not long after that vacation, the original 6-cylinder engine started going bad so I pulled it out and put a 350 small block in it. That is my daughter steering the car for me. She is now 58 and the car will go to her after I have left this world. Like most everything else that I have, this went into storage not too long after this photo was taken. Sooo .. that little bit of history brings me back to the problem of needing another engine for the model-T and the decision to use the other hemi and leave the Chevy 350 in the Plymouth. My son is loading the hemi into the back of my truck. Before I unload it, I decided to back up to the front porch so I could stand up on the porch and wash the engine off. It had been so long since I had looked at this engine that I didn't remember just what was on it. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it has an adapter to mount a Chevy distributor on it. This hemi was completely rebuilt and had a few hours of run time on it before it was put in storage. I have to put new oil seals and hydraulic lifters in it so I pulled the heads to see how it looked inside. It looks real good, you can still see the crosshatch marks from the cylinder hone. The starter was originally on the drivers side and I need to move it over to the p***engers side. It has a 3/4-inch thick aluminum transmission adapter. Using a hand file, I smoothed down the rough cast surface of the edge of the adapter plate. This surface is a little below the surface of the block so I put a piece of steel bar stock on it so I could check the squareness to the ring gear. Machining a step into the steel bar stock so it will fit up over the edge of the block when it gets bolted onto the surface of the adapter plate. The steel bar is bolted down and I'm positioning the starter so I can mark where to drill the mounting holes for it. There is a piece of .025 br*** in between the gear teeth to set the clearance. Here is the finished starter mounting bracket. The starter is bolted in place.
Sorry to hear about your flatty but Hemi to the rescue May need a little more air in the front tires Very nice build, very unique indeed
I have removed the big cast front housing that has the water pump on it I'm going to use a Chevy big block water pump instead. I bought a pair of aluminum water pump adapters off ebay and put them on. The front part of the timing chain cover had to be cut away and a flat piece of steel welded in the opening for clearance for the water pump. A new front oil seal is put in the front cover and the harmonic balancer and pulleys are put back on. This is how much I cut off the front of the timing chain cover. The aluminum Chevy water pump is bolted on. There are no gaskets in place on the water pump because I will have to remove these parts to paint the engine later. The water pump pulley is set on to be sure it lines up with the crank pulley. The fan is set on to make sure it clears everything. This is the same fan that I had on the flathead engine. Put the new hydraulic lifters in, ****oned it up and painted it. Starting to put it back together.
This is an old Weiand intake manifold for four, 2-barrel carburetors, either the early Ford Holley or Stromberg 3-bolt carbs or the early Chevy 4-bolt carbs. I had made an adapter manifold to hold three Holley 350 CFM carburetors instead. I know from experience with the intake that I had built for the flathead, that I'm going to need a heated riser block to keep the center carb from building condensation. This has progressive throttle linkage so the two outer carbs aren't flowing all the time and they will be fine once the engine has warmed up to operating temperature. I bought this old riser block off Ebay. It has the two bosses on the outside for the tube to let water flow through it but it doesn't have the steel water tube set inside it before the liquid aluminum was poured into the mold so there is no opening for water to flow through. I have cleaned and sand blasted the rizer and cut off the part in the center for the vacuum hose. I'm milling out channels on the inside for water to flow through. The boss for the water tube has been cut off the lower side of the rizer. The plate to cover the water channels is made out of 1/4-inch thick aluminum. I'm drilling and tapping holes in the steel channel so the rizer can be bolted down to it to keep it from warping when I weld on it. I left the boss for the water tube on this side. Using the heat gun to pre-heat the metal. In spite of cleaning it real good and sand blasting it, the old casting still a lot of contaminates imbedded into it. You can see all the specks of dirt on the surface of the weld. Hopefully, there won't be many pit holes in it. The cutting is finished on this side. I cut .030 into the surface of the 1/4-inch thick plate to clean it up all the way. Turned it over and took a .005 cut and it almost cleaned up the whole surface. That tells me that the two surfaces are already almost flat and parallel to each other. I took another .005 cut and it cleaned up all the way. Finished part with the edges all smoothed out. Much to my surprise .. there are only a very few pits in the welds. I guess I must have kept the weld puddle hot enough to burn off all of the contaminates before the weld puddle hardened up. The carb will sit on this surface. This surface will set against the intake manifold. ( with gaskets between them, of course ) The inlet and outlet for the water lines are attached to the center spacer. This has been pressure checked up to 20 pounds with no leeks. Because of the height of this spacer, I had to make up additional spacers for the other two carbs that are 3/8-inch thick. I had an old spacer that was 1-inch thick and I sliced it in two to make the other two spacers. Here's how they fit on the intake manifold with the carburetors mounted on them. You can see the water inlet line fitting sticking out from the center spacer. The other line fitting down on the manifold is for the vacuum ling going back to the power brakes. The water outlet fitting is on this side of the center spacer.
