Re: Mike's 53 Caribbean

Posted by HH56 On 2024/5/6 20:55:53

If you want to keep the car mostly stock I would also suggest adding a 30 amp cube type relay as Ross mentioned and use larger wire between the relay and solenoid. You could mount and sort of hide the relay behind the starter or solenoid and have the carb switch and original wire operate the relay. 54s were started from the ign switch but even the switch contact could barely take the load of the big solenoids. 54-6 key start ign switches used on senior models with the pinion shift starters are known failure items and even they could benefit from a relay to take the large solenoid load out of the switch.

Here is a typical example of what happens to the 54-6 ign switch. The small starter contact is just a raised rounded area formed by pressing it into the fairly thin flat piece. On this switch heat has melted thru the contact and also melted the corresponding contact spot on the movable plate. The black spot is a hole letting the bakelite show thru the melted raised area.

Attach file:

---

  terminals.jpg (166.50 KB)