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1929 lafrance fire turck w/buick engine


Guest lh3359

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our volunteer fire department has its first fire truck but we have a problem.the intake and exhaust manifold have several crack in them,the carb is wore out and has crack in it and our fuel pump leaks bad.i dont think this is orginal engine because it has a buick in it. the tag on the engine says BUICK model #29m engine #29mr16704 date 9/25/40. my questions are did this engine come with a updraft carb and manifold or is this something they used from the orginal engine? we need to find parts but we dont know were to start looking any help would greatly be appreciated.

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Guest noncompos

Something here doesn't compute...

The updraft carb manifold doesn't seem to go with a Buick engine with a date of 9-25-40...I'm not a Buick person, and have no reliable information re the "29" numbers.

Is this Ward LaFrance or American La France?? D'you have a body tag giving a model #??

I'd say you've maybe confused Buick with Buda, except there's no Buda #29 engine and it seems I recently ran across a mention somewhere of one of these units with a Buick engine, which I remembered as it was unusual. Is this a ladder truck, pumper or what??

Am LaF used a mixture of stock and their own engines; Ward LaF used all stock engines , but either could've used a Buick as well.

Ag engines suffer severe manifold wear, and there're outfits on the Ag forums that rebuild/repair manifolds, if yours turns out to be some kind of very rare type. George Miller Machine comes to mind; he posts as GeorgeMD on ytmag and smokstak forums.

As Bleach said, put that engine info on the Buick forum here for help. Good luck.

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it has a up carb on it, i am guessing that came off the orginal engine and just happen to work on the buick engine,it also looks like the engine bolted right in could not see any modification to the body, we had some old mechanic from town that did alot of things like that unfortunately they have all past on. i will post the body tags later today.

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Guest noncompos

Some industrial engine builders continued updraft manifolds after autos had gone to downdraft; I've never understood why but I've never researched the question.

I don't know if GM or Buick continued updrafts on any engines sold as "industrial" engines (like for some other builders fire truck) after the car engines had gone to downdraft...

Per one of my old parts catalogs Buicks in 1929 were 6s (one automatically thinks Buick=8) so it's quite possible it's an original engine, possibly rebuilt in 1940 (the only reason I could think of to account for the date, if it is a date). Fascinating!

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If you have a 1929 firetruck odds are IT IS A Buick overhead valve 6 cyl engine. The fun begins as you have to determine if you have a Buick Master engine or a Buick Standard engine.

A big hint is that the Master engine has a water tube that runs parallel to the valve cover and the Standard engine has a nipple at the front of the head that connects to the top of the radiator.

Bill

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The GMC plate explains a lot. GMC used Buick built engines from the mid/late 20's through the 30's. The smaller GMC trucks used standard car engines. The larger trucks used car engines that were re-configured for truck purposes and there were also some unique truck only engines that Buick made for GMC. At some time LaFrance quit building their own trucks and only made bodies on other make chassis. LaFrance was only building the bodies after WWWII but it may have started back as far as 29?

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Looks like it may have a governor of some style included in the manifold. That looks to have an old welded repair already. Be very careful with that assembly it may be a bit tougher to find than one would hope. Lots of folks will tell you to weld it. Be very careful about that. Treat it more like fine china than steel.

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  • 3 weeks later...

This really is Buick Master Six engine with updraft Marvel carb. The intake and exhaust manifold look correct to the engine so with little bit luck you can find replacement for both and even the Marvel carb with bronze body (guess yours with craks is zinc /pot metal/ body) can be found. I cannot tell if this is 29 or 28 Master engine though....

For carb see eg. ebay item 280792954746.

For intake manifold see eg. ebay item 110798325932

The exhaust manifolds are prone to crack when not bolted properly so they are more scarce.

The vertical part part of intake has a sleeve insert inside that is frequently rusthed through so for proper function need to be reinserted.

Josef

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Hi, the 1928 Master Six carb is exactly the type I have linked on e-bay, the body has numbers 10-105 cast on it. I bet your carb body is OK, typically the fuel bowls made of pot metal are cracked, so you likely need to find a bronze one.

I am attaching the picture of the riser, whole carb assembly, exhaust manifold and intake manifold for your reference. Be careful, this is for passenger Buick Master Six 1928, yours may be 1929 and the truck application can differ too, but unfortunately I am not very familiar with either...

You may need to post at Buick forum, there is one guy with interchange part list, so he can tell if these 28 Master parts are same for 1929.

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post-42602-143138780674_thumb.jpg

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