project 1951 Pontiac Chieftain

[barrett]

Be thankful you've any kind of key at all. My old Standard Eight, built a few years after this, didn't have any ignition key, just a switch. It's an odd feeling unlocking a car in the morning and putting the key in your pocket before you start it up. Even more odd when you realise you had forgotten to lock the door in the first place, as I frequently did

[PhilA]

 

Caressed the front wing down with 2000 then 2500 grit with soapy water from a squeegee bottle.

 

 

Cut, polish, wax.

 

 

It's surprisingly difficult to get a photograph that shows it well though. It now smells like bananas. Strange carnauba wax.

 

I'll do the rest of the baby blue and put it outside in the sun for a few pictures.

 

Phil

[hairnet]

Oh, and another Brucie Bonus

 

Phil

Wink Martindale surely

[PhilA]

I just made an eBay purchase. It should be here next week.

 

I was digging about for air cleaners and found one listed as rat rod. It's a little surface rusty, but it's a proper air bath cleaner from a Streamliner. But, better still, it has the intake muffler! Top spec option!

 

I enjoy the idea of the intake being really quiet. Right now it's just hiss from the carb with the muted rumble when you open it up, filter missing.

 

I need to get some rust converter!

 

 

Rat rod my ass. Why on Earth would a ratrodder have the super-silent option? Psh.

 

Edit: Picture of the assemblage from Internet:

 

Phil

[PhilA]

Also eyeing up the modified casing unit alternators that fit the 3-point mounting the original dynamo connected to, and look more like a dynamo too.

 

That's one part of the problem this has, the alternator is only mounted with two bolts and as such slips and shrieks like a banshee when the battery is taking a heavy charge, as it's tensioned up but sitting at a funny angle as a result of the torque on it.

 

That would also accommodate the addition of an aircon compressor, I think. It would have to be single belt, but the pulleys are big enough for tractor/truck style belt (I think the squealing belt issue is too small a belt, too) and should provide enough contact.

The crank pulley would be about 120 degrees of contact, the alternator about 70, aircon about 100-120 and water pump about 70.

Worst case there is the alternator would slip, I guess. It has about 150 degrees of wrap right now but cannot be tightened up properly. Everything has to go on the driver's side. There's no access on the passenger side for anything belt driven and there's not enough room to add a second pulley on the end of the harmonic balancer. I would convert it to multi-vee but that's awkward in terms of getting a harmonic balancer modified etc.

 

MS Paint style belt routing diagram:

 

 

Food for thought.

 

 

Phil

[Zelandeth]

Am I the only one who finds the idea of such a vast engine breathing through what seems to be a comically tiny carb slightly odd? The jets must be truly massive to get enough fuel in... though at the same time I do realise that it might actually be quite substantial and is just dwarfed by the size of the engine.

 

I also find the lack of hose clip on the top radiator hose in that photo slightly alarming...

 

Hope getting an alternator set up right doesn't turn out to be too big a headache. I know from prior experience that having the belt run even slightly out of true can result in a mighty squeaky belt even if it's right enough to nigh on pull things off their mountings.

[PhilA]

It's actually quite a big twin-barrel carburetor. I'll find something that's a good reference for size at some point next to it. It is honestly dwarfed by the engine though.

 

Stretch your leg out in front of you. It's about that long, end to end.

 

An issue discovered on these engines is the far cylinders can run lean when the center set rich at high RPM (3500+) due to the sheer length of the intake manifold. Apparently building a different intake and running twin carbs is a significant improvement.

For general pottering, however, the single carburetor proves adequate. The fuel pipe is 5/8" diameter standard though, it can provide quite a lot of fuel.

Not sure the flow capability but a guesstimate would be somewhere in the 325-375 CFM range, judging by carbs I've worked on. Don't forget there's no such thing as 6000 RPM with this engine so big flow figures just aren't called for.

 

To follow on from a few comments earlier in the thread- Yes, the crank shaft is massive. However, for its size it is fairly light. It has no counterweights- it balances itself. The main issue with such a long crank with a large rotational diameter (this engine is long stroke, small bore) is the crank can easily get into a whipping wobble (and the cam shaft too) and at that point it will break con rods or fracture into two parts.

Therefore, these relatively small carbs were fairly common until the bigger high-revving-high-power V8's started to appear in the mid- to late-sixties.

 

Phil

[Asimo]

With the belt-wrap diagrams, which way is it all turning?**

I would be wary of putting much extra load on the water pump bearings.

 

** Engine rotation is probably standard in SAE land, but here in muddled old England, with our special relationship with everywhere, I don't know which way you turn.

[PhilA]

Looking at the front of the engine (as in the drawn diagram), it rotates clockwise.

 

Adding in aircon still leaves the water pump on the most slack section of the belt.

