Bloo

Not just muscle cars. Decades ago, for Chrysler products of the musclecar era and a little beyond, he quite literally wrote the book.

GL-5 is a rating of suitability for hypoid gears, which are found in rear axles, not transmissions. A long time ago when there were less ways to make oil, it was fairly safe to assume a GL-5 oil was loaded with sulfur that would attack brass, and the GL-5 rating itself implied a level of slipperiness that might prevent transmission synchronizers from working properly. It was also fairly safe to assume that GL-4 would work OK in a transmission. Not anymore. It is a crapshoot. There is just no way to get around reading the oil's datasheet in 2021. As for Redline, the oils they make that are appropriate and recommended for synchromesh are, in order of light to heavy, 1) MTL, 2) MT-85, 3) MT-90 (or 75W90NS), and 4) 75W140NS. MTL, MT-85, and MT-90 are rated GL4 while 75W90NS, and 75W140NS are rated GL-5, not that it is terribly relevant when we are talking about a transmission. It isn't. The NS oils are designed to work in transaxles that have both hypoid rear axle gears and transmission synchronizers in the same box. In a plain synchromesh transmission with no rear axle gears in it, you would probably pick MT-90 over 75W90NS if you were at the third thickness level. But then you might go to 75W140NS if you wanted the thickest one that is ok for synchromesh. 75W140NS is what I am using. None of them are very thick. Don't use the Redline 75W90 or 75W140 oils without the NS in a synchromesh transmission. Those are for hypoid rear axles.

Well that does sound like the engine and flywheel comes down too slow. Is the car by chance idling any faster than it should? Having the throttle close enough is a big part of making the engine speed come down quickly for an upshift. Food for thought.

If you are downshifting, you need the engine rpm faster, not slower. In more modern cars, flywheels are sometimes lightened for faster shifting. I've done it and I'll do it again. I would have to think long and hard before doing it to a car with a 3 speed crashbox. It was never intended to be driven like that, and probably would not be a net gain. People didn't like to shift because there was no synchromesh. The automakers knew this and catered to it. There are many things to think about. How fast the engine slows down and how completely the throttle shuts on a shift (the two are closely related), how quickly or slowly the gears of the transmission slow down in neutral when declutched (and how much drag the oil contributes due to it's viscosity, often really thick in crashboxes), and so on. Making the gear go right in is all about speed and timing. The RPM needs to match when you make that final pull. For the moment it is beyond me. Since there are only 3 gears, and the first one is only for taking off, second is going to be pretty low and pretty slow. How much do you want to be in second?

And it works... lousy, but it still comes without all the disadvantages of phosphoric acid. I have done this and will probably do it again, but plan for it to take a long time, lose a lot of liquid, and need constant babysitting. It also ruins some pumps. The magic comes when you can submerge the parts. If you can do that, nothing else really comes close.

A TR-15 stem is larger at the base than a TR-13, and needs a bigger hole in the wheel. There is about a 99 percent chance you need TR-15. Measure the hole if there is any doubt. 0.65" for TR-15 and 0.46" for TR-13. Probably any tubes offered for 600/650-16 will have offset stems. https://www.stlwholesale.com/pageimages/download_docs/STLWT_TUBE_VALVE_SPECS_SHEET.pdf If you have steel drop center rims, not wire wheels, not rims with locking rings, and not rims with any other sort of split or removable parts, then rim strips or flaps should be completely unnecessary. RIm strips are generally for wire wheels. Flaps are generally used on rims with a split or multiple parts, and are also sometimes used on clincher style tires. A 600/650-16 is not a clincher tire. The inside of the rim should be clean and smooth. Rust will chafe at the tube and possibly pop it.

Has a digital-only option to the subscription ever been considered?

They are, but the ribbed area is what I was interested in. That shouldn't vary. I got an answer in a PM this morning. Too wide.

Yes, and I vaguely recall someone in the forum looking for or looking at a 1936 GMC, and the engine was the later one like in this car, but the correct one was the one like I posted above with the partial water jacket and the different oil filler location. Pontiacs were occasionally also used, for instance in the 1938 1/2 tons, but overall GMC flathead sixes were mostly Oldsmobile engines.

This^^ There is going to be a bunch of structural wood in this car, never mind that is has a metal top.

Lots of us do. The transmission shifts like butter with one or two fingers when the synchros don't have anything to do.

That is probably normal. I don't think I have ever seen one with the whole line full. They still work. EDIT: Wait. Camshaft? Where is the gauge connected to the oil system? Is there an oil flow diagram for this engine online anywhere?

