keithb7

This image nelow is a good reference for your master cylinder. The valve and seat at the far left is important. The air bleed hole in the master cylinder fill port cover must be able to vent to atmosphere. Stiff old brake flex hoses should be replaced. They too can limit back flow from the wheel cylinders. Are all the return springs in place on all four shoes?

I’m a Gen-x’r I guess. 1971. It doesn’t mean much to me. I like flathead era cars. They mostly were replaced by the mid-50’s. So from the horseless wagon to about ‘53 is my preference. Currently I own two 1938 year flathead Mopars. I’m not really interested in old cars that are extremely popular. I’ll pass right by the Tri 5 Chevy, Mustang, Camaro, Corvettes ect and any car show. Far too many are there. I’m actually not overly interested in winning any trophies with my ‘38 cars. The trophy is the car. I get to maintain and drive it!

Do you have a factory service manual. The wiring layout is shown quite well in there. If you don’t have a manual, i can scan you some images. The electric system is pretty basic.

I have a ‘38 Plymouth sedan with a stock 4.11 rear gear set. Tranny in 3rd is 1:1. 55 mph is reasonable. 50 feels better. It currently has a 25” long 237 ci engine in it. Nice torque! I also own a ‘38 Chrysler Coupe. I believe it has a 3:93 or so rear gear set if I recall. It has a 251 ci 25” engine in it. It also has cruise control which is super nice. No problem 60-65 mph. Mid-teens fuel economy seems about right. I haven’t calculated it in my Chrysler. Last summer my Plym was about 16-17 mpg over a 6 hr trip. My Plymouth with a 237 has better power/weight ratio than my Chrysler. It is a little more snappy and the torque feels better. It sure climbs the hills well on the hiway at 55. Its a wonderful car with the 237. I suspect the stock 201 would be fairly anemic.

I drive mine a lot. Pretty much everywhere except my M-F job, from April 1 to Oct 31. Any excuse to drive my old cars, I do. Here we are on a beer run about a month ago.

I will share my own personal experience with engine coolant temps. I'ver been chasing a few demons on my old Mopars, I've worked out a lot and I think I grasp it pretty good now. The cooling system is exactly that, a system. A system of various parts all dependent on each other to cool properly. If you try to fix cooling system overheating issues by focusing on one thing, you'll just keep on adding a band-aid, or continue to struggle. Every component must be looked at and understood. Put your engineering hat on and think about what the part is supposed to do, and what is it doing now? Could it be adding to, and compounding the overheating issues? Assume you have an all stock system. It was engineered and custom built exactly for your stock car. It will dispense heat exactly as needed. Assume you are overheating. For illustrative purposes only, lets see what might be going on: Lets assume the rad size effects 75% of heat dissipation. However that is dependent on efficient clean, air low in large volumes getting though the rad. This is a important sentence as their are many variables here. Is the rad externally clean, all the fins allowing air through them? Are the internal cores of the rad, the water flow passages clean? No rust, scale, calcium buildup in there impeding water flow? Is the fan the stock size, located nice and close to the back side of the rad? Does the rad use a shroud around the fan to control airflow so it pulls the maximum amount of air through the rad? Inside the block, is there a thermostat? Does it work? Does it need a thermostat? Does removing the thermostat make the engine run cooler? Sure on sub zero winter days only. Does changing the thermostat rating make the engine run cooler? Maybe, but only under certain conditions. Not if the thermostat is wide open, if its hot outside its now doing nothing whether the thermostat is 160F or 190F rated. It won't make any difference when things are very hot. There seems to be a lot of confusion around what thermostats do, and why the different ratings. Inside the block there are cast channels for water to flow through. The cooled water is to follow these paths to cool down certain parts of the engine. Especially important in the L-head engines. The valves in the block get priority cooling right from the water pump. What if the block cooling passages are ignored for decades? Tremendous rust and scale builds up. When the engine is shut off, it settles in the lowest part of the block. Over decades it builds up, partially plugging water passages. Then water movement becomes inefficient. Flow is impeded. Little dead spots or back-eddies are created and the water is not moving to the rad here. These areas get hot and stay hot. Assume water flow though the block is down 45% due to blockages. That is a ton of heat staying in your block not being cooled by the rad. If the block is full of crap, chances are the rad is too. So now any water that does make it to the rad, it is slowed down by 40% as it travels through the rad. The system is failing. Unable to do what it was engineered to do, remove heat. Then there's 80 years of previous owners doing funky things to their cars. Is the radiator the stock rad still? Maybe it was swapped out with something else that fit? Is the engine making stock horsepower? Maybe they milled the head to make more compression? Maybe someone bored and stroked the cylinders and rods making power HP and torque? A bigger carb? Dual carbs? A change in valve timing. Ignition upgrades. More HP and torque means more heat. Don't expect a stock cooling system to keep up with engine performance modifications. In my experience, if your pressurized cooling system boils over, its too hot. If you can control it from boiling over you are likely ok. (within reason) Upping the rad cap pressure, changing the water/glycol ratio helps. Ensure your ignition timing is not too far advanced as this makes more heat. You can run "Wetter Water" type coolant products in the rad. It boils at a much higher temperature than water & glycol. You can get away with a lot of bad cooling system maintenance if you live in a flat area and travel at higher rates of speed. Lots of airflow can cover up a lot of sins in the cooling system. If you live in mountainous terrain as I do, with a 119 HP flathead, 3 speed manual, the cooling system needs to be performing at its best. Long slow winding hills with lots of throttle means very reduced air flow and lots of heat. A traffic jam on a 100F day, things get ugly quick. No air flow. For me I have learned to be comfortable running my engine at 200F at times. I have to, its very hot here in the summer and we have steep hills around here. An engine runs more efficiently at 200F compared to 160F. There is better fuel combustion and less crap in in your oil when you run hotter. There are less byproducts of combustion in your engine when it runs hotter. Cleaner oil means the bearings and piston rings last longer. I'm thinking about building a fan shroud for my '38 Plymouth. It can't keep up on hot days and steep hills. A previous owner removed the stock 201 ci engine. He put in a different rad and shoved it 2" forward it the nose cone area. A longer 25" engine was installed. 228ci. Great, more power! I rebuilt the engine 2 years ago. It's now a 237 ci engine. You guessed it...Now I am having trouble keeping it cool. I am hoping a shroud will increase the cooling system performance just enough to get me through the god days of summer. I will try. If not, I will have a find a larger, maybe 4 row radiator. Time will tell. 10. months of the year, no problem. July and August I have a problem.

