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Quote:
Steve,

With older engines, as the interior of the water jackets in the block and head corrode, flakes and particles of rust can dislodge and travel through the coolant fluid and lodge in the radiator. Over the course of time these particles build up in the radiator blocking it and lowering the efficiency of the cooling system. This in-line radiator hose filter is designed to trap and retain loose particles in the cooling fluid. Because Wade had the radiator cleaned and tested last week and it was discovered to be about 20% blocked he's trying to avoid the same thing happening again.

See this link -http://neptune.spacebears.com/cars/stories/sctefba.html

Hi Dave,
Yes you did send me a sketch but it did'nt show the cover and Wades does'nt seem to have one either.
T.C

Monday 1st September 2009

First day of Spring in this part of the world, and with it also being the first Tuesday of the month time for a Morris Minor Picnic Club run, so no workshop today for Wade or myself.

After meeting at McDonalds at Thornleigh, northern suburb of Sydney, 9 cars and 13 people continued north to the Mooney Mooney Club on the picturesque Hawkesbury River. Cars in attendance were Pontiac Firebird, Ford Falcon Convertible, Austin Freeway, Austin A40 Devon, Morris Minor, Valiant S/Wagon, 2 x Puegot 403's Sedan and S/Wagon, '41 Packard Coupe. It was a beautiful blue sky day and after a pleasant drive, started as a convoy but traffic lights and drivers unfamiliar with the road soon put paid to that. On arrival at Mooney Mooney liquid refreshments and lunch were enjoyed by all at the club.

The '41 ran well with the new radial tyres providing a much better ride and wander was reduced to a bare minimum with tracking eliminated. I'm now an advocate of radial tyres! See page 19 of Diamondback cataloguehttp://www.dbtires.com/2009_wide_white_wall_catalog/wide_white_wall_catalog_hi.pdf for the 700R15 I'm using. Cost in Australia - AU$395.00 Each for 3" WWW's.

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Hi Dave,
Yes you did send me a sketch but it did'nt show the cover and Wades does'nt seem to have one either.
T.C

Did you want a photo of the cover?

Yes please Dave

Terry, took a couple of photos today of the heat riser cover on the car, but won't have the film finished and processed until after the PAC Tour next week. So in the interim here's a scan of the cover. Depth is about 13/16 inches (20.64mm); the slot in the side is to hold the end of the bimetallic spring, and of course promote air flow. There are two threaded studs in the mainfold, one on each side of the shaft end, and these with appropriate washers and nuts hold the cover in place. Of course you "wind" the cover to get the required tension on the bimetallic.

EDIT - found an old picture of the cover on my car. Hope it answer's your questions.

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Wednesday 2nd September 2009

No road trip today as Wade was anxiously awaiting his "comfort parcel" from Barry Smith. With work on Old Blue stymied until the manifold gaskets arrived I said to Wade I'd paint the hardware for the '41's running boards so all would be ready to re-fit them once they returned from re-covering. And speaking of which, before making the return journey from Mooney Mooney yesterday, I'd phoned Peter at Rhino Linings because they were on the way home only to learn they weren't ready yet! Anyway, while I was wiring up parts and fasteners in preparation for POR-15'ing, Wade went up to Aldus Engineering for the re-surfaced manifold. With the manifold mission accomplished, but still no gaskets, Wade turned to the '34. Dug out the fittings which anchor the door straps only to find they hadn't been painted. So as I POR-15'd, Wade was cleaning and stringing parts for the '34 and, wouldn't you know it, he kept finding more and more! Not a problem because now was the time. Painting all finished, and lo and behold, the "comfort parcel" from Barry Smith arrived containing the manifold gaskets as well as a fridge magnet for Wade from Barry's wife Cheryl, see pic. At this point I had to depart the workshop but tomorrow will be back, and knowing Wade, Old Blue will probably be back on the road. And Terry, the reason I didn't have a pic of the spring cover on the '34 hot-box emerged. Wade had been meaning to re-paint it but seeing it had been put aside it kept getting overlooked, but not this time. So I've included pic's of the '34's cover and spring as well as some of Big Red's oil cooler internals.