 

Phil

[PhilA]

I'm going to hit up the local welding places (shipyard and fabrication are big industries locally so there's plenty of things available) and price up decently large gauge wire to relocate the battery to the trunk.

 

I think I'll need a better battery tray than I currently have, this one is cracked and rusty.

 

Phil

[PhilA]

Am I the only one who finds the idea of such a vast engine breathing through what seems to be a comically tiny carb slightly odd? The jets must be truly massive to get enough fuel in... though at the same time I do realise that it might actually be quite substantial and is just dwarfed by the size of the engine.

I also find the lack of hose clip on the top radiator hose in that photo slightly alarming...

Hope getting an alternator set up right doesn't turn out to be too big a headache. I know from prior experience that having the belt run even slightly out of true can result in a mighty squeaky belt even if it's right enough to nigh on pull things off their mountings.

Common frame of reference for size.

 

 

The neck of the carburetor is the same size as the can.

 

It's souped up though in this picture.

 

Phil

[Guest Hooli]

Nice how you condensed all the info into one post.

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

Any plans on soupacharging the engine

[PhilA]

I wrote a big post on this yesterday evening that my phone ate, which was moderately annoying. Hey ho.

 

SWMBO say "enough eBay until next paycheck". I have my eye on a few missing things, mainly electrical, for the car.

 

Horns- Lucas Windtones, 12V (probably have to come from the UK, later Jaguars had 12V ones but this also means Jag Scene Tax.

Horn relay - anything Delco/mid-60's is fine.

Under-hood light - some sod nicked the one that was there. They pop up in varying states of disrepair from time to time.

Screen wash system - the Big Yellow(ish) Vacuum Tank will go, to be replaced by big glass bottle containing the most colorful screen wash I can find (RainX do an interesting green one that looks like moldy Mountain Dew).

 

I need to also get some wire, connectors and a couple of connection blocks for the front wings as mine are either broken or bad. These need to be period because they're right there on view.

 

That's all the plans for the moment, then it'll be a case of pulling wires and redoing things. Looking at it, the lighting will probably be all replaced with LED where it doesn't directly show as a bulb, simply for the heat aspect of running bulbs in holders that will have been soldered instead of crimped (new wires to go in can't easily be crimped in place).

That also takes a fair bit of load off the switches and dash dimmer rheostat.

 

Phil

[hairnet]

Any plans on soupacharging the engine

Heinz or Baxter's

[hairnet]

Let me know if you need any tat

 

If it fits in 3 ft X 1ft X 1 ft holdall I'll confuse cbp with it

[hairnet]

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GENUINE-VINTAGE-LUCAS-WT-618-ENGLAND-HORN-HOOTER-CLASSIC-CAR-USED-12v/163255710930

[hairnet]

https://m.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2332490.m4084.l1311.R1.TR2.TRC0.A0.H0.Xlucas+win.TRS0&_nkw=lucas+windtone+horns&_sacat=0

 

The ones listed Jag or that ford one are pairs so 65 quid ain't bad seeing they're new

 

30 quid on a original one that might stop working???

[PhilA]

Yeah, I had seen those ones, but the accountant said no

 

 

Phil

[PhilA]

Also discovered that the bottom of the passenger front door skin isn't actually attached to anything...

 

 

Phil

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

Heinz or Baxter's

Campbell's of course

[hairnet]

Campbell's of course

haha

 

mmmm baxters

[PhilA]

 

You see that glow? That's nuclear.

 

 

Fixed the last missing green bit for the shifter control. Still in bits because I need to rebuild the wiring and get an LED to fit. Taking this apart is a pain.

 

Phil

[Guest Hooli]

Ahh a healthy* glow that kills germs.

[Squire_Dawson]

The lock where you can unlock it and remove the key and still operate the switch was a widespread GM feature of the 1950s. I believe it is called a dealer lock. I was told this whilst seeing a Vauxhall Victor as I was surprised myself.

[PhilA]

Hmm, so that would be fitted to what, when? Loan cars and the like?

 

 

Phil

[PhilA]

Just ordered a bunch of warm white LED's for this. Estimated delivery is middle of October so I'm guessing they're shipping from China.

 

I'll stick a regular bulb in it for now to test with.

 

 

Phil

[mercrocker]

Hmm, so that would be fitted to what, when? Loan cars and the like?

 

 

Phil

 

It was to enable the dealer to move the car around for servicing without giving him access to one's trunk or glove-box.   

[PhilA]

Oh, what's termed "valet".

 

Pull the barrel, replace it with the valet barrel?

 

I know the barrel comes out of this one if you poke a wire into the hole.

 

Or would it just be "have this fitted as a dealer option" thing?

 

Phil

[cort1977]

Thinking about horns, have you heard a mid-70s GM horn?  The one on my Pontiac has a nice sound and presumably costs about $6.45 + tax.