Merle Coggins

Day 8... Show Day!! Nice hot humid day for a car show. I worked up a good sweat polishing up the truck this morning. My competition for the Truck and Comercial Vehicle class was a Jeep Grand Cherokee and a Dodge Durango. A few others that I liked... This show was run in conjunction with a local All Mopar Cruise-in. Some other nice ones from that side of the show...

Yes. Kevin and Kristin are here with their ‘88 Chrysler LeBarron GTS Turbo.

Day 7; I skipped out on the morning event. They went to the Coker Tire museum. I heard it was pretty good, but small. I opted to stay at the hotel and give my truck a bath, to remove 6 days of road grime, in preparation for today’s car show. In the afternoon we drove over to the Lookout Mountain Incline Railway and rode the train up the mountain to the top. We then walked around Point Park to see the views, and a little more Civil War history. Then back down the mountain in the rail car. In the evening we were all invited out to a local club member’s home. They have a nice place with several garages full of Imperials and other misc. Chryslers and etc. A few pics from the day...

That’s actually a Dart. But there is a Polara convertible here too.

With all of the starts and restarts on this tour I eventually had a couple guys come to me to “settle an argument”. Some were convinced that my truck was converted to 12 volts because of it’s cranking speed. Others believed it was still 6 volt. I assured them it was still a 6v system. When asked how it cranks so fast on 6 volts I replied, “Big battery cables, and clean connections.” They’re getting a kick out of my truck, and the fact that I’ve driven it down here from Wisconsin.

Day 6; Another driving tour day. We headed down to the Chickamauga Battlefield in Georgia. First stop at the Chickamauga & Chattanooga National Park Visitor Center & Fuller Gun Collection. We got a history lesson on the battle for Chattanooga in the Civil War. Then we continued on through the park and into Chickamauga, GA for lunch and a tour of the Gordon Lee mansion. Then back up through the battlefield again with stops along the way for more history lessons. At one point I ended up behind the leader of the tour, and the Battlefield historian, in his ‘57 Plymouth Savoy Other dash cam (GoPro) pics showing a few of the cars in the group. Right now is relax time, and a chance to cool down before dinner on a river boat.

Day5; Not much to report today. We visited the Tennessee Aquarium in the morning and saw a lot of fish. We also watched a movie about the ocean at the IMAX theater next door. Then after lunch we did a driving tour down to Cloudland Canyon State Park, in Georgia. I had a couple in a ‘32 Dodge rumble seat coupe in front of me. They kept up with the group fairly well. He was a little worried about the downhill run as he mentioned the freewheeling trans and the inability for engine breaking. I don’t know what they used for a transmission in 1934 but having a full time freewheeling transmission seems rather strange. Seems there would be a way to disengage the freewheeling part. We then realized that we only saw half of the aquarium exhibit. There was a second building. So when we got back from the park we went back to the aquarium (it’s only a few blocks from the hotel) to see the rest. After dinner I went with the group to a brewery beer tasting thing. Michelle stayed at the hotel. She wasn’t interested in it. I wasn’t impressed. It was a micro brewery in town. It was very noisy and I didn’t like any of the beers that they offered for sampling. Wishing now that I’d have stayed back too. I didn’t take many photos today. I did have my GoPro on for a bit during the driving tour, but I left it out in the truck so I don’t have anything to share from that.

Ahh... The Allman Brothers... ?

There should be a rubber bumper on the radiator cowl to support the front, and the hood lace across the windshield cowl supports the rear. The center shouldn’t even touch the fender. It’s close, but doesn’t touch.

Yes, Monteagle is what I’ve learned is the moniker for that hill. So you are saying the west side of the hill is the steeper grades? That’s good to know that the homeward bound run will be a little easier. I thought about running 41 down from Nashville yesterday, as an alternative to the interstate driving. But I had already booked 12:00 tour tickets for Ruby Falls and I didn’t want to risk missing my assigned time slot and have to purchase new tickets. So we stayed on the super slab. As it turned out, they weren’t busy and asked us to join the 11:30 tour to try to fill it up. I’m sure they would have shuffled us into a later tour without an issue. But without knowing that we took the less scenic route. And heading home we have a lot of miles to log, so we’ll probably stick to the big road again too. I’d love to have the time to stay off the interstates, but alas that is not the case on this trip.

Day 4... 3rd leg of the journey; Just a short 130 mile drive today. Nashville to Chattanooga. Not quite as hot this morning either so it was a little more comfortable driving. One long hard uphill pull the temp was running high again. The needle hovered a little below the 212 mark. I estimated it around 200-205. The Ol’ Dodge could only maintain around 45 MPH in some sections. Then once we crested the summit and started the downhill run (6% grade warnings were prevelant) the temps came way down. With very light to no throttle input for the next several miles the temp needle almost got to the 160 mark. Normal running has it slightly above that mark, where I estimate 180 for normal operating temps. We dipped into Plymouthy’s territory briefly. ? I-24 drops into GA for a short distance, then back up into TN to get to Chattanooga. Then we “acted like tourists” again with a visit to Ruby Falls underground water falls. If you are ever in thes area I highly recommend this attraction. It’s pretty amazing. We are now relaxing at the hotel. Plenty of “tourist” activities scheduled for this week before the show and banquet on Saturday. All in all we’ve driven a little over 800 miles so far. The truck is using a little more oil than I anticipated, but I have been pushing it harder than it typically sees. I’m getting 12-14 mpg on this trip so far. It could probably be better, but I can live with it. I’m considering going through the carb again this winter to inspect the function of the step-up plunger and idle-delay plunger. Maybe I can squeeze a little more MPG out of it.

