Bloo

I can guess whats going on here. Most American cars of this vintage have a circuit breaker in the headlight switch. I don't know for sure how many amps it is on your Buick, but in Chrysler products it was 15 amps until 1968, and then 20 amps thereafter. This was typical for the period, because the original bulbs for a 4 headlight system were 37.5 watts (x4) on high beam. Later on they raised the wattage of new bulbs. Cars with 4 headlights made before the late 60s often have trouble keeping the high beams on if all 4 bulbs have been changed. 15 amps just isn't enough. A relay system might be in order here.

Paterson 6-42?

And if you are stuck with the tiny parking light sockets, and don't want to drill.... 21 watt halogen bulbs exist for that socket. Yes it will probably get hot, but there is the whole headlight reflector for a heat sink, and it wont be on constantly. Only white exists in the USA, but amber ones exist in Slovakia! I'm not sure if they are made this way of if someone is doing the bulb paint trick. I have some here but haven't tried them. It is probably as good as it gets in the small socket. These are 6 volt, but there is also 12 volt. Available on Ebay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/1X-BULB-for-Indicator-SIDEMARKER-YELLOW-HALOGEN-LIGHT-6V-21w-BA9S-64113-H21W/371301619358?hash=item56734d169e:g:l0kAAOSwNSxVJm3x

The "Guide 6004" postwar turn signal switch is small. inconspicuous, and came in at least 2 different mounting styles and several different finishes. Some have a red indicator, some have green. The lever is chrome. They have cancel, via a rubber tire that runs against the back of the steering wheel. There is no 4-way. Some were setup to use the brakelight bulbs, some were not. I have one that was not, and it has the same switch inside as the ones that do interface with the brake lights. Some of the terminals have never had wires soldered to them. I suspect all the units can do this by adding wires. They look like this (more or less):

I guess its just a different way of looking of things. I would love to know what various parts would have looked like when new on my 1936 Pontiac. If someone was expounding about original details that applied to my car, I would be taking notes. I might not change it all right away. The car will never be shown, that isn't the point (at least in my case). I like to put mechanical things back together better than I find them.

What was the original application of the front lights?

By the way, I completely agree with you that you only get action right at the end of pedal travel, it is extremely hard to stop on the rears only, and that this is a lot of marketing nonsense. This is one of those things people think they need because someone told them they did, kind of like 12v conversions, etc... On the other hand, if converting to front disc, a dual cylinder could simplify things.

While I don't doubt what you experienced, and I'm not going to comment on ABS for fear of muddying up the conversation, a typical post-67 American rear wheel drive car loses half the brakes, unless the owner keeps driving until the OTHER two go away as well. I fixed a gazillion of these before 1988 or so. They roll into the shop with the customer complaining of a low pedal, and sometimes a "BRAKE" warning light on. Those "BRAKE" warning lights didn't always work as designed even when present. They indicated a pressure differential between one circuit and the other. A pressure differential indicates one circuit has failed. In the bottom of each reservoir there is a tiny pinhole, at the bottom of the cone shaped area in the bottom of each reservoir. Notice how close they are to a seal on both halves. As soon as that seal covers up the pinhole, the fluid cannot squirt back into the reservoir. The brakes start to work. Lets call the seals #1 through #5, left to right. Lets say the circuit at the right fails. Maybe #5 seal failed, and the reservoir drained out on the ground or got sucked into the brake booster. Maybe #4 failed and leaks fluid to the right where it can go up the large port back into the reservoir. No pressure is created in the right circuit. Furthermore, the "fluid piston" normally formed between #4 and #3 (#3 is a reverse cup) does not exist. What happens? The piston (the one with seal #5 and #4 on it) moves left compressing the spring to the immediate left. It bottoms out on the steel sleeve thing to the left, where it pushes on the other piston for the other circuit. The circuit to the left operates as normal. Now lets say the circuit at the left fails. #1 seal has failed. It covers the pinhole, but fluid just blows past back toward seal #2. From here I suspect it blows back up into the reservoir via a large port they might have forgot to draw. In any event, no pressure is created. When the driver steps on the pedal, the circuit to the right covers it's pinhole, and attempts to work as normal, but since there is no pressure in the back, it cannot do anything. The "fluid piston" moves to the left, moving the left piston and compressing the leftmost spring until the leftmost piston physically bottoms in it's bore. Then the right circuit starts to work as normal. I suspect the only purpose of seal #3 is to keep a left circuit failure from unseating reverse seal #4 and draining the "fluid piston" Anything like a blown brake line or caliper or cylinder that lets air into one circuit (and drains the fluid) has the same effect. With a failure of either circuit, you get a low pedal and 2 wheel braking.