Had a real bummer happen today. ...... I was cleaning up both of the exhaust manifolds and I dropped one of them. I have a tig welder so I could weld it up but I decided not too. I'm sure I could get the mounting surface flat after the welding but if it cracked again later on, I would have to pull the engine up away from the frame some in order to get the manifold off. Luckily .. I was able to get another on off Ebay.
Hey, Retired; Could be worth a try... As long as the cast-iron is cleaned exceptionally well, crack-end is drilled, you could weld it w/either the arc-weld nickle-rods, or mig-weld w/reg wire. The mig shouldn't work, but I've seen it done, & last. ??? Even had one(from a Dodge S/6 single outlet exh converted to a crummy-dual exh outlet) (gas-torch)brazed, that lasted for at least 5+ yrs(+however long it was done before I owned it - & I used it as a MN-dd everyday for those 5+ yrs), before slowly starting to "rot-out" Since you've found a replacement, I'd do that one & shelf it as a back-up. Marcus...
I have nickel silver & bronze welding rods that I use for repairing cast iron and they work really well. With the amount of work it would take to replace a manifold once the engine is in the car, it just wasn't worth the risk.
The model-T has rack & pinion power steering. It was a little hard to turn manually when sitting still but it move fairly easily while the car was being driven so I didn't have a power steering pump on the flathead. However, with the added weight of the hemi, I'm going to want the power steering working. The original hemi cast iron water pump had a mounting boss sticking out that the power steering pump was fastened too. I had made an aluminum bracket that bolted to the front of the cylinder head and the bolt for adjusting the belt tension was threaded into it. This is that aluminum bracket. I have the pump hanging from the one bolt in the aluminum bracket and I'm making sure that the pump pulley is in-line with the crank pulley. Making a paper template for building the mounting bracket on this side of the pump. The first part of the bracket is made from two pieces of strap steel and tack welded together on the engine. The first bracket is finished welded together and another matching bracket is made out of one piece of steel. These two pieces are welded together with pieces of 3/4-inch diameter steel tube between them. The steel tube that the pump will fasten onto is longer so it extends through the front bracket.
When this had the original cast iron water pump, I had the alternator mounted on the p***enger side. Here are the mounting brackets. With the Chevy water pump, the pulleys are set back about 3/4-inch from what they were and there isn't enough clearance in front of the engine block for the alternator to line up with the fan pulley. The oil fill tube comes out of the valley pan under the manifold on that side so there isn't room to put it higher on the block. However, there is room over on the other side for the alternator. I added a steel strap coming up off the power steering mount. Then I made up a steel plate that bolted onto the front of the cylinder head where the water outlet port is. I made up a block of aluminum for a spacer between the steel bracket and the block. There is a 3/4-NPT threaded hole in the front of this so I can put in a stainless fitting for a hose to go over to the water outlet port on the other head. I'm not sure where I'm going to put the return water hose from the heater yet so I put a 3/8 NPT fitting in the top of the aluminum spacer in case I decide to put it there. This should be about where the alternator will set with the belt on it. I have to order the belt tension bracket and the 3/4-NPT fitting.
Realised that I had skipped over a series. This work was done before the power steering pump and alternator were added. The chrome inlet water line comes of the back of the cylinder head and goes up to the carburetor spacer. The vacuum line won't be put in until after the engine is set down in the car. The three chrome fuel lines are made up and run from the fuel block to the carbs. The inlet fuel line for the fuel block will be added after the engine is in the car. The water outlet line runs from the carb spacer down to the top of the water pump. Back in the early 1980's, when I rebuilt this engine, I had put three Weiand 5-1/2-inch diameter air filters on it. The filters themselves were just 2-inch wide strips of expanded aluminum with a strip of foam on the inside. I tried to polish them up but they didn't turn out very well. The top covers have some dull areas and rust spots on them. The photos make them look much better then they are. I bought three domed air filter covers that are for a Harley Davidson. I was surprised to find that they didn't have any lip on the inside for holding a filter in place like my old Weiand covers have. So I decided to put the two covers together. First, I drilled a hole in the center of the Weiand covers. I also sanded around the outer edge. Taking one of the Harley covers, I sanded around the inside surface and then put a ring of RTV adhesive sealant around it. Then I set one of the Weiand covers down on it and bolted them together to let the adhesive dry. This gives me a nice looking cover with a lip to hold a filter. Here is how they look on the engine.
