keithb7

Your Chrysler is a beauty @RobertKB. I would indeed find it very challenging to pass up a Chrysler from the same period. I can understand the a decision to sell. We can only keep so much. Sometimes something has to go before another project can be brought home. I went through that this summer with the Airflow offering. Do you have a photo of all three of your current cars together? I'd like to see that.

2020 is all wrapped up for my ‘38. The insurance expires at mid-night tonight. Today we had fair weather. Cloudy. No rain. 47 F. Heater was on. The driver window down for arm turn signals. I put on about 70 miles today. It was a nice back country cruise. Total miles in my ‘38 this year is 1553. 2500 KM for my fellow Canadians. A great year. I learned a ton this year. My perception of the general public has improved somewhat too! I’ve met so many nice strangers who approached to talk about, and view my car. Among my favourite stops all year was the gas station. That’s where most people approached me. 2020 cruising season was a rough one in many ways. My ‘38 kept things more fun and positive. My maiden year in this car, it never left me stranded. Never saw a tow hook. Sure I ran out of gas 2x, but I’m no longer a rookie. I always had extra gas in the trunk! The bugs were all worked out and the car became better and better, as the miles added up. These are tough old cars. It was 83 years ago that the steel was being made for this car. With the right owner another 83 years is likely achievable. I stopped on the hill home for a final 2020 photo. She pulled the grade well. Running strong. Maintaining 40 mph she zipped right up. Here’s hoping the cruising 2021 season turns out as well!

Ah the good old days...People would pack into jets to visit new lands. Throw hard earned money around to go get away from it all for a little while. A hot tropical destination felt pretty good in Feb. Especially after a few months into a cold snowy northern winter. This Feb maybe I'll crank a space heater in the bathroom. Fill up the bathtub with hot water. Play some Jimmy Buffet and shoot some tequila, chased by a few Dox Equis. Where did you like to go to get away for a bit, during a crappy cold winter? Mexico? Bahamas? Belize? Antigua? Hawaii? Arizona? For me a 6 hour flight from here was about my limit for a 1 week vacation. I could get to some pretty warm spots. A cruise out of Miami was fun. Cancun was ok but a dang Mexican tourist trap! I thoroughly enjoyed Belize 13 years ago. Suspect I'd be disappointed if I went back today. We really enjoyed Cay Caulker. San Ignacio. Tikal. Someday I still hope to drive to Key West. Chill out in Roatan. Maybe see Antigua. I love snorkeling. Right now, if I could, I'd drop a few grand to go enjoy those simpler times in a warm spot. They seem like a lifetime ago. Some good memories...Off the coast of Cay Caulker.... My wife seen in the top right...Our younger son rear back in on the left. He was about 10. Today my old cars in the garage get all my spare cash! Been fun too though...These rewarding garage projects will also be known as good old days, at some point.

20 -25 mins later everything is fully warmed up. Idling is hotter even than driving down the road. Heat travels up. The exhaust manifold is very hot. Heat from it travels up to the intake manifold. Then into the carb base. Heats up the carburetor. Carb gets real warm, fuel vaporizes. Fuel level in bowl gets low. Car stalls.....Just a theory. What quality of fuel are you running? Any ethanol in it? Consider a phenolic spacer at carb base. I highly recommend non-ethanol fuel. Cures what ales ya 9 times out of 10. Consider a back up electric fuel pump with a sprung switch on the dash. So you can give it a shot as needed. Push fuel through that possible vapour lock at the fuel pump or fuel lines. They are all located near that dang hot exhaust manifold....Just a theory. Worth sniffing out.

Are you pretty confident your brake shoes are concentric to the axle/spindle centre? This makes quite a difference. I can't complain about my stock 1938 single MC reservoir brakes. They work fine for the expected speeds back in 1938....Now, if I had added a transmission overdrive and am trying to stop from 70 MPH.....Different story.

You are aligned with my thoughts As well. @RobertKB. The 201 block removed From my P6 was date stamped 11/37. Regarding the 38-up Cdn engines: i Suspect this specific logo was cast in 25” long Canadian blocks Made in Windsor. Looks like a “”W” over top of an “”M”. Maybe “Windsor Manufacturing” plant?

Thanks for the ideas folks. I am going to look into fabricating a steel enclosure with hinged top and front. I'll likely use concrete anchor bolts and mount it in place. There'll be no tipping it over or dragging it around.

Yes. However the Original 201 23” engine is gone. Has a 1953 Canadian built 25” 228 ci engine in it now. A slightly smaller rad was installed and moved ahead 2” to accommodate the longer block.