Actually those will work with one half of the system dead. That was the whole justification for their existence, but I would also question how much of a safety improvement it is. IIRC these were introduced on Ramblers about 1963 or so, and expanded to everything in the USA (almost) by federal mandate in 1967. As long as you have enough pedal travel, you can indeed operate half the system. In theory, that is safer because you can use 2 wheels to stop, where otherwise you would have nothing. In practice there are a couple of issues. Here is a master cylinder kit for the dual master cylinder I am working on right now: You may notice there are 5 seals that run on the bore. Now here is a typical master cylinder kit for a single system: Thats right , 2 seals, making the dual cylinder over twice as likely to fail due to seal leakage. On rear-wheel drive cars, the systems are split front-to-back. You might lose the back brakes, or you might lose the front. The most likely reason is an exploding brake hose, or if you live in a salt state, maybe a rusted-out steel brake line. When the seal failure is on the bottom piston, it will bottom out on the cylinder, and the other half will still work. If the bad seal is in the upper half, the spring (on the upper piston in the first picture above) will compress until the steel sleeve inside of it bottoms out, allowing you to operate the bottom piston with the pedal. In either case the pedal will be extremely low. There is also no guarantee that a pedal and/or booster designed for a single cylinder will have enough pedal travel to make this happen. It would have to be checked. It takes less pedal travel to bottom out a single master cylinder. The best possible case is you lose the rear brakes. The fronts will stop the car handily, with only a low pedal. There is a 50% chance this will happen. Don't forget having a failure in the first place is over 50% more likely because you have over twice as many seals in the master cylinder. There is also a 50% chance you will lose the front brakes. it will be very difficult and slow to stop the car, particularly if you are carrying any speed. This is why rear-only brakes were abandoned in the 1920s. It is better than nothing at all, but even then, in most cases you have these same rear brakes available mechanically via the parking brake. The only real advantage you have in this situation is that your foot is already on the brake pedal, improving your reaction time somewhat over using the parking brake. For the sort of people who never change their brake fluid, or the rubber lines, maybe a dual cylinder is safer. For the rest of us, I suspect not. It certainly isn't as cut and dry as some people make it out to be.

Looks like the choke is rotated 90 degrees from the old manifold? The old one must have been the wrong year?

It looks good in the pics. I have no idea about the value. Lets see what c49er thinks.

If you find they are all out of this down at the Buick dealer, bleach also works.

