F&J

Is there any hope of the estate person being able to sell you all the remaining keys they found in the house, after they finish cleaning the place out? Why would they need them if they don't fit the house locks? If it was my car, I'd be willing to send the seller a pre-addressed USPS flat rate small box which lays flat for mailing to him. Sure would be nice to find the keys that way, if by gambling a few bucks it might pay off. (BTW, locksmiths in my area refuse to work on vintage car locks at all)

Is that "static timing"??? "Static timed" meaning that if you used a test light on the dist side of coil, then slowly come up on number one compression stroke with hand crank while watching the timing mark, then the light comes on when the points trigger the coil to fire. I've never seen any engine static timed that high. It would kick like a mule especially warmed up. I'd try pulling the coil wire out after it's been warmed up, then see if it still stops turning when it hits the compression stroke. (or static time it to barely past TDC) .

Sad but true. I'd try Facebook Marketplace, a lot of people view that site. You really need to push the fact that is does run and yard-drive. Make a driving video on YouTube so you can add the link to an ad if FB allows that. If they don't allow links, say in the ad that "you can find my driving video on YT by searching for 1931 Olds yard drive" and use that title for the YT video. You need to get creative with this project car.

No, because this is completely hidden by the crank pulley assembly when it is installed. The pulley/hub "nose" fits through that hole. He said the clearance between the hole and the pulley nose is only 0.3mm. ( .012" ). To me, I doubt there ever was a extremely super thin felt liner in there. The threads would not be a great way to hold paper thin felt. A felt or leather front cover seal normally sits into a deep groove, and the felt is substantial, not something thin. The more I think about it, I like the post that said a felt disc. I'd try to calculate what thickness it needs to be so that it would be permanently compressed by being between the slinger and cover. Then soak the felt in oil first so it won't wear a bit on first starting. Why would that felt seal not work? I don't think it could harm anything?

keep updating, for those of us wondering why the starter is unable to turn it over on 6v. Maybe it will get better if you can keep running it, we hope.

Ok, I will be the outcast. Stored that way in wrappers, cool, dry, I would run them on my year round daily driver 32 but they won't fit the wheels. But, the tubes, if that same age, might have cracks on their folds from being in the package (if they were not in airtight sealed bags). I trust old tires but not the newer thinner tubes made these last decades (if exposed to air for awhile before getting mounted)

There is nothing that threads in there. He said 0.3mm gap, which is the same close fitting on some transmission input shafts that also have those 'threads". The spiral threads pull the oil back into the trans or in this case pulls the oil droplets back into the cover when the shaft is spinning. If the engine has too much compression blow-by past the rings, or if the engine breathers are plugged (or wrong unvented oil cap) then oil would blow out past the spirals. I agree that there might be a way to rework the cover to take a seal. You'd make a new larger I.D. steel ring to weld in place of what's there. and maybe a thick felt seal like mentioned? ...placed/compressed between the cover and slinger, but then a lot of work to take back apart if it did not work. Might be worth the gamble IMO

I got a few hours into the other front fender. I'm just showing that typically it's not "just sand and repaint". Both fenders were "repaired" back in the 1930s? with lead near both fender tire wells. This side needed all the lead removed because the contours were not correct, and no way to straighten it back with so much thick lead. pic below is with lead removed, no sanding or hammering yet. If you look along the crease in the fender bead for dark areas, that is where the metal was not tinned correctly. Then the lead would not adhere so they 'floated" the lead over these spots. It is trapped acid stains. Also see there are small dark spots elsewhere in dings that are trapped acid. All of what looks like pink bondo is burned primer. Those are high spots. The shiny areas are all low areas where the lead was. They made/carved a new fake grooved bead from thick lead, as the real bead was pushed way in: They did not remove the fenders back then to be able to properly work the damage back out on a cheap used car, they just pounded it back enough to glob the lead on. It's not easy to hammer/dolly near the fender wells even with the fender off. It's taking a lot of time and variety of hammers and dollies. I had to use a large deep socket to fit under there after these pics were taken. No reshaping had been started by me in any of these pics. Later in life somebody welded a cracked corner. It was later because the thick lead was already melted off near the goober welds. The side edge bead is all wavy going from here all the way up to the front. That takes time to fix. Both fenders were hit from the front but at different heights. Now the curves when viewed from above, are not the same: I most likely will be reshaping both of these beaded edges to match each other when viewed from above and from the front view. This stuff takes time and patience but must be done or it would look terrible later. Every fender of this era that I've ever done seems to have been hit there and all along the sides. to remove lead, I use propane torch with a wire brush to get the heavy stuff off, then go back over all of the areas with the torch and fine steel wool. Needs hand coordination or else the steel wool goes up in flames. . .

