85 351 4door Vic **DUW**

[jaywish]

I never had a car with the 11" but those should stop you from other peoples reports.

[johnunit]

Good info. Will definitely recheck adjustment and bleed again.

11 inch police drums, 255/60/15 front 295/50/15 rear so actually a tiny bit taller up front

[jaywish]

Well, I can comment on the rear brakes. The self adjusters are not dependent on the parking bakes. If the springs and cables are in correctly, the backing plates cleaned and lubed the self adjuster should tighten the adjustment when needed every time you back up and hit the brakes.

Notice I said "should". My self adjusters never performed to my satisfaction, no matter what. I achieved what I felt was the best possible braking balance when I jacked the car up every few Kmiles and adjusted them by hand. Had the same problem in some other cars back in their days.

That is probably not your problem at all though. With the self adjustment mechanism installed, the brakes should not loosen at all. So when set by hand they should only get tighter not looser. A few trips around a dirt parking lot should not wear the shoes significantly. I say adjust the brakes once more to see if it was just a break-in/settle-in issue. If you still have problems perhaps the linings are contaminated. Maybe the rear main seals?

Also do you have taller tires in the back then the front? I believe this would effectively reduce rear braking relative to the fronts. Only by a small percentage though.

In general I was never real happy with the original 10" drums in the first place. In fact I was never real happy with drums ever and was really glad when front disk brakes became popular.

Finally, you may just want to bleed them again, shouldn't hurt.

[johnunit]

So,
She runs now. And drives. Not plated, but has seen brief back-road test drives and lots of parking lot shenanigans.

Got a sound clip of it. Sounds meh at the low-speed full throttle driving, but at least it sounds incredible revving in neutral (near the end of the video).

The Bad:

The tire rubs a bit on the right rear inner fenderwell. Just that side, probably mostly because it sits lower on that side. I hope it's just a weak spring, but we'll see when I put the new ones in.

I may or may not have caught the front half of the intake on fire from leaving a fuel fitting loose. The damage is basically fixed now, but I had to use a fire extinguisher so the underhood is a total mess.

Still haven't hooked up the Lokar TV cable, so all testing/tuning has happened in first gear. Good thing it's good for 50+mph in 1st.

Still takes a bit too long to warm up/not stall. I probably just need to mess with the idle mixture and choke settings a bit more. Also stalls when you let off the gas abruptly, or will just stumble if you're at high RPM's.

Exhaust leaks... pretty close to just handing it over to the highly respected exhaust shop down the street and saying 'make this not suck'. Also it's still dumped at the axle so drone is my homeboy.

Tried the ziptie trick on the collar for the shift indicator, somehow made it worse.

Still have the engine bay wiring almost completely unloomed.

Still have the alternator light on, despite having high 13's voltage at the battery and a fairly new regulator.

From what I can learn in a slightly dusty parking lot, it's going to understeer a lot. Predictable with staggered fitment, but still pretty severe.

The brakes are just plain weak, I think. Again hard to tell from a dusty parking lot, but something is still up with the brakes, especially the rears. Having so much more tire grip accentuates that.

The speedometer needle is wobbly AND louder than before, this after putting in a new speedo cable (and lubing inside the cable sheath quite well).


The Good

My 'hand whitewalled' rear tires are holding up so far to basically every kind of abuse you can dish out in a parking lot and a few brief runs up to 50+mph. Doing the fronts will come after I get the mechanical stuff sorted, but it looks like it'll all work.

It's a lot faster at high RPM's. I wasn't really sure how much the 4 barrel would help. Once the secondaries kick in around 3000RPM, the answer is a lot. Should have plenty of passing power. Not significantly more power down low, but I knew that since it's just an airflow upgrade.

The grip has increased to the point where I can barely keep myself in the driver's seat. I'm very happy with the wheel and tire upgrade, considering I'm still running stock, worn shocks, springs, and bushings.

I finally found the damned vacuum leak that was giving me warm air in the summer. Even if the A/C compressor is basically a 50+ pound idler pulley, it's nice to have non-heated air available.

The timing marks are now accurate. I got out the piston stop and some timing tape from Summit Racing, and found that, as I suspected, the balancer's outer ring had slipped. The TDC mark was off by at least 10 degrees, and the other marks were invisible until I sanded on the balancer to get a good surface to stick the timing tape to. Turns out I was running negative timing. As in 2-4 degrees AFTER top dead center at idle with vacuum advance plugged. No bueno. Idle jumped up ~150RPM by bumping it up to about 4 degrees after top dead center. Unfortunately, I can't go any further without getting up over 40 degrees total advance at high RPM (checked by just revving in park to 3500+). Still, it runs a hell of a lot better with non-insanely retarded timing.




