Hi all, two quick questions as I’m starting to condition my *new 288 (49 or 50). I put some MMO in the spark holes to soak it while trying to gently turn the motor over by hand while it’s out of the car. As much fun as it was redoing the head gasket on my current crack ridden motor last summer, this motor was supposedly professionally rebuilt before indoor climate controlled storage so I’d prefer not to fully tear it apart.

Question 1: some of the fluid runs out from the valves unsurprisingly, is there some way to assure those cylinders get the fluid into the piston or do I just keep pouring it in/wiping it off and plugging the ports with rags?

Question 2: I’ve tried turning the motor via the front crank bolt (no plugs in), hoping the rotation would happen as easy as Ross’ retiming video, but it just seems to loosen and tighten that bolt. I tightened it down with the bar some but still the motor didn’t spin. I’m worried about over torquing and damaging something, is that a rational fear here or can I just pull it counter clockwise hard until it stops tightening as long as I keep soaking/working not to hurt valves and pistons?

Thank you all!

Definitely a lot of good parts on it, the bumpers look surprisingly good too, if it were around here I’d go see what I could salvage.

Well I cracked mine open today. No complications, three screws and the hanger and it comes right apart. Must have been rewired at some point because it was a rubberized cord shielding.

Bulb seems to say M94, which upon search confuses me. The GE M94 on Amazon here seems to look right and is a sealed beam but the specs don’t seem right. 100w 13volts? BigKev is this the 12v you used? I’m worried that it won’t work right, or bright I should say, with the car still on 6v.

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Hi all! I picked up this hand spotlight today for cheap. It needs to be fixed, mainly a new cord or cigarette plug for power, and the bulb is toast. I’ve seen a couple other posts that seem to date this kind from ‘53-55/6, but I’d appreciate confirmation of that as most I see for sale are labeled as all sorts of years and things!

Does anyone know what type of GE bulb this has, and where there are cigarette outlets I can wire in? I’d love to get it working again and use it in the car!

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Good catch, frosted was the right word. Though I will say some that I’ve seen condition wise I might describe as opaque!

I have what I think is an interior light chrome bezel and lens from a Packard which came along with parts for my 22nd series engine project. I haven’t been able to identify it, does anyone know what model/year this may be from? Most I’ve seen are flat glass, older seem to be a frosted glass, haven’t seen any that have this clear but ribbed/beveled style. It’s surprisingly tough to find pictures of all the dome lights!

I’ve posted here because it’s about parts generally, and if it’s not something I need I’d be open to selling it. I posted it to FB with some other pieces to identify and some people have already asked about buying it, but I’m honestly hesitant to sell without knowing exactly what it is. Hopefully folks here understand that concept more than the FB world.

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Well, can’t thank you all enough! I retarded the timing a couple times and it’s starting up reliably again… better than before considering I rewired and replaced most of the ignition system. The only remaining issue is that the horn relay is clearly shorting out, when I turn it goes wild, which is actually a very effective method of getting people to move out of your way! That will get addressed after the auto body fixes the rear… and maybe I’ll regrease the distributor via that cup.

I do have a delco distributor in the basement that came with the parts haul and replacement engine. If those are preferable maybe I’ll fix up that one for the big swap instead of using the Autolite on mine.

Ok great that means this one right should be circled in red? I appreciate the help, all this stuff is fairly “on the fly” so I get in my head about trying it or not, but after reading some other posts I’m pretty convinced part of the start issues is being too advanced. Well that and all the cracks and issues with the block and now probably manifolds. Maybe if the manifold is cracked I’ll rename her to The Cracken, until I get the new engine and goodies in at least!

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So I got the car started and in the driveway thankfully. It’s still hard starting but I swapped out the condenser again with a known good one, and set the point gap closer to .018. Started getting spark again and eventually it fired. I may have a manifold leak somewhere because it’s starting like it’s sucking air, and benefitting from pumps of the throttle to squirt fluid in. I also think my timing is advanced for its condition, it seems like the engine is hitting compression strokes when trying to start and then not turning over smoothly.

Can someone remind me what to loosen to rotate the distributor (Autolite 4502b) to retard the timing just slightly and see if starting improves? I think my brother did it last time and I don’t want to throw the whole thing off by loosening the wrong thing and trying to turn it.

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Limited time again today, but still no spark. I briefly could try out the meter and got some strange results. It seemed to show continuity with the points both open and closed. Maybe it was user error on the new meter as I’ve not used one myself before. Also the condenser installed was showing nothing on the 20 setting. Hopefully I’ll get some more time for troubleshooting tomorrow.