blueskies

Kinda looks like chains in the photo, but it's just snow on the tires... I've never owned a set of chains. Cheers Don Pete

I agree that the prices are absurd, but I respectfully disagree with you that you can set these brakes without the tool or at least a home made version of it. I used the tool to set up my brakes, and I don't think there is any way to know if you "got it right" unless you drive the car for a time and then take the drums back off to look at the wear pattern on the shoes. The only thing you can tell by adjusting them "by feel" is if a shoe is dragging inside the drum. You can not tell if it is the heel or the toe, or the the edge of the shoe, or the whole shoe, because when the drum is in place you can't see the shoes. Even with the tool, I had to do several rounds of adjusting the major and minor adjustments to get the shoes centered, because the minor adjustment affects the major, and vice-versa. I hear all the time how lousy these brakes are, and at the same time how absurd it is that anyone needs a brake gauge to set them up. Once I had my brakes correctly adjusted with the tool, I drove my '50 all over the country through every imaginable road condition and never felt the brakes were unsafe or lacking. Sure they don't have the stopping power of discs, but they work very good all things considered. At least when they are adjusted so that the entire shoe makes contact with the drum. And the only way to tell if that is the case is with a gauge. Pete

Happy Holidays from winter wonderland! My Plymouth is much happier in a warmer climate I'm sure... But my wagon is loving the snow... Hope all is well in the land of Plymouths! Pete

I think the real question is why would anyone spend $889 for a tool to adjust poorly designed $300 dollar brake shoes when you can replace them with a disc brake kit for less than half that price... Pete

Damn... Mine sold for a paltry $315 a few weeks ago... Pete

Here you go Pat- The wagon easily runs through 12"-14" of snow... Chilly Willy... You can also see a bunch of little video clips here: http://www.youtube.com/user/idahoblueskies Enjoy! Pete

Aint that the truth... The wagon is running better than ever, starts much easier in the cold too. The carb rebuild made a big difference. Pete

I think my heater is full of mud dobbers.... Everything else was full of those little mud cocoon things... The generator was packed with them, didn't know it until it died... I wish the heater would run me out... I checked the temps with my handheld infrared thermometer: 180 going in to the heater, 120 or so coming out. Air coming out of the heater 71 at the heater box, 50 at the defroster vents. Maybe filling all the holes that let in the outside would help... Now I'm just hoping it will run long enough to get me back home in the snow... Pete

P.S. Thanks everyone for all the advice... Pete

I knew it was something simple, just took me a bit to find it... Rodney was right, it was in the distributor... I checked the compression, not very consistent but between 85 and 100 psi. This ruled out a stuck valve.... I've been thinking all along it was electrical, not fuel, because it was so sudden. So I decided to swap in the old condenser to see if it made a difference. I pulled off the distributor cap, and climbed under the hood to take out the screws that hold in the condenser. Just for grins, I made sure it was in neutral and used a screwdriver on the starter solenoid to turn it over while I watched the points. There was spark at the points contacts, but it didn't look right. I tried to open the points with my screw driver, and the arm that moves back and forth fell off.... The old points were all metal, and the new points that I replaced them with less than 50 miles ago have a plastic piece that rotates on the hinge, and has a metal arm attached with four little copper rivets. These rivets failed, and the arm was hanging on by one of the four. Ran over the auto parts place that I got them from, got a replacement set, and it fired right up. I adjusted the carb a bit, and it revs fine. It ran pretty shitty for a while, missing and stumbling. I decided to take it for a spin, and drove it in a blizzard to my office, 15 miles away. I ran it about 50 mph up the highway, and by the time I got to my office it was running pretty good. The missing and stumbling went away. I still need to adjust the choke and fiddle with the carb a bit more, but it is back on the road . Starts much easier too, now that the carb base gasket is sealed. Just in time too, I have to take my Tahoe in for repair on Friday, and the wagon will be a daily for a few days until I get the Tahoe back. Put some new wiper blades on and can now see where I'm going in the snow. The defroster actually melted the frost off of the inside of the glass... Pete

Did a quick gas check this morning, poured some gas down the carb with it running, and it still wouldn't rev. Seems electrical to me, if not compression related. Seems to be running on only about 3 cylinders. Even if it was a couple of sticking valves, I would think it would still rev even if it was running on 1 cylinder. I'm also going to put the old condensor back in for a check. Maybe the new one crapped out and it's not getting a decent spark. Pete

