Rusty_OToole

Happens I bought a new OCPD since this was posted. The new book shows quite an advance in values. #6 $1080 #5 $3240 #4 $5400 #3 $12150 #2 $18900 #1 $27000. Your car would be on the high side of #5.

I hate to contradict NTX but a 1954 Plymouth is the last year that came as a six cylinder ONLY. A V8 will NOT fit without major butchery. Steering interference is the biggest problem. The easiest engine to fit would be a 230 cu in Dodge flathead six. A DeSoto/Chrysler six will fit but it is longer and requires some mods to engine mounts and moving the rad forward. The 230 is a very satisfactory engine with ample power for normal use. It is basically the same block as your stock 217 with a longer stroke crankshaft. In fact you could turn your 217 into a 230 if you had the long stroke crankshaft and matching connecting rods. Note, if it is a Canadian made Plymouth the big Chrysler six will bolt in. Only Canadian made Plymouths are built to take the larger engine.

If you remove the seats you may find an unfaded swatch tucked underneath.

You could try spraying them with electronic contact cleaner and working them back and forth. If that does not free them up they may need replacing.

T146 is the model number of an engine from a 1948 or 49 Dodge B-1-D truck. 230 cu in and 102 HP. It is practically identical to the original engine except for a slightly longer stroke than the original 217, giving it a little more "oomph", 102HP vs 97. There are a few detail differences like different part number carburetor and distributor and possibly a slightly different arrangement of heater hose outlets. But basically, they built only one motor and altered it slightly for different applications. Parts are available. They made millions of those motors. A lot of things can be ordered from NAPA or local parts stores. Or from online vintage car parts suppliers. A company called Vintage Power Wagons has tons of parts.

Jay Leno commutes to work in a Model T roadster. See him talk about it here.

The point was how little real progress has been made since 1958. Today's cars are better in many ways but due to slow incremental progress more than major innovations. Most of the inventions were already there. I also maintain that there was tremendous progress between 1947 and 1957, more than any other decade since.

If you can't cruise at 65 something is wrong. I don't know what but when it was new your car was easily capable of keeping up with traffic on the new interstates and had a top speed around 100 MPH.

Thanks TG57. I checked out the brochure. Several accessories are described as "new" but the FM radio is not. I wonder if it was available before 1958? I went back and looked at the 57 brochure and they showed the radio but the print was too small to see.

There are some good Porsche supply places on the internet. I know I should't advertise them here but Stoddard's in Ohio and Autohaus in Arizona have been good to me. Back in the 70s I saw a flea market vendor with some 1931 Chevrolet tail light lenses for sale for $100 apiece. I said it seemed an awful lot of money and he agreed. But, he said he hunted 10 years for a NOS set for his car before he found them, and then he found half a dozen sets in an old Chev dealership. So maybe they were rarer and more valuable than we thought.

"Without BUICK there probably would not be much McLaughlin history - it would have been a fleeting company - it took the grat name of BUICK to even make the McLaughlin name recognizable." Hardly. McLaughlin was the biggest manufacturer of horse drawn vehicles in the world, outside the US and had been in business very successfully for 40 years before they built their first car. Did you ever think to ask how important GM of Canada's profits were to supporting General Motors during the depression? Or what about the role GM of Canada played in Britain's fight against the Nazis in WW2? Remember Canada declared war on Germany in September 1939, one week after England, and put their economy on a war footing at once. We sent thousands of trucks, airplanes, weapons etc to Britain before America entered the war more than 2 long years later. The world does not end at the American border and other people have things to be proud of too.

For all you doubters of FM car radios in 1958 have a look at this page of Lincoln sales literature. 1958 LINCOLN CAPRI Information Specifications Resources Pictures Notice the "Travel Tuner" FM receiveer in the accessories list.

Here is the story in a nut shell. McLaughlin started making horse drawn carriages and sleighs in Canada in 1867. They became the largest maker of horse drawn vehicles in the British Empire. Early in the twentieth century they decided to look into making cars. McLaughlin spoke to his old friend William Durant who he knew from the days when Durant worked at the Flint Carriage Works. Durant advised him that it would take at least 2 years to develop a satisfactory chassis but if he liked, he could buy Buick chassis and have a reliable, proven car right away. This made sense to McLaughlin as in those days, many carriage makers bought their running gear and made only the body. McLaughlin made their own patent running gear for their own use, and also sold it to others. So they had no problem buying Buick chassis and installing their own make of bodies, and selling the result as a McLaughlin-Buick. In 1918 GM bought McLaughlin but it continued to operate as a separate entity known as General Motors of Canada. Now that Studebaker has gone out of business this makes General Motors of Canada the oldest vehicle maker in the world. 20 years older than Mercedes, and nearly 40 years older than Johnny come lately Rolls Royce. Did they make any custom body cars? I know they built a touring car especially for the Prince of Wales' visit to Canada in 1923, and that as King Edward he bought a couple of limousines in 1936. There may have been others but they must be few and far between.

