Dan Hiebert

I just did my steering wheel earlier this spring. Used PC-7 and initially used good ol' soap and water to clean everything. Don't think that was good enough as I still had some of the repairs cracking after everything cured, it was separating right at the joint between the epoxy paste and the original steering wheel material. Re-grooved that area and cleaned with ethel alcohol (what I had lying around). Seems to have done the trick, you just need something that will clean out the oils and such without attacking that original material - whatever it is (rubber, plastic, both, mystery fiber?). The areas that separated happened to be where most folks hold the steering wheel - thus (I'm guessing) more oils and contaminants that soapy water couldn't cut. That steering wheel material does seem to be somewhat absorbent, so you should allow it to dry thoroughly before applying the PC-7.

Excellent timing! Logged on this AM to ask if anyone remembered the article about grafting a new capillary tube onto the original temperature guage. That's this upcoming weekend's project if I can get the house trim painted during the week (gotta love the long days up north). This forum comes through again!

Kinda hard to tell, but from what I can see, the wear pattern on your differential gears looks about perfect, means your backlash was set OK. If I remember correctly, that is what the factory calls the freeplay, which tends to feel a bit "looser" on older cars. So someone familiar with newer cars would suspect something when checking older vehicles. I'd go with replacing the bearings while everything is apart as well, but I'll leave comments about foreign vs. US engineering alone.

Joe - I had the same issue with my D24 from the time we got it until I rebuilt the steering box over this last winter. My "temporary" (18-year) fix was to make a new keyway in the splines of the steering shaft so the steering wheel would be square with the wheels straight ahead - I would not have done that knowing what I do now. Primarily, my steering box was shot and no manner of tweaking would keep the steering wheel square. Anyway, first thing is to make sure your front end is properly aligned, if the geometry between the front and rear tires is off, your tires can be straight ahead, and the steering wheel still won't be square (your car would "crab" down the road, too). Any alignment shop should be able to do this for you, but you'd need to make sure your steering wheel is aligned on the keyway so the shop can square it for you. With the steering wheel where its "supposed to be", and everything to specs, it should be square. BUT, I understand you can't find that keyway anymore....So....If your steering is aligned, and your steering box sound - turn the wheel from stop to stop (full left to full right and back again), count the number of turns it took, and turn it back from either full left or right 1/2 that number of turns, (this is much easier and more accurate if you have a pair of turntables). This is the center of your steering system and where your steering wheel should be squared (bottom spoke straight down). If there were a keyway left, it would be straight up at this point. If the steering wheel is not square, and your satisfied everything else is copacetic, just pull the steering wheel and put it back on square. That's how the shop manual specifies to center the steering, it's amazingly simple but effective. If you did this with your steering wheel centered on that key way and it didn't end up square, then something would be out of alignment. If your steering shaft and worm gear (worm gear is part of the steering shaft) are in good shape, and the only problem is bunged-up splines on the shaft, I would not necessarily replace the shaft. Hope this helps. Dan

Back to the original Q - I have the same "problem", you can always tell where I've been with the Dodge by the cloud of blue smoke . Neighbors don't seem to mind since it keeps the skeeters at bay, but annoying none-the-less. (Not REALLY that bad, but makes for a better tale.) Good compression, etc. Besides the renowned members of this forum, (this issue comes up on occasion), I've checked with several mechanics in at least three states, a couple of whom date back to working on these cars when their mileage was getting to the cusp of "worn". The unanimous first diagnosis has been worn valve guides as the primary culprit, and according to the Mopar-centric ones, a common malady. Other issues such as plugged valve galleries and sludge contribute and make it worse. The guides don't even have to be excessively worn to draw oil up. Matter of fact - just stands to reason that the better your compression is, the better the engine will be at drawing oil into the cylinder during the intake stroke through worn guides. My engine's innards are very clean, but when I did a partial rebuild (honed cylinders, new rings and bearings) I didn't replace the guides and the car smoked more than before.

I've never really been annoyed by any of the questions folks ask about our car. The one exception being if the FIRST question is "What's it worth?" I get a slew of different ones, many comical, most genuine, and just a few "stupid". When out and about in the ol' Dodge when I have to be somewhere, I too work in some delay time for questions an curiosity.