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Thanks guy's for all the haet riser valve pictures. It now makes sense on how I must fit it, I had the cover on upside down.

Thursday 3rd September 2009

Well I was right. Wade had put Old Blue back together yesterday afternoon and then driven it home. Though at one point on the trip he thought it wouldn't make it as it was missing, running roughly and cutting out! So back at the workshop this morning Old Blue was back under the spotlight. Wade found the distributor cap was chipped, with a piece missing from the surface where one of the retaining clips fits. No problem, easy to fix, use the new distributor cap carried as a spare under the front seat! Except that cap too had the same piece missing from the clip surface and it's never been on a distributor! Fallback option, old cap sitting on shelf which didn't have any missing surfaces, just needed a good clean. Off for a test run but the same problems surfaced so back to the workshop.

This time as a test Wade shorted each plug out in turn and when numbers 7 and 8 failed to affect engine running these were pulled to display a gap of about 0.035". Wade runs 0.028" so it was decided to pull all the plugs and replace them with the set kept under the front seat. Only trouble with this idea was that Wade and Brian had used that set in my '41 when we were on the National Rally back in March. So I cleaned up the National Rally set in the blasting cabinet, Wade re-gapped them and put them into Old Blue. Also cleaned up the set that came out of Old Blue and re-gapped them and put them under the front seat as ready spares. Then, off for the test drive. It was deja-vu, all over again, no improvement at all.

Back at the workshop a test to determine whether there might be a intake/exhaust manifold leak by spraying WD40 onto the visible top edge of the gasket surface for 7/8 inlet. Voila! A noticeable change in the engines running characteristics immediately, loosing the roughness, not missing and running smoother. Test repeated a number of times with the same outcome. Then tightening of the manifold retaining nuts, first by Wade, then again by John. Similar to how it had been done yesterday but under hot conditions this time, it was surprising how much each nut could be further taken up! Test drive time and success! No roughness, missing or cutting out. And on the drive back to the workshop Wade explained his fear in finding 7/8 were involved was that it might be a blown head gasket in that area. Fortunately it doesn't appear so and Wade will be taking Old Blue home again overnight to give her a longer run in traffic, should be a good test.

All that done then turned to the '34. The other day Wade had started on the body by adding the door latch striker plates to the door pillars. Today it was various rubber item. Started with the rubber door straps which prevent the doors opening too far. Yesterday part of the POR-15'ing involved the retaining piece, which have little "claws" on their undersurfaces to hold onto the rubber strap. There are also wood screws for the rear doors and metal screws for the front doors which pass through the retaining piece and the rubber. So first was using the end of an old strap as a template to make the screw hole locations. Then the strap was slid through the slot in the door frame, the slot in the door pillar and the retaining pieces were then screwed to the pillar. Next were the rubber rubbing blocks, for want of a better term, on the B pillar, two for each door, top and bottom of the pillar. Then the round rubber bumps stops near the bottom of each door and located on the A and C pillars. Finally, each front door has another roughly rectangular bump stop at the top of the A pillar. Because all this needs to be done carefully and right it's surprising the amount of time this all took, my first real hands on experience with a ground up restoration. Also installed the spring and cover on the '34 for the hot-box valve now that the cover has been painted.

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Exhaust manifold:

It is interesting on my RHD 6 cylinder that I can remove the manifold setup (without taking loose the steering) only by taking apart the hot box first, then taking it out as two pieces.

I can then put it all back together and it WILL go back in as a single assembly. (Scratching head)

I too had an amazing amount of "retightening" after running hot. (and I initially torqued it to the book....the ones I could get the torque wrnech on anyway). I probably retightened 4 times.

I'll take some pics next time.

Wade, looks like your 34 will be a masterpiece.