Dan Hiebert

I think this year's eclipse is being touted so much because the moon is closer the Earth than other recent ones, so there will be more of the sun blocked out / bigger shadow on the planet. I'd say it's not something I'd go out of my way for, but I don't have to. It's coming to me this time. Weather permitting, I'll hang-out on the deck with a six-pack and "experience" it (not even gonna try to look directly at it, even with a welding helmet, I'll watch the shadows, if there are any). I'm just amazed at how many people are predicted to be here, and how there is no way this area can be expected to handle it. We can only hope/assume everyone coming here knows there's already not much here. The locals speak in hushed tones about a Phish concert here in the County several years ago that completely shut the County down for two days, and there were only "thousands" of extra people. No gas, no groceries, no parking, no movement, nothing, just people everywhere. I-95 was a parking lot for 25 miles from the border (yeah, yeah, that's normal in some places, but sometimes up here you can drive on it for 60 miles and not see another car, if there's three cars between you and the horizon, traffic is heavy).

We tried thread lock, didn't work. Unknown about the other. Kind of a matter of how much work should an agent put into changing a flat. We were supposed to be LEOs, not mechanics, no one is hired for mechanical skills, although not having some basic mechanic skills could leave you in the desert by yourself for many hours. And, yes, we did have a good number of agents that didn't know how to change a flat in the first place. We had significantly fewer agents back then, five or six thousand nationwide, there's close to 19K now. Where I was stationed then had 8 agents to cover 64 miles of the border over three shifts. Back-up was often already an hour or two away. I often gave up on back-up getting there in time and did stuff to effect seizures or arrests that would be considered insane nowadays, back then, everyone at the smaller stations did the same thing. That extra few minutes to do more than tighten all the lug nuts if you happened to get a flat at the wrong time could make a huge difference. I vaguely recall that it was finally figured out to be how the wheel studs were made, as in the composition of the metal, a cost cutting measure that didn't work. They held up fine in civilian use, but we tended to be a bit rougher on vehicles. I still find it humorous that when the Ford reps did ride-alongs to try and figure out what was going on, they were aghast that most of our work was off paved roads. Those model Expeditions were apparently designed for 4x4 use only in poor road conditions.

When I was working in far west Texas in the '90's, we had Ford Expeditions in our fleet (US Border Patrol), I forget what year model they were, but it was the fleet purchase for one year. Among other issues we were having with them, the wheels tended to come off on the highway. Seeing a USBP Expedition on the side of the road with a missing tire got to be a running joke with all the local law enforcement agencies. Good thing social media didn't exist at the time, I'm sure we would have been the brunt of many memes. Thankfully, to my knowledge, no one ever got hurt from it. Anyway, USBP tried to fix the problem by mandating torquing to OE specs, I think it was 90 ft lbs., every 1000 miles. That didn't work, so we gradually reduced the mileage to every 50 miles, and it was still a problem. Ford ended up sending reps to several field locations, their solution to the problem was to torque the lug nuts to 130 ft lbs. The wheel falling off problem went away, but we had to buy better lug wrenches than the factory ones for every single Expedition so the agents could get the wheels off when they got a flat, some of the "less robust" agents would still end up calling for help to get lug nuts off.

Wildcat Auto Wrecking in Salem Oregon (wildcatmopars.com), Mopar only salvage yard.

Start simple. Flush it in both directions with clean water. Pay attention to the flow in each direction, as well as how much stuff is in the water. If it doesn't flow to your satisfaction, or if you don't like how much gunk is in the water, then apply more caustic remedies. Check for leaks by submerging the radiator after it's drained and using air. Plug the filler neck, inlet, and outlet, apply air to the overflow at very low psi, as in no more than 5 psi or so. Any leaks will be more apparent this way.

For consideration, I purchased a carb rebuild kit from these folks (The Carburetor Doctor) last year. The carburetor in our D24 has an odd number that this Forum helped track down, and then this shop was very helpful in finding the correct kit, a kit for the "normal" D24 carb would not have had all the parts. Carburetor kits, parts and manuals (carbkitsource.com)

Out of curiosity. Many of us will be in the path of the total eclipse on April 8. Although I'm rather "meh" about an eclipse, apparently there is a huge following for them. Houlton, ME is the last place in the U.S. it will be seen from, and has the longest duration in the U.S. The locals are anticipating 10,000 to 40,000 people to be in the area for it. We've been planning for it for over a year, making a whole weekend event out of it. This will be "interesting" since this area cannot handle even the low end of that estimate, absolutely zippo infrastructure for it. Houlton's population is only around 6K, there are only 51 hotel rooms in town. The missus is doing a baked goods sale in town that Saturday, other than that, my plan is to hole up at home the week before and after. We'll have to stock up on supplies a couple weeks before hand, things are already running out. Even though there's a 79% likelihood it will be overcast, and even a 30% chance it will be snowing, we're still expecting hordes of people. What are your areas expecting or planning for?