Day 3; Not much driving today. Just a little bit around the Opryland area, near our hotel. Visited Madame Tussaud’s wax museum and The Grand Old Opry. Then took an Uber downtown to visit the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, Historic RCA Studio B, and the Johnny Cash Museum. Busy day. Lots of walking. But enjoyed it all. Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Louis, and Elvis Presley. (The Million Dollar Quartet) To keep it car related... Here is one of Elvis’ Solid Gold Cadillacs. And “The Bandit’s” Firechicken It was hard to get good pictures of the cars due to the museum lighting, and the glass that surrounded them.

Speaking of armadillos... I saw this one at the Country Music Hall of Fame gift shop and almost bought it for you. But I just tooka picture instead.

You going to replant the poison oak along a new hedgerow to keep your neighbor out? ?

Day 2; Brownsburg, IN to Nashville, TN. Truck ran fine, but the temp gauge was running a bit higher than normal. With temps in the 90’s, and some long pulls up the Kentucky hills, it was understandable. It never approached overheat territory, but I kept an eye on it. My fun moment of the day was watching the odometer roll up all 6’s. To bad we weren’t on Rt 66. 1 number off... we were on I-65. ? EDIT: Now that I look at the picture I can see that the first digit is a 5. ? Check back in another 10,000 miles...

With the marks like that you will have #6 in firing position. Rotate the crankshaft 1 full revolution and both marks should be at the top fo their respective sprockets. They will all line up through the center lines fo the shafts. This will be #1 TDC on compression stroke.

I’ve seen a couple of those in some DeSoto’s

Day 1. We got on the road around 7:00 am. Traffic was fairly light leaving town. Just a little north of Milwaukee the roads were wet, but we missed the rain. We didn’t get into any real rain until a little south of MKE. Then it rained off and on all the way through Chi-town. We got out of the rain just before getting into Indiana, but then traffic got heavier. Gotta love Chicago traffic... NOT!!! Modern tech in the Ol’ Dodge...

Well... this is what we have to look forward to this morning. Looks like it’ll be a wet drive this morning. We’ll probably catch the heavy stuff through Milwaukee and Chicago. ?

What kind of howl? Like a bearing going bad? Maybe your clutch throw out bearing is contacting the clutch all of the time and has failed? If it was the wiper vacuum line leaking it would likely run poorly too.

So tomorrow morning begins our 10 day vacation, with the Ol' Dodge, to the annual WPC Club meet in Chattanooga, TN. The truck is all ready to go after my recent maintenance and repairs. I've got a car top cargo bag in the bed to keep our luggage dry. Even through I have a tonneau cover some water gets in around the tailgate, leaving little puddles on the bed mat. The cargo bag will keep things dry just in case... and it looks like a pretty good possibility of driving through some rain tomorrow. Heading to Brownsburg, IN (Indianapolis area) tomorrow (370ish miles) to visit my sister, then on to Nashville (another 300 miles) for a couple of nights. If all goes to plan we'll roll into Chattanooga (130 mile final leg) by noon on Tuesday. We have plans to tour Ruby Falls before heading to the hotel. There will be many sight seeing tours during the meet, but that place wasn't on the list. We've been told it's a must see when in the area. I'll use this thread as a blog of our trip, hopefully with may pictures of awesome Mopar vehicles and other cool things. I was looking forward to meeting up with Greg down there but his plans changed and he won't make it now. If anyone else from this forum will be there be sure to say "Hey". Stay tuned...

This is from Tod Fitch's ply33.com web page https://www.ply33.com/Repair/tempgauge

When "all heck breaks loose" what does the timing light do? Does the timing become very erratic? That would indicate points bounce as Don mentioned. It happened to me once. Didn't get the spring hooked right and the points would bounce/float at higher RPM. Timing would go nuts. Engine would stumble and loose power. Redid the points with the spring properly hooked and all was right with the world.

Wheels look nice! In my opinion, a short sidewall tire would look out of place in the larger wheel opening. I'm running 235/75R-15's on my truck and they're pretty close to the original 6.50X15's as far as overall diameter. Plus, a smaller diameter tire would mean higher RPM at speed than a taller tire. If you have a lower numerical differential then it may not matter to you, but if you still have the 4.10 gears you'll wish you had taller tires.

LOL! Years ago I helped a friend build an Olds 350 for his '80 Cutless. It was a sweet running engine and really packed a punch. Someone finally caught up with him at a stop one day and asked what he had under the hood, because he couldn't keep up with him. "Just a 260 with a cam." was his reply. ? If you want a "sleeper" engine, why not just use the Mopar big block blue?