Started a new thread here as only the 1st part touches on what we had discussed last week and now, unfortunately has gone in a new direction.
So last week i was talking with some of you here regarding my vacuum advance, timing and such related things. To follow up, I did install a new single port vacuum advance canister (which also, with it’s much small size, clear the A?C brackets & allows room to real-time adjust the internal spring with an alan wrench. great, thanks Bill for that suggestion!
With my compound meter gauge and a brand new (replacing a 23yo basic light) now full featured digital timing light [RPMs, total timing etc], I was planning to tweak the carb settings and dial in all phases of the timing then take the cat out for some relaxed cruising, but alas… I never got that far, it was not in the cards.
A bit of backstory on the car is in order, so a little over 1yr ago the PO had farmed out quite a bit of varied work to different guys & much of what I discovered in person over time is at best what I’ll call hack or half-azzed . Given this I have been addressing these issues and related to where this post is going. The car only has 37K original miles but it sat for over a decade as well so much needed be done, they did send the heads out for go-over & valve job which obviously means they installed new head & intake gaskets.
I went to 1st tackle the bypassed heater core, non-functioning A/C and a trashed original heater/evap box of which i did a full restoration with deep clean, all new foam seals, lubed & adjusted doors, control-cable adjustment plus new vacuum lines and actuators. That job sucked, but it was very satisfying once completed to see it all come together and back re-installed properly. For full center-console restoration along with a new stereo system, i had had the center unit & stereo had unit in/out 3 different times already so i was like “i am NOT going through this again” so i even managed to do the entire project without removing my pass.seat or the radio/center console!
Now last month while out for a couple drives, i noticed the temp dial nearing way up on ‘H’ and when i shut the car off i could hear the boiling under the hood and eventually once the cap released, the overflow can started spitting out coolant on the ground. when i opened the hood, the hoses were obviously under extreme bloated pressure as well. So i stopped driving the car, kept working on it in the garage and along with the restored heater box, ran my new hoses & clamps, refilled the coolant & setup my tall burp-funnel all in planning to test run for leaks while burping out any trapped air from all the new related work and parts.
I also had installed a new 2" temp gauge in place of my broken center clock so I could monitor actual engine temp at all times & right in my face.
Yesterday, with compound meter/vacuum gauge hooked up to manifold port & new temp gauge connected to intake, started the car and immediately observed not good sound as well as bad readings on the gauge: pressure/vacuum= 10/4 well the sound was obvious that the base timing was way retarded because i was moving the dist around to get the giant dual advance removed & new single unit installed. so as soon as i turned it and brought the timing up, she smoothed out and was idling nicely BUT… the pressure/vacuum only moved to 30/13 never higher. meanwhile the car was warming up 140 the moved to 180 area where my electric fans kick in & again with the burp funnel in place (no closed radiator cap ATT) i didn’t have change to connect timing light as this all took place quickly within few minutes, any adjust to dist. had zero positive effect on the compound meter, so i shut the car off to reevaluate and bam… a volcanic gusher of boil-over coolant erupting up out of the burp funnel all over the place.
So immediately i’m thinking oh shTT, right in middle of car-show & driving season, now i have to do head gaskets on this thing to boot. But here’s some info and see what you guys think on things here… all thru this there’s never been oil in coolant, nor coolant in the oil. as well, there is zero coolant loss (other than overflow spitting out as it should under the extreme boil-over pressure relief) but then, even though the car idles and runs very smoothly, i have horrid readings on both, engine pressure and manifold vacuum.
I have the tools here to test leak-down and also cylinder compression (although i do not want to run this car any longer in it’s current state so i’d need do a manual compression check) as far as leak-down, i just discovered that someone stole my air compressor out of the basement so that test will need wait until i get another one here, if i even need to do that test.
For ref, i have built, rebuilt, repaired & maintained motors in a dozen different cars over the years but haven’t actually ever dealt with this scenario before. just based on all this info as well as the compound meter readings, i’ll ask you guys…
although it would default to head gaskets gone bad, is there any chance that it could be just the intake gasket pushing air into the cooling system and acting like a bad head gasket and if so, what would be THE definitive test IYO? or am i already destined to tear down and do the head gaskets (which if so of course will include the intake anyhow) but yes is a big deal in work intake vs head gaskets. input or experience on this is appreciated.
Now related just incase i end up doing the tear-down for head gaskets, i have an important question. On my 1979 Cadillac Seville (Oldsmobile 350), Cadillac added on a nylon liner to the timing chain for purpose of ‘quite running’. well, that garbage deteriorated over the decades and causes a near bulletproof lifer timing chain the need to be replaced because of all the slap once the nylon falls apart & puts oil pickup at risk on again, one of the most bulletproof motors ever built.
well, i had heard that these early (1st year) Ford 302 Windsor motors have that nylon on the timing chain. can anyone 100% verify please yes or no on that (01/1968 San Jose build). if so and im in there deep anyhow, i will certainly replace it with a new full-metal chain.
Anyhow, thanks for taking time to read this through and all input and thoughts along the way are much appreciated. I do not like to see posts/threads like this just fall off where, either way good/bad the OP never follows up. so yep i will update with any related progress or questions and ultimately into restarting the motor for testing again whenever that is.
And She’s too special to be off the road during peak season. but, little by little, we’re getting there:+1: