Los_Control

Curious about the cables. .... 6 volt positive ground requires heavy cables to carry the amps. I have .02 sized cables which is on the small size but they work. 00 or 01 would be ideal. The red cable looks small, but photos can be deceiving. .... The black cable looks way too small, judging from where it sits next to the red one. Seems like you would still get a click or something, even if it would not turn the engine over fast enough to start. .... Something else is going on. Grounds are extremely important on a 6 volt system .... looks like yours is connected to the head? Seems like it would be ok. Mine goes to the transmission cover on top. The starter & trans are both bolted to the bell housing ... Your ground may be more effective ... May not matter. I think it would look a lot cleaner if you ran the wire from the battery down low .... maybe to a bell housing bolt? Looks like you have a stomp starter, iirc there is a copper washer under the cover of the solenoid. This can get corroded ... this would prevent the starter from working. I think you can remove the solenoid cover with the starter installed and clean/inspect it. <---- Would be the first thing I would check.

Love your energy and the progress you have made. HAPPY ANNIVERSARY! ???

Yes I feel safety inspections are a good thing. Our shop is honest, if something is not right they will not pass it. So you just check everything yourself before you go. .... Now it is just a social event, old men telling stories while getting the paperwork done. I do worry about taking my pilothouse in for safety. Everything will be working fine, but my windshield has some de-lamination around the edges showing fog. None of it blocks the drivers vision .... still needs replaced along with all the glass rubber. I really just do not want to change the windshield or rear corner glass myself. Much rather get it licensed then drive it to a glass shop & let them take care of it. Emission test in other states can be a nightmare.

I can not answer that ... it seems it a a different base of oil then most. This may explain the dirty oil the op is asking about. Nobody has convinced me the Castrol is better then the rest .... I'm just tired of dirty oil & switching. .... Would be my luck the dirty oil meant it was working better then the rest.

I skipped through the last several replies .... I have been using Castrol oil in all my cars ... The known characteristic is dirty dark oil. I'm just saying I have changed brands of oil because of such dark & dirty oil from Castrol .... While this is a known issue of castrol oil, it is possible if you change the brand of oil & get good clean readings. .... You did not say what oil you are using?

Good on you for finding the problem. While I'm working on my truck I see no evidence of past rear main seal leaking ... Some drips but nothing major to be concerned about. And the usual cork gasket leaks around the pan .... It was wet but just dripping not pouring. Looking at the rear pinion seal .... that baby been leaking for a long time before it was parked ... needs attention. I expect to pull the engine & replace all the seals, rings, bearings ... since the rear main is not leaking I'm in no hurry.

I replaced the front wheel bearings on my ot daily driver 2 months ago. Bearings were loose & races scarred up ... they needed it. The OD of the bearing is the correct size to pull the dust seal out without damage. The other way is a pry tool to pull it out ... you will damage it. Does not matter if you are going to replace the seal anyways. Me, I have a oil change coming up .... I will remove my 2 month old bearings & seals and repack them with grease & re-install the 2 month old dust seals .... Just because I can & want to insure I have well greased bearings. If removed properly you can re-use them .... not worth it if they are 20 years old.

Inner outer is much clearer .... I just know from another post they working on front drums ... So I assumed.

Usually it is a dust seal that holds the rear wheel bearing in. .... I do not remember exactly how I did my 49 Dodge .... was so normal I did not remember anything special about it. A common trick is to remove the front bearing, then put the drum, & castle nut back on loosely. then pull the drum off by hand. The castle nut hits the rear bearing which then pushes out the dust seal .... The drum is in your hands & the rear bearing/dust seal is left on the spindle. On assembly you install the bearing & tap in the dust seal. .... You may want to replace the dust seal since they are $5 ... may not be needed. The bearings & races are a matched set. You need to clean & inspect the bearings & races. .... The race you can enter a long drift punch in from front of drum to catch the edge of rear race and tap it out. Then tap in the new race. Just remember if you replace a bearing they come with a matched race & get replaced together.