My 10A 6V-12V converter works no problem with my car’s positive ground system. Another great thing about these old flatheads with a standard tranny...They are so easy to jump start! I’ll do it just for fun at any easy opportunity. Roll away down a decline. Twist the key on. 2nd gear. Clutch out. The engine starts so fast and quiet! A 12V booster pack is easily used safely to start an engine with a 6V system if needed. If you know the proper procedure follow. I don’t really have a need for a 6V booster pack for convenient engine starting.

This coffee cup holder is $3.50 or so at Walmart. Look in the High Performance Automotive section. Just be careful reaching your hand and arm in through the steering wheel spoke to grab the cup, while driving. Especially if you are in a parking lot, using the spinner wheel...Sayin’ for a friend.

A link to pretty good summary what many folks here are running for engine oil. I add some STP too for the heck of it. I host a YT Channel. Videos covering many technical topics on these old Mopars. Just search "Keith Barron Mopar". They'll come up. I'm no master mechanic. However when I learn and grasp something new, I do like to post it for future new Mopar owners to learn from. I cleaned out both my old engines. I pulled the oil pan. Degreased the valve area. The oil filter housing too. I've been running modern detergent oil since. No issues. I like a little heavier oil for the hot summers, when the car gets used most. My car is not insured for driving all winter. I went with a 15W40 engine oil. There is no need for a 6V brake switch. They are common little pressure switches. Pipe thread if I recall. Just match one up. Normally open. When pressure is applied the switch closes. Easy change, common, generic part at most any half decent auto parts store. A continuity tester goes a long way here. It won't hurt to run all new wires to the rear end, if they are questionable. A fun easy project. The 6V system works just fine when it it well maintained. For these old 7:1 flatheads, 6V is totally adequate. My engines start like a dream. Modern convenience? A $20 6V to 12V 10 amp converter allowed me to install an iphone USB charger. That's pretty modern...

We live in right on the edge of town here in Canada. The interface zone between man and wildlife. We have nuisance bears that roam the neighbourhood, looking for an easy meal. Winter is approaching and hibernation is in mind. They need to fatten up asap. Especially if there are a couple of cubs in tow. Momma is making rounds with vengeance. The City pics up the garbage, curb-side is once a week. Yes we are supposed to keep garbage containers secure, inaccessible to the bears. We are not allowed to put our garbage out to the curb before for 5AM on collection day. My garage is my craft room. Like your living room, I spend my time in there relaxing. Working on projects. No I don't want stinking household garbage in my garage. Would you like it in your living room? We have large garbage bins handed out by the city. Plastic. I have attached ratcheting tie down straps around the garbage can. 2, crossing at the top. Securing it lid on tight. The bears can't get in. They try. The plastic bin is full of teeth marks and claws digging in. its only a matter of time. I have resorted to collecting household garbage only when needed. When it starts to stink. To lessen days that it's actually stored outside in the collection bin. The bears are getting into other garbage in the neighbourhood. They associate the bins as a food source. A fed bear is a dead bear unfortunately. They eventually will be captured and destroyed by Provincial conservation officers. They just keep coming back. As mentioned, the fall seems to the the only time of year it is a problem. So I know what I need to do. It's simple. Find a secure place for my garbage bin. I am thinking of fabb-ing up a metal enclosure with a hinged lockable top. Flat sheet metal and angle iron. Screw/anchor it right into the cement. Wood is easier, cheaper. However it rots in the weather and needs regular paint and maintenance. I am interested in seeing what others may have built to secure their garbage from the bears. What have you built? Pics and ideas are welcome. Guests coming and going here in the dark evening are a concern. Just 20 mins ago a bear cub walked along the wall of my house, 2 feet from a window. Momma is not far away. Someone unaware may inadvertently get between Momma and a cub. Other times, I have come home and seen a bear up in a tree in my driveway. Just last week my wife heard a ruckus outside. I was not home. Momma bear had chased her two cubs up a tree. She was knawing on my garbage bin. She did not get in. My wife opened the door yelled at the bear. The bear was not intimidated and was not leaving. My wife proceeded to throw empty glass beer bottles at momma bear. Several later, bouncing off the bear's head, and more yelling, Momma bear walked away. A very dangerous situation with cubs around. I have a 12 ga with slugs and buck shot. That'd do it, however it is illegal here within City Limits. Unfortunately, in reality those bears are gonners when the conservation officers catch them. What have you done? Do you have a similar problem? Any folks from Alaska here? Ya'll gotta have bigger problems than me. We have no fruit trees. That's not a contributing factor. Aside from building a shed, I am looking for design ideas on an enclosure. Here is a pic of a Momma bear 2 years ago. Beside my house My garbage bin knocked down in RH lower corner. It's a problem....

