85 351 4door Vic **DUW**

[79lincolnlover]

So you've been laid-off??

[johnunit]

well, it's a tire shop, so I guess I'm seasonal. They seemed pretty adamant that I'd be back in february. Once the winter tires are all on, people don't have much reason to come back until the spring.


What this does open up is the possibility of parking the car for the winter. I don't have a car cover or garage, but at least it wouldn't be exposed to the salt so much, and I'd not have to cough up insurance for 2-3 months.

[79lincolnlover]

laid off

well, it's a tire shop, so I guess I'm seasonal. They seemed pretty adamant that I'd be back in february. Once the winter tires are all on, people don't have much reason to come back until the spring.


What this does open up is the possibility of parking the car for the winter. I don't have a car cover or garage, but at least it wouldn't be exposed to the salt so much, and I'd not have to cough up insurance for 2-3 months.

My step-bro was in the same boat as you but he decided to get another job altogether. He's now working full-time as a janitor.

[johnunit]

Full-time I can't do because of school, but I'm definetely going to look out for another job that doesn't die out. I only work weekends, and if any new job included weekends, so be it. I'm generally a pretty comitted and diligent employee, but if you're gonna wait till the last day to tell me I'm not going to get any hours for months, I'm not gonna feel bad if when you do call me I have to tell you "sorry, I'm working somewhere else now".


I got the tuning booklet for my VV carb today. It's a bit heavy reading, these carbs are VERY different from your basic quadrajet or double pumper, and I probably won't full comprehend it all before I have the carb on a bench in front of me.

That said, this means I have a 40 page booklet and rebuild kit, both real ford parts, for under 30 dollars shipped. I think I did pretty well.

[johnunit]

My parts-to-work ratio got even worse. I picked up Dymax outer tie rod ends. 46 dollars canadian for the pair, hopefully they last.

There's a squeeking now at idle from one of the accessories. I couldn't pin it down because it's been rainy and nasty and it was dark. If it turns out to be the alternator or something else expensive, I may just park it for a few months to save the insurance instead of scraping by like this. That'll give me time to tackle all the stuff that I've paid for but haven't done.

[johnunit]

My super-duper Eastwood black trim paint finally came, so that along with slowly replacing and re-routing the ancient vacuum lines will slowly make the engine bay look slightly less like an un-touched barn find. The paint only took a month to come, it's not like that's ridiculously long. Makes me feel great about paying 20-something dollars US for shipping alone on an aerosol paint can. This paint better never, ever lift. Or chalk. Or catch fire.


I'm parking inside on the weekdays now, which is allowing me to do simple interior and tuning stuff, even if I can't do anything that requires jackstands or fluids (underground parking at an apartment building).

I replaced a broken PCV valve and hardened tube to it as suggested by Thain and Ivan, and then very slightly adjusted the timing, since it'd been adjusted while the tube was leaking vacuum. That left made Sophie a good bit more peppie, but it still doesn't come alive much below 25mph. She's always been a bit like that, but it seems strange for a 351 with a 2bl and conservative cam to only come alive at higher RPM's. Then again, "higher rpms" is 3-4K, and I've never driven another 351 panther, so I don't really have a baseline.

Short-term projects:
Lubing and inspecting doorlocks
fixing bad tire valve stem (nicked by hubcap, needs to be refilled weekly)
painting various underhood parts
stockpile 5/16 vacuum line and replace ALL of the vacuum lines I can trace
Figure out if I'm going to park her for the next few months

Longer term:
Bleed and adjust brakes
patch hole in floor
try to patch exhaust leak
rebuild carb
install tie-rods (and likely find out that wasn't the main problem, forcing me to also install ball joints and wheel bearings and control arm bushings)
install U-joints

[87gtVIC]

Quick tip for the tire valve stem..Take off the bad tire and put the spare on...place the bad tire underneath a bumper and place the bumper jack stand on top of the tire jack the car up then drop the car and move the tire again till the bad is broken. Take a razer blade and cut the bulbus part of the valve stem from inside the tire then remove stem. insert new stem from the inside of teh tire and pull through with vice grips. and then re inflate tire.

[johnunit]

Thanks, 87GTVic, that's probably what I'd resort to if I didn't have the shop. Luckily, my shop teacher is fairly generous, so I'm going to do it on an actual tire machine.


A few minor questions that I didn't wanna start a thread for (anyone who knows, chime in)

1. How the hell do you get to the passenger side nut for the alternator bracket? deep sockets won't sneak in behind the pulley, and short sockets are too...short. Does the pulley have to come off?

2. How would you fix ripped vacuum lines from the heater hose to the firewall? The hose seems to be permanently attatched to the firewall and on the other end permanently attatched to the fitting in the heater hose. It's also broken clean off about a half inch before it meets the heater hose. I have the same issue with the similarly plumbed vacuum reservoir lines.

3. Any recommendations on good coils? I want a decent coil that will more or less bolt in place of the original one.


Short of something big changing, the car comes off the road february 15th, not sure for how long though. While it's off the road, it'll get at least 500 bucks worth of parts thrown at it.

[johnunit]

I finally got a bunch of pics taken. Sophie is all salty and unwashed, so no outside pics but lots of underhoodage.



Painted a few things, cleaned some other stuff, replaced most of the smaller vacuum lines




Some of the clusterfuck of vacuum lines around the air pump. Again, lots of vacuum lines replaced, just not the ones that are like 7 feet long.



I found what seems to have been a big vacuum leak. The rubber line that bridges the PCV tube to where the vacuum line comes out of the manifold was not even tight on the line it was so hardened. Worse yet, the actual metal line from the manifold had worked loose, and oil was apparently leaking out under certain conditions. A bit weird. The tube came out with the rubber line. I epoxied the metal line where it went into the manifold, cut a new length of rubber line, and put it all back together. Just going by the easier cold running, I'd say it was a pretty significant source of vacuum leakage.