@dgrinnanI feel your pain ..... you will have the same problem with rear drums if needed. Unless you can find some good used ones local .... shipping on them would seem costly because of weight. I bought the rusty hope kit for my first project that I abandoned. I still have the kit. It is about $250 or somewhere in that area .... It only consist of mounting brackets & hardware with instructions. Then you buy the rotors, calipers, bearings ..... I think you will come in cheaper then $800 ... hard to say with today's inflation iirc the rotor/calipers are a 1975 Volare ... wheel bearings are a Ford F100 ..... just all common parts you can get from a local parts store and not rare or expensive. Forgive me if I'm wrong on the rotors, been a few years since I've looked at the list .... point is the same, all easily available. I have wondered about the scarebird kit, ... I think they are selling a service by putting all the parts together & delivering it to you ... Good on them they deserve to be paid for their effort. What about replacement parts? Do you need to order a replacement rotor from scarebird in the future? Just a question I would ask, I do not know the answer. Brake drums on old mopars are a issue. If you are doing a restoration, you pay the $1k & be happy there is someone out there reproducing them. If you just want a driver and not a restoration I see 2 options. 1:, How bad are your current drums? How many miles per year will you drive it? .... Will you drive it through the winter? (depends on location) Just asking if you can use them while searching for good used drums? 2:, Is a disk brake conversion where you put the problem behind you. Keep it in the back of your mind, you will run into the same problem with the rear brake drums. .... Almost cheaper to do a rear end swap with modern brakes. I bought a old 1949 dodge truck bed utility trailer just hoping it has good brake drums on it .... since they were not used as a trailer. You need to be on the lookout for good used parts for your old car, thinking ahead.

A small town there is only one station in town to do the inspection. ... Often I pull up for inspection & 1 or 2 ahead of me. Sometimes 3 ..... Because they are a towing company that also works for the state .... Recovers semi's/accidents from the freeway, They do impounds for the police department, they have mechanic station for repairs .... Just saying every citizen here goes through the same procedure ... The Mayor, The police chief, the ladies at the tax office accepting the inspection to grant you a new registration .... If you have to wait, the old dog will nip at most people .... for some reason He lies near me & lets me give attention. .... Is what it is. .... Small towns rule!

I wonder what I would do .... I hear right stuff is really good and worth the price for admission. I hate cork gaskets for valve covers. Seems they always leak. While decent modern rubber gaskets work really well. Since modern gaskets are not available for the oil pan. I would probably use the old permatex gasket shellac compound to glue the cork gasket to the pan one side only. Then use the right stuff on the tough areas near the front & rear seals. .... Thats pretty old school though. Just curious did they drive your car? I believe that is a requirement to have a inspector drive the vehicle to check drive-ability brakes, steering, etc... My town they do not bother .... The inspector sits at his desk .... usually on the phone .... directs you to operate your lights, horn, wiper etc... If you get stuck with his daughter .... she will walk around & check your tires and dry rot on wipers. .... for the $7.50 they are allowed to charge they do not get excited, anything obvious they will fail you.

I wonder what your floor looks like? .... This would be a good time to use heat on the bolts to free them up. If they are fully painted, with insulation, undercoating .... heat could be a bad thing.

I will share one of my ... IMHO, I love all original parts as much or more then the next guy. .... I would not waste my time saving zirk fittings. A test for king pins, if you can grab the tire & give it up & down lift while watching the king pins top & bottom .... Any movement at all means the bushing is wore out. I have 3 bushings with zero movement, the 4th bushing the zirk fitting would not accept grease. It had 1/16" movement. I suspect that zirk was bad when new or really has not worked for a very long time. After changing the zirk, I packed it full of grease & movement is down to about 1/32" on that bushing .... still wore out. I will watch & monitor it. I had to turn the steering wheel many times & stop to fill it with grease. Just saying I do not think the original zirk ever worked ... I'm not cleaning it & hope it works ... I'm replacing it and any other zirks I find not working. Dried grease can be a problem. What I have found is grease protected from uv rays is not that bad. You can see in the photo above I have jack stands on the axle. If I were to move them to the frame, I then could use my jack to raise & lower the rear axle to move the shackles. I then could add grease like I did with my front axle Raise the rear end up, add grease. lower the rear end add grease ... raise it to the middle & add grease. Then treat it like a carnival ride for days raising/lowering the rear end .... then add as much grease to it as you can. You will need movement to get the fresh grease circulated. .... Then you can address the problem & use a proper fix if needed.

