hchris

As others have said and the mention of rear cylinders running hotter, it is highly likely that there is a buildup of sediment in the cooling jacket at the back of the block, most of the Mopar 8 cylinder engines suffer the same problem. Unfortunately changing thermostats etc. wont cure the fault, you will have to bite the bullet and work on flushing or probing this area to remove the scale and crud. Not sure of the freeze plug locations for the DC8, but any access into this area is the place to start; as regards flushing are there any heater hose outlets at the back of the head or block, this would be a good place to begin with. When you get it running again put a filter (even one of her nylon stockings) in the upper radiator hose to catch the remaing rubbish that will circle around for some time after the flushout.

Me thinks you should now leave the ignition alone and concentrate on the carb. Your description of carboned plugs, strong fumes, inability to idle etc. all sound like carb symptoms, despite it being rebuilt. I would start with the likely culprits such as the choke mechanism, idle mixture screw settings, float level setting just to name a few.

No disrespect but this is not a job for a novice, unless you have experience with reamers etc. you should give the job to a professional. But as you have asked, then the process for removal is to apply some serious heat to the guide area, chill the guide and then press out the old guide; replacement is to again apply heat whislt chilling the guide and then quickly inserting it, let everything cool then ream the guide to size; accuracy during guide insertion and reaming is critical.

What he said, or remove the dis.cap, hand rotate the engine to a points closed position, turn on ignition and manipulate the points open/close with a thin probe/screwdiver, making sure not to earth points anywhere; you should see a healthy spark at the points as you open them. Quite often when people replace points they misfit the insulating washer/s on the points and they remain permantly grounded.

Once had a similar problem and it triggered the resetable breaker in the light switch. In the end we found a wire chafing in an add on loom for trailer lights; perhaps start with an integrity check of the turn indicator wiring?

Whist I cant confirm the percentages, there is no doubt that the Japanese numbers increased significantly in a very short time frame; no different to anywhere else for that matter. The sad fact for most of our auto industry manufacturing is that the Japanese (and now Asia in general) simply do it better, not helped by our the scale of economy of course.

I 2nd,3rd & 4th what Bob said; also from your original photo it seems there has`nt been a lot of lubrication up there in a while so you could assume the wear all round will be significant.

What they all said, that hole which runs horizontally midway down the body of the kingpin has a tapered pin which you need to knockout first ( same as you find on a bicycle pedal arm), it secures the vertical kingpin. Once this is removed you should, with drift and hammer, be able to drive the pin down, once out the axle stub is removed and you can get to the upper and lower king pin bushes for replacement. Have you established that there is enough wear to warrant this excercise? to check, raise the wheel off the ground and grasp it top and bottom, try to rock it in a vertical movement and if you have more than 1/16" freeplay then its time to replace the bushes, just make sure however that the play isnt in the wheel bearing before you start stripping things; if you have an assistant rock the wheel while you observe the kingpin you should be able to work it out.

Originally Posted by bofusmosby I would suspect the rear rope seal leaking only under pressure. If the car has been sitting a long time, I would think of this being your problem, rather than the rings. Like it was already said, your car would be blowing a ton of smike. Well I`m thinking that if its leaking externally at that rate on a 250 mile run there should be oil everywhere under the car, and if it stands for a while I would expect to see a big puddle underneath. So as there no mention of visible leaks where else could it go ??<!-- google_ad_section_end -->

Have you looked at the spark plugs ? I imagine that if the engine is actually consuming that amount of oil internally, then the plugs will be well carboned up.

Yes your problem is probably lack of freeplay between the master cylinder pushrod and brake pedal, there is an adjustment but you really should get onto a hand book which illustrates how the adjustment goes. I suggest you log on at the Plymouth owners website, it covers lots of this stuff.

The tube is located in the block, not the head. You gain access to by removing the water pump and inserting your hook into the tube cavity in the front of the block. The problem now is how to withdraw the tube, which is obviously the same length as the block, out of the front of the engine with the radiator etc. in the way. Not being familiar with your particular vehicle, you might get away with it by removing the radiator and part of the grill to give you the necessary clearance, otherwise it`s out with the engine. Having said all of that I would first establish that the radiator is not at fault and the block is clear, you mention thermostat and hoses but what condition is the radiator in and have you given the block a thorough flush out ?

Sorry folks perhaps I have to clarify my original statement. What I meant was, if the vehicle is fitted with different bore cylinders on the front wheels as opposed to those fitted to the rear wheels, then the larger bore cylinders will normally be fitted to the front wheels for the reasons originally explained. In reading the original post, (the ones I took off are two large and two small cylinders), that was I thought the question and perhaps it still is; with regard to individual cylinders which are step bored then fitment is as per the illustration. FWIW my Lockheed parts catalogue shows for a 1942 Dodge - front wheel cylinders stepped bore 1 1/4" and 1 3/8" rear wheel cylinders stepped bore 1' and 1 1/8" So back to Don and the original question, are you asking about cylinders removed from the front and the back wheels or are you asking about cylinders removed from one set of wheels only??

First up larger cylinders will always go to the front, as this is where the weight is transferred to during braking, weight tends to come off the back wheels hence less braking action required to avoid lockup. Having said that I am a bit confused with your intentions, are you asking about fitting cylinders which are the wrong size to the originals? if so please dont go there, you must absolutely only refit the same size cylinders that came off.