You have the chrome upper piece that holds the glass. That part is hidden by Scotts wood roof header that your car will also need. They removed/drilled out all of the folding roof pivot rivets because they were going to get the parts replated. You already know, but yours was an old hotrod with engine mounts welded on, and mid 1950s Ford F100 front shock mounts bolted on the frame. You got a deal on that very rare car with the parts. You said you have all the sheetmetal, meaning fenders, hood, grille shell ? 33 Dodge always were very desirable in convertible coupe, pickup, regular coupe, etc. Nice thing on mopars those years, they were not wood framed bodies. Very little wood, and all can be fabbed at home if you are handy. I see a side door window chrome frame, that would be tough to find. Well worth bringing this one back. BTW, many years ago Barbara Streisand had/or still has a 33 dodge convertible coupe resto rod. .

You have a great mindset. I also would also be looking forward to trying to do it myself. I would think the thin skillet handle might be more likely to fail compared to the manifold. You are obviously not doing it to save money; you just want to try it. The guy at your local welding shop, he once was a guy who never had welded cast iron before. Now he can. One of my neighbors gives lectures about the phrase; "what if". Meaning that all through life, a person can back on doing many things because something negative might happen. The location of that crack and size, makes me think it won't be a real bad risk. It needs to be deeply Vee'd out a lot more, right to both ends of crack. Some guys lightly hammer the bead to relieve stress

Back after a long cold winter of not doing anything besides bringing cordwood into the house. I lost all drive to work and now I'm out of shape physically. Tried to find the lost spark of wanting to work at all, before warm weather comes. Then I drove the Nash out of the storage bay 2 weeks ago and parked it in the lot to just stare at it for inspiration. It didn't help because it's just looking like a doodlebug with no fenders/hood, lights. Then a week ago, I found a 2015 pic of the Nash that I posted on another website that I don't have on file: As soon as I saw it, I knew that if I can somehow find the drive to fix and paint the front fenders, then put the painted hood and headlights back on, this is what I'd see when I walk into the shop: So it finally warmed up this week enough to do bodywork on one fender outside where I can see better and make less dust mess. It took me a long time to hammer/dolly out so many hits on the fender before using filler. Then late yesterday while in the house for a break, I heard rain and the fender was outside. It was still sunny and it was light hail. I wiped down the fender as I realized I would be able to see if I missed any waves when it was wet. It's all wet in this pic, but you can't see it: I did miss a few spots but might be able to finish it today when it warms up this afternoon. I decided to only get one fender ready for paint at a time, rather than jump around on working both fronts. Seems less daunting that way, and I don't want to feel overwhelmed. I simply must play these mind games now until I get my passion back. I only think of getting the complete nose back together like the blue sedan above. I block all thoughts of how far I still need to go after that. Also I've been going through this painfully long build thread, and I just can't believe how many tough challenges I was able to do, and I can see in my written words that actually liked doing them back then. Seeing all of what I've done, I just can't quit now. No, I've never regretted buying this super rough car. I still do recall just how excited I was to see it at a local swap when I had zero plans to ever buy another project car. I really wanted to buy it and fix it up, period. lol

Link not working for me, but I found a link earlier today which says Auction 1 of 3 this year at Howe estate. I did a fast look for wheels in the many pics shown, but did not see any car parts. I can't find a list of the other 2 auctions items? https://www.pateauction.com/auctions/detail/bw78611

There is a YouTube video showing how to remove the old one without a press. He welded a thick washer into the bore of the bushing from the front side. Then use a punch down through the big hex shaped hole where the torsion bar fits on the back side. He placed the welded side over a piece of big pipe on the concrete floor to let the bushing get pounded through. It was fast and easy.