I always snicker to myself when I hear how people are going to improve the reliability of these oldies by bolting 80s GM parts on them. The most reliable cars I have ever owned, old or new-ish, have been bone stock, or very close. The engineers were not idiots, and did what they did after checking and rechecking their math, and stress testing prototypes before production. Occasionally they miss something, but not much. There is nothing wrong, I suppose, with coming up with your own combination of parts to make a car. You can pick the best parts of every year for a particular engine series, find a transmission you like, use aftermarket stuff, etc, and come up with a very good car. What most average guys don't seem to get is that it puts YOU in the engineer's chair. Do you know how to arrange the driveline angles so the universal joints will last and not vibrate? Do you have enough grill opening to cool the engine at the horsepower level you are planning? Once you get past 3 rows on the radiator, more doesn't do much. Oh, you want air conditioning too? The shiny new carburetor will come out of the box jetted too rich (so you can get it running without a hassle), and will need to be rejetted. The metering rods (or power valve) will also need attention. The distributor curve kit that came from the speed shop is all wrong for the street because it is designed for bracket racing. Even if it were right, you don't just throw weights and springs in a distributor and call it "curved". The results are completely random. You need to check it on a distributor machine, or with a dial-back timing light, or degree tape. It will need to be changed to suit the new engine. The vacuum advance probably came from a car with EGR, because that is usually what is floating around in the wild. It moves way too much, because you don't have EGR now. Got a hot cam? The spring tension in the vacuum advance is probably wrong too. They do make adjustable ones. What heat range plugs are you going to run? The answers can be determined experimentally by road testing, dragstrip or dyno testing, hopefully an exhaust gas analyzer, plug reading, maybe an oxygen sensor with a readout, or an exhaust pyrometer, or colortune. The ignition curve and the jetting interact to some extent. The process is iterative. None of this is hard, just time consuming and often expensive. The learning curve is steep if you have never done it, but extremely satisfying when you get it right. It is always an enjoyable conversation when I run into someone else who knows how to do all this. It doesn't happen often. What I usually hear are things like "I don't need a choke" or "I can run without a power valve" or "it runs great but it wont idle" or "it overheats when I take it out of town" and so on. At the local cars and coffee I ran into a guy who has another flathead Pontiac, newer than mine. He plans to put it on a chassis from an F-body or a Monte Carlo or something. He is going to take it on trips, and says that it will be impossible to find parts for the old drivetrain while on the road, and he needs to be able to repair it without waiting for parts. I guess he is planning on repairing it on the road. As someone who has repaired 80s GMs for a living, I imagine he might have some opportunities to do that. It never even occurred to me that my Pontiac couldn't make a road trip without breaking down. I drove it 150 miles on Thanksgiving. To each his own.

Don't braze an exhaust manifold. I understand these are hard to come by, but replacement is BY FAR the best option if you can make it happen. I have never yet seen a welded exhaust manifold stay welded long term. The heat, expansion/contraction stress and leverage exerted is just too much. There are members of this forum however who have had success with welded manifolds. If you need to weld it, I suggest you ask around and hire the best cast iron welder that you can find. Find someone in the forum who has a welded exhaust manifold that held together, and hire the same person. It will probably need re-machining when you get it back. Generally speaking, it is possible to weld cast iron successfully, the trick is to pre-heat and post-heat. It is usually done with a stick welder and a high-nickel rod. The casting is put in a kiln and heated up to something close to welding temperature. It is then pulled out, welded (quickly), probably hammered to relieve stress (not sure on this detail), and then shoved immediately back in the kiln. It is then allowed to cool down VERY SLOWLY. This means hours if not days. Probably days. It is also possible to torch weld cast iron. I have seen old welding texts that treat this as routine. Special rod is needed, as is the pre-heat and post-heat in the kiln. I have never seen it done. Without pre-heat and post-heat the weld will crack along it's edge immediately, probably while you are still welding...... I have never heard of mig welding cast iron. I imagine it is possible (with a kiln). A long time ago before I knew better, I rebushed a heat riser with brass. The bushings disappeared. About the same time a friend of mine tried to braze cracked headers. The brass melted and blew out. I wouldn't try brass. On a part that runs colder it would probably be ok. Brass works on exhaust further toward the back of the car where there is less heat.

If I'm not mistaken, the insert is steel rather than fabric on a 1937 Graham. Other than that it is exactly as Ozstatman says.

Where are you located? About 2 years ago a 36 Chevrolet coach driver's door popped up on Portland, OR Craigslist. The listing said it was bought as a 36 Pontiac door, but proved not to be Pontiac. No idea if it sold. No idea if it was Master or Standard. I probably still have the contact information. Shoot me a PM if you want me to try and dig it up.

