keithb7

Sorry Plymouthy Adams, I correct the title. It should have read 1953 Plymouth - What owners are saying.

Hi folks, recently I happened to locate a pile of vintage magazines from the 1940's through 1960's. I rifled through them to try and find any information about Mopar products. I singled out info mostly around the years of my 1953 Windsor, and took them home. I thought I might scan the articles and share them on the internet so others could enjoy them. I am thinking maybe I should go back and get the whole pile of books. There are many. I believe I saw some as far back as the early '40s. It might be fun and interesting for members here. If this is interesting let me know, I'll keep on scanning and consider getting the rest of the magazines. Hopefully the images are readable. I scanned them as jpegs. I am open to other suggestions of how to proceed if anyone has some ideas to improve the format. I will post more Mopar articles as time permits. If anyone wants their own copy, you may be able to right click and save on your computer? Or just contact me and I will email the images directly to you. I'll begin my project with the first article here. The Magazine is Popular Mechanics. Dated May 1953, priced at 35 cents. This month featured an article on "What Owners Say About The Plymouth". Here is the article:

Well, finally I am back out cruising. It's been a very busy August and into Sept. I had my '53 out today for a heck of a great time. I wanted to check in here, update the thread and share the fun. I'll start by going back to August. My father passed away in August. Eventually brain cancer took him. He was 74 and diagnosed 6.5 years ago. He had 3 brain surgeries and we were grateful for the extended time we got with Dad. I spent tons of time with Dad, and he loved my '53 Windsor Deluxe. Things got crazy busy from there. Then our 2 sons left home for University. Both are gone. Now it's just Momma and I. This past week was our first grocery shop for 2 in over 20 years. It was fun, and cheap! Here's Dad and I back in June. This was Dad's last trip to visit our family in our home. Unfortunately my Windsor Deluxe was down for a valve job at the time. Dad cared little. He was very excited to get in and feel the luxury of the old Chrysler. From right inside the garage. Today the Canadian autumn weather was perfect. Sunny but cooler. I fired up the '53 and went for a few different cruises around town. I found 2 different excuses to head out, to go buy what I needed in the old girl. I meet so many neat people when I am out in the '53. (That's we call it, "The '53") Someone pulled up behind me when I parked, and he got out to talk to me. The fellow told me he saw me drive by about 3 miles back and chased me down. LOL. He had to talk to me about the car. He said, "I had to come talk to you and find out all about this beautiful car." He went on, "I cannot recall seeing one in many years. This is the first old Chrysler Windsor I have seen in this town." We chatted for about half an hour. He asked me what the fuel milage was. "I have no idea", I told him. I drive it for pure pleasure. I stop for gas and drop in $10 or $20 whenever I feel like it. I guessed, when I told him it got about 12-15 MPG. I said "A better gauge would be, How many smiles per mile does it get?" Most days when I take it out, I gotta be getting over 3 smiles, thumbs up, head-nods and waves per mile. From strangers. Easily 3, maybe more. I went in to a store to buy a gallon of brake fluid. I am preparing for the brake overhaul on the '53. I came out of the store to find this: A senior couple posing for a photo. They were total strangers to me. Their son with his iphone up, taking the shot. We met, they congratulated me on the car. We had a few laughs and they really enjoyed the car. Grandpa was looking at the chrome dash assembly and smiling. Grandma was looking in at the back seat and smiling. Lol. Maybe bringing back some memories. I cruised past a few new vintage-car friend's homes that I have met, since buying the '53. I enjoyed lots of good socializing and laughs. My last stop was at a local senior's home, who I also met through my car. He is down sizing and selling off lots of his stuff. I have bought a few things from him. He owns a 1955 Pontiac. Today I bought a vintage 1950's bake-lite tube, home radio from him. Also some 1953 to 1954 Popular Mechanics magazines. I went through a huge pile and picked out several with car reviews from the 1950's. I have a Desoto review article from 1952. One on what owners are saying about their 1954 Chryslers. Another Giant Supplement on all 1953 cars for review. A review on 1953 plymouths, and finally, 1953 - "The Owners Report On The Dodge". I am anxious to get started reading all these Mopar review articles. I plan to scan them all and upload them here for sharing. I will be sure to start new posts for each article that I scan and share. I was thinking there might be a few folks on here who might enjoy them. Here's my radio find. I will service this tube AM radio myself and have it working like new. Also here you can see how I solved my modern iphone charging problem. My iphone charger is in the trunk. It doubles as a booster pack for the 6V slow cranker. Mind you I have had no use for it's boosting power yet. My 6V electrical system is in great condition and performs flawlessly. The car starts no problem, even after sitting for prolonged periods. I continue to find great new things and interesting people through my car. I am amused at how it has enriched my life. I had no idea. - Keith

Exhaust valve clearances? No idea. Never owned an 8. Sorry, I'm throwing darts. I'll follow along to learn.