Engine is Olds, but is 1937 or later. Starter looks odd. 12 volt? 1936 did not have full length water jackets. The oil filler and some other details also changed. I'm not sure if it is even a related engine, but I suspect it will bolt in as similar updated engines have shown up in the forum before. An earlier style Olds engine as used in 1936:

An Olds of that era with no hydramatic is really uncommon. You'll probably never see another one.

Put some more oil in, quick! 🤪

Evaporust is *NOT* phosphoric acid. I see this come up again and again in the forum. I have probably seen and used every new "miracle" phosphoric acid rust remover to come down the pike in the last 40 or more years, and their characteristics are all similar. Evaporust is *NOT* the same. There are some pretty glaring differences. All of these phosphoric acid cures will eventually stop eating rust and form a hard black skin over the top. They advertise this as "rust conversion" but if you break through it, there is still rust under there. Removing rust always involves multiple cleanings with a wire brush or whatever and will never quite get to the bottom of all the pits thanks to this skinning behavior. Unlike phosphoric acid, Evaporust is not really suitable for parts that cannot be immersed. You can try to soak paper towels with it and wrap in plastic, or even arrange a drip. It is extremely slow, fiddly and does not work very well. They may even have a product for this type of use, but I would be skeptical. If you can immerse the part in Evaporust, the rust turns to a black powder and falls into the bottom of the vat. It WILL get all the way to the bottom of the pits. It will get there a lot faster if you take the part out now and then rinse any of that loose black powder off that may be slowing things down. Either way, the reaction will continue until all the rust is gone. It works faster when warmer, and if it gets too cool the reaction temporarily stops. You want this stuff in a warm room. If you leave the part in "too long", or intentionally leave it in a long time to insure you got all the way to the bottom of every pit, the part will turn black. This is harmless, and does not resemble the crust from phosphoric acid. Most will wash off, but what remains will resemble discoloration from heat or gun bluing. The black powder falling off of a part in Evaporust most closely resembles what happens in an electrolytic derusting vat. Electrolytic derusting is much cheaper, and therefore doable on a larger scale. The downside is that there is somewhat of a "line of sight" problem, and areas that are farther away from the electrodes may not get completely done. For instance, the internal areas of a rusty door or trunk latch mechanism might not ever get completely done. Evaporust has no such limitation but is expensive, so better for smaller projects. FInally, phosphoric acid burns your hands, while Evaporust is watery and sticky. Phosphoric acid fumes are acid fumes, while Evaporust fumes are not very strong and are sickly sweet. If Evaporust is related to any old time method, then it must be related to molasses. It resembles sugar more than anything else. It turns to a nasty sticky goo if it dries, but washes off because it is soluble in water. When my vat leaked a little the ants went crazy for it at first, and then decided they didn't like it.

T5s shift like butter. It just might be the smoothest transmission ever. Most of those issues sound like clutch problems, and I would be very hesitant to blame the T5 for any of this unless it is really old and worn out. Are you sure it is a T5? I would check the fluid. Most of them take automatic transmission fluid (ATF), not gear oil, or motor oil, or synchromesh oil like most other manuals. Check the tag on it and look on the Internet. The piece if info you are looking for is if it is "World Class" or "Non World Class". Yes that is real terminology from the manufacturer. "World Class" takes ATF, "Non World Class" is a far less refined transmission and takes more normal oil, probably synchromesh oil would do well in one of those. With that out of the way, let's get back to the real problem, the clutch. A properly engineered clutch in anything remotely modern should not feel like that. It should seem to go "over center" with the pedal partway down and then get easier. This action might come from a diaphragm-type clutch pressure plate, as seen in older GM cars and basically everything modern, or it might come from an "over center spring" in the clutch linkage that helps you push after the pedal gets down a certain amount. The linkage might also be designed to go over center. The spring probably would have been used with a "Borg and Beck" style clutch with coil springs in the pressure plate. The early Mustang's original clutch was probably like that. There could be missing parts, or the conversion could have been done wrong. The clutch fork must run at a reasonable angle for one thing, or there is a bunch of lost motion. Then there are the leverage ratios and angles of any other arms in the linkage. Or, they could have put in a hydraulic clutch. That has nothing to do with the brakes except that it has a couple of brake-like cylinders that have a reservoir and use brake fluid like brakes. If they did that they may have not got all the air out when they bled it. Or, they might have got the leverage ratio wrong somehow where they connected it to the clutch pedal. Another thing that could have happened is if they put some kind of high performance or racing clutch in there. It's pretty likely they did if the engine is hopped up. To handle more torque requires more spring pressure, and the pedal can be very uncomfortable. Unfortunately, the most likely scenario is that it is a hack job. People like to put all this stuff on like disc brakes, different transmission etc., but wont read the books and do the math to figure out how to make those things work right. Then they get mad and put the car up for sale. Mushy disc brakes are another common thing. On a car as common as an early Mustang, parts are probably available to make the conversions you mentioned work right, although it is also likely much of it would need to be redone or replaced.