I'll bet they did do a lot of testing to get it right. Fixing one with the correct parts is the way to go whenever possible. Still, they all do about the same thing, and a working riser of any sort would be far superior to the stuck incomplete one in this thread. There is a page on p15-d24.com that describes pretty succinctly what a Chrysler heat riser should do. p15 production ended in early 1949, but this description is about right for any V8 era Chrysler heat riser up until the round weights appeared in about 1970. Some examples: "After installation test the operation of the heat riser. With the engine cold and not running you should be able to move it forward almost 90 degrees, release and have it snap back to the upright position. Start the car, and rev the engine. The counterweight should again move forward as the force of the exhaust gas causes the valve to open and exit out the exhaust system. The counter weight should return to the upright position when the engine drops back to idle. Check the spring resistance of turning the counterweight. (wear gloves, it will get very hot!) As the engine warms and the exhaust manifold heats up, spring tension should lesson, divert less hot gasses to the heat chamber." "When the counterweight is a 12 o’clock the valve is closed (or in the up position), diverting hot gas into the intake manifold heat chamber. When the counterweight is in the 3 o’clock position, the valve should be open, allowing the exhaust gas to pass straight through the manifold to the exhaust system." (That could be 9 o clock for open on some cars I imagine, depending which end of the shaft the weight is on The important part is that the weight came down 90 degrees or a little less ) "When attaching the spring and counterweight be sure to wrap the spring the correct number of turns and in a counterclockwise direction. It should be wrapped 335 degrees. Also check the valve alignment to the counterweight." (Ok, 335 degrees is a bit more than I guessed, but it is still less than a turn. Also, counterclockwise might not apply to every car) http://p15-d24.com/page/p15d24/tech/heat_riser_adviser.html/ I think you could get a long way with what is on that page.

I didn't mean the whole kit... I meant that little stop thing. Just looking at that heat riser of yours, lots of 60s era parts would fit, even the bushings I think. Hopefully his bushings wont break loose from the manifold, and he wont have to take the shaft out.. The stuff always needed to get mopar heat risers working back in the day were the thermostat spring, the little keying tab that locks the weight in position, and that silly little stop. RIght now, on ebay, a generic mopar thermostat spring is listed (back to 1933!). I assume it is a repro. The lock tab for the weight is also listed. Not sure if those are repro or NOS. Not worth making yourself for $5 (but it wouldn't be hard). What is missing is that silly little stop. If I remember correctly it fits everything up to 1970 or so, and it is always bad. Somebody should repro that. After there were no more of them, I just used pieces of spring steel with a little more bend so the butterfly lands in the right place. It might make noise but it works.

No no no.... lol Save the high-res versions of those pictures though! It may come in handy later. Somebody will have that weight on a junk broken manifold. Ask around. It wouldn't surprise me if some sixes are the same. You can improvise the rest. Even the weight could be made if it were really necessary. Can you weld? I made this one for a 1936 Pontiac. I wish I had pictures like that to work with!

I don't know. If you can put it on in such a way that you wind it until the valve goes to the cold position plus about a half turn to hook it around the peg (at room temperature) it will probably work fine. Of course the correct parts are preferable if you can get them.

A weight could be made if it was really unobtanium. I'll bet it wont be too hard to find. The thermostatic spring is often shot, but the one in the pic looks very close to what Chrysler used in the 60s and 70s, and in a pinch it would probably interchange.

Where did you get that little woven pad doohickey? I bought the last two or three of those out of the Chrysler parts system back in 1996 or 1997, at least the ones for the 60s era cars, and this looks like the same part. Is it reproduced now?

Ok well... it looks like a screw bushing to me. Hopefully Rusty or someone more familiar with this exact suspension can give you the real scoop... How these generally work is the threads on the shaft (yes, threads) are about the same pitch as the mushy, round, self tapping threads that hold the cap into the control arm. That is what allows you to assemble it. Here is a picture of random screw bushings off a Ford. Once assembled, the greased threads are what allow the control arm to move. As you can see, the arm will move fore and aft slightly in relation to the car, due to the threads. Bushings may be available separately, but if the control arm is loose on the shaft. most likely the shaft is bad too. I would probably take the control arm and shaft off of the car to work on it, if you can. You will need the spring pressure off of it no matter what.

I believe model a wheels have exposed lugs.

It is good you found that. JB weld wont hold a freeze plug for long. I would replace all of them. The wire probably held the sand core together when they cast the block. I would run a bunch of water through there with a hose. Maybe poke around with a coathanger. Get all the crap out of there. In addition to the scale and crud that builds up you might find some casting sand. A long time ago, I flushed about a coffee can full of sand out of a Ford 352. I am fairly sure this engine uses a water distribution tube. Since the engine is out, I would definitely want to assess that and probably replace it.