@greg g My car is running great as mentioned. I am enquiring about valve timing just to learn from other's experiences. I have no symtoms with my car. I was reading about someone else's troubles, and I've reviewing my own depth of knowledge on the. Subject. Peresonally, when I look at the front timing gears on a flat 6, and the chain length, I too have trouble believing the chain could skip a tooth. I am in agreement that there are many other questionable parts and systems on the car that I would inspect before ever looking at the timing chain. I am merely asking to further my knowledge on the subject. Thanks.

First off, my car is running great. No concerns. I got to scratching my head about camshaft timing. Hypothetical question here: If a flat 6 old mopar timing chain skipped 1 tooth, is this enough to see low compression? Would a simple compression test reveal lower numbers across all cylinders? I tend to think a compression test would reveal low numbers. No? Normal symtoms would probably include poor running engine. No acceleration. Backfiring. Exhaust noise through carb. Correct? To check cam timing , am I correct to say rad, fan, crank pulley and front timing coverre to come off? Depending on model of car. Could valve timing be verified another way? Using #6 TDC locator hole in cylinder head and checking valves? Maybe by using a degree wheel? Or no, best to just access and view timing gears? Thanks. i just love learning more on the old engines. Keith

https://racine.craigslist.org/pts/d/chrysler-flathead-6-rebuilt/6253011079.html

MAPP gas and air: 2,020 °C (3,670 °F) Propane and air: 3,623 degrees Fahrenheit or 1,995 degrees Celsius The difference appears negligible based on the info I found.

I have been busting my knuckles, stripping heads and breaking hardware for years. School of hard knocks I guess. No real training. I just kept learning from my mistakes. I have never used anything hotter than propane. It sucks in many situations but in some smaller-ish applications I've had luck. The reason I've tried nothing else is, I have no access to oxy/acetyne torches. I have never welded, and no access to one. The older I got I found that I had more patience. I learned a few tricks. I learned to take my time. Soaking parts in penetrating oil and leaving it overnight has worked sometimes. Tapping the tool end with a small hammer helps free things up sometimes too . Then lastly theres the reverse drill bits and easyouts. Hand-filing to re-shape bolt heads, was a good lesson to remind younger me to use the right tool for the job. If you've got nothing else, take some heat to it. Even propane might help. Worth a try. Some oil. Some tap, tap tapping. Add Time. Try fastnee and repeat as necessary. Fast it ain't. I've gotten things done one way or another.

By chance I was crawling around under my '53 with a grease gun just this week. I really need to get into my manual and research where all the zerks are. There's certainly lots of them. I have decided it's time I invest in a pistol grip grease gun with a rubber whip Some zerks won't take grease. I'll be pulling those and replacing with new. Then there's all the shifter linkage. We'll get 'er done.

Thanks for the illustrations on the oil flow folks. I did see the little oil reservoirs near the tappets. That makes sense. They supply oil for the tappet shaft as it travels up and down. I'll guess oil does not readily get in between the end of the tappet adjuster and the valve stem?

One question. How does the valve train get lubrication? I see no sign of any oil getting tossed around at idle. Does oil get splashed around when the engine is rev'd up, finding it's way to the tappet adjusters? Thx.

