DLK

The Wayfarer finally made it to the new owner in France. A couple of interesting observations.... The light switch knob disappeared between the loading of the car and its arrival in France. (A trophy for the hauler??). I never had that knob off and I know it wasn't loose. I imagine it will be fun finding that used part overseas. Second the guy who picked up the car (about the only English word he knew was a four letter word that starts with F) parked my car under a car that leaked oil or brake fluid all over it. When it got to the dock in Elizabeth NJ it was covered with it. You can see by the picture from La Havre, France somebody did a good cleanup job.

That is one nice thing about the 1950 Dodge. Two piece flat windshield. When I look at those forward-look Mopars from 57-59 I just imagine the cost of a replacement windshield, if you can find one.

Well at least I took plenty of pictures on the transport if they need to file a claim but you are right.

I said goodbye to my 1950 Wayfarer sedan after 8 years today. It was more emotional than I expected. Unlike a lot of my car club friends, I have never had more than one collector car at a time. The good news is I have had the chance to get to know a little about the family in Brittany that bought my car. They seem like really nice people and I hope they enjoy the car as much as I did. Now the question is do I buy another old car? For now the answer is no, since I am still stuck with the undersized garage and no work space. That is the principal reason I sold this car.

We were on a trip to Virginia over the weekend and pulled into Appomatox Court House and were pleasantly surprised to see the Chrysler 300 group had included it on their itinerary. There were 300's all the way from 1955 through the late 60's represented. If only I could afford it I would love to take possession of one of those beautiful cars. I like all of them but am particularly fond of the 1956 and 1960. (I owned a 1960 Windsor 15 year ago.) They had a gorgeous day to take their old cars out for a drive in the Virginia countryside. My 1950 Wayfarer is sold and will be making it's way to France soon. I have mixed feelings about selling but am happy it is going to a couple who really wanted a Wayfarer like mine.

Don - Mopars in general at least through the 80's it seems are oil leakers - wouldn't you agree? I had a Duster with slant six that leaked significantly and have had several K-Cars and early Minivans with 4 cylinder engines (2.2 and 2.5) and all of them were leakers after 40-50K. I have 81K on my 2014 Town and Country with the 3.6 and it doesn't leak a drop (or burn even half a quart between changes either). I have about 2,500 miles on the rebuild. The shop that reassembled the engine did not do a good job with gaskets. I replaced the valve cover gasket (under the exhaust manifold) because of obvious leakage and it looks like the oil pan gasket leaks too. I can't tell how much of the leakage is from the rear main seal but am sure that is part of it too and harder to address. I suppose I could do a compression test but since the engine runs smoothly and has so much more power since the rebuild I haven't bothered to.

It is still more than in should be on a rebuilt engine. I probably get 700-800 miles to a quart. With the amount I drive it's not a big deal. To be honest most of it is probably leaks - I need a pan under the car in the garage. It doesn't smoke at all - before the rebuild it looked like a mosquito control vehicle going down the road.

Yes the o.d. is nice. At least with fluid drive I don't have 4.1 ratio some cars have.

We took a 305 mile round trip to Northwestern Wisconsin with the Wayfarer today. It ran great and I had no trouble keeping up with traffic. I only hit 70 once but cruised easily at 62-65 when I could. I guess the amount of driving on county roads and state highways at lower speeds must have helped my mileage. By my calculation I got over 18 mpg for the trip. It was a perfect day for a car without a/c - cloudy much of the day with temps around 70 but without rain. I still am bothered with that chattering clutch when taking off but haven't tried any remedies yet. At least it is only a problem when starting out from a stop

Ed - barring weather or car issues in the morning we are planning to see you at the cabin Sunday. Quite an adventure for your kids!

You aren't the first one to say that. It just seems strange to me that at idle oil pressure would be that low on a rebuilt engine.

I thought about the throwout bearing - I would have thought when they rebuilt the clutch and transmission last winter they would have replaced that but maybe not. Guess i will check that out. Then again maybe they put in an overseas cheapo part.

