Bloo

This thread is confusing. Are we talking about a pointer on the front of the engine or down in that little hole at the back of the engine? Did Pontiac ever put a timing mark on the front of the engine on any flathead 6 or 8? If so which ones? I added a pointer to the front end of my engine. The one inside the little hole under the cover at the back of the engine is just too hard to see. If you made your own pointer for the front, You can find true top dead center with an extra-large plastic zip-tie. Something with a head about 3/8" thick and a tail so long you cannot possibly lose it. With all the spark plugs removed, and the battery disconnected, shove the zip tie in through the #1 spark plug hole, sideways, so it goes WAY over to the left side. The spark plug holes are over the valves, but you want the head of this zip tie to go not only into the cylinder, but way over to the far left side. Turn the engine with a wrench until the head of the zip tie gets caught between the piston and the cylinder head way over at the left side. Make a mark on the balancer. Now, turn the engine the opposite direction until it stops again. Make another mark. Now you should have 2 marks, (maybe 1" or 1/2" ? apart). Make a mark exactly halfway between the two. This is top dead center. Get the zip tie out. With only a top dead center mark, you can use a "dialback" timing light to set the timing to spec (if one will work on your car). If you need a real timing mark for the ignition setting there are a couple of ways. MSD makes "timing tape" for different size balancers. Thats the easy way. Measure yours and see if there is anything made that is close enough. It gives you a whole scale. Another way is to just measure the circumference of the balancer (the sort of measuring tape used in sewing works good), and divide by 360 (degrees). Multiply this number by the number of degrees you want the ignition timing mark to be at, and that is the distance the ignition mark should be from the top dead center mark.

That works on 2 wire meters as long as there is enough swing. On 3 wire meters there is more than likely going to be smoke.

When the change was first made, there was a chorus of "I won't do this anymore" in different threads all over the board. It doesn't really affect my postings, because I use Imgur.com and just link them. I still notice. The long threads with pictures have largely disappeared. This forum is a wealth of information, and discouraging people from posting pictures, especially in technical threads, but in all threads, does not bode well for the future. There are 2 issues really, one is that people wont post in the first place, and the other is that the pictures will have insufficient resolution to be useful, a common problem on old photos posted 10 or 15 years ago when 640x480 was the standard for forums. I often use online pictures to get information about parts that a car may be missing. I blow them up huge, because I am often looking for some detail that may not have been the original purpose for the photo. High resolution digital pictures are great, low resolution digital pictures just go to pixels when you blow them up. GaryW's 1937 Buick thread is full of high resolution pictures, and they solved lots of little mysteries for me. Restorer32 posted some scans of lithographs in a FIsher body manual (apparently an original) years ago that show detail that cannot be seen in the scans of the same book on OldCarManualProject, nor on the reprint that is sitting next to me. We are now not only discouraging such posts, but doing so at a time that the hobby is in trouble. Its 2019. Storage is cheap. Bandwidth is cheaper than it used to be. Is the club really so broke that we can't do better than this?

You can bet thats off of a piece of test equipment, and most likely not automotive.

Yeah, I restored one. They do seem to be a bit hard to come by, but some 12v models should work. Yeah, note the 2-wire hookup. That dramatically increases the chance it will work on positive ground, but you would have to check the book for sure. Yeah, that should usually work. I do that with timing lights. One should check that it is swinging the needle far enough. In that scenario, the electronics inside the meter have the 12v supply they need, but the wire from the coil is swinging from 0-6v instead of 0-12v. If the needle goes to zero with the points closed, and the correct number of degrees with the points open, its fine. I wouldn't trust it without checking it first though. Also, if you tried to do this on a positive ground car, it couldn't really work. Although the meter would have the 12v it needs to operate, the wire from the coil would be swinging from 0 to negative 6 volts, and in the wrong direction. There would be 18 volts between the wire from the coil and the 12v supply wire. The meter was probably not designed to deal with 18 volts between those wires, and would probably be damaged. If by some miracle it worked, the needle would swing the wrong way and try to go off the scale. If you could center it up on the scale somehow, the numbers on the scale would be backwards. If you are going to gamble, something with 2 wires is a much better bet, because you can just hook it up backwards on a positive ground car. Even better if it actually says it does 6 volts.

Probably not in many cases. Try your 12v meter. If it is a two-wire meter there is a fighting chance it might work, even on 6v positive ground (with the leads reversed for positive ground). If it is a three wire one, I don't think you will ever get it working on 6v positive ground and would likely damage it trying. On 6v negative ground maybe? Try it! All it has to do is swing to 0 degrees with the points closed, and the number of degrees between cylinders with the points open. If you can get it to do this you are home free. For instance, an 8 with a "normal" ignition system fires every 45 distributor degrees, a six every 60 degrees, a four every 90 degrees, and so on. Some dwell meters have "set" marks at the high end of the dwell scales and a "calibrate" knob. That probably increases your chance of success.