We usually have 3-5 feet of snow on the ground this time of year, but this year there's only a few inches in the woods, and none on the open ground. So far, the roads only had to be plowed three times this winter, what is usually a weekly event. It was 40 degrees out yesterday (t-shirt weather here) and I was sorely tempted to at least get the Beetle out, but it's too muddy between the shop and the driveway. The good ol' D24 is still partly disassembled from fixing the frame. Still addressing a myriad of little things I discovered. I generally plan to get the old cars out and about in May, despite the springlike weather, it's still "only March". In the meantime, I get a kick out of you'uns getting your cars out. Provides additional inspiration!

I don't know how much castor oil and butyl alcohol costs, I'm assuming not very much. DOT5 is relatively expensive, I think I paid a bit over $30 for a quart about 20 years ago. But, DOT5 is readily available, does not attract moisture, and does not damage paint (if those are your concerns), and in a well sealed system, lasts a very long time. Personally, when it comes to safety things like the brakes, I wouldn't try to out-engineer something that is already proven to work well.

Ach, I'll admit I'm the a-hole driver...in many other drivers' eyes. Speed limit, turn signals, obey traffic laws, "usually courteous" (nobody's perfect), etc. But I don't do it out of a sense of virtue, it's more like...spite! I know it annoys the heck out of bad drivers to no end.

Ahh, tales of sewer / septic woe. Once upon a time, in a land far away, (round about SE Illinois), my brother and I inherited the annual purge of the septic tank on our grandparents' farm when we were about 8 or 9. 100-ish year old farm house with add on bathroom and afterthought septic system. When that was plugged, we always had the ol' two-holer originally issued with the farm. We were provided "the bucket" with a rope on the handle and couldn't do anything else until the tank was emptied. Thankfully it wasn't the first chore of the summer to make us rue visiting grandma and grandpa, so we'd generally forget that was on the agenda until the visit was almost over. Thats when I first heard the analogy "five gallons of poop (you'uns can probably guess that's not the exact word he used) in a two-gallon bucket", from our grandpa. I don't recall being overly put out by it, other than being kids that didn't want to "work", but our grandparents and any visiting relatives were certainly impressed by how bad we smelled, and kids being kids, we kind of relished that. Our grandma "bragged" about how bad we'd get to smelling during that chore until the day she died. And I still don't like messing with plumbing, although I will when necessary. I'd like to say I don't smell as bad after any plumbing chores, but the missus may disagree...

I had completely rebuilt the brakes on the D24 before I began using the DOT5. I ensured all the fittings were as tight as possible, so I wouldn't have any "micro leaks". I wasn't thinking bleeding problems, but there were some seeps in the original system that really annoyed me, and I took this as the chance to prevent that from happening again. I slowly and methodically bled the system using both a vacuum draw from the cylinders, and the good old fashioned pumping the pedal method, to the point that if I had been working for a brake shop, I would have been fired for taking too long. It seemed more challenging to get the system bled right with the DOT5. The main reasons I used DOT 5 had to do with the car sitting idle in occasionally heated garages during long cold winters in humid climates, since the DOT5 doesn't draw moisture; and that it isn't (as) corrosive in case I did get leaks. This is going on 20 years ago, other than the mushy brake feel, I have had absolutely no problems with the brakes, no leaks, no weeping, nothing. I haven't even needed to add any brake fluid in that time. Our garage is constantly heated here, but the car still sits idle for at least 6 months every winter, and Spring can be humid with wide temperature variations, so I think I'll be sticking with the DOT 5. That said, I don't use DOT5 in any of the other cars, they are driven much more often.

I use DOT5 brake fluid in the D24. I would call the brake feel "mushy", but I have good braking action.

I dunno...does Sniper mean there's not a lot of content...or not enough intelligence in the content...?

That candy affect seems more Christmassy, but the original looks nice, too.

There was really no U.S. standardization for driver position until the 1940's or so. Joe Citizen could order a car with right-hand drive if he wanted, still can. There are a couple U.S. Postal Service contractors up here that have "civilian" right hand drive Jeeps. That and the export market already mentioned, so car companies designed their cars for minimum cost and manufacturing effort to go between right and left hand drive, easiest way to do that was to put the instruments in the middle so those didn't have to be changed, another was to make that instrument package so it could easily transfer from left to right. There is still no statute requiring cars in the U.S. to be left hand drive.

I have the same issue with my number 3 and 4 cylinders. It is definitely oil, which doesn't pool, but there's enough to need sopping up. I'm pretty sure it's a combination of blow-by past the rings and more so worn valve guides. I've noticed on many L6's that there seems to be issues with valves and cylinders closer to the carb, I have theories why, but that would be a different conversation. But - you can indeed have the same issues at all the cylinders. (Someone brought up an oil additive touted to stop smoking and blow-by a few months ago, perhaps that is the "stop leak" being referenced.) I had the coolant pooling in the #1 spark plug well as well. The thermostat housing was the culprit, in part the same issue as kiethb7, which I fixed in the same manner (he had posted his resolution previously). But it still leaked a little afterwards. What I noticed is that I could not get a socket or box wrench over the left side bolt, had to use an open end wrench (which I did not appreciate, because I rounded off the bolt almost every time). I took a grinder to the area on the housing adjacent to the bolt to the point I could get a socket over it, which allowed the housing to be moved to the left ever so slightly, which took it a tad further away from that radius from the top of the head into the spark plug well. Absolutely no issue since. Exactly why it worked I couldn't tell you, but it worked.