Interesting they are left handed threads on passenger side .... I question if that is necessary? Like left handed lug nuts ..... maybe a lil bit over engineered? Looking at mine on my 49, I assume we are talking about the same part? Think I will need to get out the book and study it a little. What I'm seeing is the U-shackle has bushings top & bottom. Here the bottom bushing looks good, but you can see the top bushing sliding out & exposed. .... The other side the top looks good, the bottom bushing is wore out & missing metal. The photo shows what I think is the U-shackle, is this what you are working on? I see it as a serviceable item you take apart and clean, replace the bushings, zerks as needed ..... The U-shackle only gets replaced if damaged. If you could find a good used one that would be fine.

Ok we are not just talking about getting grease to them. Would be good if you got grease to them they may be sufficient again. Only thing I have ever seen is replacing them .... Have not seen any oem replacement options available .... have read where there are some jeep parts that are close enough to modify & work. .... Just nothing off the shelf.

Are you saying the zirk fittings are left hand threaded .... I have not seen that yet. I have found while going through the front end for paint & grease, I found several zirks that would not accept grease & simply replaced them with modern right hand threaded zirks. ..... This included the front leaf springs. Currently am working on the rear end of the truck & expect I will need to replace many zirk fittings here also .... The wheel bolts have left handed threads, the zirk fittings are all replaceable with modern right handed threads .... of course I have been wrong before.

Assuming they both are 3spd transmissions. .... Many have taken the top cover from the floor shift and added it to the trans that was column shift. One thing Dodge did was keep things simple. ... Assuming they are both 3spd trans .... you can probably disassemble both of them and use the best parts to build one with a floor shift. I did some reading several years ago, my first truck was a 1948 3/4 ton with a 1/2 ton straight axle with a 1938 engine .... I have no idea what year the 3spd trans was. Seems 1935 they did some modifications & moved the starter a few inches .... this affected the bell housing, flywheel, starter .... So you needed the correct parts to swap things from 35-36. Your 1940 should be fine. Dodge did everything they could to keep things simple .... All this post says is it is a pickup. The 4spd was a common option on all trucks these years. .... It could easily be a 4sp as well as a 3spd. You do not offer your location in your profile .... If you are outside of the USA, often these trucks came with a 25" motor instead of a 23" motor .... A whole lot of reasons why it may not work, but it probably will as a guess with the info you provided. More info & you will get a better answer.

If you just move the plug wires 1 position either way the engine would not run. If you rotated the distributor 180 it would not run ..... The fact it does run tells you it is set to what you need. These engines are known to have sticky valves if they sit for a long period of time, At the valve guides the oil gums up & the springs do not always pull the valves closed. The rings are known to stick to the pistons & not sealing 100% .... The carburetor could have some crud in it. The points could need cleaned. Lots of reasons for it to not run perfect .... the fact it does run I would not be looking at distributor plug wires at this time. Often a few heat cycles will free up the valves & rings, some seafoam in the fuel tank to clean up the carb would not hurt. Time to know more about the vehicle, how long since it was last driven etc...

You really do want the right tool for the job in this case. I bought mine from ebay a couple years ago for $80. I see today $46-$95. Using the dog bone handle I used a 3 pound sledge hammer on it. You put enough force on the puller where I was just a bit hesitant to apply more .... Tap on the side of the drum a few times .... walk away for 5-10 min. Whack it again a few more time & let it sit ... 20-30 minutes mine popped free with such a force the dog bone handle flew 3' & hit the side of the house. The other side came off in 5 min. You really want a good tool, a lesser tool may fail before you get a tough drum off. You will probably never use the tool except for a old car with tapered axles .... no good way around it though.

I agree @plymouthcranbrook I have had cars in the past where the distributor was installed 1 tooth off & plug wires adjusted to make it run ..... they never ran right though. Installing the distributor correctly made a huge difference. They fired late or early, not when they should. For whatever reason our 6 cylinder engines do not care & fire when they should regardless of #1 location. I expect to remove my engine for some work at some point, I will fix it then. @Woodslip Above post I mentioned to check to see the pipe plug is clear with a rod. ..... I should add. Mine was plugged with carbon. Not thinking I just took a nail & hammer & cleared the hole. ..... easy peasy. When I started the engine there was a strange sound as the hard carbon piece was bouncing around the cylinder until it got caught under the exhaust valve and got stuck for 45 seconds and the engine ran rough as the valve hammered the carbon piece into the valve seat ... eventually got sucked out the engine. Just saying I would rather pull the head to clean the hole then just push it in the cylinder again. Possibly might try a 1/8" drill bit & drill a small hole, then work up to larger size bits .... Do not just knock it out of the hole into the cylinder.