Oops I don't know how I missed this, sorry. Most of it was recycled from the old sockets. I dunked the springs in evaporust and then zinc plated them. The small parts and supplies I did use all came from Rhode Island Wire. I don't recall if I got new fiber discs, and I am not sure if they had them for double contact. They did have contacts, and I ordered some but don't recall if I used them. I may have used them on one socket. Theirs have a hollow hole to solder the wire into, while the salvaged originals resemble tacks, but are made of brass. https://www.riwire.com/

Do any cam timing specs exist for this car? On most old cars, the overlap is almost centered at TDC. You can count the number of teeth on the crank gear, divide 360 degrees by the number of teeth to see how many crankshaft degrees equals a tooth. Then, watch with a borescope if it is the only way to see, or through the lifter access if that is practical. Knowing how many degrees a tooth is, and that on nearly all these old flatheads the overlap center is within a very few degrees of TDC, the error should glare at you.... if it exists.

All this obsession over date codes is a recent thing, driven by the Internet for who knows who's benefit. It certainly is not in our best interest to promote it, as supplies of authentic tires are spotty at best. It may not be possible to buy correct tires with a current date code. A tire needs to hold air on the show field even if it won't be driven on the street. More and more tire repair facilities now have a 7 year cutoff, or some similar policy and will refuse to work on a tire based on it's date code. I often see people telling themselves in here that bias ply tires don't rot nearly so fast. I doubt you could convince the guy at the tire shop of that, even if it were true. He has probably never seen a bias ply tire. That is not a slam against the tire guy. He is expected to be an expert in the things he actually works on, and bias ply tires are not one of those things. They were trailing edge technology 40 years ago. The best thing you could do at this point is figure out which tire shop in your area doesn't look too close and give them all your business. You never know when you might need them. I can see the day not too long in the future when every enthusiast will have to find room for an old Coats 40-40a and an enormous service station sized air compressor. That is not a trivial commitment. Now it may sound like I am advocating driving around on old rotten tires. I am not. I am getting a little nervous at the 7 year point. Some common sense should be applied here. Before the date code obsession nobody I know would have advocated driving around on 20 year old tires or even 15. Still storage conditions make a huge difference and that has not changed. The overwhelming majority of tire failures are due to under-inflation and overloading. That has not changed either and is not likely to change. Under-inflation and overloading are almost exactly the same thing because the maximum load a tire can carry is tied directly to it's pressure. At the end of the day, people are lazy and checking your tire pressure all the time is inconvenient and almost no one does it. I do it, but not as often as I probably should, so I am guilty too. With this new date code obsession, people have a code they can check once and call it done. They don't have to think about it anymore. People love that and tell all their friends. Tires will continue to catastrophically fail for the same reasons they always did. Under-inflation and overloading will remain stuck firmly at the top of the list without even a close runner up. TPMS systems, on the other hand, might actually do some good.

Has soaking it in Evaporust been tried? Question for @carbking , does any reasonably good aftermarket, more or less properly fitting carb option exist for these engines?

It's nice, isn't it, when they don't put the valve in the lid.

Does anyone in here have a 1937 or 38 "80" or "90" with a Bob's front rubber mat? If so, I would love it if you could take some measurements for me. If you measure across the ribbed area only, from one side of the car to the other, about as far back as the shifter is, how wide is that? Is the shifter hole in the exact middle (I doubt it). For instance, if you measure from the shift tower to the edge of the ribbing only (not clear to the edge of the mat), is it the same on the right as the left? How wide is the transmission hump? Thanks!

That's it. And what a pain to install because of that neck. It's almost unbelievable. I don't know if the fill tube is longer, it wouldn't surprise me, but the tail lights might be a red herring. That was a mid year 36 change on the US models. If you see a US 36 Pontiac with round taillights like mine, it's late 36. I would be curious to know if it was different in Canada.

Sorry to say it is probably ruined. Don't give up yet. Take it out and disassemble it if it will still disassemble. Inspect all the parts and see how bad it is. There is a chance for recovery. Small, but there's a chance. Alternatively contact the guy you got the cover from and see if he has the rest of the transmission. I am assuming it's another 38 Pontiac transmission. If the cover came from a Buick or an Olds or something I would hold off on that.