Here is a photo of the car, ready for the engine to go in it. I'm still waiting on parts that I have ordered so it will be a little bit before I can drop it in. This is what I started with back in 1978.
The exhaust manifold that I bought off ebay arrived the other day so I was able to get both of them cleaned up, painted with heat proof paint and put temporally on the engine. With both of them on, I measured from the outside edge of the flange that the exhaust pipe will fasten onto, across to the outside of the flange on the other manifold. That measurement is 22-inches wide. The distance between the inside of the frame rails is only 20-inch wide so the engine isn't going to just set down in there. When I had first built this car back in the late 1970's and early 1980's with the other hemi engine, I had built a set of headers for it that tucked in close to the block. I also put an aluminum heat shield along both sides of the oil pan. Here is one side of the header. You can see how it ran inside the frame and then out under the frame. Ofcourse, with that blown engine, it was necessary to have a good free flowing exhaust system. However, with this stock engine ( even with the three carbs on it ), the stock exhaust manifold will work just fine. You all know that 90 percent of the time those two outer carbs will never have gas flowing through them. I just need to move the exhaust pipe flanges in closer to the block on each side. So I cut the flanges off the manifolds. Then I cut the angled section off so I'm left with a flat flange. Then I cut a couple of pieces out of a 1/4-inch thick wall steel tube that has the same inside diameter as the outlet hole in the flange. Here are the three parts. They are tack welded together and test fit on the engine. Now the exhaust flange is tucked in close to the block. I also rotated the flange so instead of the mounting studs being on the side they are now at the front and rear. This let me get the flange closer to the block. Here is one of the manifolds all welded up. The welds will be ground down smooth before they get re-painted.
The engine is set in place and the bolts are put in the rear transmission mount to locate the engine in the frame. Here is the clearance between the exhaust manifold and the frame and also the clearance for the universal joint to the rack an pinion steering unit. Exhaust pipe on the driver side. The heat shield on the right is wrapped around the steering unit. Exhaust clearance on the p***enger side.
When I took out the first hemi engine and put in the flathead, I had to cut the hemi motor mounting pads off the frame to get clearance for the flathead headers. That area of the frame is smoothed off and has been re-painted. To use the factory motor mounts, I would have to make up another set of frame brackets and mark where they need to go on the frame. Then I would have to pull the engine back out to drill and tap the holes in the frame for fastening the brackets on. There isn't enough room to do it with the engine in place, even with my short right angle drill and with the frame already painted, I don't want to weld them on because that just makes a big mess. So .. I have decided to go ahead and use the existing flathead frame mounts and make brackets the fit between the engine mounts and the frame mounts. I took the hemi mounts and separated the inside metal mounting bracket from the rubber. Then I made up brackets that extend forward out of 3/8-inch thick strap steel and 5/8-inch diameter solid steel rod for extra support. Here is how they look mounted in place. The engine sets 3/4-inch off center to the p***enger side to clear the steering unit on the driver side.
Cool, hurst made similar mounts. When I was looking around for ideas to mount my Studebaker engine that look very similar to early hemi’s I came across some old photos of them. enjoying seeing this one come together!
With the radiator set in place, you can see that the fan shroud opening is way to high. I had to cut out a new shroud base with a higher opening when I switched to the flathead. It is made from regular sheet steel and painted black. This is the the original shroud base that I had used for the first hemi engine. It is made from polished stainless. The shroud ring is held together by six pop-rivets, which I have drilled out. When I made this shroud ring, I formed a short flange on the back edge. The metal right in front of this flange is formed so it is raised up a little from the inside surface of the ring. When the ends of the ring are fastened together, this area just in front of the flange forms a little smaller diameter than the rest of the ring and this holds the ring in the opening in the base and makes a nice tight seam. Looking at the short flange on the back side. When I had made the shroud base for the flathead, I had to make sure that the opening was the exact same size as the original shroud base. The fan is centered perfect in the shroud ring. However, this water pump is sitting back farther than the pump that was on the first hemi so I'm going to have to use these two spacers to move the fan forward into the shroud ring.
I’ve been told that for best results, have the back side of the fan blades protrude about 1/4 inch from the back edge of the shroud.
The Jalopy Journal