Finally I got around to checking and adjusting the valves on my '53 Chrysler. I did a valve job in June. I set the valves best I could, cold. The car has been running well. Those in the know, say the valves need to be checked with the engine hot. Even better, while it's running. Well for me, this was a first. When I first learned about setting valves on a running engine, I laughed. Good Lord, why would anyone tell someone to sick their hands inside a hot running engine ? Well, I finally got some time to do it today. I took the car out for a ride. I got it nice and hot. Came back to a driveway with all the tools lay'd out in advance ready to go. Like a pit stop, I had it jacked up and the valves exposed in little time. I fired up the engine and I checked all my intake and exhaust valves. I did find a couple of exhaust valves were a little tight. As I expected, as they expand more as they heat up. I shut off the engine, made a quick adjustment, then fired it up again to check valves again. The hot, engine-running valve set enlightened me as to exactly why this needs to be done. You can really feel those feeler gages being pulled in when it's right. My intakes were all good, in spec. I made adjustments to my exhaust and I feel a lot better about properly cooling those hot valves while I am driving. After I was done, I put together a quick unedited, unscripted video for anyone interested in seeing how I did this. Sorry about trying the talk over the engine. It's hard to clearly hear what I am saying when my camera was so close to the engine. It feels great to do, and learn something new. I only burnt my left arm once near my wrist. Totally worth it! - Keith https://youtu.be/aameeYT7SXQ

I wait for sale prices then I stock up and buy a year's worth. For all my vehicles. I do this for engine oil and oil filters as well. I have the room so can do this.

Did you get a lot of incorrect or inferior low quality parts from Rock Auto? Please elaboate. So far my orders for '53 Windsor parts from Rock have been good. Thx.

I believe 15W-40 oil is thicker, slower moving oil than 10W-30. It would make sense that you will possibly see slightly more oil pressure on the gage. Even when fully warmed up, it will stay thicker.

The big annual, local car show was yesterday and today. I have been putting off repairs, for fear of having to sit out the show. Thursday night I was like a kid on Christmas Eve. The weekend events began on Friday at 5 pm where I headed down to register for the poker run. My wife and mother-in-law came along. We had a lot of fun. We followed instructions to 18 different stops around our city where we drew cards from a deck. Prizes were awarded for the best poker hands. We ended up with Flush of hearts, ace high. Not enough to win anything, but we sure had fun. Several stops were at Senior Villages. The old folks loved seeing the old cars. My 53 was a hit. Lots of waves smiles and horn honing ensued. It was a hot night. Lots of stop and go traffic. If you've been to Kamloops you know we are surrounded by considerable hills in all directions. The old L6 held up well. I thought I might overheat climbing up the big hills, starting from a red light at the bottom. I think were close, but we did not overheat. I was able to get my speeds up again and she cooled down quickly. I have never overheated yet, so I am not sure where that happens on the temp gauge. Lots of other cars did overheat. Newer cars than mine did. I was a proud man, with my big old Chrysler puling them big hills. At one stop, there was a gas station near by. My wife grabbed a poker card while I put in $30 gas. Sitting there getting gas, I am pretty sure I had fuel vaporizing in the fuel line while sitting. After the fuel up I was fuel starved for a bit, attempting to climb yet another hill. I came to a stop after the engine stalled. No traffic, so I rolled backwards, pulled a reverse u-turn and glided back down the hill. Started the car, and burned through any fuel vapour. Got to the bottom, turned around and pulled that hill no problem. I think I will get a longer fuel line and move it farther away from the manifolds. Maybe also wrap it in some heat insulation. We had fun and put about 60 miles on the car maybe that night. Sat morning, today, I met with the local ACAA Vintage Car Club at 7am. We gathered to enter the car show all together. We paraded in to a full reserved bock in the downtown core. That was exciting. A 1931 plymouth was behind me, and a 1941 Dodge in front. Here we are heading into town. I was pretty jacked up. The blue 1941 Dodge was a nice car. Canadian built with a 218. The owner is 87. I am told he will forget more about L6 Mopar engines than I will probably ever learn. We had a great chat. He restored his '41, back in the 1983. He has since towed a RV trailer all the way across Canada and back to BC two times. He had pics of this rear tires dipping in the Pacific ocean in Victoria BC, and his front tires dipping in the Atlantic ocean in St. John's Newfoundland. He told me one trip, return was about 12,500 KM (7,767 miles). I was impressed to hear, he'd done it twice in the same car over the years. I picked his brain a bit about the car. I really enjoyed the gentleman's company. I look forward to spending more time with him at future car club events. I asked him how long his points and condenser lasted on the trip across Canada and back. He said he had no problem. He had spares but never used them. No problems with ignition system during either trip. I was again pretty impressed. He said his buddies are doing the same cross Canada tour again now. He's be there with them but at 87 he decided to pass this time around. Maybe I should volunteer to drive him across the continent and back in his car? Wouldn't that be great? Engine compartment 1941 Dodge: Here is my '53 next to an unrestored 1931 Plymouth. It was painted a couple years ago, but that's it. Owner told me it was originally from Chicago. He said he thinks the car was owned by some type of Gangster or other. He has found three custom hidden areas for hiding things in various locations in the car. One under the dash he is pretty sure was for a hand gun. Could be an embellished story. Who knows? Sounds neat and believable though. Not a bad place to spend the day, tucked in with some great company. The streets were packed all day. I met tons of new friends and many, many people loved my big old '53. Again, I was the only 50's and older Chrysler at the show. I did see a 1960-something Chrysler Windsor at the show. Totally different car. One guy said "Wow, this is rare. You never see these old Windsors any more it seems." One guy offered to buy it. Many had their photos taken with it. I was in heaven all day talking about all the neat little things about my car. I must have educated 10 or more people in the workings of a Fluid Torque Drive transmission. The creme car with wood spokes was a 1920-something Studebaker. Two rear mechanical brakes only. External round brake straps around a drum. Dicey! If I had to give up my Chrsyler today, I would still be very happy. In such a short time I have enjoyed many great experiences with it. It has brought so much joy to me and my family. I have met so many great people, through my car. I had no idea. Vintage cars are so rewarding to work on, and so much fun to own. Everyone here knows that! I can't think of many times where I have struck up wonderful conversations with 100 total-strangers, in one day. A simple car conversation turns into great stories about their Dad, Grandpa or Uncle who bought one new in the 1950's. So interesting. Good times!