You must get the same responses I do when I take the '37 Terraplane to shows and such..."a what?"..."who made that?" I like the bold script idea.

Chin up! We understand the need to vent, it helps. Life happens, can't do much about that, but you have options to get your car up and running. Silver lining to the over-the-road dark cloud is that putting your car in a long queue may not be a bad option, since you're out on the road a lot. That also gives you the opportunity to seek out a decent shop, which are indeed far and few in between. I had to wait almost a year to get our Dodge's radiator restored! It would have been longer if I'd gone out of State. Unknown who you drive for, but mayhaps you have backhaul (that's what the truckers up here call it) opportunities to get either the whole car, or just the engine, to a shop and back. I don't know of any shops that work on older engines that don't have a waiting list, because there are many more that can't or won't do that work, for whatever reason. These things can take a while, you've got a nice car and plans for how you want to enjoy it, don't lose hope.

The Amish communities do most of the ice harvesting in these parts. They don't seem to have any qualms getting out when the ice is thinner than usual. But their equipment is horses, sleds, and hand saws. They have some pretty sturdy horses, but still nowhere near as heavy as trucks (duh). They use the horses to gauge the ice, if the horse steps out and goes "nope", they'll leave that patch alone. We're at -4 here right now, but it's supposed to get into the 40's next week for a couple days - right in the middle of our annual ice fishing trip.

I guess I've been lucky as well. Racking my brain for a good response, since I'm bound to have crossed paths with a bad part or two in 40 or so years, but I got nothing. Probably some small things that didn't imprint because I didn't expect much in the first place, but nothing major comes to mind. We had one whole (new) car that was poop, but that's a different story.

If it's the original window seal, I think you'll be opening a can of worms. It'll be hardened by time, and you may have difficulty getting the trim out without damaging the trim or the weatherstrip. And for sure difficulty getting it back in. The leak is probably around the glass or body, not the trim. When the weatherstrip gets old and hard, it also shrinks a bit, enough to start leaking. You may be able to work some window sealer in around the glass, body, or both, where it's leaking. Otherwise, the better plan may be replacing the window seal altogether.

Our Terraplane was undercoated when it was "restored" the first time, long before we got it. It did not adversely affect anything preservation wise...but...it covered some repairs that were not well done. I've had to add significant time to any work under the car to remove that undercoat. It's actually made me defer some repairs because I usually don't feel like dealing with it. So, I wouldn't recommend undercoating. You can achieve sound deadening and insulation with interior applications. A good clean, prep, and paint job on the underside will serve well to preserve that. In these parts, folks lean towards epoxy paints for any parts of the vehicle with weathering concerns.

I've always had pretty good luck with Andy Bernbaum. Other sources may be Kanter auto products and AMS Obsolete. Kanter has everything listed online, but phone calls sometimes help, and they'll note when a phone call is really needed. AMS (amsnos.com) often has hard to find parts, but can be expensive, especially if it's a really hard to find part. Phone calls and patience work best with them, they get new inventory all the time that won't be on their website.

This project proved to be interesting, if not really as hard as I anticipated. I think the hardest part was getting the cowl trim pieces off - had to break out the list of appropriate expletives. The rest was just carefully unbolting stuff so I could remove the doghouse. I didn't have any help, so I took everything apart, as opposed to removing the doghouse in one piece. The frame metal moved easier than I thought, but I still had to apply good heat to the passenger side frame horn to get it to move without ripping more that it was, it was really bunged up. The bottom quarter or so was actually torn apart, I had to use some 1/4" rod to fill in the gap along the bottom, and patch a hole in the side. I used a 4-ton portable ram, a couple BFHs, heat, and a prybar to get the metal where I wanted it, then a mig welder to keep it there. The passenger side isn't perfect, but the front frame measurements are now where they're supposed to be, so my bumper will sit straight, and the passenger side won't jiggle. Clean, prep, and paint, at it looks pretty darn good. Alas, I did not see fit to take any photos. The take-away is that it was not that hard with the right tools and a bit of patience. I was expecting a fight, since I had recently tried to fix some of the banged-up frame on our Terraplane, and that wouldn't budge. While I've got it apart, I'm fixing some small stuff that I didn't know how to fix, or have the tools to fix, the last time I had the doghouse off 32 years ago. Some of it I forgot about, none of it can be seen under casual observation, but I will feel better knowing it's fixed right.