They look like the emblems on the side of the pickup truck hoods from that timeframe.

A ray of sunshine through parting storm clouds and angels singing - this forum comes through again. My speaker diaphram went the way of the dodo a long time ago, and I've been searching for someone to fix it with no luck. Never even thought of putting a newer speaker in the car becuase of the 4 point connector on the original vs. 2 point on new ones.

Takes me half an hour to pick up just the cigarette butts every weekend, and I've only got 90 feet frontage.

Sounds like the horn ring is bent just enough on that side to keep the contacts from closing.

I got an 88. Not too swift on the "subtle" trim differences.

That's what I was pondering, having a half degree or so difference to overcome the road crown. Mine are just the opposite right now (less on the right than the left), and since I've got a borrowed caster/camber guage, might as well make the adjustments, not as if its hard to do, and the weather certainly isn't cooperating with getting on the road this year (snowed here again yesterday!), otherwise I'd be following Greg G's sage advice and driving it anyway. Besides, the alternative is being in the house with SWMBO watching some silly reality show. Adjusting to eliminate tire wear is a common theme, when discussing this with our head mechanic (the aforementioned former stock car racer) he'll make degree recommendations, but defaults to whatever has the least tire wear regardless of specs.

Ramon - I took the whole shebang out. You can get the steering box and shaft out without disassembling and removing the column, but as AndyD notes, its a total PITA, and reassembly would be even worse. You'll save a lot of aggravation by disassembling and removing the steering wheel and column before you remove the steering box. Column from inside the car, steering box from outside (under).

I'm a bit surprised New York isn't on the list myself, or Michigan. I've noticed that our city streets tend to be horrendous, but the state highways, most country roads, and Interstates are about even across the board and tolerabpe. Like they say, the four seasons in (insert appropriate north east state) are "Almost Winter / Winter / Still Winter / and road construction", although I can never figure out what they've fixed. In-laws live in New Joisey - I heartily concur with its ranking.

My sentiments exactly. Regardless of the product placement, no self respecting "outdoorsman" or "sportsman" would do something like that - even if he/she had the skill to do so. Besides, chirping crickets and burping frogs are part of that outdoors experience.

Dave pegged it. Dodge Customs came standard with electric wipers (part of the upscale package), Deluxe had vacuum. Read that in a sales brochure recently. Don't know if you could order electric for your Delux or not, tho.

Yep, snowing in western New York since yesterday, too. Not quite that much tho. Beats "my" old record - you remember that blizzard on April 16 in '05 or '06? Every dark cloud has a silver lining, tho - this is something we can brag about to the kinfolk down south

That's a cool thought - what stories our cars would tell. In 1999 I met the salesman that sold my car new in 1948 from Carlsbad Motors (NM) ("only sold one grey one in '48"), he told me the family and where they lived, and the house (but not the family) was still there! Then following the service sticker trail to Roswell and Las Cruces, NM, and acquiring the car in San Elizario, TX (outskirts of El Paso). Somewhere along the line an accident, a shotgun blast to the quarter under the drivers side rear door (hunting accident?), and the odd stuff found under the seats, in the trunk, and the glove box that hadn't been opened in many years.

Greg - nope, the manual only indicates +1 degree without any variances. As you noted, I think I'm safe as caster is never quoted as a factor in tire wear (the principle concern - $). One of the mechanics at the office used to race stock cars and was forever adjusting front ends according to track conditions, he said it would only affect which way the car may tend to drift - usually towards the side with the lower number - but wouldn't affect tire wear at all. With the crown built into most NY roads, I would want to have it drift left to compensate for the the crown, rather than down off of it, but he didn't know how bias ply tires would affect it, or whether 1/2 a degee would even matter on these tugboats. I'm gonna take yer advise and drive it as is, if it bugs me, I'll adjust it. Heck, the way it handled in the past, I probably won't even notice what difference a half degree makes. Now if it'd only quit snowing........

Greetings all. Over the winter I've rebuilt the steering box on the D24, what an improvement! But, as these things tend to do, it led to addressing other issues that weren't recognized as such until the "master problem" was fixed. In my case - the alignment. When I first got the car I dissasembled the front end, cleaned everything, replaced a couple of obviously worn parts, and was careful not to change any of the adjustment points when I put it back together. Now that everything is fresh, I decided to check the alignment again. I used the TLAR method initially, with the intent of doing a more thourough job once I got around to fixing the steering box (18 years later ). The front tires show some feathering from the toe in/out being off, and probably from the wandering they did with the worn-out steering box. I followed shop manual steps - set one item before moving on to the next - everything is apropo, but now the question for the esteemed forum members for the last item - the caster. Manual sez 1 degree postitive, my car has 1.5 on the right, and 2 on the left, both positive. I know positive caster is designed to make the car "lead" - or return to straight ahead after a turn. Caster on our rides is set by "proper assembly of the upper control arms", and mine are spot-on according to the manual, yet I have the noted variances. Are they off enough to worry about, especially since they're different from each other? The upper control arms may be a bit out of whack from a long ago accident, and I can probably make the minor adjustments to bring the caster into exact specs, but it will throw the control arm secs off. Should I even worry about it? Thanks in advance!

In 1995 we had the D24 on the theatrical list in El Paso when Hollywood came to town to do the remake of "Lolita" (with Jeremy Irons and Dominique Swain). The movie company rented the D24 (and me and the B&C to drive it when we could) for 6 weeks. They had several "transportation" guys that were familiar with authenticating cars for particular eras. They noted that the outside sunshades were much more common in the southwest than other locations (they were out of Georgia). Our cars are from the era when practicality tended to rule over substance (but ostentatious was just starting to take hold) - so the expense of an outside sunvisor woulda been weighed against the benefits. OK, a bit of a rant, and remembering one heckuva good time, but goes to show that the shades can tend to be "regional". As they say, whatever floats your boat, I can appreciate just about every genre, but wouldn't have but a little of it. That movie car database has "Lolita" in it - and guess what - our D24 is nowhere to be seen. It was a background car, and I know which scenes it flashed by in, but it never played prominently. Goes to show why it costs 30+ bucks to go to a movie, we earned a good chunk of change (cha-ching!) but our car wound up on the cutting room floor. (Got to drive a quite a few neat old cars, tho. If you'uns get the chance, put your cars on the theatrical lists for your areas, you'd be surprised what happens - and no, they won't blow up your car unless they buy it first .) Sorry, way off on a tangent.

I still don't know if I can make the WPC event or not, but its on my calendar. I'm near the Falls and would be glad to hear from folks planning to play tourist on the way to Vermont. If you wanna go to the Canadian side (recommended if you have the time), I can provide info to make the border crossing "easier" - depends on your point of view . Before 9/11 I coulda got you across in a breeze, but even I get secondaried at the border now (and I'm the #2 guy for CBP here!), best bet is to have the right documents. I'd like to meet some of the forum members that I've only known in the electronic universe.

May seem a bit odd, but I tend to like the look of these cars when they are "in progress". I think I took more pictures of our D24 when it was disassembled, dog-house removed, and shot with primer than since it was finished (but...they're never "finished" - good thing - maybe that's an odd thought too ). Looks great, keep it up, and keep us posted.

That's what I think I'll do, Randy. Re-attack the "new" cracks and pay a bit more attention to details. Almost hate to as nice as the rest of the steering wheel turned out, but it'll just bug me knowing they're there. Now that the paint is fully cured, they aren't quite as noticeable - just hairline cracks, but with the ebb and flow of temperatures around here, they're bound to get worse. Thanks all

A hobby shop that specializes in military models may have that color, too. Or someplace that sells camoflage paint, I really haven't looked. The one I put on my car didn't have any paint at all on it by the time I got to it. I painted both sides the body color. I read about the sage green on a Fulton Sunshade reference site that was posted by someone on this forum a few years ago - after I had already painted it. Don't have quite the issues with glare anymore in western New York But if I happen to repaint the old girl in the near future I'll probably return the sunshade to its factory hue on the underside.