The Questions

Stalling when letting off the gas, how the heck do I fix that? The idle RPM and mixture are reasonable. If anything it's too rich and idling too high. Yet it still tries to die when you let off the gas abruptly. Holley 4160 carb.

The timing issue. I've got the "heavy" springs from the Crane Cams advance kit, and have actually JB welded the holes in the mechanical advance limiters to reduce the total mechanical advance. But it's still adding roughly 40 degrees of timing from at idle with the vacuum advance plugged (base timing) to 3000+rpm. So I worry that in a medium throttle, medium RPM situation I could get both vacuum advance and mechanical advance coming in and detonate/knock badly. But I don't know, this is the first car I've had to set up timing from scratch with.

The shift indicator needle. If I've got the collar that always breaks stable, but still getting extremely sporadic movement from the indicator, what should I be looking towards?

Speedometer needle shaky would maybe be lubing something in the speedo housing, right? I don't think a gear is stripped since this changed while the car was parked.

Alternator light: What will turn it on other than low voltage? It is on steady. Externally regulated alternator. Yes I'll probably go 3G eventually but that's not in the cards time or money wise right now.

Brakes: possibly stupid question, but we do almost no drum brake work in the shop. Will not having my parking brake cables hooked up cause the drums to lose adjustment? They have been removed (totally seized and rotten) but not replaced yet because ohgodrusteverywhere.

[johnunit]

I've seen the rust converter stuff, but I've never actually tried it. As you may know, when you use the Rust Check oil stuff, you have to keep reapplying it, and it doesn't actually stop the rust completely once it's started. Is the rust converter really a more permanent solution? It sounds ideal from the way it's described, but it seems too good to be true.

Better than putting anything traditional over the rust, by a significant margin. But the best plan is always to remove anything that doesn't look like proper metal.

[IPreferDIY]

Current plan is grinding and wire wheel, then rust converter, then asphalt undercoating.

I've seen the rust converter stuff, but I've never actually tried it. As you may know, when you use the Rust Check oil stuff, you have to keep reapplying it, and it doesn't actually stop the rust completely once it's started. Is the rust converter really a more permanent solution? It sounds ideal from the way it's described, but it seems too good to be true.

[johnunit]

Nice! Sounds do-able, if you can post up details of how you did it after all is said and done.

I forgot to say sorry about your other ride! When it went, it went hard!

I've been keeping pictures and annotated wiring diagrams as I go, I'll post it all when I prove it actually works.

Yep, made a hell of a noise. Just glad it didn't take much with it, just the cv shafts really.

[Brown_Muscle]

Thanks. The tunnel now.has some light at the end of it. I can stop being quite so jealous hearing your updates.

I haven't got it all together and prove yet, but short version is I took the computer middleman out and will.now trigger things by temperature, vacuum, a timed.relay, etc.

Nice! Sounds do-able, if you can post up details of how you did it after all is said and done.

I forgot to say sorry about your other ride! When it went, it went hard!

[slack]

Awesome progress! I'm hoping to try some of the POR-15 on my frame before the winter to hopefully keep away having to reweld in sections.

[johnunit]

Awesome progress! Good to see you're still at it. I bet it feels good to have that extra feeling of security, having the car solid once again. How did you get the smog stuff operable on it's own without the MCU? You said something about relays? I know that the MCU controls those solenoids to divert the air from the air pump to different locations depending on temperature and a couple other things, I think without it, it just purges it to atmosphere, making it essentially non-functional.

I considered keeping my smog pump and the MCU just to run it...but ended up ripping it out-engine sounds a lot healthier now, and no problem passing emissions.

I can't wait for the next updates! Will be nice to hear what a 4bbl does to her.

Thanks. The tunnel now.has some light at the end of it. I can stop being quite so jealous hearing your updates.

I haven't got it all together and prove yet, but short version is I took the computer middleman out and will.now trigger things by temperature, vacuum, a timed.relay, etc.

[Brown_Muscle]

Awesome progress! Good to see you're still at it. I bet it feels good to have that extra feeling of security, having the car solid once again. How did you get the smog stuff operable on it's own without the MCU? You said something about relays? I know that the MCU controls those solenoids to divert the air from the air pump to different locations depending on temperature and a couple other things, I think without it, it just purges it to atmosphere, making it essentially non-functional.

I considered keeping my smog pump and the MCU just to run it...but ended up ripping it out-engine sounds a lot healthier now, and no problem passing emissions.

I can't wait for the next updates! Will be nice to hear what a 4bbl does to her.

[johnunit]

Thanks. The reliability improvements have mostly been of the 'well I might as well do it while I'm in there' sort, but having it so thoroughly checked out and fixed up is almost exciting me more than the extra power and grip.