Simple or not, the new policy sure has put a damper on interesting threads around here. Hopefully it will be changed before everyone gives up.

Nice car.

Maybe SMS in Oregon?

What exactly do you mean by that? Turn key on, warning lights come on, but then you turn further and it doesn't crank? What are you bypassing? Are you shorting out the solenoid terminals under the hood? Which ones? Make sure it is out of gear, E-brake on, and in park if Edsel the has that. If you are shorting out just the big ones, try shorting from the big one that goes to the battery to a little terminal. One of the little ones should make it crank. If it doesn't, make sure the solenoid has a good ground at the mounting bracket. If it does, and one of the little terminals wont make it crank, the solenoid it bad. Going at it another way, If you put a test light or a multimeter on a little wire (and to ground) with the key on, one of the wires SHOULD be live. You want the OTHER one. It should become live when someone turns the key. If it doesn't, there is still trouble with the wiring or the key switch. If the car has an automatic transmission, it will have a neutral safety switch. That will keep it from cranking if it is bad, or more likely just misadjusted. On my Ford with a column shift automatic, I think it was on top of the steering column down near the floor. No telling what Edsel might have done with the pushbuttons. Do you have those? And finally, the two little wires on the solenoid might be reversed. If they are hooked up wrong the car won't crank. One comes from the key switch (possibly going through a neutral safety switch on the way) crank the engine. Putting 12v between that terminal and ground (the bracket) is what makes it crank. The other one goes to the positive terminal of the ignition coil. It sends a full 12v to the coil while cranking. It has it's own contact inside the solenoid. It is not necessary for cranking, or running, but will make the car fire off easier when the battery is low.

I hear ya, but throw the old one in the attic or something. You might need it someday. I have that copper/brass thing in my Miata because I think it is a much better bet for repair in the future when all the aftermarket support dries up. It isn't stock. The original radiator was aluminum, with plastic tanks. It cracked lengthwise along the top tank. As it turns out, that is a common thing. The normally black plastic (on those particular radiators) first turns brown, and then green. Once green, it is in danger of literally falling apart. Once in a past life, I worked on Volvos for a while. There are 3 possible brands of original plastic/aluminum radiators on the Volvo 240. One of the three, Blackstone, is prone to rot. The hose connections will literally fall off. They don't even change color to warn you something is up, they look fine. POOF! All your coolant is on the ground. My local radiator guy was fixing a lot of the aluminum/plastic ones in his last few years, mostly for big trucks. But, he considered the all aluminum units disposable. At least with copper there is some chance I will be able to fix it myself. I have done minor repairs in the past with just my torch and some nice runny flux. I even soldered up a hole in a tube in the second row of a three row radiator once (1970 Dodge). Yeah, that was dumb luck, and I've never been able to repeat that performance. Still, there's a chance. If the whole radiator needs to be built from scratch because the one in the car is an unrepairable type, that sounds like a bigger problem to me.

Is the ground wire on the breaker plate in your distributor ok?

Nice Work!

How much air is in them? I have not had these particular tires, but if you are seeing "squat" they probably don't have near enough air.

Well, I was going for something they might have actually shot for at design. Yeah, in reality it is closer to 100.....

Its pretty safe to assume 90 on the old sizes that are pre-1965, and specify the rim size rather than the outer diameter. Truck tires may be a bit taller than expected due to the extra plies. These tires on the other hand are a bit weird. They work out to about 7.60-15 with a 95 aspect ratio. The first number is the section width , so something that has a section width of 7.62 isn't an 8.20 no matter how you cut it. They are the correct outer diameter for an 8.20 though, just slightly narrower. Keep in mind that tires take a little liberty even today with the actual size, and 50 years ago they were all over the map. Maybe they made them just a little bit tall/narrow to increase the bias ply illusion. It would also make them more likely to fit in a spare tire well or a sidemount cover.