A couple of other things to consider, (I am assuming you have the original Carter BB carb installed) float level required is 5/64" if this is set low then the carb will starve for fuel at higher speeds. There is also a high speed enriching device known as stepup piston and rod, the way this mechansism works is a vacuum operated piston holds down a metering rod in a high speed jet at lower rpms, as the throttle opens vacuum falls off and a spring under the piston lifts the retainer plate and rod out of the jet to deliver a greater (enriched) fuel flow, obviously if its not working correctly then the higher rpm range suffers. If you lift the top off the carb you will see a screw holding a retainer plate at the edge of the float bowl, it holds down the spring loaded vacuum piston; at the other end the retainer plate has a thin wire metering rod which locates inside the high speed metering jet at the bottom of the float bowl. With finger pressure on top of the retainer plate compress the spring loaded plunger, then release the spring tension and note that the the whole mechanism rises smoothly, any hesitation here means that during normal operation you will not get the correct mixture at high speed; it is very easy to kink the metering rod during reassembly.

From the getgo you need fuel and spark, beyond that there could be a host of reasons for not starting. So to begin with the fundamentals; as you have tried unsuccesfully with starter fluid, how to check the spark ? easyist way is to remove the high tension lead from the top of the distributor cap and position the metal tip within say 1/4 inch of the block or some good metalic earth point, now wind the starter and see that you have a nice blue spark from the tip of the high tension lead. If you dont have a spark, lift the cap off the distibutor, manually turn the engine to a position where the points are closed, turn ignition on and with a small tip screwdriver or similar open and close the points, you should see a small spark occur at the points, be careful not to earth the screwdriver against any part of the distributor, and you may need to be in shade or darken the area as the spark may not be highly visible in bright light; no spark here means you have to start back tracking wiring/connections, condensor etc. all the way to switch and starter button. If all the above is good then start with the fuel system and beyond that compression checks, timing and so on and if you need further assistance just ask.

Sounds like the m/cylinder pushrod is not set right. If you dont get this adjustment correct the primary cup inside the cylinder doesnt return far enough, after brake release, to uncover the m/cylinder compensating port, this then wont allow return fluid to bleed back into the the m/cylinder and causes a pressure bulid up which activates the brake switch. You may well find also that the brakes are dragging, dependent on the trapped fluid pressure; if you havent got a book then just go to the m/cylinder and back off the length of the pushrod a bit- give a few threads slack - and see what happens.

From memory there are no water galleries in the front of the block, most likely source of the leak is the water pump; use an inspection mirror around the bottom of the pump .

I think we all agree that getting the shoes adjusted right is of major importance, its easy to assume that the pedal wont come up because of improper bleeding but without the shoes set up right in the first place you are just chasing your tail. As to bench bleeding the master, I and others on the forum have encountered situations where faulty assembly or kit parts have affected things like the secondary or compensating ports being partially blocked, this leads to all sorts of weird pedal feel/softness issues; I have always found it better to uncover these problems before the master is installed. In summary if the shoes are correctly set up and the master is bled, then any futher problems are in the lines or wheel cylinders.

A number of things can contribute to your problems, first did you bleed the master on the bench before installing, second, have you set the shoes up concentrically with an appropriate tool; this is absolutley vital as you will never get a good pedal until the shoes are adjusted correctly and then there is the matter of getting the master cylinder push rod adjustment correct. Not wanting to sound negative here, but as previously mentioned, you will see a lot of grief from previous contributors who have gone about the job adhoc, you really do need the proper references from the workshop manual and work through the tasks in sequential order, otherwise you will be chasing your tail forever.

A little more info might helps us to help you, but first, is the electrical system original with positive earth connections? because if you are charging with negative earth connections you wont be going anywhere. As to the non starting, are we talking about a car thats in regular use, how long since its been started, how old and what quantity of fuel do you have, has it flooded, does it have a spark, all these things will help forum contributors to get you started; as keiser says absolutely make sure that you have clean battery and starter cable connections, this will ensure cranking power is at its maximum.

A few observations from a CB owner hard to comment on your values but down here it would seem to be reasonble value at say $8 to $10k CA/CBs are often regarded as orphans given the focus for 1934 was the Airflow, for that reason you wont find many around headlight shells come up on ebay from time to time, you have to be quick rodders love them seats appear to have been reupholstered but rest of interior seems original well engineered solid cars sharing many similar components with other Chry/Plym/Dodge etc. of the era so most parts are readily available, front suspension is coil spring for this year only so bits are unique but still available last of the exposed water jacket engines, they have a weakness in that blocks crack on the left side, apparently castings were a bit weak in this area seems like a nice unmolestered vehicle, I would be in it in a flash curious as to the stencilled numbers on the engine bulkhead??

Yes right on the money Paul and some have timing marks on the flywheel, unfortunately it only indicates for one cylinder, good for setting the timing but doesnt help finding TDC for the other cylinders ..

First up we know the firing order goes 1 3 4 2, this then is the easiest sequence to adjust the valves in. In order to get each piston at TDC to carry out the valve adjustment, it is probably easiest to refer to the distributor rotor position as a guide, rather than timing marks. If you understand that the distributor rotor will be pointing to the appropriate spark plug lead, as each cylinder fires in sequence, then its a "close enough" method of locating each piston at TDC. So at the distributor cap, first determine which plug leads connect to 1 3 4 and 2 spark plugs, now remove the spark plugs so as to easily turn the engine over with crank handle, or you should be able to turn by hand using the fan and belt; you now need to establish that the engine has to be turned clockwise, as viewed from the front, to carry out the next steps. To begin, hand turn the engine to a position where the distributor rotor points to the #1 plug lead on the distributor cap and the contact points are open, obviously with the cap fitted you cant see this, so beforehand put an external mark (pencil, chalk, whatever) on the body of the distributor adjacent #1 plug lead position and then mark the other 3 as well. Now with the engine positioned at #1 TDC, as determined by the rotor, you can adjust the valves to specs; next turn the engine in clockwise direction until #3 is in position, adjust valves and progressively move on to #4 and #2. Job done :)

Keep it simple - disconnect the hot lead