I've finally got grease under my fingernails! I've had the car since Easter Monday, and I finally got to take a solid crack at it today, though I only had about two free hours to work on it.
My friend Kevin and I pulled to plugs (after I labeled the wires). It
was easier said than done given the fact that the passenger side plug
cover was long gone and squirrels had lived on top of the engine for
years and years. There was also water standing in the spark tubes (gooed-
up with vegetable debris of squirrel meals) from the pressure washing
I'd given the motor when I first got the car. (Goodbye squirrels' nest)
Ministrations with a shop vac and a long, thin screwdriver got most of
the gunk out from around the plugs so we could pull them without dropping
watery leaves and mud into the cylinders. We didn't attempt to remove the valve
covers, but Kevin pulled two of the plug tubes and we could see inside.
I didn't want to see too much after hearing his initial sigh, so I
only took a glance but there was a thick layer of cracked black goo on the
bottom. I had this dream of the heads being clean, especially with the low
mileage, but no such luck. We couldn't release No. 8, the plug under
the heater fan (if indeed that is "No. 8.") so we left it for another day.
The rest of the plug wells I accessed with a long, thin plastic funnel and
poured a healthy dose of Marvel Mystery Fluid into each piston chamber.
We could just barely see the tops of the pistons by shining a pen light
down the shafts: all black with carbon deposit.
Kevin was a diesel mechanic in his younger days (relatively speaking.
I'm 39 and he's 42) and he was dying to try and turn the motor at the
crank shaft. To do this, as you all know, we'd have to pull the
radiator. So, while he dug out the spark wells, I figured out how to
separate to two-part fan shroud, which I thought was pretty neat, and
pulled off the top hose. I tried to avoid it but I ended up cutting the
bottom hose simply because I couldn't get enough leverage to yank it off
while lying under the car. We hadn't jacked up the car because it would
have reduced our labor to one guy on one job. Sadly, while contorted
down there I also twisted and broke one of the two transmission cooling
pipes while trying to unscrew it from the radiator tank. &*%$#@@&$&!
I ended up doing the same on the other pipe, on purpose, thereby creating
a new repair that needs to be done later. That won't be the first time
I do that during this project, I have little doubt. I guess I can splice
in a patch. Anyone out there ever done that? I'll also have to remember
to try and flush those out.
In working on the radiator, I could see that someone had drained it
long ago because the stop-cock was wide open. Shrugging off the mix of
positive and negative connotations of that discovery, we carefully
unbolted and (thanks for the warnings, fellas!) gently drew out the
radiator, sparing the fins and A/C coil. There was a little trickle
of dirty water out of the bottom tank when I turned the radiator over,
but no other surprises. I believe the radiator was quite new when the car
was retired. I wanted to follow another IML tip and flush out the water
channels in the block with a garden hose, but I didn't want to get the
garage floor wet before I was sure I didn't need to crawl under the car
anymore. I passed on that chore for another day.
We now had the front end opened up with the radiator out of the way.
Kevin had his huge socket set, so we found the match for the drive shaft
and pushed a pipe over the wrench and gave it a few shoves. Nothing
moved. Frankly, we didn't push too hard. We socketed and torqued each
appliance (generator, power steering pump, etc.) and saw that each of
them turned against the fan belts, so if anything is really frozen, it's
the block. It would have been great if it had just spun around, but no
such luck. Given the fact that we've only just poured lube into
the piston chambers and that the engine has sat since 1977, I'm holding
out against acknowledging a small tragedy and hoping instead that the
lube will do the job.
I also took a few minutes to hook the car up to my battery charger.
The charger has a 75 amp starter mode that I've never used, but today
I flipped it on to check for signs of electrical life from the dashboard.
The headlights came on, which was very heartening, and the six-way seats
buzzed a little when I tapped the paddle. I mashed on the driver's door
window switch and heard some arcing and buzzing, but didn't press my luck.
The fan switch did nothing, and I didn't keep the power on long enough to
try every single thing. I did turn the ignition key, having been under
the impression that the starter operated from the neutral button on the
dash. The un-mistakable "clack" of a starter bendix hitting the flywheel
resulted, and I quickly backed off. I guess I was misinformed or the
starter switch was converted. (??) No horn, the radio was deader than
crap, and I couldn't raise a flash out of the turn signals.
We ran out of time at that point, locked up the garage and ran off
before our wives sent out the posse. One night later this week I'll
go back and label all of the screws that we took out to remove the
shroud, etc. I can see that I'm going to have to be very, very
careful about documenting any tear down that I do because I'll forget
how to put it back together. I don't have a digital camera... yet!
There's a new reason to get one now, though I don't relish the idea of
handling a piece of electronic equipment with dirty hands and flashing photos of the engine compartment. I also want to bring the shroud home (as I've explained before, the Imperial is housed in a garage a few blocks from my house) and place it along
side the air cleaner and the lone spark plug guard for prepping and painting. I also want to start a notebook of all of the jobs I'm deferring, like the crankcase water chanel flush and the broken trans-mission cooling tubes.
Kevin was a great help, and we had a lot of fun working on the car. I kept reading it on the IML email, but now I've lived that fact that this is a great hobby because you can so easily involve friends. We're looking forward to the next chance we have to work on it. I hope next time to take off the oil pan and clean it out, then the valve covers.
Kevin speculated while we put our tools away about the "frozen" shaft. He wonders, as I have in the past given how extremely difficult it has been to push this car, whether the transmission is in gear and "freezing" the motor. If we'd had the time, he wanted to jack up the rear and see if he could turn the motor with the rear wheels freed. Specifically, he wanted to raise the right rear, his best guess at the "power" wheel. I'm pretty ignorant about drive trains and thought that the car would have traction on both wheels. Kevin corrected me, but we are both rusty with respect to automotive technology in general and we don't know jack about the specifics of old Imperials and whether Posi-Traction was standard. etc. He wanted me to ask you all if there is any way to tell if the transmission is engaged against the crankshaft?
Should we drop the drive shaft and try to turn the motor again?
I'll welcome all advice, admonitions and musings from the Club. Thanks
for all of the guidance you've given so far.
Patrick Moore
Southeast Louisiana
1958 Southampton 4 door hrdtp
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