How many more conversions have you seen like that? When I was doing driveability-smog-electrical work I NEVER ONCE had a properly done 12v conversion cross my service bay. I never once had a 12v conversion cross my service bay that had everything working. What I have seen is a lot of godawful messes. People do this because someone told them to, and then can't get the car working properly again. "my M6 wont shift" "my gas gauge won't work" etc. The story is always "its already converted" and "the hard part is done" and "just _____ and _____ don't work, could you have a quick look?" What you usually see is a hacked up harness, cheap crimp connectors everywhere. all the same colored wire, zip cord that came with some stereo speakers, and so on. One guy told me he hooked onto the old harness with a tractor and pulled. Sometimes you will see a conversion by someone who has done industrial electrical work, and everything will be nicely done, harnessed, tagged, and rows of terminal blocks everywhere. They didn't think about the fact that all those extra connections cause significant voltage drop at 12 volts. At least those cars are easy to probe and trace, but the headlights are probably dim. Then, there are the kits from Painless, Ron Francis, etc. They just allow you to wire a car from scratch in the manner that a 60s-80s American car is wired. It is possible to do a nice job with one of these. They still always seemed to come in with too many splices. Also, these don't do anything to help getting the 6 volt equipment working on 12 volts. This isn't a bad solution for a street rod with all 12v gauges and accessories. I do my best to help people patch these things up when they ask in the forum, I understand how frustrating electrical problems can be. I am here to help. On the other hand I wont even look at a 12v converted car to buy for myself. When I see the 12v battery I click "next". I insist on cars that work. Most of those don't, and that's why they are for sale, and they are quite a bit more trouble to fix than cars that have not met the wirecutters. I guess that makes me a "purist" (pay no attention to the truck in my side yard). :lol:

Maybe it is titled to the frame number? Not every state titled to the engine.

A bunch of extensions can act as a spring and limit torque. Thats the principle on which a torque stick works. Put the socket right on the torque wrench if you can. If you cant, use a thick extension, and as little extra length as you can. Flex sockets and wobbly extensions will behave unpredictably. Never do that unless you have to (and then you cant quite believe the number). With a crowfoot wrench, the actual torque can be calculated based on the amount of offset in the crowfoot.

6.3 Volts is the normal voltage of a fully charged 6 volt battery. Welcome to the forum!

I recently fixed the pushbutton on my 36 Pontiac glovebox. The cylinder fell out only when unlocked. It turned out that a piece was broken off of the cylinder. The cylinder casting (just the piece with the tumblers in it) was what needed to be replaced. On this particular lock (the button), you turn 90 degrees to the right to unlock, and then you can remove the latch from the back, then turn the lock ANOTHER 90 degrees and the cylinder comes out. I wonder if yours is a similar design? This is the unlocked position. See that notch at the top rear of the cylinder casting? It shouldn't be there.

Is that a button push to open? I don't have a 35, and it is hard to tell how that latch works from your picture. If it is a button, I think your lock cylinder is broken.

If you can spray professional products, put 2-part epoxy primer on all steel parts, then use some sort of a filler primer from the same product line. If you are stuck with rattle cans, get some rustoleum "self etching primer", put it on fairly thick, let it dry for a couple of days, and wet sand it until the high spots show through. Repeat until the pits are full (usually twice with deep ones like that), and then put one last thin coat on to cover the exposed steel, let dry, then paint.

Yes. And common wisdom says that when comparing radiator cooling capacity, pound-for-pound aluminum wins. In square inches, copper wins. Thickness of core only helps up to a certain point, and you hit the law of diminishing returns VERY quickly. If you are limited by air intake area, as you usually are in an antique, copper is theoretically better. In many cases, the cars already ran too hot, and now everybody wants to hang on air conditioning. The argument from the other side is that the solder used in a copper radiator does not conduct heat as well as aluminum, and that aluminum radiator technology has progressed to the point that aluminum has surpassed copper. I have a first generation Miata. In Miata circles the idea that aluminum has surpassed copper has taken over, and there are all sorts of proven (and expensive) high performance aluminum radiators available. Although the high performance some of these is undeniable, I am still skeptical that technology has overcome such a huge difference in the metal. I have a copper radiator in my Miata. I don't even think you can buy one anymore. A copper radiator is at least theoretically repairable forever. With all of the radiator shops disappearing, it is questionable whether you will find anyone to do it in the future. But at least it is possible. You might have to make some elaborate setup and do it yourself if it needs major work. Repairability of aluminum radiators varies. On the plastic tank type, you can theoretically take the tanks off, rod them out, and re-crimp them. The trouble is that plastic tanks rot, some worse than others, and you really can't depend on them being around forever. On the aluminum radiators that have aluminum tanks welded on, such as are popular in the musclecar world these days, it would seem that you could just cut and weld them as necessary. I asked our local radiator guy (when we had one) about this. His comment: "it would be easier to just make a new one". For now I will stick with copper. Your mileage may vary.

If it really isn't wanted here, wouldn't it be better to have a moderator split the off-topic stuff to a separate thread? The information and pictures could be of use to someone later.