1968 Coronet 500 Project

[JimKueneman]

New FirmFeel stage 3 steering gear, hoses and pitman arm!

I also reassembled the wiper motor. They are not horrible to take apart but this old "black and silver" motor has the wiring harness soldered directly to the motor windings. That said no one makes a replacement harness. Kim at Passion4Mopars says she will make me one. How long it will take is unknown The original is not that bad but I know it will look terrible against all the other new harnesses under the hood. I'll replace it when she gets the new one done, I don't think it is that hard to change with it in the car.

Before:

After:

 

[JimKueneman]

Decided to take the starter apart while I was in the garage. My NOS starter drive is at the P.O. and the rebuild kit from Alternator and Starter Parts Wholesale came in last week so I have all that I need.

Pop the cover off by removing the 2 end cap bolts. Then carefully separate the housing from the nose casting. There is a screw to remove for one wire and the other is wrapped on a post. Unwind this one with some pliers.

It is fairly self explanatory to get it apart after the rotor is pulled out. One screw and the brush housing comes off (may be difficult as the old sealer is hard) then the lower shaft pulls out the armature end of the nose housing to remove the reduction gear and bendix drive. Then the fork and solenoid plunger can come out.

The beauty of rebuilding BEFORE there is an issue is things are not overstressed. The brush ring has no pitting or grooves. Just a little emory cloth and a razor saw to relief the mica between the plates a bit is all it needs.

The rebuild kit gives you everything but kitchen sink. The kit is for a later starter where they had the ears and two screws in the solenoid area (see the brush plate on the upper right). I had to buy the plate for the older earless plate separate. It was still way cheaper to buy the kit + the plate rather than piece the parts together for just a makeshift kit for an earless starter. I think I had less than $100 for both the starter and alternator parts for the rebuild kits (plus the $35 NOS drive I got off eBay).

Just need some cleaning and soul searching on how many bushings to replace. None of them look all that bad. Polish up the shafts and a bit of lube on the original bushings should be all it needs. May change my mind after I clean things up but right now that is my plan.

 

[JimKueneman]

Ok winter came in a BIG hurry in Arizona. Barely making it to 50 most of this week and 20 at night. The garage is getting chilly but I did force myself to spend a bit of time working on the starter. Almost done... should be able to spin it up this weekend. This will be the first functional item I have ever seen operate on this car!

Found a nice NOS factory starter drive on eBay for $35 too.

And looky what Santa brought me for an early Christmas present. Fresh from Kelly's transmission in Whetstone Az, right next down to the awesome Dave who did my motor.

She needs a bit of polishing but looking good!

 

[JimKueneman]

That transmission was just to corroded for my tastes... Some wire wheeling and steel wool and metal polish made it sparkle. Spent the day assembling more on the K-Frame including the transmission, new FirmFeel gear, and a number of odds and ends. I am starting to run out of parts to assemble!!!!!! I am starting to get a bit anxious about getting this thing running!...

I am running out of parts!

Also have all my new wiring harnesses and a few goodies for under the hood.. It is starting to look like a car again...

 

[JimKueneman]

Finished up the starter today.

Solder on the Solenoid wire. Don't just wrap it. There is a tool the twists the wire very tight such that the corners of the post bite the wire. You can't do that by hand. You must solder it. See that insulator on the wall of the frame behind the copper braid to the left below the iron. That MUST be there or the hot side of the brushes could short out on the case.

Quick test on "Boost" of the battery charger. Clip to the chassis and to the small post. The solenoid should pull the starter drive to the engaged position with a clank.. Don't hold to too long you will overheat the solenoid.

Like the wiper motor the old cloth insulators are getting dicy. Add some heat shrink tube to sleep at night..

The Brush housing would not let the magnet frame engage. Make sure the tab is lined up in the slot in the housing and give it a love tap to get the housing to seat all the way in the solenoid area.

Perfect...

Wrap the wire to the post with the two assemblies separated then mount them together. Make sure none of the wires are protruding so the armature can catch them.

Perfect.. Now slide the armature down after lubing the shaft for the bushing and the gear.

The armature will push that washer down and release the brushes.

If you look you see that the bolt runs right where the hot brush braid is (where we had the insulator pad on the nose housing) so I was nervous and added some heat shrink tubing the the bolt just above where the threads will stop engaging when bolted up..

Measure on the bolt to know where the end the tubing.

 

[JimKueneman]

Now put in the bolts and tighten it up.

Hook up the battery charger to the large post and the case and jump from the large post to the small post. Don't arc and destroy the threads of the small post...



A little paint and she is ready to rock...

 

[JimKueneman]

Installed the new front pads and the reconditioned brake parts from months ago....

Then I pulled the master cylinder apart to see how bad the piston barrel is pitted. It is not too bad after running the brake cylinder hone in it for a few minutes. I will likely order new pistons and see what happens. Worse thing I will need to send it to the Ram Man to restore...

 

[Glenwood]

Nice detail work!