IIRC, my chebby truck the large reservoir is for the fluid on front disk brakes, while the small reservoir feeds the rear wheel cylinders-drum brakes. This suggest to me the larger disk brake calipers require more fluid to function properly? Interesting the original master does operate the new disk brakes .... I was kinda under the impression a modern master cylinder swap was mandatory for a disk brake swap. .... Opinion probably fueled by the thought I want a dual reservoir anyways even with original drum brakes. 2 years ago 40 miles from home, a panic stop blew a rear wheel cylinder. Brakes were good enough to drive home and fix later.

Hrm, are you sure it is tdc on compression stroke? If you flipped the distributor 180 it would be closer to the suggested 7:00 O'clock #1 position? Timing is set when the geared oil pump is installed. So it is common to install 1 tooth off like a distributor. My #1 is at 6:00 O'clock. ..... Seems these six cylinder engines do not care about relocating the plug wires & run fine. For TDC compression stroke, there is a pipe plug over the #6 piston. Insert a long wire or rod to make sure it is clear. remove rod and put a small piece of Toilette paper over the hole .... rotate engine by hand, when paper moves you are on compression stroke, insert Rod & find TDC. Now #1 is TDC on exhaust stroke, one more rotation & will be TDC compression. Since you need to get #6 first, I just start installing my plug wires with #6 first instead of the extra rotation to get #1 up on TDC ..... good enough for plug wires.

I feel sorry for this car .... Neighbor bought it I'm thinking for a occasional toy to drive & thinking he made a investment he will sell later making lots of money. I went through the complete cooling system for him asking him to now drive the full tank of gas out of it .... then with fresh gas I would do a tune up, check the brakes & weld in some support for seat belts. ..... Take it out & drive it, bring it back next week with a new tank of gas. ..... I parked that car where it sits over 2 years ago & has not been moved since. .... Gas in the tank is almost 4 years old. While the car is I believe a older restoration with the interior 20 years old, paint etc .... Original radiator & suspension etc... Someone did a good job. Someone later installed the modern engine/trans & their work sucks. The bigger transmission the floor needs to be cut out and rebuilt so the engine would sit level. As is, when I changed the oil, I installed proper amount of oil .... The stick read 1 quart low because the engine is at such a angle. Sniper would pull his hair out looking at this work ..... I almost think since nothing major was butchered, might be easier to drop a older transmission in it and fix the issues with it. As is the owner thinks it is a goldmine and is not for sale .... Will wait another 5 years then look at it.

I have read a thread on another forum the op posted when he got to a car show, the portawall would stick out or flex out leaving a gap in one spot. I remember some others reply was they used some sort of glue to just stick it to the tire .... replace glue as needed, seemed to be a minor issue. I just did a little checking on this myself. http://www.portawallshop.com/ They sell 2 widths for a 15" tire. 1-3/16" ... 2". I measured my 235-75-R-15 on my truck. 2" from the wheel up the sidewall ends right before the bulge on the sidewall. So it would lay or have a good chance to lay flat. Looking at my neighbors abandoned Ferd, I measured his true bias ply wide whites. They measure 3.25" from the wheel rim. It does overlap the bulge in the tire, where the portawalls end before the bulge. My conclusion on this little thought process. The modern portawalls are not as wide as original & made for modern tires. They will not look exactly like the old originals. .... Wide. @Sniper would need to sit & consider this. Imagine this car with radials & a 2" white wall? ...... Might look cleaner then it does now. .... At least better then plain radial black wall? This car has a late 90's Ford FI 302/AOD with all stock drum brakes, bias ply tires. Just a pain to drive as the tires follow the grooves in the road. You come to a stop sign & car pulls left one time, pulls right the next time .... We know radials would improve drive ability 100% .... A fatter tire & A shorter 2" portawall may look better?