Hi from central TX: when I finish my Hydro-E window project (blog in post war) I will be tackling the a/c system in my 54/300. Would you mind sending me a photo of that Sundren compressor--seeing ahead that I'm probably "not" going to get my big fat Tecumseh compressor up and going. The a/c system is add-on with evaporator in the truck. Thanks

Today's segment of the Hydro-E project deals with the installation of the dual conduit hoses from Steele, in the left rear and driver's door. Also the first photo shows those metal braces for the two front doors that appear to be for stopping the down travel of the windows (previous posting). In the left rear door the double conduit had to be cut approximately in half in order for the electrical wires to reach up to the window switch hole in the door. This was not hard to do, using a utility knife, but it had to be done very slowly so as to not cut into the new hydraulic hose and the electrical wires. Photos will show that this has been done and the left rear door "conduit" is now snugly in the vertical pillar. And the new hydraulic hose replacement for the metal line is tied in and runs to under the front seat. Same now with the driver's door: only this time a slit was made in the double conduit for the electrical wires to reach up to their post, and the new hydraulic hose has the full 23" of conduit for insulation and protection over to the new cylinder. Both sets of the electrical wires were re-wrapped with electrical tape for protection. Next work session to repeat this procedure on the right rear and right front doors. When accomplished, the hydraulic hose installation will be finished. Much WD-40 was used to pull the new hose through the conduit.

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Don't worry about what kind of fuel pump it is....send it to Feltz Terrill @ Terrill Machine, Deleon, TX and he can tell you and send it back rebuilt. He has rebuilt all fuel pumps on all my cars--excellent work, reasonable

Good point on those braces--if you mean the cylindrical braces for the two front doors, going through the frame of the window lifts they are in!! What is not in, and I'm not sure right now how to install them, are the two wedge, two-bolt-hole braces for the front windows. These braces seem to be for stopping the down travel of the big window glass. I need to get the glass up a bit in order to attach them to the door. I did not have any such braces for the rear doors. My saving grace for reinstallation of these hydraulic lifts was the fact that I had placed all parts in plastic baggies (OCD) and labeled them for each door back in the 80's when I got side-tracked. **in the photo where you see (2) red arrows pointing to indentions in the door frame, this is the birds-eye guide for verifying the (2) guides on the bottoms of the window glass.

July 21 update on hydro-e System project: this is a continuation of my 1954 Cavalier hydraulic window project which began following the Texas Packard Meet. Another car was out of my way in the garage for a while so I got back to this project in the Texas heat. With my Harbor Freight fan almost on high, I managed to get the last two cylinders clipped into their frames and all four lifts AND glass reinstalled in all four doors--in four 3-hour work days. There is not enough room here to tell you everything about those lifts, but if you are observant and have no distractions the reinstallation is absurdly obvious. I don't want to ever do this again, but I can rewrite the certain sections of the service manual regarding hydraulic windows. All four doors were cleaned thoroughly at the bottom and sprayed with OSPHO to help detain rust growth. Then began the reinstallation: 1) lifts go in first and stood behind its platform 2) wing glass must go next 3) window glass next holding onto the top of the glass while you reach with the other hand and bring the lift frame up and onto its platform 4) tighten those four bolts 5) work the wing glass into place and secure it with the only bolt at the bottom. **With this part of the project done I am moving to installation of the double rubber hoses at each door. Left rear door already has the hose installed, but it will need changing. While working with the window lifts it became clear that the two hoses that Steele sends you is enough to do 4 doors. If you try to use 23" of double hose conduit it will seriously crowd the area of the window lifts. The 23" hose should be cut into half (hindsight), because rubber is only needed between the door pillars to cover up the electrical lines and hydraulic hose in that single area. Inside the door the only issue is to secure the hydraulic hose against vibration.

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This is interesting information on steering wheel adjustment. On my '54/300 I don't have the exact problem of alignment, but rather a problem of "lost motion" as discussed in the service manual. Also, when hand-turning the steering wheel left & right in this "lost motion" zone there is a "bump" sound in the steering wheel. A sound as though a tooth might be broken in the steering box. On the road, the car steers okay, but changes from one side to the other of the "lost motion" zone. The service manual is very clear on what to do first for this problem, before going into the steering box. Any takers??

Back in the 1980's I had my '54 Packard radio rebuilt with a new vibrator and it played beautifully. At that time I found that most AM radio stations had only Mexican style music. So before you go to a lot of rebuilding trouble you might tell your friend that he will need to take a Spanish course to understand the language on most AM stations now. Or, they will need to really like Mexican style music--which I do fortunately.

Try AMK Products, Inc. They have a vast catalogue. They had moulding clips for my '62 Buick Electra.

June 1, 2013 update on hydro-e-lectric window project. The left rear cylinder and spring lift is reinstalled in the car. Unexpectedly I was agonizing over how to get the new cylinder installed while at the same time pressing down on the lift arms to extend the spring enough to "just" get the top end of the cylinder to stay in place, when all of a sudden I got the answer--look down from birds-eye view and it all comes together. So the left rear door now has the cylinder lift frame bolted in (no glass yet) Observing how to attach the 3 wires to the door switch it was noticed that one wire was missing--that being the yellow wire from the door switch down to the new cylinder. For some reason ONLY the driver's door had this wire-the other three doors did not.(??) I removed this one wire and sent it to Y-N-Z Wirez and had 4 new 14 ga. wires made for the switch/cylinder hookup--loop one end, douglas the lower end. Back to you soon with photos as I begin the same process on the driver's door. ***note, I am trying to get all 4 lifts installed, wires hooked up to each door switch JUST so I can test the condition of the pump.

If you do not have a service manual, look for one on E-bay, as it would be a huge help to you. The transmission section of the service manual would give you many different types of problems and how to solve. **Please look above at suggestion of making sure, when in neutral that both levers are parallel. Let us know how that works out.