Its Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. Happy Thanksgiving fellow Canucks. I’ve got 1 week of road insurance remaining. Its fall foliage photo season. Time to get out and cruise. Rustle up a few leaves. I did so today in Marg. I think I’ve finally decided to call my ‘38 Plymouth, Marg. After my Mother. For various reasons. She’s tough. Enduring. Well aged. Brings comfort. Yet sometimes she can be all over the road! After next week we’re back to our regular scheduled programming...Cruises and pics with my ‘53 Chrysler. Be sure to check back here for more Mopar goodness.

Mars is our back up plan. When we completely destroy the earth and all its resources, we'll be ready to start a new colony there! The space ship should be called the "Plymouth" in reference to our Mopars of course, but also the Pilgrim landing spot in North America. If we could catch one of them evasive little aliens, learn to communicate, go to their home and learn a few things...That might yield better results. Are they watching us waste a ton of precious rare minerals and resources here? Are they dodging all our junk floating around in space? Wondering what in the heck we are doing? Perhaps they populated Mars many millennia ago. They abandoned it when it was no longer able to sustain their life.

I started a brake job on my 1937 Chrysler Royal & I found a couple of unique things I want some members input on. First the rear wheel cylinders, the piston diameter is larger on the rear shoe 1-1/4" than on the front shoe 1-1/8" of the rear axle, I think I know the reasoning for this but haven't came across this before. There must be an engineer here who can tell us what exactly is going on. Different sized cylinders will all see equal pressure form the master cylinder. However a larger diameter piston would offer increased pounds of force. For example say 700 pounds PSI of force is exerted from the master cylinder. 700 x 1 ¼ = 875 lbs force on the front shoe. 700 x 1. ⅛ = 787.5 lbs force on the front shoe. My old study book here tells me that by having stepped cylinders, the larger cylinders get more breaking force. So perhaps n your 37 Chrysler, they wanted the lazy rear brake shoes on the rear wheels, to be forced into doing a little more work. We almost always see large cylinders for sure, on the front of the car, compared to the back. I ordered brake shoes from Andy Bernbaum & they came as 4 identical shoes with full length lining on each shoe (not surprising for that era IMO). When I pulled the drums I found whoever did the last brake job used a set with 1 primary & 1 secondary shoe. I have no Idea who did the last brake work but I plan to use the shoes I have. If you got modern reproduction shoes, there won't be any asbestos in them. My understanding is they may not perform as well as the eariler shoes with asbestos. The steel brake lines quite rusty & I will replace all of them, they show their 83 years of trusty service. I was planning on using the straight steel lines with the spring coil covering but the parts store suggested the newer steel line with a plastic covering. Good idea. Replace all brakes lines. Right to the master cylinder as well. I highly recommend the Cal-Van brake line flare tool kit. Seen here. Easy peasy. Professional flares every time. https://www.ebay.com/c/1100195016 Lastly I seen an article on converting the 1960s era tapered shaft axles from the swedged on drums to the newer style floating brake drums. That conversion involves studs on both hubs so all your doing is freeing the drum to be removed without a puller. Does anyone know if the newer 60s era studded hubs are interchangeable with the older hubs with the threaded wheel bolt holes & drums rivitted to the hub. Thanks in advance for any input on this.....Vic Personally, I wouldn't bother with this idea either. My puller works well. No complaints. Seen here: https://www.amazon.com/Cal-Van-Tools-94800-Hub-Puller/dp/B0066PU1PM/ref=sr_1_10?dchild=1&keywords=brake+drum+puller&qid=1602196582&sr=8-10

My dwell meter has 3 connections. Positive and negative for battery posts. (Red & black). The 3rd (yellow) wire, is for the coil primary side. The connection that has a wire going into the side of the distributor.

