Bloo

Someone was looking for a tailpan just the other day, but I don't recall who.

Check your fan.

The 5 terminal regulators, which include your 5588 from an electrical perspective despite it having only four, used a switched lead from the ignition switch. It turns the system on. More importantly, it is the "sample" voltage the voltage regulator sees to estimate battery voltage from. At some point a couple of years later GM turned away from this design rather suddenly. The 4 terminal regulators with one terminal sticking out the top do not represent one terminal missing, they are a complete redesign on the voltage regulator on a different principle. That is why the terminals are in a completely different order. This new system turns itself on like most other newer generator systems. It also samples voltage right at the cutout to estimate battery voltage. It no longer needs the ignition lead at all, and you will see Delco's update instructions telling you to cut the ignition wire off. Using a bone stock 1937 Buick with an original 5807 as an example, because the key to understanding all those Delco "update" sheets is Buick wiring, here are the 5 terminals: GEN/ARM F/FIELD GRD AMM/BAT IGN So, if you've been keeping score, GRD is gone because it was never there on 5588, and IGN is gone because GM and or Delco completely revamped their design philosophy and their regulator design. That leaves 3 terminals. GEN/ARM F/FIELD AMM/BAT But we were talking about 1937 Buicks so we still have GRD too. That's four. A new four terminal regulator replacement for the 1937 Buick has those four. GEN/ARM, F/FIELD, AMM/BAT, and GRD. As mentioned earlier, GRD is not ground. It goes to a set of points in the regulator assembly. The terminal is grounded only when the cutout is cut out and the generator isn't charging. Buick Autostart starts when you step on the gas pedal. The starter has a solenoid on it to pull the gear in place and a big set of contacts to turn the starter on, just like a much newer GM car. On the 1937 Buick (and a bunch of others), there is a little relay hanging on the back of the solenoid, so that it can be triggered (and the engine started) with even less current than the solenoid by itself needs. This little relay has a floating coil, and you must provide it both power and ground to activate it. On the positive side, there is a combination vacuum-throttle switch. If the throttle is open, and there is no engine vacuum (not running) it sends power to the relay. On the negative side, the GRD terminal on the regulator grounds the relay when the system is not charging. If the system is charging, GRD does not give the relay a ground. This is sort of a double-safe system to make sure the starter doesn't engage while the engine is running. If the engine has no vacuum, and the generator is not charging, the engine has to be off and you can start it with the throttle switch. If there is engine vacuum, the engine is running and the relay gets no power because of the vacuum switch. But, what if you are floored going up a steep hill? The throttle is open, so the throttle switch is on. The throttle is wide open, so there is no vacuum. The starter can't engage though because the charging system is charging, and GRD does not give the relay a ground. So what they did was make "4 terminal" regulators to replace the 5 terminal ones. They had the new design that did not need IGN, but still provided GRD for Buicks (and some Pontiacs that had either Buick Autostart, or an idiot light, or both). If you used one of these on a 36 Oldsmobile, you would only use 3 wires. No IGN because the regulator is the newer design, and no GRD because it was never there. Later on they were replacing these 4 terminal regulators (and any 5 terminal ones still left) with a 3 terminal regulator. The sheet you posted earlier is for this modification. They were having you piggyback the wire that had been on GRD on the GEN terminal. In fact, this is how later Buicks with autostart and factory 3 terminal regulators are wired. The little relay on the starter finds a ground through the generator windings, but when the system is charging, the GEN terminal comes up to charging voltage and it can no longer find a ground that way. The double safety still works.

I would expect the 5588 to physically look like the regulator in the first 2 pictures of this thread (5590). Maybe not though. I just found a pic of real Buick 5807, and it is not the way I remembered. I would have expected a flat cover. This looks more like the alleged 1118213 with the white 3712 tag hanging on it. The 5807 uses an IGN terminal though, and I'll bet that regulator with the 3712 tag does not. I'd really like to see a 5588. The regulator in your Blue Streak post replaces 5588, but also 1118203. My guess is, this would be an "update" regulator that does not use an IGN terminal, and so 3 terminals (or 4 terminals including GRD if present) would be exactly what is expected. It would most likely work fine. Old Blue Streak stuff is extremely high quality, probably even better than Delco. If you were wanting exactly the original setup, I don't think this is it. EDIT: The 1118213 picture in your last pic does not match the picture of the 1118213 in the book in your last post! It's a whole different series. I wonder what is going on there? Is the book wrong? Is the regulator not really 1118213?