The colour is killer. That's with a quick no-soap rinse after 2+ years under a tree. The colour is part of why I haven't swapped her for something cleaner.

[Hearsesrock427]

Wow! I wasn't expecting this much progress. You've basically got a brand new frame underneath her- I approve of the hit-hard-with-hammer test. Best to fix stuff now and get her running and driving nicely before you start adding power. A fast car with a questionable frame and wonky brakes is a statistic waiting to happen. Then you can hoon with confidence- after you get your lovely jungle of wiring under the hood sorted out. I gotta give you credit for being brave with that stuff- especially keeping the emissions crap! If it were me, I would've just gutted all that shit and grinned like an idiot.

You won't be phased by more modern cars and their miles of wiring at this rate, that's for sure.

I love that shade of blue BTW, reminds me of an old unmarked cop car. Those teal pinstripes really pop out against that dark blue background too! New wheels look great too- she definitely gives off the street machine vibe with those babies on. And I know what you mean about being under the gun drive a summer car! I've probably got three solid good weeks left before I need to park Ebyt, and there's a whole lot of work to be done..... precious little time for hard, fun, driving.

[johnunit]

After a few setbacks I'm in a race to get this thing on the road before it's time to store it for the winter. But I've gotten a lot done.

First off, one of the main setbacks. The engine almost fell out of my other car.

I knew I was pushing my luck with the passenger engine mount on my Mazda3. A bit of wheel-hop in the rain and a sudden awful noise. I cut the engine, pull over, and after calming down start the engine again to a cacophony of noises. Pop the hood and see this:





Look under and see this.... well hello!


The transmission is not supposed to play peekaboo through the undertray.

The passenger side mount can (and did) fail totally without the engine dropping. What happened was the added stress from the passenger side mount doing nothing broke the bracket the driver's side/transmission mount attaches to the engine with. That's the triangular thing with the broken-off top. Then the massive change in position cause the CV shaft to tear apart on the driver's side. That, combined with the engine resting against the strut tower, is the horrible noise I heard at failure. Remarkably, aside from a possible minor vacuum leak somewhere, that's all the damage that was done.



So new mounts, new CV shaft, new summer tires and cross-drilled front rotors, and that car is sorta-kinda out of the way.









As for the crown vic:

Frame repairs are done! Ended up finding a weak spot on the passenger side frame rail too. I can now, if nothing else, say that the entire frame as accessible on a hoist passes the "hit it really hard with a welding hammer" test.


I spent a ton of time screwing around with the brake lines before removing and retightening the fitting where the line to the back goes into the flexhose solved my no-pressure issue. Go figure.

I entirely redid the rear brakes, except for the drums themselves. Wheel cylinders, lines, hardware, backing plate ground down.

Found some nasty grooving of the backing plate and a snapped wire to the self-adjusting mechanism. That'd explain the super-touchy passenger side lockup issues.

Ground the backing plate contact points down as far as I dared and added anti-seize.



Oh and a 1991(?) and newer style starter. Cranks faster, weighs less, draws less, sweet. Big thanks to everyone in the thread below (lots of good links in there) for that.

http://www.grandmarq.net/vb/showthread.php?50606-electrical-questions-with-swapping-to-starter-with-the-solenoid-attached&highlight=

Picked up some more parts, not going on this season though
Police spec shocks all around and a 2500RPM lockup torque converter


Then I did some minor crap not worth mentioning, and fitted my 1.25" spacers on the front. This meant I could finally get it on the ground with my new tire and wheel combo. I still haven't whitewalled the front tires. 255/60/15 on 15X8's front. 295/50/15 on 15X10's rear.



Weld Draglites - love the deep dish on the rear. The fronts aren't as nice, but I may ditch them for deeper-dish fronts that won't require a spacer if I can find them. For now they'll hide most of the time though. The tires are Mickey Thompson Sportsman S/T's, think Radial T/A's but modern and not shit. Whitewalled by me as discussed earlier in this thread.



Covered up with the hubcaps, held on with a bolt through the Weld center caps acting like the original locking setup.





As it sits now, I'm just working my way through making the wiring mess below (Variable Venturi MCU removed, all engine wiring looms opened up) workable with both fully functional emissions and a holley 4-barrel. I have 2 relays to wire up and then it's putting the new distributor (still duraspark, but with less mechanical advance since there's no longer a computer to stave off detonation), new carb, and new intake on. And making the wiring look pretty... and making sure that it all fits under the hood... and test driving the brakes... and... gah. Wish me luck.




So it's not all going to plan, but fingers crossed I'll get to drive the piss out of it for at least a couple weeks this year.

[johnunit]

Are you going to apply some rust treatment products on the frame after the repairs are complete?

Current plan is grinding and wire wheel, then rust converter, then asphalt undercoating.