squirrel's 55 chevy

[squirrel]

Back to work on the 55. I put it on stands this morning, and fixed the transmission and exhaust. The park pawl thingy works with a funky bracket on it, that you can put in backwards if you aren't paying attention...I put it in backwards...no park. All better now. And one of the collector gaskets was burned out, so I replaced that. Now I need to put a tach in it, and play with the carb. I might put one of the 650s on it for now to see how it runs, then play with the 800 some more. Or work on a 750 vacuum secondary and see how that does.

[Scott Liggett]

What's happening with the 800?

[squirrel]

I don' tknow, I haven't driven it enough. Doesn't like full throttle.

[Scott Liggett]

Cutting out like lack of fuel? Can't remember if it has two power valves in it. If it does, run both. My 454 did not like running on one with my 850.

[squirrel]

I think it was also running real rich on the primary side, I looked and it had stock jets in it.

[Scott Liggett]

I put stock jets in it when I rebuilt it.

[squirrel]

Sure runs rich...around 11-12 afr cruising

[squirrel]

Went for a little drive...it's running ok. Kinda rich, like I said, but it seems to be working fine at full throttle now. I guess it needed cobwebs rattled out or something.

[squirrel]

I swapped on one of the 650s from the blower motor, and tinkered with it. A little bit leaner, not much. I goofed and never timed the engine after I did the swap, so it had been retarded something like 12=15 degrees with the 800, which was hampering drivability. I'll probably play with the jets in the 800 and try it again. Although it was having more hot soak problems than the 650, maybe I just picked a cooler day for the 650 test drive?

I also put the bumper back on the car, and put in an 80s SW mechanical tach. There are a few more things I want to mess with also. It's a nice, quiet, sedate, almost slow car now, but that's compared to the Chevy II, which is pretty darn radical.

[squirrel]

I offered to drive a young man and his gal to a birthday party, he wanted a ride in a 50s car....so today is the day, I went to start the 55 this morning, and no fuel. The pump was not running. The last time I drove it, was in a huge rainstorm, and it seems some water got into the motor part of the pump, and got some corrosion on the shaft and it got stuck. I took it apart and got it going again. And gave the car a bath. Recently, I put the Centerlines on it, so I could steal the wheels and tires that were on it, for other cars. I still like how they look.

I also needed a new radiator for my Chevy II, since it sprung a leak on drag week. The 55 had the same model radiator, so I decided to put a cheap aluminum/plastic one into the 55 and put the fancy one into the other car. This radiator costs $100 and it's in stock at your FLAPS. Kinda ugly, I need to paint the center black, but it'll do for now. Seems to cool ok on a nice 80s degree day like today is.

[Barry Donovan]

I hated those radiators in my subaru..
on the truck, I recently put in new supports up front, all new cab mounts, welded, twisted, lifted and aligned...hammered cut grinding..

..to a whiff of antifreeze with no leak at the plastic side seam..
I then knew one of the pro arguments for the plastic tanks.

Twisting chassis does not necessarily need to pop it at the seams. Clever.
The truck is mover, like an old chevy... plastic tanks ain't so bad. I guess they save some amperes too.

[TheSilverBuick]

I ran one of those 1 row aluminum radiators with the plastic tank's on my Skylark with the V6 for years and years, then two or so years after the 455 swap. Through Vegas and Mojave (I-15) summer heat without issues. I got a bigger radiator when I was chasing a cooling issue at idle, which turned out to be a corroded timing cover (water pump backing). I tried to put that radiator in the Firebird, as it still sitting in the barn, but the mounting points/methods were too different and I wasn't inclined enough to mess with it when I had a stock '69 Firebird brass-copper 3-core radiator sitting there too. The previous owner had an aftermarket transmission cooler on the car, so I was leery of the trans cooler on the OE radiator, but I flushed it and so far seems good.

[squirrel]

that's reassuring! They do seem to work ok.

[TheSilverBuick]

Now that I think about it, it's actually the radiator I used on my Firebird's engine run stand =P

[68scott385]

The OEs have been running plastic tank radiators for decades. In my experience they need to be replaced about every 5-7 years, that's same car, several radiators. I hope you have better luck with yours than I've had with mine.