Have you tried California Pontiac? https://www.pontiacparts.net/ Those are a regular stock item for them as far as I know. If it's not on the site be sure to call them. Personally I have found the website completely useless since they revamped it 2 or 3 years ago. Even before, it didn't list everything they had. 714-245-9800 The original was a fairly low temperatre Harrison bellows type thermostat, 151 degrees or so but maybe a 160(?) degree unit by the end of flathead production. In any event, I think they used a hotter one (180 degrees) if you had a heater and did not intend to use alcohol for antifreeze. I am not sure if a standard modern poppet-type thermostat fits, but there is probably one that does if the standard one does not. If you get a modern thermostat get one with a tiny bleed hole (or a rattler) in it, because the original bellows thermostat had a tiny bleed hole. The key is that retaining ring. They were not all the same length originally (depending on year of engine). Every one you are likely to find today is too long no matter what year your car is, and you'll have to cut it off. I don't know why that is but expect it. California Pontiac warns you of this. I believe their retaining ring is stainless, while the originals were steel. I had to do it to the NORS one I bought on ebay in a bright yellow 1950s looking box. All this stuff shows up on ebay occasionally if you would prefer NORS. Rust is the most likely reason there seem to be no originals around. My NORS one is already showing a little rust. Stainless would be harder to cut, but probably worth the effort. I cut my steel one with a dremel cutoff wheel and dressed it a bit on the grinder. The ring edge should be flush with the bottom of the themostat housing. It bumps against the head surface to lock it in place.

Thanks for posting that. It confirms what I expected, and is even stronger evidence that the regulator should be 5588. I've been casually looking and can't find it. I found this older thread that says 1938 Oldsmobile takes 5814. The interesting part of the missing post is that the 1938 circuit has 4 terminals, but was highly unlikely to match anything from 1936. The things you have posted confirm that. https://forums.aaca.org/topic/369565-wtb-1938-olds-voltage-regulator/#comment-2281397 It is identical or nearly so, but for it to make any sense you need to think of the 5588 as a 5 wire regulator even though it only has 4 wires. Electrically it is a 5 wire regulator, it is just missing the "GRD" terminal, that terminal being useless on a car with a conventional starter and ammeter. The update instructions make a lot more sense if you are talking about a 5 wire Buick. Pontiac and Oldsmobile may have adopted a "true" 4 wire system in production about a year before Buick. As you noted later, not really. 1935-36 Pontiac Eight charging and starting systems are wire for wire identical to 1937-38 (and some 1936?) Buicks, except for the generator itself. The main differences are mechanical, such as mountings and linkages. The 1937 and 1938 Buick generators are slightly larger and wired differently internally, but that really makes no difference to the regulator or wiring discussion. Please post if you get one. Police cars are a can of worms. US Chevys at that time used a simple 3rd brush and a cutout, but with a field terminal. There was a resistor in the headlight switch, and it effectively turned up the charging rate when the lights were on. This fixes one of the biggest disadvantages of a 3rd brush and a cutout, that it cannot compensate for headlight load. In theory, you might be able to drive all night with this and not run out of battery. There was also a half click in the headlight switch to allow the driver to force a high charging rate in the daytime if he knew his battery was low. It is a step up from a model A, but less sophisticated than the 5 terminal regulated systems we have been talking about. It probably makes more sense to think of those Canadian and State Police Chevys as having a Buick/Olds/Pontiac-type charging system. 1936 Canadian Pontiacs have some charging system differences that escape me at the moment. 1936 Pontiac police cars have a completely different charging system that I believe is common with LaSalle. It uses a 2 brush generator, a 3 unit regulator (with 6 terminals on it!), more output, and true current regulation in addition to voltage regulation. Outside of the extra terminals, it has more in common with a post-1940 charging system than it does with any of the systems we have been talking about. I don't know what a 1936 Olds police car has. This is pure speculation, but my working theory for the moment is that the mounting is different. Maybe it won't mount on the firewall (on Pontiac, maybe Olds too) without hitting something? My car has a correct (for 1936 Pontiac) 5557 on it. As I understand it the 5557 is electrically the same as 5807 (1937-38 Buick), but mechanically different. I have a sheet somewhere that says so. I don't know what book it is out of. My suspicion is that the mountings are just rotated 90 degrees. Maybe the 5588 mount is also 90 degrees off? I have no pic of a 5807, but being Buick, I'll bet someone would come up with one if I asked. If you get a picture of a real 5588, we can compare.

Yes it should. I believe that is what @m-mman was getting at. With the horn button apart like that, and the horn not being honked, the only thing between your test light and the 12V supply is a coil of wire inside the relay.

I see those as a solution looking for a problem. But then again, I have not really had much cutout trouble in my life. I don't think I have ever bought a brand new one. I've cleaned a bunch of dirty points. Somebody must be having cutout trouble though, because those "solid state" cutouts with a silicon diode inside sure are popular. On one hand, the points in a mechanical cutout can stick, but on the other hand the most common failure mode of a silicon diode is a dead short, so the result of a failure would be exactly the same. Either type can work fine though.

There would be voltage, but not in the way you might think. An open ground will show the whole supply voltage when measured with a voltmeter. There just wouldn't be a lot of current available. It helps to think of the open spot in the circuit as a resistor. You can't really do math on infinity, but think of it as something crazy high like 99 billion ohms. The resistance of the horn relay coil is dwarfed by comparison, and an overwhelming majority of the voltage gets dropped across the open part of the circuit, the 99 billion ohm resistor. The drop across the relay coil is so miniscule, you wont even notice it. All of the supply voltage will appear on your meter. Now when you honk the horn, by shorting the contact, that 99 billion ohm resistor becomes 0 ohms. Well not quite 0 ohms because that is impossible, No connection is quite perfect. It is extremely close to zero though, maybe 0.001 ohms or something like that. Now the coil of the horn relay is the highest resistance in the circuit, and an overwhelming majority of the supply voltage gets dropped across it. The relay pulls in and the horn honks. It's the same reason you can measure voltage on the ground terminal of an ignition coil when the points are open.

That's pretty much it. One tiny nit to pick, it's generator voltage that causes the cutout to pull in. Voltage present on the generator side of the cutout indicates the engine is running and the generator is spinning. It is way easier to hold a relay down than to pull it in in the first place. Also, once the cutout is "pulled in", the battery is connected, so the relay would stay pulled in no matter what. For this reason there is a second winding on the cutout relay that senses current. When current starts flowing the wrong way because the generator is not charging, for instance when you shut the engine off, that second winding pushes instead of pulls and forces the cutout to open. I am talking about plain single-relay cutouts, although that all still holds true for the cutout relay section of a voltage regulator. A couple of hints: First, in case you didn't already know this, never run a third brush system with the battery unhooked. Second, check that fuse under the knurled cap in the voltage regulator.