Usually a gap measurement on a typical oil pump is not between the teeth, it is the gap on the sides of gears against the pump housing and/or the end cover. Too much gap there and the pressure escapes around the sides of the gears. Some cars, it's just a simple flat steel end cover that is worn, and a new flat plate can be made if it's worn too much to have it ground smooth.

It seems like he used the hand crank because he said "it gets harder when you hit compression" Trying to explain just how free, or how tight an engine feels over the internet is frustrating. Then it's more complicated when trying to use a hand crank with new engine rebuild, new rings, etc. They would feel a lot stiffer than a well-used engine. With a used engine, you could feel the engine try to move backwards as you came up on compression and then let the handcrank back off. On a new engine, you likely won't feel that backwards movement. I sure don't understand why his starter was stuck to the flywheel on just 12v, but not on 6v. Makes no sense? However, it seems like the gears are not meshing correctly with the 2 clues; 1: the engine won't spin correctly, and 2: the gear got stuck? This might be a tough one to figure out.

Yes it was Ford, a Model T car chassis, not a TT truck. A very short rear body, not like the big one in post one, that one is a full size hearse. Bill's was painted all white, he said children/infant hearses were always white. I did wonder why Bill chose to save that type of vehicle rather than the many classics that he ran across over the decades of dealing with ancient cars. I thought he only had just that one car saved indoors.

How fast did it spin on 12v with plugs installed? All of the old 6v cars I have done that to in the last 50 years spun extremely fast. I hope you have better luck than a younger local guy with his 29 chevy. He bought a lower mileage "formerly rebuilt" engine with no starter, the seller later let him borrow a starter that was said to be a very good one from another running 29-31 car he had, but it would not spin fast enough on 12v to start the engine. I just don't recall how the engine felt with a hand crank with plugs in. Then the seller told them to try shimming the starter every which way, that did help a lot, but still wouldn't quite spin fast enough to start with one good 12v battery jumped with booster cables to a running 12v car. Definitely sounded like starter was binding a lot. The starter got hot, too. Before shimming, the starter barely budged the engine on 12v with plugs in. They then wondered if there was some difference in starter drive gear sizes. They gave up and it's all sitting out in the woods at my place, rotting away for 5 years. I only wrote this because you already burned up the battery shut off switch, and also you bought a repro starter gear unit. Either the engine is far too tight, or the starter is not meshing correctly? Didn't you own another Chevy that you could try swapping starters with? Maybe I'm thinking of somebody else on here with 2 chevys