I too recognize it as a M6 transmission mated to a fluid torque drive for a 6 cylinder flat head Mopar engine. The torque and engine share the engine oil. About 13 liters. The V8 Hemi cars with the fluid torque drive has a oil pan sump under the torque, as well as a cooler located near the front left side of the V8 engine. Here's my original Windsor example:

Has the rad been removed and sent to a rad shop for full cleaning? Do you have a digital thermometer to measure inlet temp and outlet temp coolant of the rad? Have you considered pulling an engine lower block plug? These videos below here will give you some ideas about what's going on inside your block. Scale and rust build up impedes water flow. Block sediment. Water distribution tube. Radiator internal flow rate. Radiator external air flow rate. Water pump moving enough water? The various issues add up, leading to overheating.

@neil morse Yes indeed it is very similar to my ‘38 Chrysler Royal coupe. I’ll hold off celebrating until there is a known sell price. I did check out the Craigslist ad and found a great photo there. The Chrysler building in NYC in 1937 or ‘38. An awesome photo! I copied it for my own files.

I’m trying to stay on the high road with this guy. I guess a good way to address the situation, is to give you folks all you need to build your own brake tool. Please, by all means build your own tool. I’d appreciate that. - Keith See here:

I’m intrigued and interested. Will you send cheapest ground mail to Canada for the $25?

One more clue to add: When you flash up and old cold engine, the black spatter on the garage floor by the exhaust pipe; after it dries up the black dust is all that’s left. The water evaporated…If it’s water. If its oily later, its not water and you likely have an issue to address. If its just black dry soot left later, sweep it up. Nothing to be concerned with.

Soot develops in the exhaust system. Engine is likely running a little bit rich. The “wet” is condensation. A byproduct of burning gasoline is H2O. Water. It condenses inside the cold exhaust and tail pipe. The water droplets form. They mix with the soot inside the exhaust lines and spit out on your driveway. Nothing to be concerned about. A hot exhaust pipe, droplets don’t condense and form. So you don’t see the water. Normal stuff here in my opinion. This is why mufflers rust apart from from the inside out.

Very cool. Great work!

Are you aware the shoes need to be concentric to the axle shaft? There’s a tool for that too. Not easily done without a concentric tool.