I have a couple of old Mopar cars. I too had to get in there and deal with valve adjustments. I read and heard what people had to say. I researched to understand what exactly was going on with the valves and why. I went further and performed a valve grind myself. The old way, by hand. Then I followed up with lapping and checked for valve sealing. It was indeed fun. I learned a ton. I wanted to try my hand at setting the valves when running. I had the car hot at full running temperature. I inserted the feeler gauges while the car was running. I had the RF wheel off and the inner fender window removed. I could tell when a valve needed adjustment. I'd shut off the engine, make the adjustment, fire the engine back up and re-check the clearance. I was not able to confidently insert two wrenches in the engine while I was running to adjust a tappet. So this is why I shut the engine off. Due to siamese casting design of the block, and the L-head design, the valves do not all run at the same temperatures. A hotter running valve stem may elongate .001" longer than an adjacent valve. This is why they want you to get the engine hot....So I set them hot, and it seemed to be a success. That was 3 years ago on my 53 Chrysler. This year I replicated the valve set process in my 38 Plymouth. It was more difficult for some reason. Maybe a tighter engine bay? I struggled a bit to get good firm confident settings. After my face way black, my back was aching, and I figured I'd inhaled enough crankcase gasses, I was done. I reassembled the engine. I had a couple of noisy valves. Hmm.. I did not experience this when I set my 53 Chrysler valves. I drove it for a bit, and scheduled to go back in. This time, I decided to set the clearances when the engine was cold. I added .002" to the specs for both intake and exhaust. I did find 3 or so that were too loose. I set them cold and flashed up the engine....Perfect. Nice and smooth and quiet. I picked up some noticeable horsepower too. So I've tried both ways and had success with both hot and cold valve settings. Cold was easier, I must admit. Easier on my back, lungs and face. LOL. A few tips for the cold method: Blow out any dirt around the spark plug holes. Remove all spark plugs and #6 cylinder timing plug access hole in the head. Get a small piece of oak wood dowel from your local building supply store. Use it to find TDC on #6 and #1. Then start at #1 cylinder. Set the valves. Watch a fan blade and turn it 120 degrees. (1/3rd of a full revolution) Then set #5. Repeat going through all cylinders. Firing order is 1,5,3,6,2,4. When you are on TDC of any particular cylinder, grab the respective tappets. You should be able to move both the intake and the matching exhaust valve tappets up and down slightly. Then you know for sure that cylinder is on TDC. You'll easily be able to back up or roll forward the crank slightly as needed by simply rotating the fan blade. It will take two complete revolutions of the fan blade to get all 6 cylinders set to TDC. Get a piece of paper and draw out the valve positions. They are not simple. They are E, I, I, E, E, I, I, E, E, I, I, E. Mating up pairs per cylinder it starts to become clear. You may find yourself referencing your paper with valve locations many times when your face is down in the wheel wheel setting the lash. In many of todays engines in my field of work, after a rebuild, an initial valve set is done at about the 250 hour mark of the engine. The break in period. Everything settles in. Then the valves can be left alone for quite some time. Proper valve lash is indeed important. I was quite surprised at how much performance I gained in my old flathead, after setting the valves right.

Fantastic scenery @RobertKB. We're sure having a fantastic fall out west here! Great for cruising. Heck of a boom year for grasshoppers here. Good to see your cars getting use!

Hopefully this doesn’t offend anyone. If so I will delete my post. We’re just out having a little fun with our ‘38. Making great memories. Yes it was unloaded. We went to a remote area for the photo. Firearm was locked out and transported as per Canadian Federal laws. I am certified and licensed to own. A few notes: Another Bonnie & Clyde pic remake. A Remmington 870 Wingmaster. My Dad’s. He ordered it new from the Sears Catalog in 1970. Dad passed in 2017. My wife may appear a lady...She is indeed. However she is up for anything and has had her hands deep into my '38. Grease up to her neck, when help is needed. This spring I recall she was up top while we were lining up and reinstalling the tranny. I was down under the car. She dropped a tool that landed on my face. Ouch!

I started reading Henry's autobiography today. 35 pages in so far and I felt the need to share it. In general I am not a Ford fan, however we cannot deny his incredible success. Henry is saying a ton of heavy stuff in his book that really rings true today, 100 years later. His work ethics and business acumen are still relevant. Maybe even more so today as "work ethic" and "common sense" seem to going the way of the dodo bird. I am impressed so far with what Henry has to say. I'm sure he was hated by many as well. Probably justified. He said some racist things too I'm sure. As I flip more pages we'll see. The book was written in 1920. Times have changed incredibly. I hope the book carries on as it has so far. I'm very much enjoying it. In my job today, I work for a very competitive corporation. Henry says a lot of things I can really, really relate too. Hits close to home. I shake my head when I read a statement that he just knocks out of the park! ......"The better we do our work, the better off we shall be. Which I conceive to be elemental common sense." Recommend! Especially if you are old and grumpy. Like me! Fed up with what the world is becoming...Lol.

We have a TV and Netflix. I never use it. Don't know the remote well enough to turn any of it on any more. No need anyway. I am entertained in my garage. I read books. I have this site and about 10 other sites I check in on for News. Weather. Classifieds. Car stuff. You tube too That's about it. I have zero time for TV. Sitting though 12 minutes of commercials for every hour you watch TV? They still make you do that?

Today I asked Momma to take a quick second to try our version of the Bonny & Clyde photo. Great fall weather today! The car is running great.

My Canadian built 1938 sedan P6 was built with a 201 engine. I assume early enough in 1938, before Chrysler was producing engines in the new Canadian foundry. As we know, all the Canadian blocks were the longer Chrysler and Desoto 25 ¼” blocks. The stock 201 in my 1938 was the shorter USA block. I would guess, cast in Michigan and shipped to Canada for assembly in Canadian built cars.

Looks like a viable long term fix for many of us suffering the same! Lol.

Sounds like it'll be more like a road show.