I had BIG plans. With two weeks off and relatively good weather I
figured I'd really pare down the growing lists of minor repairs I'd
promised myself to take care of this winter. I wanted to tackle the non
functioning horn (still haven't located the relay, which I suspect is
the problem), replace the door hinge bushings, replace the worn door
latches with the new ones I'd purchased last spring, install new
stainless steel clamp straps on the steering rack gaiters, attempt to
repair the original oil pressure gauge, finish cleaning up some messy
wiring, attempt to repair the tears in the vinyl soft top, make a new
aluminum panel for the trunk, make a longer handle for the new scissors
jack, install a new speedo gear at the transmission end, flush the
clutch fluid, plus a few other items which I've forgotten for the moment
but will recall the moment I finished writing this.
And of course I have an equally long list of intermediate level projects
which will have to be taken care of before too much longer. Like
replacing all of the U-joints. The drive shaft U-joints were last
changed in 1969 and the half-shaft joints are 1963 originals. Then
there's the differential. I'm sure after 30 years (a number of them
inactive) it could do with some attention. Any Salisbury experts out
there? 1969 was also the year I last re-did the suspension. I'm sure
there are some things to be taken care of there too considering AC's
design philosophy of non lubricated suspension components. In '69 I
installed grease fittings front and rear, but since the system wasn't
designed to be greased, probably the only function they served was to
prevent rust (I HOPE!!), rust being the primary reason for the rebuild
then.
Then there is the upholstery. I'll probably have the seats done
professionally since leather seat kits are expensive and I don't want to
run the risk of screwing them up. Carpets I can handle. I'd like to
have a new top custom made, but most shops won't do that if new ones are
available. They are, but for the cost and the generally poor fit
mail-order tops typically have, I'd prefer having one made by a
competent top maker.
The biggie, of course, is the HiPo engine. This will be both expensive
and time consuming. The up side is that the car will be driveable in
the mean time 'cuz of the old Fairlane lump presently under the hood. I
rebuilt the T-10 in '69 also but it seems to be functioning well, so
shouldn't need much beyond new gaskets. It has less than 30k miles on
it since the rebuild.
So what did I do during those two weeks? Not a lot. I did take care of
some of the wiring mess under the dash; while I was under there I
plugged all of the bulbs back into their sockets so that the few
functioning gauges can be seen at night. I also took care of one task
I'd been dreading: replacing the plastic cable ties holding the newly
installed gas line to the frame with stainless steel straps. I hate
working under gunky old cars.
My only other accomplishment was to strip a bit more paint. I managed
this because it was easy. Just spread on some stripper, cover with
plastic wrap and let sit for a few days. The longer left, the less
effort involved. One nice thing about aluminum is that stripper can be
left on almost indefinitely without serious corrosion resulting. The
only problem is that I'm running out of easy places to strip. Most of
the remaining areas require removing some piece of trim or a light
before the stripper can be applied. Oh well. Even so, I've gotten
enough paint off so that the car is starting to have a very different
look. Imagine a very large can of Coors Lite beer, if you will.
Now to the important (to me, anyway) part- Recently I've been
experiencing an intermittent problem when I drive the car. The symtoms
are somewhat like vapor lock, though I'm reasonable sure that's not the
problem. First of all, the fuel lines are pretty will shielded from
exhaust heat and the weather has been cool lately. Plus I've never had
vapor lock problem in the past, even in very hot weather. The symtoms
are sudden coughing or outright dying for a short period. Usually
there's no difficulty re-starting, though there may be a bit of coughing
or missing for a few seconds. Then everything seems to be fine.
Sometimes there's only a subtile hesitation or a "missed beat". To me,
it seems like brief episodes of fuel starvation, but I can't get the
symptoms to last long enough to pin the problem down. Once it started
doing it while I had the air cleaner off. I could see fuel being pumped
into the carburetor throat when I worked the linkage by hand, but the
coughing and sputtering continued for a bit; then it cleared up and I
couldn't get it to re-occur. I removed the canister-type fuel filter
for a look. The filter appeared to be clean; the canister itself was
full. Gasoline flowed freely (via gravity form the tank) during the
time I had the filter off so the line from the tank to the pump seems to
be clear. I blew the line between the fuel pump and the carburetor out
with compressed air. There didn't seem to be any obstruction. I even
took the top cover of the carburetor off. The float chamber was full
and it looked clean.
For a while I thought the problem was temperature related because it
doesn't seem to occur until after the car has been running for a while.
Last Sunday I made a couple of diagnostic runs around the neighborhood
to see if I could get a handle on what was going on. Nothing much seem
to happen until the temp gauge got to 140 or so. At that point the
symtoms started to occur, though not on a regular basis. But later when
normal running temperature was reached, everything was back to normal.
But that was then. I know the problem has occurred when the car was
fully warmed up. Just bad (good?) luck that day, I guess.
Even though this seems like a fuel problem, I do have my doubts. First
of all, I haven't found any obvious problem there. Second, everything
is new (or recently rebuilt). Last summer I removed the tank to fix
some leaks. While I had it off I clean it out and sealed it. So far
the flow from the tank seems good and I haven't discovered any crud in
the lines or filter. While I was at it I replaced all of the lines,
both solid and flexible, between the tank and the carburetor. I also
replaced the fuel pump since I was suspicious that the old one was
pumping raw gas into the crankcase. The summer before last, I rebuilt
the carburetor. I doubt it has more than a couple of thousand miles on
it since then and it has been working fine up 'til now. Of course, this
could be one of those half full/half empty situations. Either
everything on the fuel supply side being new eliminates it as a
possibility or makes it the prime suspect in the event I screwed
something up. I'm keeping and open mind.
On the electrical side, the situation is somewhat the same. Most
everything is new. I replaced the points, condenser, distributor cap,
spark plug leads and spark plugs last summer. Last weekend I swapped
the coil for a spare used one I had. No change. Pursuing this side, I
wriggled various wires while the engine was running. A few months ago I
had had a intermittent problem (different symtoms) which was traced to
corroded pins in one of the firewall feed-through connectors. Needless
to say I tugged and pulled at every connector and terminal in sight.
The only place where this may have had an effect was at the starter
solenoid/ballast by-pass module. The symtoms occurred just as I
wriggled one of the leads to the solenoid, then cleared up. Try as I
may, no amount of fiddling with these wires caused a re-occurrence. In
fact, I couldn't get the symtoms to repeat at all after that. I even
drove around for 15-20 minutes. Nada.
Maybe that fixed things, but my guess is that the problem has just gone
into hibernation and will be back with a vengeance. I sure would
appreciate hearing suggestions on what might be causing this problem.
To recap:
'stock 65 289 (Fairlane) engine
'stock mechanical fuel pump
'stock single-point distributor w/vacuum advance
'stock Ford 2-barrel carb
'stock coil
'stock starter solenoid
I do have a spare starter solenoid but I hate to swap it because there's
no way of knowing for sure whether or not this was the problem unless it
re-occurs right way.
Roland
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