There is a lot of oil there though, and I'm not sure I can chock it all up to leaky VC gaskets and the problem I just fixed. Eventually I'll hit it with brake cleaner and see where it comes back. I'm sure if theres a problem it will be obvious when the carb comes off (either to be rebuilt or to do a 4 barrel swap like discussed here http://www.grandmarq.net/vb/showthread.php?t=33429 ).



The "controversial" Variable Venturi carb. Fate undecided.


A broken vacuum line to the "thermal blower resistor" or something like that. On closer inspection, the electrical plug to is has already been disconnected and jumped for years. I'm going to take Gadget's advice and just cut the lines back and plug them at the firewall.


New(er) head unit. It fits quite nicely and sounds slightly better than the old one. Installed by BrandonN on here, with me handing him tools and helping fog up the windows. Frustratingly, only two speakers work. I'll have to tear into the speaker wiring at some point. That'll be fun.



head unit on along with dash lights. When you turn it off, the entire set of head unit lights goes off. That's refreshing, what with the stark blue light.





Uncracked dashpad. Looking at the old pics reminds me how much I hated the old cracked one. Best 20 (or 30?) bucks I ever spent.




Annd the beauty shot. I think I found my new facebook profile pic.

[87gtVIC]

Damn That is a nice dash pad. Everything is looking great man!

[hemihotrod402]

where did you find that dashpad? Maybe I need to go to canada a find one, cause ive been looking forever. Looking good. The more I look at this, the more I wish I had the money to go ahead a get a 351 lol

[1987cp]

Thanks, 87GTVic, that's probably what I'd resort to if I didn't have the shop. Luckily, my shop teacher is fairly generous, so I'm going to do it on an actual tire machine.


A few minor questions that I didn't wanna start a thread for (anyone who knows, chime in)

1. How the hell do you get to the passenger side nut for the alternator bracket? deep sockets won't sneak in behind the pulley, and short sockets are too...short. Does the pulley have to come off?

2. How would you fix ripped vacuum lines from the heater hose to the firewall? The hose seems to be permanently attatched to the firewall and on the other end permanently attatched to the fitting in the heater hose. It's also broken clean off about a half inch before it meets the heater hose. I have the same issue with the similarly plumbed vacuum reservoir lines.

3. Any recommendations on good coils? I want a decent coil that will more or less bolt in place of the original one.


Short of something big changing, the car comes off the road february 15th, not sure for how long though. While it's off the road, it'll get at least 500 bucks worth of parts thrown at it.

1) Alternator bracket? I'll assume for now you mean A/C bracket since you indicated the passenger side. Last time I messed with mine, I found at least a couple of uses for the Great Neck offset metric box-end wrench set I picked up at AutoZone. At least with the exact belt I have right now (560k6 IIRC, bypasses the smog pump), the pulley has to come off entirely to get the belt off. I have a fun little short socket extension that I seem to recall coming in handy as well.

2) In theory at least, you can cut any plastic vacuum line off anywhere and stick on an aftermarket rubber hose end that you can get at AutoZone. However, when I tried to use a pair of those with some bulk plastic line, the rubber ends deteriorated and ripped faster than I could say Jack Robinson. Easiest thing is probably to find some thin-wall bulk vacuum tubing that's a tight fit over the broken end of the plastic line and go from there. Potentially better would be to yank the grommet out of the firewall and cut it so a piece of rubber line fits through. Best would probably be to substitute suitable diameter metal brake line wherever you can, but I just now thought of that and haven't personally heard of anyone doing it. Now I'm thinking I should consider trying it, though.

3) Any quality replacement or performance coil will be adequate. From a service standpoint, I don't know of a reason to replace a coil that still functions. However, popular units like the MSD Blaster II canister coil should work great. You might also consider upgrading to an E-core (TFI-style) coil, which just requires a plug swap, though I haven't personally researched whether there are any long-term reliability concerns associated with that (I finally decided I didn't really trust the ignition system I whittled up using a Chevy HEI module and Ford E-core coil, but I was also having trouble with dizzy cap fouling at that time). My P72 is still using a Crane HI-6 and E-core coil combo, mostly just as it was installed by the previous owner.

[Nathan in MI]

What are the mysterious yellow orbs that appear to be making laps around your air cleaner lid?

[johnunit]

Thanks hemi and 87GTVic. I got the dash pad off a wrecked Grand Marquis that had seen no winters, been parked in the shade at work and home, and had 43,000 KM (30,000 miles). It was a real shame that it got wrecked, it was in REALLY nice condition. Certainly better than Sophie as she sits in these pics.


1987CP, I did mean alternator bracket but I didn't word it clearly. I was referring to the farthest to the passenger side nut holding the alternator bracket on. The Great Neck things sound like they may be what I need though. I also might pick up this tool kit http://www.canadiantire.ca/AST/brows..._ene_socket_en when it goes on sale. Or I might just pull the pulley.

I'll look into the blaster coil II coil or similar. I want to replace the coil mainly because it's ancient and I get occasional signs of a weak spark, like misfires going up hills in 3rd at low speeds. For under 50 bucks, I might as well.


Nathan, I THINK they're a reflection off the brass wing nut, but they may also be scouts for an alien race that is studying my car and I from afar for the purposes of casting a reality TV show in which a young Earthling and his car (newly equipped with rockets) travels throughout the universe sampling the best food various galaxies have to offer.

[1987cp]

Oh. That nut. I don't think I've ever tried getting it off without removing the water pump pulley first. Before I had metric tools of any sort, I used to just use a 5/8" spark plug socket on that.