An original wiring diagram for a 36 olds F would solve a lot. How do you engage the starter? Does the car have a real ammeter or an idiot light? As I mentioned before, these are the two most important clues by far. The sheet you show for the 5 terminal to 3-terminal update is something that comes up a lot in Buick forums. A similar sheet was posted in a thread about a 38 Oldsmobile the other day, but it was the sheet for converting 5 terminal to 4 terminal. Note, this would most likely NOT be a version of one of the flat cover types as used in 1936. The terminals were not the same. In that case also the instructions were far more applicable to a Buick. At least 5558 is the right type of a part number. I doubt very many of the long part numbers were in use in 1936. Maybe none. There is a 29-48 Delco book online. Despite being published so much later, it *seems* to show the original part numbers. Despite the fact that GM took a hard turn away from the regulator family in question around 1938 nothing appears superseded, at least in the Buick and Pontiac sections. It says 5588 for both Oldsmobile F and L in 1936. http://restoringcornelius.com/files/29-48 Delco Remy.pdf For comparison: 1935 Pontiac 6 5588 1935 Pontiac 8 5557 1936 Pontiac 6 5557 1936 Pontiac 8 5557 1936 Buick 40 (optional) 5589 1936 Buick except 40 5594 1937 Buick all 5807 1938 Buick all 5807 I believe everything in the table above is going to be a flat cover 2-unit regulator like your first 2 pictures in the thread, and the 2 regulators to the left in the third picture your the last post. All in the table I believe are 5 terminal regulators except 5588. It should be about the same thing, just missing the "GRD" terminal. I've left out 1937-38 Olds (5814) because I believe it was a newer series of regulator by then. The wiring diagram posted in the 38 olds thread from the other day backs up this idea, because there is no IGN terminal. I've left out 1937-38 Pontiac (5808) because I believe they had moved on to a newer design as well. I am going to ignore the 36 Buick (5589, 5594) because I don't know what is different about them. Possibly they are generator mounted? The Canadian 36 Buicks used 5557 like a 36 Pontiac. American 36 Chevrolets still had no regulator, but State Police and Canadian 36 Chevrolets used the Olds regulator (5588)! That leaves 5588, 5557, and 5807. I have a sheet somewhere I can't find that says 5557 and 5807 (and several others of the same internal construction) are electrically interchangeable but not mechanically. Maybe the 5588 mounts like the 5807 (37-38 Buick)? Some 1935-6 Pontiacs have the regulator mounted on a little shelf so the can is pointed up. Some do not. I don't know why they would do that on only some cars. If the 5588 (36 Olds and 35 Pontiac 6) mounts differently than the 5557 (35-6 Pontiac 8 and 36 Pontiac 6), that could explain it. I vote for 5588. EDIT: I found a picture of 1116213 on ebay. It is the 4-pin type Buick started using as a retrofit for 5 pin regulators after they didn't want to use the ignition lead anymore, circa 1938-39. I don't think it is even in the running for 1936. EDIT 2: I don't really believe that regulator in your first 2 pictures is what it says it is. Except as it turns out, it isn't. Blow up the first picture. The number stamped in it is 5590. That doesn't appear in the 1948 book at all, but I found it on Delco's site, and it supersedes to 5839 and then 1118436. Neither of those are in the 1948 book either. The number on the package, 1118309 doesn't appear in the book either, nor does 1118332, the number Delco says it supersedes to on their site. I see no reason to believe that regulator is related to the container in any way. Of the numbers scribbled on the container, 1118203, shows up in the 1948 book only in listings for replacement internal parts for the regulator. It does not show up anywhere in the application data. 3730 appears not to be a Delco number at all. I doubt this regulator, actually a 5590, is for a GM car. I doubt it is for a car at all for that matter. Maybe a generator, or a pump, or a welder. Maybe an air compressor or a speed sprayer. Maybe a truck or a bus. It has the correct look for 1935-36 GM, but the wrong terminals. It might be coaxed to work correctly on the Oldsmobile with one wire disconnected, but only if it is for negative ground and only if it is for the correct type field circuit.

It would have taken more than a Ford solenoid. If I remember correctly it was series for cranking, parallel for running and charging.

The mention of pot metal reminded me of trimacar's post in this thread. Maybe worth a look:

Definitely not original. As @PONTIAC1953 mentioned, it is a 6/12 volt battery. The other parts, relays, etc. that mount on top of it are not there. There is a manufacturer's name for this setup, not Delco even though it uses a Delco battery. At the moment the name escapes me, but maybe somebody in here will remember. There have been threads about these on the forum. It would be pretty useless today. In the days of tar-top batteries, just about any 12v battery could have been reconfigured to work with this. Today the difficulty would be high, and that is putting it mildly. It's probably best as a display piece, especially if you can find the rest of the parts laying around somewhere.

