Where to start?
Under the hood was in pretty tired shape, I've seen much worse, but also
have been under the hood of a couple of 100 point show cars. This isn't one of
them. A previous owner had the idea of detailing the engine compartment with spray
cans but without masking!! Over spray from this project went everywhere, and really
looked bad. Add this to 38 years of rust and grease, and you have the typical
under hood disaster.
The Intake Manifold was leaking exhaust around the heat riser. I also
had Leaky exhaust manifolds, and rings which only produced 80 pounds of pressure,
instead of the recommended 115-125 pounds. I had a minor engine fire after
a cold weather backfire, which didn't do the carbs any good. Just a tired
38 year old engine. Can't wait to see what it will do when its totally
restored.
When I first started this project I was a little bit worried about the
number of parts and complexity of the three carburetors. Lots of vacuum lines
and switches. To add to the complexity the car has Cruise control and A/C. None
of this stopped me though, I just started taking things off and putting them into
zip lock bags. I used a magic marker to identify everything in the bag and kept
records of any missing or incorrect parts. This is an absolute must when doing
a restoration. There will be literally thousands of pieces of hardware off the
car by the time the car is ready to put back together. Lots of pictures are also
a good thing. I recommend a digital camera if you have a computer.
(The shot above is of the Power Steering gearbox, after the PS pump was removed)
First I took off all the external devices. A/C compressor, Power
Steering pump, Fuel Pump, Generator, Fan, and Water pump. I took each piece off
and rebuilt it, cleaned and repainted it before moving on. I decided after reading
some restoration books, that I would rather be slow taking the car apart so I
had time to document and remember each stage of the restoration. This practice
also worked well because it let me keep the pile of removed parts small. After
parts are completed I packed them in boxes and moved them to the attic.
I had planned on taking everything north of the firewall off
and restoring it. I went ahead and pulled everything out of the front of
the car. Headlights, bumper, radiator, radiator frame, Hood, etc. Again,
each part was stripped, fixed and repainted, before storage.
Checkout those Carbs!
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Author: Bill McKenna
email bill@mckennasgarage.com