Don I have resisted not using the clutch because of the low oil pressure reading at idle. With the rebuilt engine it reads 5-10 lbs at 450-500 rpm and 40-45 at cruising rpm. The shop told me they checked and said my gauge is reading wrong its more like 15 lbs. Just for my comfort leveI I set the idle faster which means I have to stand on the brake more at a stoplight with the clutch out. I will try your suggestion on the chatter. Thanks.

My best friend turned 68 Tuesday and has always been a dirt track racing fan. He decided it's now or never and paid to drive a sprint car on a 1/4 mile oval. He got over 25 laps for whatever he paid. The hardest part was getting that senior body shoe-horned into the car. Wife and I drove the old Wayfarer about 110 miles to see him - we had a perfect weather day. The Wayfarer runs great - my only complaint is the amount of chatter from the clutch on startup - it seems to be getting worse. It works fine otherwise. The clutch disk was just resurfaced this winter.

When you do get a solution please post it here. I was frustrated a couple years ago with similar problems. With a rebuilt engine my Wayfarer had little power when warm - it had less pep than before the badly needed complete rebuild - slowing down on even moderate hills at full throttle. In my case there were two issues - the vacuum advance was not working properly and the spark plug wires were old and shorting out. Making those two changes solved my problems.

I was going to leave early tomorrow to catch the car show at Culver's tomorrow night and judging Saturday. Just looked at forecast - heavy thunderstorms tomorrow with hail and damaging winds. I will pass on the 1200 mile r/t and hope there is no damage to the cars there.

Pat Boone and Patsy Cline do too! (I am dating myself)

If its not too new a 56 Chrysler 300-C. But I couldn't afford one anyhow.

I am sorry but not surprised. I guess if I want older stock stuff I should go to the AACA events.

I have never been to the Chrysler Nationals which will be coming up in July (or any other Carlisle or Hershey event). I have a friend in Philadelphia who would like to meet me there. I am sure some of you have been there and can answer a simple question. I get the feeling that the event is probably 90%+ resto-mods and muscle cars. Am I correct in that assumption? I have nothing against them but I can see enough of them at events here without driving 1000 miles. If I want to see older MOPAR stock cars like P-15's or like my Dodge with a flathead and slush-o-matic ts that the wrong event?

I put a RediRad in my 1950 Wayfarer two weeks ago and it works great.. Yes you are limited by the capability of the old factory speaker but it is such an improvement over AM radio which locally offers almost no music. I was ready to spend $400+ for an FM conversion of my stock radio but for $300 less I like this better. I plug in my phone or MP3 player and listen all day to music of the 50's and 60's. And even better they have a positive ground version so I didn't need to deal with that. I put it in the glovebox. Matt and the others were great to work with. I sent them an email with a question on Sunday morning and had an answer that afternoon!

"Problem" solved I went to two big tool stores and the biggest phillips they had in stock was 16". I went to Menards (Young Ed can relate to this) and they had a 24" one for just about $3. It worked slick I could reach the screws from the backseat. Now the embarrassing part... I disassembled the latch from the decklid and still could not open the trunk. I decided to apply pressure with a pry bar and finally it popped open. It turns out I got some Bullfrog rust remover on the rubber gasket and it stuck so well that when I got the trunk open the rubber gasket pulled out of its track!

I see a 20" screwdriver on Amazon for $12 I guess I will do some measuring to see if I can reach through with that! If so worth a try.

Well I have gotten so far as to take back seat out, fish out the car cover and look at what I have. My daughter would raise the roof if I tried to get my grandson to squeeze between the bars and try to remove the three screws holding the latch assembly in place. Besides he would not have the strength to loosed the screws without a powerful electric screwdriver. As I see it I have two options to either cut away part of the seat back bracing so I can crawl in myself (I could weld or bolt it back in after) or to try to find a phillips head screwdriver with a 36" handle. I was pleasantly surprised to see just three screws holding it in place.