You could start with the 2 McLaughlin - Buick limousines custom built in Oshawa for the King of England in 1936. Perhaps he got the idea from the touring car they furnished for his 1923 visit. I believe he was quite impressed with McLaughlin quality as was Sloan and a lot of other people at the time. When they made horse drawn carriages (1867-1912) McLaughlin's motto was "One grade only, and that the best". Starting in 1908 they built their own bodies on Buick chassis which they assembled. McLaughlin designed and built their own bodies into the mid to late 20s, as the hand made wood framed body gave way to the mass produced stampings they became practically the same as Detroit products.

By the way Jim AM FM car radios were available in 1958 (first year) and so was cruise control. Not to mention disc brakes and radial tires. I agree that a 1958 design with the best modern materials and parts would be a very satisfactory, and modern car. The same cannot be said of a typical 1948 car. I think there was more genuine progress in that 10 year period than any other decade since.

There was a guy named Gottlieb who did a classic car column in Motor Trend at that time. Someone asked him what 1957 cars would be the classics of the future. His answer? None of them. He reasoned thus. The classics of the twenties and thirties were the most expensive, hand made, custom designed cars of their time. There were no such cars being made in 1957. Everything was mass produced, mass market, run of the mill junk. Plus the cars of the past were made of good materials like steel, brass, and leather and could be taken apart and rebuilt repaired or replaced as necessary. The 1957 cars had no such advantage. Everything was stamped out and swaged together. Upholstery made of vinyl molded on giant heat presses. In a few years they would be rusted out and falling apart and it would be impossible to restore them once the dealers' supply of parts ran out. Well here we are 54 years later and a few 1957s are still running. Let's see what cheap mass produced junk is considered worth saving. I would start the list with the 1957 Thunderbird, Chrysler 300C and Imperial, Plymouth Fury (Christine), Chev BelAir hardtop and Corvette with fuel injection 283, Cadillac Eldorado convertible, Lincoln Continental, supercharged Studebaker Golden Hawk and Rambler Rebel 327 hardtop to name a few at the top of the market. In the import line they had the Mercedes 300 Gullwing, Jaguar XKS, Rolls Royce Silver Cloud and Bentley Continental, Austin Healey, Porsche 356, Citroen DS, and the classic Ferarri V12 and Maserati V8 sports models. O well it is hard to say what will stand the test of time.

I knew an old time transmission rebuilder who always installed a new inline hydraulic filter on the return line where it went back into the tranny. He started doing this after a rash of failures in the sixties, caused by metal filings and junk in the cooler. After he put on the extra filter he had no more trouble. This was in addition to the OEM filter inside the transmission.

For a heavy car like a Chrysler a 360 might be best. There are thousands around in pickups and vans if you can' t find one out of a car. I have a 1992 ambulance in my yard that starts and runs like a champ even with 200.000 miles on it. It came with the heavy duty engine with 4 barrel and automatic overdrive transmission. Such a combo would work great in your Chrysler. The newer Magnums are even better but then you get into more electronic controls, fuel injection etc.

I note you are talking about an early 30s Chrysler. What happened to the original motor or dare I ask?

I know Vincent Massey the Governor General of Canada had a loaded 54 Packard Patrician. I saw this car last summer unfortunately it was in a badly deteriorated condition. The story about the club sedan with wire wheels, continental and maple trim sounds like a load of bull to me.

My experience of Chevrolet and GM is that they are not very well built. Some people have no trouble with them while others have nothing but trouble. Like any car you will likely have better luck if you baby it and maintain it by the book. If you are buying new you can do this, and not worry. Plus it will be under warranty.

I know Jensen front suspension uses parts from Austin's London cab model. Perhaps the wheels are also Austin, from the Austin Healey or a light truck?

It breaks my heart to say this but a Chev 350 would probably fit easier. I helped a friend put a 340 in a 1937 Plymouth coupe years ago. The starter and exhaust were a headache because they hit the steering or frame. We had a Chev engine lying around and test fitted it, it fit much easier and nothing hit anything. If the starter hits the frame or steering you can use a Japanese starter that is much smaller than the old Chrysler model we had. It was first used in the early 90s and it is probably the most common one to find these days.

A brief history of Chrysler's A engine. Plymouth got a brand new engine in 1955 not related to any other engine. It debuted at 277 cu in but by 1957 was enlarged to 318. This was the base V8 for Dodge and Plymouth for years, it had distinctive wide heads with scalloped lower edge on the valve covers and staggered valves like a Chev big block. This was called the A engine. In 1964 they needed a narrower engine for the compact Dart and Valiant so they made the 273. Basically a 318 with 1/8 smaller bore and different heads. They even used the same crank, and extra heavy piston pins to make up the weight of the smaller pistons so they did not have to rebalance the crankshaft. There were other unique features to the 273 such as solid lifters, and adjustable rocker arms. This was the basis of the new design of 318 made from 1965 on. It was called the LA engine. Chrysler's strongest engines were the B big block, 413 426 440 etc. Unfortunately this block would not fit in the small Dart, Valiant, or Barracuda body. So in 1968 they introduced the 340. This was a souped up 318. Bored out cylinders, new big valve heads, cam, Thermoquad carb etc it was the hottest small block of the time. The 340 Swinger was nearly as fast as a 440 Road Runner at the drags, in fact if the Road Runner driver was not on his toes the 340 could take the lead. A few years later they needed a "smog" motor. Something with lots of torque, cheap to build, and reasonably economical for their full size sedans. So they took the 340, gave it a smaller bore and longer stroke, put in smaller exhaust valves, detuned the compression and cam and made it into a 360. The 360 is the only one of the family to be externally balanced and therefore requires a special flywheel or torque converter. Chrysler dealers sell a balance weight that can be welded on to a torque converter. All these engines are related and some parts will interchange while others are unique to a particular engine. Generally speaking you can put any LA engine in where any A or LA engine used to be. They did relocate the motor mounts at some point but you can buy special mounts aftermarket to put the newer engine in the older chassis. Or just grind off the mount and weld it on an inch farther forward. It all depends what you want to do. A 273 block can be rebored and rebuilt but it can't be bored 1/8 to turn it into a 318. But there are millions of good 318 blocks out there. Easiest and cheapest to find would probably be a 318 out of an 80s Fifth Avenue sedan. These were very reliable long lived engines and seldom got abused in a Fifth Avenue. You could probably pull one at random out of a junkyard and it would run fine. If you were pernickety you could buy a cheap overhaul kit and put in new rings, bearings, timing chain, and have the heads redone and get another 100,000 miles. Many of these came with automatic overdrive trannies. An A or LA engine will only fit an A or LA transmission. Also in the early 60s they changed the flywheel/engine/transmission interface so it is best stick with "all early" or "all late" configuration. The changeover year is around 1962 so this is a problem that seldom crops up anymore. For a heavy car the 360 is a strong motor. A cam, intake and headers will really wake one up. They were very detuned from the factory, one of the old time "smog" motors. But the basic design had a lot of unused potential. The newer "Magnum" motors from 1992 up were very much redesigned, more efficient, more powerful, more economical. Came with roller cams and fuel injection. But only installed in trucks and vans. Since you do not state what kind of car you have, what you want to do with it or anything else that is about all I can tell you offhand. There are Mopar websites that go into a lot more detail. I recommend Allpar or Mopar Action magazine web sites.

Do you have a Chev engine made in Canada by McKinnon Industries? Here is how you can tell. The Small Block V-8s are all stamped with an engine identification code. This can be found on the right-hand side of the cylinder head. This ID code is an eight-character stamping. The first letter identifies the plant where the engine was manufactured. This is followed by four numbers, the first two denoting the month of manufacture and the next two the year. The last three letters are the engine suffix code. If the first letter is V (F for six-cylinder engines), the engine was manufactured in Flint, Michigan. If it is M, the place of manufacture is the Gulf of Mexico. S stands for Saginaw Services in Michigan. T is for the city of Tonawanda in New York. Finally, if your engine head ID starts with K, you are the lucky owner of a Chevy Small Block made by McKinnon Industries Canada in St. Catherines, Ontario. McKinnon Industries was started by a Scotchman in 1878. It was bought up by General Motors in 1929. They started by making Delco electrical equipment for cars and trucks, shock absorbers and steering gears, and other small parts. By WW2 they had expanded to make truck axles, transmissions and similar parts. In 1954 they built a new plant to make Chevrolet engines for Canadian Chev and Pontiac cars, and assemble Oldsmobile engines from imported parts.