A quick clarification about the plugs... After it started to run crappy, I assumed it had fouled the plugs. I pulled the old ones out, and they didn't look too bad. Instead of cleaning them, I installed a brand spanking new set of plugs, and it ran the same. Compression test tomorrow, along with an inspection of the points. The oil needs to be changed anyway, so that is on the list too. I'm not so sure it flooded with the pump, as it was running. Doesn't seem to be flooded now either. Pete

pretty sure it's not the choke. And the plugs are new. compression test is next... Pete

I've discovered since I sold my beloved Plymouth and bought my Willys that I am much better at assembling a shiny new pile of parts into something kick-a$$ than I am at taking an assembled pile of worn out POS parts and making it run long enough to get down the street... My '60 Wilys wagon has been running well enough to run around town, and I have been fixing the weak links as they break. I've only had to use a roll-back once thus far... But this time I'm stumped, and need the collective wisdom of my fellow Plymouth brotherhood. I've been having trouble getting the wagon started in very cold temps, 10-20 degrees. The lousy battery that it has will go flat before it fires. I charge it up, and try again, and get it going. The engine is a flathead six 226, similar to the Plymouth flathead. It has an electric fuel pump that I put in a toggle switch because the mechanical pump seems to work just fine. But when it is cold and hard to start, I've been turning on the electric pump to get the fuel to the carb faster because of the weak battery. I went through this routing a few days ago, planning to take my son to school. Once I got it running, I left it idling in the driveway for about 10-15 minutes to warm up while I got my son ready for school. We went outside to get in, and I noticed right off that it was running very rough. We hopped in, and I noticed that I had left the electric pump on... I figured it was flooding, and would clear itself once we got going. But to my dismay, it wouldn't rev at all, it would just bog. I never did get it to come off idle. I shot this clip of it running crappy- After watching the clip a few times, I noticed that when it belches fuel vapor out the carb, it also blows a bunch out of the base of the carb... clearly a bad gasket seal. So, I figured I might as well tear the carb apart and do a rebuild while I had it off to change the gasket. I tore it apart, and didn't find anything obviously amiss. Got it all squeaky clean, and re-assembled with adjusted float and new parts/gaskets. Installed, and it runs just the same as before. Here's a clip of it running after... It has a new coil, new spark plugs and wires, new condensor, new points. It was running ok the day before, this way the next. I don't think the timing changed, but I did try adjusting it with it running and it didn't make any difference. I changed the plug wires after I did the carb rebuild, so I'm sure they are in the right order. The carb is squirting fuel. I have not done a compression check, and haven't checked the points again. Also haven't yet tried to dump some fresh gas down the carb in case the gas in the take is bad (the gas in the take is only a week or so old, and I've run a few tanks through it before now). Other than that, I'm stumped. Any thoughts? What am I missing? Thanks for the help... Pete

I sold my '50 for $14,500.00 And, I took a 5k hit at that... I don't think in the ten years I watched these cars sell that I ever saw a four door sell for more than about $7500. The two doors not much more. Selling my car was much like winning the lottery, because nice '50 Plymouths can be had like this one all day long for less than half of what I sold mine for. But then again, mine wasn't like any other on the market. I didn't spare a penny getting the car just the way I wanted it, and I have expensive taste . Every nut and bolt on my car had been removed, sandblasted, painted, and replaced. The car was essentially new, and loaded with vintage $peed parts to boot. If it were me, I'd buy the nicest car you can afford. It will cost far more to make it nice than it will to buy it nice. My 2c. Pete

Happy to see you still have the poster Don, I have it's twin here.... Got my wagon running again this afternoon. I did a few tests to make sure the coil was firing, and that the coil to distributor wire was good. I decided to watch the points open and close as I cranked over the engine, to see if there was a spark there. When I cranked it over with the cap off, there were sparks all over the place, but none at the contacts... I took the points out and looked them over carefully, and found that the part of the points that hinges open and closed had worked it's way down the hinge to the point that it was contacting the base of the points. In effect, the points weren't opening, and the coil wasn't firing as a result. I ran over to the Parts-Plus and got a new set of points, $10, and put them in. Hit the key, and it fired right up... I did find a couple of other issues in the process though. The spark plug wires are so bad I'm not sure how it runs. The ends that were put on at the distributor end of the wires were done incorrectly, and it looks like the spark must be jumping from the cap to the end of the wires because the metal terminals that are crimped on are on the outside of the wires only... Looks like new wires are next. Also, when I hit the throttle, I noticed a little squirt of fuel jet out of the side of the carb and onto the manifold... I tightened the screws on the carb and it seems to have stopped the little squirt. Might have to rebuild the carb too. It is running, but missing a bit on takeoff. Might be the bad wires, might be the carb. I think the points problem was a complete coincidence with looking under the hood the other day... Pete

