keithb7

Thank you Robert. Your example encouraged me to get my car out too. Plus, its not too often a Canuck can challenge a southern US location for January weather.

I’m in the January drive club. Finally. It’s the first Canadian winter I think that I’ve had it out in January. Blue clear skies and roads. They say its snowing in Texas today. ?

Awesome. Snow in Texas! It's still dark here. Weather is favourable. My '53 is out and staged....Make a big production out of just a drive? Yes indeed I will. ?

Thax @Dodgeb4yaI really appreciate your tips. Today I wired up my 220V socket in the garage. I ordered a 40 ft extension cord. So I can do my welding out in the driveway. My garage is attached to where we sleep. We won’t be risking any rogue sparks inside the garage. We had a near miss fire incident last evening. Not related to welding. It was tense and a good scary reminder how quickly crap can go sideways.

Bob Cageon! The Hip. Arguably one of Canada’s bands ever. Cheers fellow canuck.

It’s hard to take a bad photo of an old Moapr. Welcome to the forum. Thanks for the introduction. You’ll love it here. This is thee worldwide home for flathead Mopars. Many helpful, kind folks here. Its a great community to be a part of. There are no dumb questions. Ask all you need. Folks will help you. Nice car! Enjoy it.

We’re driving in January in Canada. Snow free roads. It’s snowing in Texas. Lol. Can’t say that very often.

You have given me the idea to take my old Chrysler out tomorrow. If the weather is fine I will. There is no snow left in the valley. There’s a little bit up where I live. Roads are great though. I’ll report back tomorrow.

You guys...Packing up and getting together with old Mopars. I am jealous. I long for a local Mopar buddy. Not found one yet. I have a new goal. Make one of my old Mopars drivable to Southern Alberta! A summer trip would be dandy.

Easy-peasy pump-a-leasy. You can rebuild that. Looks more like a water pump. Lol. Unscrew that nut on the bottom of the glass bowl. Flip the wire retainer up out of the way. The glass bowl will pop off. If not tap it with a rubber mallet, lightly. I happen to have a spare of the exact same pump here. We got your back. You got this pump rebuild.

Looks like you are on the right track for a kit. Does your fuel pump have a vacuum booster incorporated? That big black circle in the top right of the image...Prime suspect. The main diaphragm. Time breaks down the old rubber. Ethanol used in modern fuels speed up the eroding process. I watched a couple of videos on You Tube to get an idea what needed to be done to rebuild the pump. Then I graduated to my Motors Manuals. There are good instructions in there. If you are planning to keep and maintain this '34 Plymouth you should start accumulating a few good service books.

Late this evening before bed, we could smell something burning in the house. We couldn’t tell where the smell was coming from. We got up in the attic. We started pulling off switch and wall plug cover plates around the house. Sniffing for smoke. We could not positively ID where the smell was coming from. We started shutting off electrical breakers. I started thinking about a night watch. We both would not got to bed at the same time. Our home has in floor heating with a boiler. We don’t have a central furnace moving air around. So a central fresh air exchanger is utilized. There are air vents and ducting all over the house. Fresh air is pulled in from outside. Warm air from the house evacuated. The warm air leaving heats up the cool air coming in. We’re not talking a lot of air here. Just a small amount, but steady. One part of the house, it we could smell the burning, more concentrated . We could not find out why. I got up and stuck my nose near the fresh exchange air vent. Yes! I could smell the burning smell stronger than ever. It was entering the room via the fresh air vent. I bolted to the basement and opened up the fresh air exchange system. I touched the blower fan motor. Holy crap! Smoking hot. Literally. We immediately flipped the breaker at the panel and shut it down. I measured 350F at the blower motor with my laser thermometer. I removed the motor to have a look at it. I‘ll get a new one. On the motor it reads “Thermally Protected”. I wonder at what temperature it is designed to shut down? Anyone know? Seems to me it was about to burn up. Middle of the night? Scary thought. Hopefully the 15A breaker for it’s circuit would have tripped. I’m no electrician. A few encouraging words about built-in safety would be reassuring. Thanks. Keith

This 6V pump seen below worked well. It got me out of a bind a couple times. Roadside. Then later for troubleshooting too. Back when I was learning all about these old cars, and what was going on with my fuel system. I finally figured out a couple of things. I JB-welded my mechanical pump fulcrum pin in place. I learned to only run non-ethanol fuel. I figured out where my fuel gauge sat when the tank was bone dry. Then I never needed the electric pump much. I flip it on to prime the system when the car has been sitting for a week or so. That’s about it. The old mechanic pump seems to be doing well, once I rebuilt it.

From my 1938 parts book. It is odd that the don't show the 2 spring clips that hold the throwout bearing to the fork. As seen in the pics above.

I see in the 1938 Parts books, a "pull back spring". Part # 671915. Used on all 1938 Plym. Dodge, Desoto, Chrys cars. Images below.