I rebuilt the 4 wheel mechanical drum brakes on a 1928 Dodge Bros Standard 6 sedan. It was the first time for me learning about mechanical brakes. It was fun. I learned a few new things about mechanical advantage. It did take me a few attempts to get the brakes set up decently. I found that a clean asphalt road or concrete pad is a good place to set them up. You can then see the 4 tire skid marks clearly. You can see which brake is locking up first, or not at all. Then adjust each brake as needed. It’s best when they all brake equally. More stopping power, and you brake in a straight line. Its easy to lock-up all 4 wheels, skidding to a stop. If the brakes are set to engage too high, at the top of the pedal, you give up mechanical advantage. Same if set too low near the floor. Levers and fulcrum points are utilized to provide increased braking power. Its a good lesson to grasp. The brakes work quite well for the car. Its not a heavy car. It cruises nicely at 30 mph. The brake system is just fine for the car that was designed to be driven in 1928. I’m comfortable driving it around town today. It’ll never see hi-way speeds. I’m not too worried about braking performance at 50+ mph.

I attend BJ in January in Scottsdale about 6 years ago. We spent a day looking at all the cool cars at the static displays, before or after they were auctioned off. We toured all the vendors. We had fun. At the end of the day we went to the live auction. It was certainly an interesting experience. We watched all the big rollers drinking, smoking cigars, bidding. Some had young models hanging off them. There were trophy wives too. The jewels and Botox. We walked the 4 or so pit-stages that the cars went through on their way to the auction block. People were frantically working to get a vehicle running. Washing it. Teams of people waxing. Cleaning glass, tires, whitewalls. Polishing chrome. Everything. Then the car finally rolls out onto the stage. Seemed like there was a million lasers and various lights up in the rafters. Enough to make an actual piece of dog excrement sparkle on TV. It was interesting to watch the whole spectacle unfold. We saw some famous people. Rubbed shoulders with a few. It’s not like we’re 20 and in awe but it was memorable. We had fun. Yet we have great memories and had fun times at the Rusty Spur in Old Scottsdale at night too. A “car nut” person should try and swing by. It’s not all bad. The static displays were great.

I own a 1938 3 speed 4 dr sedan. 3rd gear output is 1:1. Axle ratio 4.1:1 The car has a 237ci fathead 6 in it. The engine is 3 7/16" bore X 4 ¼" stroke. Its geared very nicely for the power to weight ratio. I don't need overdrive, as I have little desire to take to 65 mph. The car is very happy at 50 mph. So is the driver. 55 mph she get a bit buzzy. 60 mph to me, is uncomfortable. Not only does the engine RPM seem high , but braking and handling. No seatbelts. 1 safety feature, laminated glass. I drive the car over 1000 miles per season and am just happy to take-in the world around me at 45-50 mph. Bias skinny tires, 4 drum brakes, worm gear steering, rear leaf springs. I struggle a bit to understand why anyone would want to take an old car like mine over 50 mph.

Sorry folks unfortunately I don’t make or sell the brake tools any longer. My tool was copied and the culprit now mass produces and sells them. Keith

It doesn’t surprise me to hear of Henry sneaking around in tunnels. Firing people. Pretty hard guy to work for. Did emplyee know him better than Edsel? The only employee he wouldn’t fire, and wouldn’t quit. So Henry conspired and worked around him.

A spare head I found in my parts stash. Another hump shot.

I am not a flathead mopar expert, but I have not seen a water neck like the one above, without any type of by-pass visible. Thwre seems to be no hump. No external by pass hose either. Is it possible that a previous owner scrambled some parts together and came up with this configuration? Once the thermostat is open the by-pass isn’t having much effect. I believe it is there to allow minimal coolant circulation when the thermostat is closed. Have you looked in there? Is there a thermostat?

You can see the extra hole in the front edge of the gasket here: With hump, illustrated here.

Sorry about the late or a reply. Been a busy past couple of days. 25" long block, Fel Pro with hump: 7688C 25" long block Fel Pro without hump: 7256C

I take a practical approach. I like ‘em white on my ‘38 Chrysler. My ‘38 Plymouth does not get whitewalls. I tend to think the Plymouth was an entry level new car. It’s market might have been the shoe salesman. Not the bank manager. The Chrysler? Indeed the Bank Manger might own it. He wants whitewalls. He’s likely less frugal. A 4 door sedan Plymouth, the family piles in to go on a picnic on the weekend. The two door Chrysler, a free wheelin’ single guy is taking his lady friend out on Sat night. It gets whitewalls.