That up/down play at the steering wheel is not too common. Yes, there always is a way to adjust that play on the many styles of early boxes. If it's that noticeable, I would think that something on the worm bearings has failed. One other possibility is that the former restorer did not do something right if they had it apart. We don't know. Does the steering feel rumbly or not too smooth? Here is a random pic that I just found of a much more modern box design. I put this up to show you the upper and lower bearings that keep the worm gear from moving up or down. I wanted you to see that (every worm gear that I have seen), the ball bearings ride right on the machined race surfaces of the worm gear. Those worm gear races are machined as a non-replaceable portion of the worm. I've see many early boxes that had no oil, or had water in the box, and then the balls or rollers are chewed up, and race surfaces are very pitted and flaking. That would be bad for you, as a NOS worm shaft for that car will likely never be located. Above pic, look at the far right of the box cutaway where is has printed "preload shims". As I said, boxes differ greatly to adjustments in those years. This shim method was used on some cars, but always at the bottom of the box instead. Here is another pic that a member posted of a late 20s Mopar box. I had labeled certain parts when he asked how to adjust his type of box. I will use this pic to explain several types of adjustments for totally different boxes of that era. I just said that some other box styles use shims at the very bottom, and those shims shove the outer replaceable bearing race against the worm to remove play. These would have a bolt-on lower cover for doing the shimming. The box above is different in worm preloading. These have no shims. The part with the X or arrow with B, is threaded, and turning it in, tightens the upper outer bearing race against the worm. You had to first loosen the locking bolt E as well as the locking bolt(s) D as the outer steering column tube needs to not turn with the big nut. more info on other types of play,,, NOT your type of up/down steering shaft play: The sector shaft brass bushing A sometimes is very worn. Put tires on ground, then one person slightly works the steering wheel back/forth while you look to see the shaft moves sloppy, meaning it moves back or forth before it can move the steering linkage, while doing the free play test. More info on adjustments on different boxes: This Mopar box has the casting for the sector shaft "movable". That casting when moved, pushes the sector teeth closer to the worm. It does the movement by: loosen all those nuts, then turn the "Eccentric Nut" C to move the casting closer. It moves straight in or out as the casting has a slot and guide pin at G. I want to make a guess on yours, that it is not like this? IDK. If it was the other type of box back then, the slop between worm and sector is done by a slotted screw with locking nut on the backside of sector shaft marked F. That shoves the sector deeper into the worm teeth. This adjustment has nothing to do with the steering wheel moving down and up. Again, this adjustment is NOT for your problem of up/down steering wheel movement. In my opinion, I would want to know why you have so much up/down play at steering wheel before adjusting anything as a potential band-aid repair. That type of play is uncommon IMO. >> I suppose that if your box gears feel very smooth when you turn with a load on the tires, then perhaps you should do the adjustment for the worm bearing preload. BTW, Box & column ass'y gets removed with steering wheel removed, it must come out from the bottom of the car. Jacked way up, or on a lift.

No, if it's empty. You will kill the battery, (and torment the starter), and I doubt it will pull enough vacuum to get any fuel at cranking speed. 50 years ago, I learned that I had to partially fill the vacuum tank through one of the fittings.

Some replies seem a bit defensive about those of us who drive a lot. I know that people sure don't like to be told what to do, but most here that post their experiences of driving are simply trying to share what it makes them feel like. Many AACA members into prewars are in the sunset of our lives, and for various reasons, a few will never "be able" to drive those long term projects that will never be finished before they are. That's sad to me. At that point, you have proved to yourself that you don't own the car just to be "showing off". It's dark, and nobody could even see you on that deserted dirt road in the country lowland with the top down, gentle warm breeze, moonlit views, the springtime tree frogs peeping.....It's just beyond description. Walt G also said "things in motion" ...Since we've drifted to other types of collecting/owning... A decade ago while working outdoors behind my shop overlooking the river valley, I heard a huge radial aircraft engine coming. I ran down to the large newly cleared commercial lot, climbed up onto a huge dirt pile to look at what it was. I went up there hoping he'd see me. It was a WW2 AT6 Texan trainer plane at low level, following the river. I raised my arms high with closed fists to show my interest and excitement, not knowing if he could even see me. He damn well did! ... I saw and heard him go full throttle into a hard bank with wings 90 degrees to the ground, did the hard tight 180 and dropped down super low as he approached me from a mile away at full bore. Like he was doing a strafing run. This happened two or three times. He sure "knew his stuff", and what it could do.. Ok, who got the biggest extreme rush, him or me? Was he just showing off his wealth, or was it because I showed interest in his vintage plane? I doubt either of us will forget that thrill. I absolutely knew was having a blast too. I've never been to a warbird air show, never been to a warbird museum, but I got an awesome warbird show that he did for just one spectator, me. I drive vintage only since 1995 (for preference then), and now late in life I cannot afford a modern car.. I have a 66 4wd gas hog truck I never use, and my year round car is a 32. Took years to build it from junk and always dreamed of going to Rhode Island ocean in it during the never ending build struggle. Last September, I finally just went because I was a bit down...no cell, no spare, no triple A. I'm running out sunsets, so I just went. (and made it back home no problem) Leno bought a 1930s $15.5 million mansion on the water right near here,... me, I found a place to park all afternoon for free