Worden are you running bias ply or radial tires? I find my bias tires are a little more of a wrestle on grooved up pavement, compared to radials. Especially older asphalt with lots if heavy truck traffic. Ruts, sort of wide gutters, develop in the asphalt from heavy trucks. She's a bit of a squirrel in those ruts with bias tires on.

Ok, but this feels kinda like showing off my Boy Scout badges. I can't get it all in one pic. But here's the smaller hand tools in the chest. Recent MOPAR required tools are on the floor. I pulled them out to show them off. Rear hub puller, vintage L-head valve spring tool, vintage valve seat cutter tool. All worked very well, I must say. I have click-y torque wrenches, tap and die sets, endless sockets up to 1/2", tone of pliers including Oetker pliers. Mity-Vac, heat guns, soldering gear, to call out a few things. I have been collecting tools for about 30 years now. I figure if I am doing a job myself, it only takes one time to pay for the tool. Quite often, the more expensive the tool, the more expensive it would be to pay someone else to do the job. So I buy whatever I need. After 20 years of putting up with a crappy floor jack, I finally went out and bought a 2T decent floor jack on wheels. Why I put up with a crappy one for 20 years, I have no idea. Tons more bigger stuff like compressor, chain hoist, jack stands...You know the usual stuff. I have my eye on a 120V AC 70A MIG Welder. I never learned to weld. Its about time I tried. Coming soon I'd say.

My '53 is definitely raked forward. The suspension appears stock, as far as I can tell. It seems all the pics I can find of same era Windsor's, are lower a bit at the rear. Even old ads and drawings, that I have seen. My higher rear end seems a little too high to me. It seems the rear wheel wells come down to almost the red Chrysler emblem on the hub cap. Mine are much higher near the edge of the hub cap. You can somewhat see the rear height below here: Do all I need to lower the rear a bit are spacer blocks and longer u-bolts? Is it that simple? Maybe all others I am seeing are lowered? For example:

Uh oh. Something is up. Thats the block coolant drain in the pic. There's no oil in there. Unless oil is entering the cooling system. Got any pics of the brown crud you found when you removed your rad cap? Is it possibly oil mixed in with the coolant?

I read these discussions about breakerless ignition upgades with intetest. My '53 is still original. It runs very well. I'm not sure I need solid state ignition but I do ponder the idea of it. Wondering when it best offers advantages? Maybe it's good for folks who aren't comfortable setting and maintaining points? If I were preparing my car for a long epic adventure? Like a tour clear across Canada. Would solid state offer better reliability for such a trip? Do folks generally just keep spare points and condensor, feeler gauge and small file in the trunk?

TimFX did you remove the lower rad hose to flush it multiple times? Or just drain it at the little rad drain petcock, then refill?

Yes thats it. Just twist it until the coolant flows out. No need to try and remove the drain assembly completely.

Yes. Look for block drain petcock on the side of the block near distributor. Open it and the block will drain.