Thought I'd give a heads up in case anyone is looking for one... http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110607961729 Pete

James- Lots of back country dirt around here, from desert to mountain. The wagon makes much more sense for me than the Plymouth did. I can drive it year round in the hills and snow, and I'm not paranoid about scuffing the paint like I was with the Plymouth. So far, it's been great fun. And a total mindset adjustment too, the Plymouth was a quiet cushy ride. The wagon is a tin can truck, rough and ready. Pete

I'm thinking that it may be the distributor to coil wire, as there is no spark at all, and it won't start as a result. Business is the same, pretty much none to speak of. I'm trying to get the wagon running on the cheap, no money to spend on it right now. I want to replace the wiring with a new harness and alternator to get rid of a bunch of stupid previous owner wiring messes, but for now just patching it up here and there. The generator front bearing crapped after about 20 miles, and seized up, smoking the belt. Had to get a tow back home. Dug out my old Plymouth generator and found that even though it was ten years older, it had the same case and front bearing/pulley. Swapped out the front half, and it works great and cost nothing to fix. The boys are doing great, and are enjoying tinkering on the wagon between football, soccer, hockey, and homework. Never a dull moment around here... Here's a few clips of the wagon in action: http://www.youtube.com/user/idahoblueskies Note that the incessant rattles and squeeks have been mostly silenced... It was a symphony of sound for the first ride in the hills... mostly because everything had been thrown together by the PO and hadn't even been tightened down. Pete

Suffice it to say that I felt it for a while afterward... The cap looks ok, but I'll look it over again, maybe I missed a crack somewhere. I checked all but #1 on your list, that will be next. I regapped the points, and the coil is new. Didn't see any signs of bad wires inside the distributor. Thanks, Pete

Hi Gang- Having an issue with the ignition on my wagon, and thought I'd post here for the best sage advice on the net... Because I tossed out the points distributor on my Plymouth for an HEI unit, I didn't learn anything about points and how to troubleshoot the system. I have been working on getting the wagon roadworthy, fixing this and that, here and there. Now that it is drivable, I have been driving it lately, as much as possible, to find all the week links before I head out too far from home. Last week my son and I drove the wagon over hill and dale looking for a deer in the back country. It ran perfectly all the way, about 80 miles of dirt, rocks, mud, deep rutted gulleys, and a stretch of highway back home. I let it sit for a couple of hours while we had lunch, and went back out to check the oil. While I was under the hood, I looked over everything there for anything obvious, and noticed that the distributor hold down bolt for the timing adjustment wasn't tight, and I could turn the distributor a bit each way. I fired it up, thinking I'd time it by ear, and see where it ran best in the little bit I could rotate it either way. When I grabbed the distributor, it gave me a wicked shock that made my arm go numb... Once the feeling came back in my hand, I tightened down the timing bolt and let it run for a few minutes. Shortly thereafter, it started running crappy, and would stall at idle. I restarted it a couple of times, and it got worse until it wouldn't start. I pulled the #1 plug and found no spark at all. I have since replaced the coil and condenser, the points look fine and I re-gapped them to .020" per the manual I have. There is power to the + side of the coil from the key. I have not checked the spark plug wires and the plug wire from the coil to the distributor cap. The ground wire from the - side of the coil to the distributor and the stuff inside the distributor look fine too. What am I missing? It has to be something simple... Thanks for your wisdom... Pete PS, the wagon is part Plymouth now, I rebuilt the generator when it crapped out with the front half of my left over '50 Plymouth generator...

Not a classic car, but I won a 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid in '08. It was a free drawing giveaway at a convention. Couldn't believe it when I found out I won... It isn't a car I would have bought on my own, but it has been a saving grace with the lousy economy. I have about 60,000 miles on the car already, commuting 200 miles a day for work. I have saved about $8,000 in gas over driving my Tahoe the same distance at $3/gallon... Pete

Thought you guys may find this supplier handy for fasteners of all kinds. Looks like they carry lots of the Mopar clips for trim and interior panels, etc. http://stores.ebay.com/Page-Auto-Supply Pete

If you are going to replace it, might as well get a 230 crank, rods, and flywheel and gain the cubes... Everything else is the same between the two engines. Pete