Rusty_OToole

They are probably an accessory that can be used on any car. Is there any trade mark or numbers on the back ?

It is possible to buy a car from Canada but I'm sure you will find one just as good or better, for a lower price, in the US. Good old cars are awfully scarce in the frozen north even more than in the rust belt states. When I see ads for good rust free cars at a good price they always seem to be in the southern or western US. Florida seems to be an excellent place to find pristine low mileage Rolls Royce and Bentley cars from the 80s at low prices. Florida and Texas. But there are lots of Buicks there too. I think every old retiree moved to Florida and bought a Buick or Chrysler in the sixties. Now they are dying at the age of 100 and leaving these cars with low mileage, most of it on sidewalks and astride 2 lanes.

It was a photo finish. Both cars debuted the same year, 1961 or 62 ( too lazy to look it up). I think Corvair may have beat Olds to market by a couple of weeks.

Porta walls did not have the embossed metal part. They only had a moulded in rubber lip that fit between the tire and rim. Those whitewalls with the built in beauty ring jarred loose a faint memory. I may have seen them on a picture of a 52 Buick. The picture was a Buick publicity shot taken when the car was new. I am not at all positive about this, as it is a faint memory of a picture seen 30 or 40 years ago. But that is my best guess. If I am right they are a beauty ring/whitewall combination, to be used on cars with the small hubcaps. They press into the wheel and the ribs grip on the wheel.

Could be the starter was not rebuilt right. A local mechanic had a 55 Dodge Royal V8 that always started slow even after installing a rebuilt starter. Several years later, after trying everything including a new battery every year, he took apart the "rebuilt" starter and found it had 12 volt field coils. New 6 volt field coils and it started like a new car.

There may be a drain plug on them someplace.

Before you go nuts with the loctite and frozen Nitrogen, can you get behind it with compressed air? Usually a few puffs from the air hose will dislodge anything. A continuous blast is not recommended because it gives too much pressure and could break something. Look for the passage where the gas comes out of the pump and see if you can get some pressure in there.

Usually a shot of oil fixes them. They are supposed to be checked and topped up regularly. If you can't find knee action fluid, which was last available from Western Tire during the Johnson administration, hydraulic jack oil makes a good substitute. Motorcycle shock oil should work too, and comes in different grades for fine tuning. If you fill up your shocks and the oil all leaks out in a week it is time for rebuilt shocks. You might need to fill them up, drive around for a week or 2, then top them up again to get all the air bubbles out. Many owners of old cars with lever action shocks, report that filling them up transforms the ride and removes all desire to replace them.

It weighs 320 pounds. Olds F-85 used the same engine with different heads. The Olds was the first turbocharged car on the market, sharing this honor with Corvair.

I had a funny one on a 1967 Chev pickup. It would give a low oil pressure warning when idling hot but only when turning left. In other words when making a sharp left turn with the engine running slowly the oil light came on, but at no other time. Turned out to be a worn wire to the pressure sender. It grounded out but only when the engine rolled into a particular position.

American cars of that age have no vase of expansion. The expansion is in the top of the radiator. When filling a cold radiator you must leave 50cm to 75cm empty at the top. Over filling will cause water to come out of the overflow pipe when the engine is hot. Sometimes the engine gets hotter right after being stopped. If the engine will idle but stalls as soon as you start to drive, it could be a vacuum leak or carburetor problem. Check the nuts that hold the carburetor to the manifold, and the manifold to the engine, they may be loose. If I had the car in my garage, I would start from the beginning. Find the original factory repair manual, or factory specifications, and check the valve clearance, the ignition ( points condition, points gap, condenser replace, spark timing, spark plug condition, clean and regap or replace spark plugs), carburetor ( inspect and adjust) if carburetor is faulty it may be necessary to rebuild it. Check the compression to verify the condition of valves and piston rings. With all this done, the engine should run as well as it can. If it is running satisfactorily with good oil pressure, drive the car for a few hundred kilometers and it should be as good as new.

It sounds like the engine stops as soon as it gets hot, is that the problem? Could be a bad condenser in the distributor, or a bad coil. They can work correctly when cold but fail when hot.

To work on the distributor of a Ford, Mercury or Lincoln from that era you are supposed to take the whole distributor off and fix it on the bench. Take the caps off first and leave them hanging by the plug wires.