 

[JimKueneman]

Busy week at work and 2 days of Dual Sport motorcycle riding. I really had no energy to work on the Coronet today but it was a perfect day for urethane drying. Likely one of the last that will fall on a weekend for a month or two so I took advantage of it. I hated the brackets I painted with SEM and Krylon clear. The paint was soft and easily chipped. I dragged out the Starblast grit and blasted these parts, again, to remove the paint and give the SPI black epoxy some bite. I am glad I did. The sandblasting removed the paint in seconds, it would have not held up well. Switch to glass beads to finish up reconditioning the AC hoses, mufflers and fitting.

The SPI epoxy goes on like glass and just feels like it is gripping the metal.

Bead blasted, wire brush polish and flushed the AC hoses. Ready to install the R134 o-rings.

A lot of parts came in last week but most are not installed yet. I should have all the parts I need to completely assemble the car to the point of the Exhaust and fuel system.

Ready to rebuild the master cylinder...

NOS bushings for the distributer ready to be installed...

Also blasted the torsion bars and painted them cast iron color.

May have to travel next week for work so not much getting done until the Christmas break by the looks of it.

 

[JimKueneman]

2 days of sunshine and lots of UV have the parts painted with SPI epoxy primer dried completely. It was worth the extra effort for sure. Way more durable and looks better..

Look what else came in sooner than expected. Snazzy and Classy!

Need to spend the week on the other side of the country. Not much getting done this week.

 

[JimKueneman]

Master cylinder day. First I dug out my small slide hammer. I used this back in the day to drill a small hole in the EPA plugs that the factory placed in carburetors after they set the idle mixture at the factory. Start the screw and pop the plug out to adjust the idle screw.

Start the screw into the brass cone that seals the brake line..

Slide hammer the fitting out

Piece of cake!

Pull out the check valve and spring. Mine is full of rust....

Put in the new check valves, springs and push the brass cone in enough so it is started square. Then go to the brake line and thread it in. It will press the brass plug into the bore until is stops.

All done.

Simply put some oil in the bore (after honing it) and on the seals of the new pistons. Slide the new pistons in like the directions show. Then put the retainer on so it won't jump back out.

Now it is time to restore it. Spray it with Seymours Cast Blast to give it a raw cast iron look. Notice in the earlier photos that the old cast iron leaches moisture out and starts to rust again so something needs to be applied to seal it and keep it from rusting again.

A little more restoring of the lid and clamp and here we are, ready to bleed the brakes after I get the front K-Frame installed and the front brake lines hooked up!

 

[JimKueneman]

Started to work on the AC compressor next. I stopped at Auto Zone and bought 8oz of Ester based AC oil for R134a refrigerant. I bought R134a compatible seals and o-rings from Windy City Muscle Cars and Detroit Muscle Cars. In order to see what things looked like and clean out as much of the mineral oil based refrigerant oil I pulled it apart and started to clean things out.

I have it pulled apart further and will post more disassemble photos tomorrow as I put it back together.

 

[JimKueneman]

Here is the RV-2 all disassembled (except for the pistons and crank). I cleaned it all out with an alcohol based grease and wax remover and blew it dry.

11/16" socket was perfect to knock out the inner sleeve to replace the o-ring.

I applied a coating of ester based R134 compatible oil. This system takes about 8oz of oil. I will use about 4oz in the compressor and put the rest in the new dryer when I buy it.

Time to assemble the reed valves and cylinder heads.

Now put some oil in the oil pump to primer it and install a new o-ring in the groove and install the plate.

Polish up the shaft were the seal rides with some emery cloth or 1000 grit paper.

The spacer goes with the lip towards the bearing.

 

[JimKueneman]

My new seal seemed to have a problem. The inner ring is made of a ceramic material that chips and cracks easy. Notice that it did not fit into the recess correctly. I decided that was risky as if it was pressed in when I tightened the bolts it would crack. A few swipes on a piece of 180 grit allowed it to fit cleanly in the housing.

There is clocking nibs in that rear bushing, make sure they are engaged in the tabs so it sits flush.

New o-ring and the outer bushing can be pressed into the housing with your fingers.

Don't draw the housing in with the bolts. Make sure it goes in all the way with some light love taps.

Flip it on its head and install the oil pump check valve before installing the oil pan.

 

[JimKueneman]

Install the input and output adapters, torque the bolts and it is ready to roll. I am going to paint it with Seymours Cast Blast to keep it that cast iron look. The stock is black but that makes it a big black hole under the hood. This beast should be shown off in it raw beauty!

Started to really install the brackets that I painted with SPI epoxy. A bit blurry as it was getting dark and the auto focus was failing....

 

[JimKueneman]

The restored RV2 is NOW worthy of being king of the hill on the 318 now. I like the cast iron look instead of the big blob of black.

My those reproduction heater hoses look really nice against the AC Delco radiator hoses and belts

 

[JimKueneman]

So one of the AC nuts and washers was missing when I disassembled the car. Does anyone have a factory nut and washer for these AC mounting bolts they would part with?

 

[JimKueneman]

So what do you think...... Should this go on top of the 318?

+

= AWESOME

 

[Billccm]

I vote for EFI.
I've seen quite a bit of good reviews of the atomic efi.
I believe higher ethanol blends is in the future, so efi is the route to go.

 

[JimKueneman]

Little work under the hood this evening. New battery box hardware and hold down clamp from Year One, new wiring all around from Year One, restored and new firewall items. Windshield washer tank and hoses from Classic Industries.

And a blurry one