I doubt any of these are the one, If you want to go all the way back to 1936. What follows is based on Buick and Pontiac research, but it is a fair bet the same things happened at Oldsmobile, even though the parts involved were most likely not quite the same ones. This may help understand whatever was happening at Oldsmobile at that time. The story starts with a 5 terminal voltage regulator on Pontiac Eights around 1935. The top cover most likely looked exactly like that one in the first 2 pictures. The terminals on one side are GEN and F (field). The terminals on the other side are AMM (or BAT), GRD, and IGN (ignition). AMM and GND are almost stacked and come out of the same hole. This is a 2-unit voltage regulator, in other words there are 2 relays inside. One is the cutout, and the other is the voltage regulator. It is used with a third brush generator, but with the third brush position fixed. Current regulation is still handled by the third brush. Since there is a voltage regulator, there is no need to "turn down" the current (Amps) by the moving third brush holder. They have chosen a spot that is low enough current (Amps) to protect the generator from damage and riveted the third brush holder in place. The generator itself (on a Pontiac) is smaller in diameter than a typical generator and is capable of 15-17 Amps maximum when driven at the "ideal speed". What I mean by that is that third brush systems have some particular RPM that they generate their maximum current (Amps). Go faster or slower (in high gear) and you have less current (Amps) available. Getting back to the regulator, the GEN terminal (AKA "ARM" sometimes) is exactly what you expect it to be, the large charging wire coming from the generator. Similarly F is Field, the voltage regulator's control wire for charging, and is the small wire coming from the generator. BAT (or AMM for ammeter) is the large wire carrying current to the battery and the rest of the car. Electrically it goes to the ammeter, although it might land on some other terminal first under the dash. GRD is not ground, at least not like you would normally think of on a voltage regulator. It is a contact on the cutout that is grounded only when the cutout is actually cut out. Whenever the generator is charging, this terminal is disconnected. IGN is a longer story. I'll get back to that in a minute. Are you sure that's right? I'd cross-check that to the shop manual if you have not. I would not expect "Ground" on an Oldsmobile, but in 1936 I would definitely expect IGN. Do you have a Buick-type Autostart (throttle start) system? Do you have an idiot light for the charging system? Those were the only 2 uses of the "Ground" terminal that I am aware of. In fact, there was a 4-terminal version of these 5-terminal regulators that was original equipment on 1935 Pontiac Sixes. They had neither Buick-type autostart nor an idiot light, so the "Ground" terminal was missing. Well, you could easily eliminate "Ground" if you don't have one of the items mentioned above. A real ground wire for a regulator is always a good thing, but this isn't one. Next, GM had you eliminating the IGN wire when these cars were not very old. These 1935-1937-era regulators, like the one in your top 2 pics (but more typically with 5 terminals), had an "IGN" terminal for a wire from the ignition switch. It turned the charging system "on" and also served as a "sense" wire (voltage sensing) for the voltage regulator. GM soon decided that strategy was a bad idea, and unreliable. I have a lot of skepticism, because the Chrysler "roundback" and "squareback" alternators used that strategy many years later, and while there are some downsides, I believe it is the most reliable alternator system ever made. I am using a correct and probably original 5-terminal voltage regulator on the 36 Pontiac, and outside of cleaning the contacts carefully and setting the voltage once not long after I got the car, I haven't had to do anything to it. Anyhow, GM backed away from that strategy suddenly in the mid to late 30s, and later "updated" regulators had no IGN terminal. GM wanted you to cut the wire off at the harness when installing an updated regulator. I would never do that, I would insulate it and tape it back if I wasn't using it. It wasn't long before GM also eliminated the so-called "Ground" terminal (GRD) on their updated regulators as well.

Also Brake and Equipment of Minneapolis, MN. I have had sleeving done there with very nice results. They rebuild too, but I have always done that part myself. It depends on whether you want brass or stainless. That's like a Ford vs Chevy debate that goes nowhere, so I won't attempt to solve it. White Post has brass, Brake and Equipment has stainless.

