1973 F-250 - Turbo BBF - It's off to a new home!

[Beagle]

the FP gauge should be worth at least .18 better time in the mud pit.

[andy30thz]

Seems like a pretty nice spacer for the price!
Did you ever get your dual fuel tanks sorted out? I thought there was some questions on the switching valve?
It should make trouble shooting a lot easier if you can take the carb out of the equation!

Did your wheels show up yet?

[BBR]

It's still bypassing the tank selector valve. I think the valve is leaking so the pump would never get a good suction when it was connected. Kind of like trying to drink through a straw with a hole in it.

Wheels are shipped, but UPS has not updated with a delivery date.

Grand total: 1172.50

[BBR]

Wheels are set to be delivered Jan 2nd, although they show to have arrived at the UPS facility yesterday.

Cant wait cant wait cant wait

[BBR]

The weather started out decent today then the wind shifted to the North and it was less than pleasant. However, that did not stop me from making great progress today.

I started the day trying to get the truck to pull fuel from the tank and run normally. I filled the float bowls with fuel and connected my underhood starter button. I primed it and it cranked and ran until the bowls were empty, but still no fuel pressure. I refilled and reprimed and was greeted by a GIANT FIREBALL in the face when I went to restart!!! It got some eyelashes, eyebrows and the hair sticking out from under my hat by my ears. Yowza. It has been along time since I have had that happen!! After regaining my composure, I decided to go ahead and pull the ac compressor off since the lines were disconnected and since I would need to take it off in order to get to the fuel pump easier.

After that little chore was complete, I removed the line from the pump to carb and turned the motor over to see if it was pumping anything. Two little anemic squirts is all it could muster. So I decided to look at it from the bottom to see if there was anything obviously wrong. Well, there certainly was. When I put a new section of hose from the hard line to the fuel pump, I cut it too long and it had a big kink in it. I cut 3" off and reconnected. Problem solved. Hit the button and it was working perfect. Reconnected the fuel lines, cranked it over a few times, turned the key on, hit the button and it burbled to a nice steady idle. Awesome. Sort of. It starts and runs 85% better than before but still has a miss that I think I have traced to cylinder #7. 7 was one of the holes I did not test compression on because it's plug is so darn hard to get to.

I went ahead and pulled the valve covers off to verify that all the valves are opening and closing as they should to eliminate the possibility of a flat cam. Pulled both sides and all 16 are operating properly. The valve covers have been off before as has the intake manifold. The inside of the engine looked pretty clean and just had the normal black coating on everything. I buttoned it back up and started on the interior.

I took the seat and seat belts out and proceeded to rip out the nasty carpet that was in it. There were plenty of mouse pills and just general filth. I did find a set of wheel spacers, $0.48 in change and some S&H green stamps. I vacuumed and windexed the insides of the cab. It will certainly have to have another round of that, but it is so much cleaner now. I removed the center dash vents because they had been melted by a small dash fire at some time. There is one little rusty spot on the floor board that was caused by a dislocated body plug over by the gas pedal. I reinstalled the plug and the seat and called it a day.

I will post a few pics tomorrow when I have access to a PC. This ipad sucks for that.

[BBR]

Kinked hose.


Vc off.


Melted vents


Carpet....gone!

[Beagle]

engine looks CLEAN - like NOT 1970's anything clean. I wonder if the top end has been done? Looking good senor BBR!

[andy30thz]

Where are the wheel pics?!? (Did you decide on letters in or out? For some reason now I'm starting to lean towards in....)
Its coming along nicely! I wish the carb would have fixed your stumble....looks like you have a little more investigation to do!
Yikes on the carb backfire, that must have woken you up!!! I think you had a timing light on it and everything checked out, right? If there was a weird timing issue, could that cause your stumble? Its only under load/rev, not idle?
Compression, air, fuel, spark, cam timing....obviously there is an issue with one or more of them....

Boy...if you clay'd and waxed the inside of the cab, I think it would look like new!
Were any other parts damaged in the dash fire?

I'm still dying to see this thing buffed out on its new wheels!

[BBR]

It misses pretty much all the time. Timing was good at 15 deg BTDC. I pulled the 1,2,3,5,6,7 plug wires when it was idling and the only one that did not change it way it was running was 7. I have not ruled out the possibility of a mouse nest clogging the #7 intake port though. haha

Wheel have not arrived yet. Patiently waiting.... ok not really so patiently. haha

The flexible ducts for the dash vents are awol, the paint is burnt off the metal part of the top of the dash (by the speaker hole) and the dash surround is melted in one place up by the hvac controls.

wait... ups just got here. whoo hoo. brb

[gearhed1971]

It misses pretty much all the time. Timing was good at 15 deg BTDC. I pulled the 1,2,3,5,6,7 plug wires when it was idling and the only one that did not change it way it was running was 7. I have not ruled out the possibility of a mouse nest clogging the #7 intake port though. haha

Wheel have not arrived yet. Patiently waiting.... ok not really so patiently. haha

The flexible ducts for the dash vents are awol, the paint is burnt off the metal part of the top of the dash (by the speaker hole) and the dash surround is melted in one place up by the hvac controls.

wait... ups just got here. whoo hoo. brb

wheels?

[BBR]

haha I'll get them mounted and balanced tomorrow and take a pic then.

[andy30thz]

NICE!
Hmmmm....sounds like #7 is a dead hole....and that stinks becasue I think you've covered all the easy fixes....
Should you make the effort to get a compression test of that cylinder?
What else could make a cylinder dead, you have spark, correct timing, the cam is moving the valves and you've got fuel....

[milner351]

I may have missed it - but have you looked at plug wire, cap terminal, etc to rule out non mechanical issues for #7 miss fire?

[BBR]

New cap, wires, plugs and I used the inductive lead on the timing light to verify all 8 were sparking. It won't take long to check compression on 7. I was joking about the mouse nest, but really, there could be something in there. Other possibilities are stuck rings, busted rings, or a burnt piston I guess. It does not make any odd noises when running, so I doubt it is anything catastrophic.

I've been running through my options in my head. A full rebuild kit is $360 on ebay. That's pistons, rings, gaskets, oil pump, bearings, timing set, etc. I could pull heads, check the bores, if ok, I could hit them with a hone and go back with std size stuff and call it good. If not, bore the block 30 and go on.

But even with the miss, as soon as I get the tires on it, it can be driven around town some.

[Huskinhano]

This reminds me of the '86 HDF250 460 truck I bought years ago. It ran like shit, the poor guy was so frustrated with the truck. He had dumped a lot of money on the engine. He was trying to talk me out of buying it. It was literally running on one cylinder when it was towed to my house. I replaced the usual tune up stuff, not because I was trying to throw parts on it in hopes of getting it to run but rather to know where I was and to more importantly have a reliable truck.

It had a 4180 Motorcraft 4V, same as the 83-85 Mustang basically. The $300 the PO paid to have the carb rebuilt was the problem. The shop had the carb apart but never used new gaskets! They were torn but I guess they mated back up. The big problem was they painted it with gold paint and plugged up all the air bleeds real good. I had to buy a used core and rebuilt the core. Now the truck ran but I had a steady miss at idle and couldn't pass the CO or HC test. All cylinders had equal readings and it ran fine on the road, no miss. The problem was the intake manifold gasket. IIRC the #2 intake port had a chunk missing. I replaced the gasket and it ran great after that. I had a 750 Edelbrock on it for a while. It ran like a raped ape. I ended up selling it to a ricer who was going to use it as a tow truck for his car.

Check the intake manifold gasket.