Pete O

Here's a site that has good information on the 1957 Dynaflow. It might give you some clues as to where to look for your problem. https://www.hometownbuick.com/1957-buick-dynaflow-transmission-specifications/

The thrust pad on your car does look like it is home-made, but it looks like the thickness is ok and it is supporting the transmission. When the thrust pad disintegrates and the rear of the transmission drops down, that is when it effects the adjustment of the shift linkage and impact the shift into reverse gear. You probably have to look elsewhere for your problem. Maybe a linkage adjustment is needed?

Old Buick Parts has it: http://www.oldbuickparts.com/product_info.php?products_id=435

Excellent work! It looks like a professional did it. Congratulations.

By tension on the automatic choke, are you referring to rotating the housing to either "rich" or "lean"? I find that is more trial and error than science. Fiddle with it until you have it where it will start easily but won't run on the choke too long. But if you are referring instead to setting the lever on the choke vacuum piston where it connects to the choke shaft (internal parts in the choke housing), that requires a special gauge that is near impossible to find.

Here you go....

I had the same problem of slow cranking, particularly when the engine was hot. After a lot of trial and error, I found that the starter itself was binding. The bushings were too tight on the armature shaft. I could not spin the armature by hand. Took it apart and reamed the bushings and that fixed it.

Apple Hydraulics https://www.applehydraulicsonline.com/

Sensible? You keep your junk in a shoe and your engine under a hat? I hope you were being facetious 😉

80 years later and to so many of us we still are impacted by WWII. Interestingly, 1941 was 80 years from the beginning of the Civil War. I wonder if people in 1941 felt the same about the Civil War as we do about WWII today?

Another anachronism is "hub cap". Even the plain dog dish hub caps from the 1940s onward were not really hub caps. Cars like Model T Fords, with the brass (or later nickle) caps that screwed onto the hubs had hub caps. You can still find the actual hub cap tapped into the hub to prevent the bearing gease from spraying everywhere under the dog dish hub cap.

Aim high in steering. Leave yourself an out. I think there was one about following distance, but I can't remember for sure. I think there were six points altogether?

That elbow was not one of GM's better engineering decisions. I had to do that job on my 07 LaCrosse too. Another bad GM engineering decision on these cars were the o-ring seals in the tranny. Sub par o- ring material caused leakage which led to slippage which led to rebuild.

Did your car spend any time in Cuba or South America before you obtained it?

I do not know this first hand, but in another thread about an erratic temperature gauge, another user named DonMicheletti posted on 10/19/21: "The last rocker arm stanchion "bolt" on the distributor side of the engine is actually a stud. The stud hole is tapped through to the water jacket directly above the temp sensor bulb. If you remove the stud you have access to the water side of the bulb and you can manipulate the bulb through the hole to loosen it. It still can be a challenge. Be sure to use a sealant when replacing the stud or you will get water in the oil." Like I said, I don't know firsthand if this is true, but if it is, it can be a fantastic way to coax out that bulb. I for one, and I am sure I'm not alone, have twisted that bulb off in attempts to remove it.

My MoTor's manual from 1935 shows that Cadillac had a mechanical system still, not hydraulic. I'm not suggesting that the complicated brake system in a Cadillac is anything like the simple system in my Model A Fords. But worn out parts can lead to a spongy feel in the pedal. My '29 roadster's brakes were in bad shape when I got it. Every friction point (clevis pins, clevises, shafts, bushings) were worn out to the point where there was lots of play at every joint. Stepping on the brake pedal would result in lots of lost motion while the slack was taken up before the brake shoes would move. And then, as more pressure was applied, more movement in the worn joints produced a spongy feel in the pedal. Check every spot where something moves in the system for wear.

Maybe a replacement engine? They are not crazy expensive. There's a few on ebay now for around $2,000 Here's one. https://www.ebay.com/itm/275035218001?hash=item4009606051:g:O9oAAOSwid9hj-md

I think I've expressed this unpopular opinion in another thread like this. I don't care if kids today are interested in the hobby or not. Kids today either have the itch for old cars or they don't, period. Nothing we do will convert those that would rather be on their phone every waking moment and would prefer a self driving car so they can do just that. Those that have the itch don't need encouragement; they'll find the hobby on their own.

Any auto parts store I've tried has the group 0 6 volt in stock. The key to long life of any battery where you don't drive the car every day is a trickle charger. I use the Battery Tender brand, and the batteries in my Model As are more than 10 years old with no sign of dying. That being said, batteries today don't give you much warning when they're about to die. Years ago, they'd go slowly. Now, one day they're good as new, the next day they're dead.

Man, I love American Sedans from this era. Plenty of knee and legroom, easy to get into and out of, and a good view of the road. The shape and height is kinda reminiscent of today's crossover SUVs! What's old is new again.

I have. I agree that it's not as strong as it used to be. When it was still Wesley's, it used to melt the top layer of the whitewall away so that not only the dirt, but the oxidized outer layer came off revealing a brand new surface on the whitewall. But I used to think, is this a good thing?. Was this product still eating into the rubber after I rinsed it off? How many times can I use it before I seriously weaken the sidewall? And if you breathed in any of the droplets of the spray, your eyes would water and you'd cough up a lung. Now, it doesn't seem to melt the surface of the rubber any longer, and it does take a little scrubbing with a nylon brush, but the whitewalls do come out clean and white. And I don't have that same adverse reaction any longer if I breath in the mist.

I dunno, it still works pretty good.

Excellent! I'm surprised Ford didn't have a vent already built into the filler pipe. Could it be that your filler pipe is a repro that lacks the vent that an original would have? I recently obtained a '57 T-Bird, and had the same issue. I got soaked the first time I went to fill it up. There is a small diameter vent pipe soldered to the outside of the filler pipe and it ducks into the pipe about four inches from the neck- above where the tip of the gas pump nozzle would sit when filling up. The other end attaches with a rubber hose to a fitting on the fuel level sender to allow the tank to vent. The vent pipe had filled up with crud so that the tank could not vent when being filled. I replaced the whole filler neck with a repro and problem solved.

Interesting stuff. It's a valve-in-head design, only it's a side valve design rather than OHV.

I don't know anything about '48 Lincolns, but I have a 6V system in my two Model As and '51 Buick. None of them have a resistor in the primary wiring, and they don't fry the coil out. I always believed that resistors weren't added until the switch to 12V systems because 12Vs produce too big an arc back at the points and would burn the points out too quickly, not because the coil couldn't take 12V.