There was a Topper sequel called Topper Returns with Roland Young and Billie Burke as Mr and Mrs Topper but no Cary Grant. In it, Topper's car is a 1936 Mercedes 540K roadster chauffeured by Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, best known for his work in Jack Benny's movies, radio and TV shows.

How about a Smart car? Or to stick with a vintage theme, Renault Dauphine or Fiat 500? Or a King Midget for the American car fans.

I'm sure they were available as an accessory in the 20s.

Normally the steering box and column are all one. You have to remove the steering wheel and whatever clamps and wiring hold it in place inside, take the steering arm off the bottom, remove the bolts that hold the box to the frame, and withdraw the whole assembly out the bottom of the car. Don't forget to disconnect the horn wire, there is usually a connector at the bottom of the steering box buried in ancient grease.

Those switches are known for failing. Disconnect the switch, if the lights go off the switch is faulty.

The difference in pressure could overpower the carb float. A simple solution would be to buy a pressure regulator and set it to 1 or 2 pounds. Mount it next to the carb. A vacuum tank has 2 chambers. Vacuum from the intake manifold provides suction on the top section. This draws fuel up from the tank. When the top section is full a float closes a valve. When the bottom section is empty it opens a valve allowing the top section to drain into the bottom section. Then the valves reset and the top section fills up again. Gas feeds into the carb from the bottom section by gravity so pressure is low. A pump probably puts out 5 or 6 PSI which is way too much for this type carb.

Ah the magic of the movies! The Wombat is RHD because the movie is set in England. The interior shots were no doubt done using a partial car made by the prop department. They could not have shot the scenes thru the tiny windows of the actual car. Most movie car interiors are filmed using a car cut in half. All studios used to have prop cars and taxis on hand that were already cut in half but in this case they must have made up a special one because the Wombat is so different from a normal car. The moving scenery seen thru the windshield is another movie projected on a screen in front of the "car", I believe this was called a "process shot". Notice the giant speedometer stretching across the instrument panel, necessary to the movie scenes but quite different from the Phantom Corsair. This alone suggests they made up a special prop car or half car for interior shots. Possibly two, a front half and a back half as I see they show the inside from both angles front and rear. By the way there is a way to turn a LHD car into RHD for movie purposes. To shoot an "English" scene in the USA, use LHD cars and drive on the left, then turn the negative over and everything is reversed. To make the scene look right you need to make up special road signs, shop signs etc with the lettering backwards so they will come out the right way round. The last couple of seasons of "The Avengers" were actually shot in Canada not far from my home. That's how I know, they shot all the "English" scenes this way.

Stutz painted their race cars white and gave their drivers and crews white coveralls. This was in the teens and early 20s.

I think white was seldom used before the fifties but it was used. I recall a story by the head of styling for Pierce Arrow. One of the top executives of Pierce ordered a custom built phaeton painted white with white leather upholstery and accessories and fittings that were "awful". The styling guy, using all his diplomacy and charm, talked him into a more conservative ensemble that complemented his personality and was in better taste. This was some time in the teens or possibly early twenties. So you could get a white car back then but it would be considered gaudy and in questionable taste. It might surprise some people to know that whitewall tires were likewise gaudy and in questionable taste, and were never seen on formal limousines or sedans. I think it is correct to say white first became popular in the fifties and was most often seen in 2 tone or 3 tone combinations. The 3 tones always seemed to be white/black or white/charcoal gray plus a pastel accent color. The 3 tones were offered in 1955 and 56 on certain medium price cars.

Just to make the story a little more complicated Royal Enfields were sold in the US as Indians in the fifties and sixties. When the Indian company folded the name was bought by an English company called Brockhouse. So, if you bought an Indian Enfield and slapped an Indian label on the tank, and called it an Indian Enfield you would be doing what the Indian company did in the fifties. I think the 500 single was called the Indian Brave. I know the Enfield 750 twin was sold as the Indian Chief.

For the original question my vote goes to the Phantom Corsair aka the Flying Wombat. See the Flying Wombat in action

A few years ago a magazine writer was doing an article on the Scarab including a test ride with the owner. While they were buying gas a Toyota salesman asked what it was. For a laugh the writer said it was the newest mini van from South Korea, they were bringing them in next year to sell for $6000. The Toyota salesman turned white and nearly passed out LOL.