AJ, What you are seeing is a car that definitely was parked outside for some extended portion of it's life. It's not one that was garaged since new. Use a PC or laptop so that you can use the ebay "hover to zoom" feature on the inside of the open trunk pic. Hover/zoom over to the passenger side trunk lid hinge area. That sure looks like very extreme surface rusting from water sitting for a very long time. I doubt it is just a huge dirt buildup? Also hover/zoom on the spare tire rim, rust. Look at the windshield VIN tag, light rust from damp climate/ or water in car. Then compare the hinge areas and spare wheel on the 45k car. "You cannot relive youth", sorry for long post on my own experience below: Only once in my life (30 years ago) have I purchased just one of the several cars I had in my teens. It was a 56 BelAir 2dr ht. My first 56 B/A 2dr ht was in 1967, it was a $10 (no lie) rusty CT junker that I eventually swapped from 6cyl-3spd to a free$ but tired oil smoking 283, then a cheap rebuilt 348 W motor with tripower...but in all reality, the car was just a junker that I filled with bondo and painted it the new 68 mustang medium blue metallic. Back then I dreamed of a brand new 66-67 SS396 Chevelle but with no money at all, a low buck hot-rodded tri-5 seemed like it would be sort of cool to drive to school.. Fast Forward a few decades: When my only child was born late in my life, I was so happy that I bought myself a mint black 56 B/A 2dr ht shipped from Kansas with ralley wheels, 327 4 speed, tripower. I think it's the only vintage car I ever bought (for my own use) in finished condition! It's just not the same feeling, sadly. Our old memories are sometimes not as honest as what we thought. The black one was sweet, ran strong, but handled and braked just like any 56 Chevy did with manual steering/manual brakes! I guess I forgot what a 56 drives like after decades of more modern cars/trucks I had later. But now, Duh, there are no teenage feelings, no high school life, no cruising to McDonalds every night.... "it ain't the same" (Also I do recall it was actually fun as a learning teenager to do the 348 swap and painting.) I was flipping cars back when I bought the black 56, so I immediately bought for resale, a black 55 B/A 2dr ht Cal car, and a 57 B/A 2dr ht Okla car, both nice, both had 327 4 speeds. I resold those and sold the 56 a few years later as I did not use it much. Quote from Emilio Estevez in the old "Repo Man" movie that really hits home hard for me at age 70 : "That was then,... this is now" Now? I was happy just to get to Rhode Island ocean to sit in a 50s style hotrod that I dreamed of as a child, but never could have built one then. Not sure if I can ever finish my 32 Nash conv or 34 LaS conv. I just saw on CCCA page that the 34 might be a CCCA Classic?, not 100%sure, but no matter as I have so little interest in working now. It might help of it ever warms up here. (PS should we be happy with what we already have?, ...but our genes are from the Hunter/Gatherer past)

Well...that depends on "which" non titled State, as far as needing any paperwork at all, other than a bill of sale: In my State, there are no titles on older cars. If one looks at the DMV website here, it appears that you definitely do need a prior registration...but if you live here, and know what the local DMV has for special forms, you can register a non-titled car with no prior registration papers at all. If they ever change this, I will be in a bad spot with 2 early 1930's convertibles that are not ready for registration yet. Both were likely junked in the 40s, so no paperwork at all, just Bill of Sales

...Go get that sucker and then pick Belinda Carlisle up to relive 1981....She knows how to drive it.. ( after 40+ years they finally got in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year). ..

I have heard NJ is a real tough one. You need a NJ person to help you for if there are any work-arounds... 😉 Is it registered now? or does it have an old registration, but expired? In my State, we don't get a title on older cars when we register it. When selling one from my State to a Titled State like Florida like I've done, the buyer needed a current registration from me, to be able to register the car in Fla.. I could not have sold it to him if it was not registered in my name, and it must still be currently registered in the sellers name.

This pic will look familiar to you? I think around 1920 Cadillac? It's in my 32 Ford that I use year round as primary car. I used the small former air pressure line to be a vent line under the car furthest to the back. I like having the mechanical gauge for when I put gas in, as I don't ever fill it to 20 Gallons. Also made a electric sender spot for my dash gauge. These were sometimes used right after WW2 at Bonneville salt races, as many cars used pressurized fuel systems.