If you can find a rebuild kit, its not hard to rebuild your pump. Otherwise source a replacement pump. I have not personally bench tested a pump. I did hook up a vacuum & pressure gauge and measured pump pressure when the fuel pump was mounted, cranking engine over. I did successfully rebuild my my first ever fuel pump last winter. Worked well. Wasn't hard. It made 0 psi when I took it off. It made 3.5-4 PSI after I rebuilt it.

Stages in life. We all go thru ‘em. Boats. Motorcycles. Old Mopars. None are needed. Its nice to bring some fun into life. Something to throw money and passion into. If ya can. Work and only saving your money, makes for a pretty boring existence. I did the family boat thing when our boys were young. Water-skiing. Tubing. Etc. Up until they were about 15 years old. Then they got part-time jobs and girlfriends. They had little time for family any more! Then I quickly sold the boat. Don’t miss it one bit. The Kids grew up. Got married. Got their careers going. They came back around. Turns out Mom and Dad are kinda fun to hang out with. Especially when they feed everyone. So now I ask them, “When are you buying a boat?”

Any idea how much sediment is in your block? I found 3” of a dirt floor in my block. No amount of vinegar rinsing would get that out. A good clue to sediment condition is to open your block drain petcock. Any water ir coolant come out?

Forgot to mention, you can also lean into the engine bay and activate the starter linkage, to watch for spark at a plug. Car in neutral. Park brake on. Ignition key on. Pull a spark plug or two. Plug wire re-attached. Lay plug on the cylijnder head so it can ground. Activate foot starter linkage by hand. Look over and watch for sparks at spark plug. Keep away from moving parts. Engine may start!...Then shock you when you go to open the door handle, to shut off the key. Lol. Don't ask me how I know this.

You are getting closer! Good news. It does sound like you are experiencing a fuel delivery issue. Remove the fuel line off of the float bowl. Lean over into the starting motor in the engine bay. Leave ignition key off. Tranny in neutral Park brake on. Push the foot starter linkage, with your hand, from within the engine bay, leaning over the left fender. So the foot linkage engages the starter into the flywheel ring gear. Push the linkage further to engage the starter switch and get the engine cranking over. Watch the fuel line. Is there fuel spurting out of the fuel line you just disconnected from the carb bowl? It could take a while of cranking if there is no fuel left in the lines. If no fuel pumps out, the fuel pump will likely need to come off for inspection. Could be the rubber diaphragm in it is spent? Valves stuck? Not hard to remove and re-install the fuel pump. If bowl is stuck on this leads me to believe the pump is old, crusty and probably needs work. A careful tap with a rubber mallet may release the glass fuel bowl. If you are getting fuel spurting out while cranking over the engine... Stop cranking the engine. Go re-attach fuel line to the carb bowl. Crank engine over some more. Fill up the fuel bowl. Remove the air cleaner. Look down the carb venturi. Cycle the throttle linkage all the way open and closed a few times. You should be able to see a raw jet stream of fuel squirting into the venturi from the accelerator carb pump. If not, open up the carb bowl and inspect next. Main inlet needle & seat working properly?

@Sam Buchanan Another perspective on the front cover differences is shown. In the past I have sprayed my tranny gaskets with Permatex Copper to help seal them up. Seems to work fine. Not hurting anything anyway. Trannies are fun!...Despite the mess.

Doh! Never thought of that. I suppose thru trial and error I’ll find out. I have a pretty good array of technical and parts books for my ‘38. This one supplements them. I’ll cross reference things and find out.

My Hollander Exchange book arrived today. Wow. Lots of good info in there. Mine’s dated 1950. I’d recommend it you are a Mopar geek. Fixing your own cars.

My car is positive ground. My engine is currently removed, so the distributor and wire is out with it. The way I came to wire mine up like this is: I figured positive ground. When the points close it lets the 6V in the outer (primary) coil go to ground. So the positive side of coil, (primary winding) goes to ground. Ground is positive. Makes sense to me.

I used the original key switch and wire. I spliced-on an extra length of old cloth wire I had kicking around. Solder and heat shrink the splice . There already was a hole in the firewall. I added a rubber grommet to the hole to protect the wire from rubbing through on the sheet metal. I fed my wire to negative side of new 6V coil. Works perfectly. The old metal tube with the wire inside it, was an early anti theft device. The hot wire to the coil was encased in a shield of armor. Might take a thief 30 seconds longer to hot-wire it and drive away. I cut the metal wire shield and tossed it away. Just leaving the wire. I’m not too worried about anyone stealing my ‘38. Most don’t know what a stick shifter is. Lol. Besides it rarely leaves my line of sight. I’m not sure what size that old cloth wire is. If I were buying a piece of wire today, I’d probably go with 12 ga. No smaller. 10ga would be nice too. The 6V system sure loves fat wires. A few pics of my hack work. I’m not trying to build a show winning car. I’m trying to drive and reliably enjoy an old car that looks like it just came off the farm. So far that’s working for me!