Work on My F8, No. 11

[king of obsolete]

sounds like you had a busy day, any pictures???
it rained all day in the KINGDOM plus my daughter had 5 of her friends over. so it was surf the internet.

thansk
KoO
Published Author

[Jim Price]

Thnigs have been a bit slow over the past two days but for a couple of big events!

Picked up the engine night before last and hauled it home in my ancient Toyota pickup. Found that my seller had painted it a bright red in hopes of selling it to a hot rod builder. Have ordered the correct Ford engine green paint appropriate to 1940. Engine and it's innards look good. Will see if we can get it started! See the picture.

Began work on the engine by removing all the head bolts so that we can polish the valves. Lots of flaked-off rust in the water jackets and began to blow them out with some air from the compressor. Need to be sure we get that residue out before putting it back together!

Am giving some thought to going to a 12-volt system and having an electronic ignition/distributor installed. Will change to a negative ground system but with all the electric components out the only problem we may have is with the some of the original instruments. Any thoughts or comments out there?

Picked up the frame from the painter yesterday. The color looks good! The picture attached shows the color to be a bit lighter than it actually is.

Picked up the square pipe, 1/2" by 1", (not channel as I thought!) night before last and today we cut it to length and I took it over to a machine shop to have it cut to 1/2" OD by 3/8" ID for the windshield frame. It should be ready by the middle of next week.

No work planned for this weekend. It's hot, hot, and humid. Temp reached 105 F today. The garage is open with only a fan to cool us off! Must stop every hour to drink at least a 20 oz. bottle of water.

That's all for now!

Regards,
Jim

[king of obsolete]

the engine colour looks good since i'm colour blind, LOL check between the valve seats for cracking. my dad SiR HENRY rebuilds these engines and he goes through several blocks before he finds a good one to rebuild.

thansk for the updates during the heat. cool evening here in the great white north with the windows open and a nice cool breeze at +19C.

thansk
KoO
Published Author

[cletrac (RIP)]

There's two places that the old flatties usually crack. On some cylinders they'll crack between a water passage and a head bolt. These aren't serious and a bit of sealant on the bolt will usually avoid having any problems arising. The ones that go across the valve seat and into the port are a different matter. They turn an otherwise good engine into a boat anchor.

[king of obsolete]

cletrac, you can lock&stitch these cracks. also SIR HENRY is updating the valves with chevy ones.

thansk
KoO
Published Author

[T Creighton]

[Began work on the engine by removing all the head bolts so that we can polish the valves. Lots of flaked-off rust in the water jackets and began to blow them out with some air from the compressor. Need to be sure we get that residue out before putting it back together!]


You are certainly making speedy progress Jim.

Please keep up the running commentary.

While you are checking out the engine you should consider replacing the 4 expansion plugs (frost plugs) at the bottom of each side water jacket where the oil pan bolts on. They are usually brass but some engines have steel ones that will develop pin holes. While they are out you can give the water jackets a real good cleaning.

Cheers, Terry

[Jim Price]

Terry:
Thanks for the tip about removing the frost plugs. Will be working on the engine on Tuesday and knock them out!

Also, thanks for the kind words about my commentary on the F8 restoration project! It's fun and I hoped that others would enjoy reading about my progress on it.

Regards,
Jim

[Jim Price]

Days 46, 47 and 48 were spent recovering from the previous week's activities. We resumed today and accomplished the following:

Cleaned some more lug nuts. Am down to 6 to go!

Cleaned all 48 head bolts after my helper made the maximum effort and managed to get all of them out without snapping a one!

Began to clean out the the water jackets on the engine and heads and got one side almost cleaned out. Amazing what happens when an engine is allowed to dry out and the rust buildup turns into rust flakes!

Picked up the radiator from the shop. What a thing of beauty! Will post pictures as soon as I get it unloaded from the truck.

Went to the speed shop that specializes in parts for vintage Fords and Chevrolets and picked up a brake line kit, a 4 lb. pressure radiator cap, a can of sealant for the gas tank, a gasket kit for the engine and a book on rebuilding the flathead engine. Unfortunately the front seal for the differential that they had advised had arrived turned out to be the wrong one!
Will need to go back for it as it's already paid for!

Got a call from the chemical stripper that my gas tank is done; will pick it up in the morning.

Regards,
Jim

[Mike K]

Jim

It may be worthwhile getting your engine block cleaned in a bath by a professional. Some engine shops use a hot caustic bath to boil out all of the crud .. others use a acid dip then another dip in something else . The block will look like new again, almost.

You need to remove any alloy bits , I cannot recall if those blocks use babbit cam bearings in situ ?

Those Ford V8 lumps are 'warm motors' . With not much leeway there for potential cooling system problems .. everthing needs to be top shape .. I had a ex army 1941 11D truck and it would boil away at the slightest mishap.. like the coolant level going down slightly . I must have poured 50 bucks worth of bars leaks into that thing over the time I drove it around . The radiator in it was U/S .The movie company I sold it to (Illumination films in Middle Park ) , recored the radiator, $800 !!! It was used in a movie called 'the nun and the bandit'. Channel 9 used to play it on late night time slots , Chris Hayward is in it.

Mike

Mike

[Jim Price]

Mike:
Thanks for the cleaning tips on the block. I was gone most of the day and my helper cleaned out the rest of the engine water jackets by hand. We'll be getting together tomorrow to decide what the next step will be.

The babbit bearings were used up until late 1936 when they went to the stell inserts. Mine is a 1938-1942 production and has the latter type.

Ford flatheads have always run hot. One of things I have done is to have a diffferent filler neck installed that will accept a radiator cap with a four pound pressure. This should help prevent the loss of so much water. However, it will still require attention!

Regards,
Jim