packick

Thanks, Tom. As I mentioned in my earlier post I purchased one off of eBay so I still have my broken one to experiment with. Nothing to lose . . . whether it sits on the shelf broken as it is now, or sits on the shelf after I break it some more trying to fix it, what the heck. Columbus took a chance.

Gee, Tom. I wouldn't mind learning how to rebuild the unit too. Are the instructions something you can post on the Forum?

Tim: I also had a broken line on my temperature gauge when I purchased my ’55 Century. I was referred to a shop in Portland, OR by a local vintage car parts supplier. The place he referred me to is Abbott Instrument Rebuild (503) 246-1287. Please note that I have not done business with this establishment. I ended up finding a working gauge on ebay so I never sent my old unit to Abbott. So I can’t give you a personal experience report as to their quality of work, turnaround time, etc. At least this is a place where you can start.

Thanks, Ken. Those are words of wisdom and I will follow your advise. I didn't realize there were shims to deal with. I have an old Carter 2-barrel carb with the starter switch on it and all there is inside it is a spring, "plunger," and the ball. No shims. Hopefully they are easy to deal with.

Willie: Another theory I have received is that the ball that controls the starter switch is hung up. Their suggestion is to take the ball out and clean it up and I should be fine. This makes some sense to me in that we had the carburetor off the car to fix the needle and seats and rotated the carburetor every which way. And there was no vacuum leak before we took it off the car. So while the car still starts the ball may be stuck. That is an easy fix if it works. Otherwise I will look at the throttle shaft. Thanks Willie.

I think we figured out why my car was hard to start when hot. It seems the needles were installed upside down (rubber side was towards the floats rather than the seat). But now I have developed a vacuum leak that wasn’t there before. We reassembled the carburetor twice thinking that something might have gotten hung up but that didn’t fix the vacuum leak. This photo shows were the leak is (arrow), and it is quite a strong vacuum. The hole has a screen inside of it. What did we do wrong on the reassembly? Is there a plug that fell out? Any help would be appreciated. By the way, this is a Carter 2197S carburetor. Thanks.

Bob, thanks so much for the photos. I now know what I need to do. On mine, those screw holes are cover up with muck that someone applied years ago. I think I have a lot of digging and scraping to get the current ones out. I don't think they were factory installed. Thanks again.

Bob: That explanation helps a lot. A picture would be nice if you have the time and energy. Thanks.

Bhigdog, thanks for the reply. I think the old xacto knife may have to come into play on this one. But before I start slicing, I am going to the Buick National Meet in So. Bend in a couple of weeks and maybe someone there has installed these pieces and I can see how they did it and go from there.

I guess I'm just not seeing it. Does anybody have a picture of these roof rail fillers installed on their 1955 Century or Special 2-Dr. Riviera Hardtop that they can share? The way I was intending to install them interferes with the door flapper. What am I missing?

John: I found this site which discusses the Model T Fords. http://www.mtfca.com/encyclo/S-T.htm#tool Under "Tire Pump" it indicates that the double barrel tire pump was replaced by the single barrel pump in 1920 for the Model Ts. I don't know if this was an industry shift around that time, or if Buick or McLauglin followed Ford's redesign. Or maybe Ford was catching up with the industry that had already gone from 2-barrels to 1 barrel? There is also a good discussion as to which tools Ford supplied with their Model Ts.

Jon: The needle and seat may not be the source of my problem, but for peace of mind I have to inspect it. Since I did not have this problem before the rebuild I still suspect it vs. the fuel volitility. And, after reading the paragraph you sent, I am still confused how to use that method with a system where you depress the gas pedal to start the car.

Willie: Thanks to your suggestions I think we have located the problem. We did as you said and removed the plugs on the side of the bowl while the engine was idling and no fuel came out. But, when we shut the engine off fuel came out of the primary bowl hole. So we think we have a needle and seat problem; it is not shutting the fuel off as it should and instead the fuel is seeping into the bowl causing the flooding problem. Thanks again for you help. You always have a wealth of information.

Thanks, Willie. I will be burning up the full tank of 92 octane this weekend when I attend a regional Buick show (about 260 miles round trip). Then I will fill it up with 87 octane and let you know the results. Stay tuned.

Willie, I am a bit confused. I assume what you are saying is to first go back to 87 octane and see how the car starts hot with that grade vs. the 92 octane I am using now. But if it still cranks excessively with 87 octane, then check the float level as you describe. But since the car runs great after it is started, your guess is that there is nothing wrong with the carburetor settings right now?

Thanks for validating what I already believed. Since my carburetor builder is adamant about his job being perfect, I need to locate another source for working on this carburetor. I will check out what Old Tank recommended as a start. Also, I am using 92 Octane ethanol gas, but I treat it with Sta-Bil ethanol treatment. In the past I used the 92 Octane but did not treat it and had no problems starting hot. It is only since the carburetor rebuild that I started using the Sta-Bil product. Could this Sta-Bil product be causing some of the problem?

Ever since we rebuilt the carburetor on my 1955 Century it is hard to start when warm or hot. It acts like it's flooded. I have to crank the engine for 5-10 seconds before it finally starts (and yes, the engine cranks fast, not slow). It usually takes a few minutes after turning the engine off to get into this condition and it will be hard to start until the engine is almost cold again. I believe it's flooded and not lacking fuel because if I pump the pedal before starting, or turn on the electric fuel pump it only makes matters worse . . . it will crank for 15-20 seconds and blue smoke pours out of the exhaust pipe. When cold, the engine starts very quickly and normal.</SPAN> The guy who rebuilt my carburetor says that all of the carburetor settings are right on specs, and that hard starting when warm was always a problem with the accelerator starting system. The problem is that you have to depress the accelerator in order to start the car and that pumps gas into the engine that it really doesn't need.</SPAN> Is my carburetor rebuilder right and this condition is normal? Or is there something that can be done to correct this problem? What might be causing it?</SPAN> Oh, by the way. Once started the car runs great and idles smoothly.

Mike, sorry for the delayed response. We have been unable to access the Internet for the past 3 days. These pictures really help. I now know what I am up against. Thanks for all of the help.

Mike, thanks for the information. I probably will just put up with it until the winter when I have numerous other things to do to the car too. Then I will try to repair what I have. Once I see what's what, then I can fabricate something that I hope will work. Questions: Can you elaborate on what "piece of rubber" means? Is that foam rubber or solid? Does the 1/4" refer to how wide a strip of rubber is that goes around both sides of the circumference of the flapper, or how thick (if foam) the piece is? Is there somewhere on the Internet where there might be a picture or drawing? Thanks.

The "door" (flapper) on the right side cabin air vent on my '55 Century flaps when driving along. What I hear is a metal-on-metal noise. I can get rid of the noise by barely opening the flap (center control knob) to move it away from the base. I guess my real question is this. Is there supposed to be a rubber seal around the vent base so that when the flapper hits it you don't hear the metal-on-metal noise? Or is my flapper moving too freely and needs stiffening up?

In case you do write an article, I found this diagram buried in the depths of my computer that I got a while back from another thread.

I agree with KAD36, this has been a great and informative thread. Who would of thought that so much discussion could occur over a washer jar?

Thanks again, TexasJohn. I agree with Pletch.

TexasJohn: Thanks for the detailed instructions. When I get a free moment I will follow them and see what could be the problem. I suspect the jar in that I had it apart over the winter. Thanks again.

John: Yes, I replaced all hoses. And this past winter I blew air through the hoses that connect to the bottle and air did come out of the nozzles on the firewall through one of them. By the way, I assume the pump is the unit inside the glass jar?