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Yeah, I checked the ground wire were I could. I need to check it at the tank, which means I’ll need to lower the tank to get to it.

It doesn't matter if it pushes oil up the tube or not. The oil will merely pressurize the air. Think Archimedes. All the matters is the reading on the gage.

True.


Still wish I'd seen the pressure come up in the gauge. I'll definitely need some help with next steps, but it will have to wait for a couple weeks.

This coming weekend, I'l be moving my daughter from NC to Nashville.

In the meantime, I have some other things to work on during the week.

Okay…I was doing some tinkering today and made some real progress.

First, I noticed my fuel gauge pop to life when I turned on the key. It went right to 1/4 tank which was right as I had 5 gallons in a 20 gallon tank.

Then, it quit again…. The gauge is sticking a bit. It seems to be getting better with a little exercise. The good news is that all is well with the sending unit which means I don’t need to lower the tank again!

Then…I decided I should test the new oil pressure gauge. My son recently had a new one that was bad.on a car he was building (just finished) So, I blew some air into it….nothing.

Then, while messing with it, the line pulled out of the gauge. I discovered a user error….I had tightened the compression nut, but not enough for it the compression fitting to compress on to the line, so the line was “leaking”. I tightened it down and retested with air….works.

So….hooked it back up and cranked the engine. I could see it coming up to about 20 while cranking.

Took a bit for it to start, but when it did, the pressure came right up to about 40.

So…That meant get her off the jack stands, torque the axel nuts, tighten all the lug bolts, put the fire extinguisher in the car, install the headlight lenses…race against rapidly dwindling daylight…install the license plate, install the tail light lenses…

Did I mention that I really hate not staying on daylight savings time year round.

Well, more to come on the tail light lenses….went out with “white”tail lights. (no lenses) and no hood. Don’t flog me…sometimes you just have to do what you have to do.

Steering definitely has a lot of play…that’s moving to a high-priority item. Brakes felt great! I’m really happy about that.

Went for a short drive. First stop was Mom and Dad’s about a mile and a half away. Pretty exciting! I pulled into the drive and honked the new horns. They sound awesome! I left the car running while there and had the headlights on. Then, noticed the headlights start turning off, then back on, back off, back on. I turned them off for a bit. Then turned them back on when we left and they seemed to be normal again.

Then a short stop to get a bit more gas…about three miles. I took a big risk and turned off the car while pumping the ethanol free gas…another five gallons to bring up to about half a tank. When I went to start her back up, it cranked VERY slow, but did start…Drove straight home (about a mile and a half). The headlights operated normally right until I was pulling into the garage and then they started blinking again. I also noticed that it was all light doing this, not just the headlights.

So with the off-on “blinking” of the lights and the slow cranking after getting gas, I’m guessing I have a generator problem. Any thoughts or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

All around good day!

Congrats on getting her started and on the road!

The lights blinking on and off may be the headlight switch. It's likely a little corroded and could use some cleaning. However, on mine it only affected the headlights. Not sure why yours would be all the lights. Generator possibly, but I would expect that would lead to dim lights.

-Kevin

Thanks, Kevin!

I’ll have to play around with the light switch. The way those switches are, it’s conceivable that it would affect all of the lights.

Check your battery cable connections both on the battery and engine/starter side. Make sure they are tight and clean, if your whole electrical system is flickering and a warm engine barely cranks, it sounds like an intermittent poor connection.

Also go and check your battery voltage with a voltmeter.

Okay…I finally figured out the tail light lens gasket orientation and got the lenses on. They look great and are very secure.

Also, realized how much better my headlights work with the lenses installed. Not sure why, but I just hadn’t thought about how much the lenses control the beam patterns. Photo order is City (low), Country (high), Passing (right high, left low). Cheap bulbs are the cause of the right bulb being so much dimmer.

I also re-installed my rear view mirror. That’s going to make driving MUCH better.

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Don, what is the diameter of your tail light lens? The seal looks like it may also work on the rear siren light of my 1951 Henney-Packard ambulance.

The outside diameter of the bezel measures 3-7/8in.

Not sure of the actual diameter of the lens since it’s installed now.