No pistons in that kit, and there probably would be today I think. If all the parts you take out are in good shape, you can clean up and re-use except the cups, those should be new. Lubricate the new parts and bore with sil-glyde. The bores may be shot. Hone them to see. Don't try to hone pits out, just hone to knock down rust and high spots. You absolutely don't want to hone the bore oversize trying to get rid of pits. They will be pitted, mostly in the center where the old shot fluid was sitting. If pitting is in a spot the rubber cup will run on, the bores can be resleeved. NAPA has cups for sale by size just like the old days, but their online listings are terrible making it very hard find a size or to determine which size you are looking at. It is frustrating that they don't list the most important specification in a searchable way. With some digging you can figure it out. If the boots and the rest of the internal stuff is shot, then you will need whole kits for sure. You would likely get cup expanders in newer production kits that you wouldn't have with the original parts. They are either cone-shaped sheet metal cups that go under the rubber cups, or sometimes the springs are formed into a cup expander shape a the ends. Before cup expanders existed, the residual pressure valve in the master cylinder was responsible for keeping pressure on the cups to keep them sealed. These systems with the master cylinder under the floor can slowly let air in and may require bleeding if the car sits a lot. Cup expanders may not prevent this completely but they help. I don't get hung up over cup expanders. I drive the car a lot and I change my brake fluid every 2 years or so to avoid the corrosion problems, so it's getting bled now and then. It just isn't an issue to me. Your mileage may vary.

Is that car a replica? 26x2.125 is a bicycle tire size that appeared around 1933.

I believe this is for a Pontiac Deluxe Six or Deluxe Eight. A Pontiac Master Six (aka Standard Six in early 1935) has a leaf spring front suspension and would not have used anything like this. What surprises me is that only Pontiacs are listed on the box. I would have expected this part to be the same as 1935-36 Chevrolet Master, which uses a nearly identical Dubonnet front suspension to the 1935-36 Pontiac Deluxe Six and Deluxe Eight.

I don't think that's terribly far off. Especially the part about rhyming with geezer. I might pronounce a tiny bit more of the "j", something more like "zh". Source: listening to geezers talk about this stuff long before I became one.

Guide Multibeam didn't have 3 bulbs exactly, it had 3 beams. Make that four if you count the internal parking light that yours apparently had. Most and probably all of them used the American Prefocus bulbs that were common at the time, 2320, 2330. 2530, etc. On yours, there would have been an additional parking light bulb up high in the reflector. The lenses are different right to left and the cutoff is vertical. They are aimed crosseyed. When you beam down with a footswitch, the passenger side bulb beams down. GM cars except Chevrolet used them in the mid 30s. So did some independents I think. I would have guessed Cadillac, but I don't think they had that rib on top. I'd start looking at pics of cars from around 1934-36. The internal parking light is a small clue (suggests later). The fact that they mount at the bottom is another small clue (suggests earlier). Multibeam was around in some form or another for most of the 1930s.

Chrysler for many years. The resistances the gauges used might have been different, that detail escapes me right now, but it is the same system. I believe it is a King Seeley design. Voltage regulator is being a bit generous, though I know they did call it that. It's more like a flasher. It just keeps turning the power off and on, and if I remember correctly the duty cycle is 50%. The gauges are thermal and don't react very fast, so this gets rid of any unwanted waving around of the gas gauge. A typical setup has one of these flasher things powering two gauges, gas and water temperature. There is a screw on the flasher doohickey, glued in place, that adjusts the duty cycle. It was never intended to be adjusted. An out of spec unit was meant to be replaced. If you do adjust the duty cycle, it affects the calibration of both gauges, so it should never be attempted unless both gauges are off calibration in the same direction. Stuck points will cause both gauges to read extremely high and possibly get damaged. It's easy to pry the can off and clean/unstick the points when you know that.

GM used those for several years. I can't confirm 1960, it sounds too early to me. but it might be right. They are like spring-type hose clamps. You squeeze them to make the holes a little bigger and slide them on the posts.

Neither of the areas indicated are sealed by the head gasket. They are inside the combustion chamber.

It's modern. No steel band.