new here with a '73 Custom Cruiser

Jaunty, after reading Saf57's reply, I'm sure he wasn't making fun of you. I don't think I've ever seen any postings where anybody makes fun of anybody else. That's one of the coolest thing about this site. We all hate derbies, saf57 included, and it reads to me like he was joining in on your diatribe over them. Of course, I don't want to speak for saf57, but it's my opinion that he was totally agreeing with you. Saf57, am I right?

That's the one problem with emails and internet forums. Alot of times, an entirely different meaning can be inferred than what the author intended.

 

I was being a bit tongue-in-cheek with my original post about the water department guy and demolition derbies, but I took Mr. saf57 as going beyond having fun with what I said and mocking me as though I really was deathly afraid of someone stealing my car in the night.

I understand the limitations of internet postings, and my posts on many sites over the years have sometimes been taken the wrong way. It's nice of you to come to his defense. It would be nicer if Mr. saf57 would come to his own defense. He's not obligated to, of course, and I'm not expecting it.

 

Jaunty, some of us, me included, sometimes kid around and the message is lost in print.

I'm quite sure he wasn't mocking you.

To change the subject a bit I really like the pictures you've posted as I'm definately not a clamshell owner and know nothing about them but I like learning pretty much everything. Some of these threads become valuable reference material if we can find them again when we need them. Keep up the information, it's great. I just love those great big land barges. We Americans sure could built them eh?

Yes this from a small Mercury owner. I don't have a wagon preference. They all make sense to me.

 

Jaunty...Saf was just having fun
he's one of the more eloquent guys on here

i'm the one that usually getting in trouble for my sarcasm...
nice to see someone else in trouble for once

 

^^^^^^^^^^
What Rev said.
I can't believe I'm agreeing with something Rev said.....

 

...........................

 

Yeah Fox, Saf does have a way with words...quite eloquent and thoughtful...that is, until that tawdry "Beaver" thread!
No one walked away from that one with their dignity intact!

David

 

Beaver thread. Not touchin' that one, wix. I'm tryin' to be good!

 

Uh oh, here we go again! :banghead3:

David

 

Jaunty!

Every wagon-saving story warms my heart, Clamshells especially. I grew up with one (a '76 Chevrolet Caprice Estate), so I too have an emotional connection with mine.

You're in the best wagon forum out there, glad to have you in the family.

Best of luck to you! Safe to say, we ALL look forward to reading your updates and seeing pics.

Matt

 

Thank you for the additional welcomes.

Here's an update. I finally had a chance yesterday morning to remove the tailgate motor (three easy bolts), and then the gate would move up and down freely. But I couldn't pull it all the way up. When it's up as far as I can pull it, there's still about a 1/2" gap. Is there some kind of latch that I'm meeting the resistance of and I just have to push a little harder? Something to look into.

I needed the back end closed up because I needed to drive the car to the local title office to get a new title. Because I brought it in from out of state, I needed to get a "VIN inspection," which is what Ohio requires of any car brought in from out of state if you want to title it in Ohio. Because it's cold and wintry around here, I didn't want to have to drive the car the 10-mile round trip to the title office if it wasn't weather tight.

I got the VIN inspection, and it turned out that there was an error in the VIN on the West Virginia title dating all the way back to when the car was first titled in 1973. The second character is a "Q", but it had been recorded as an "0", which was an easy mistake to make if one looked only quickly on the VIN plate on the car, which is down very low under the windshield and kind of hard to see. I pointed out the error, and they made sure to record it correctly. I got the title and registered the car as an historic vehicle using a 1973 Ohio license plate I found at an antique store.

So now that the car is all legal with the state of Ohio, I can focus on the problems. The car actually ran quite well on the trip to the title office as that was certainly the longest and farthest the car had been driven since 2005. The heater worked great, which was nice on a 20-degree day, but I notice a coolant leak that looked like it was coming from within the radiator itself. So that will have to come out and get looked at by a radiator shop, and I'll replace the two hoses as well as they look like they could use it.

Other vitals on the car look ok, though. According to the service records, the brakes were redone just before the car was parked in 2005, so they had about 11 miles on them when I got it. The pedal is firm, and the car stops straight and fast, so I'm not anticipating anything needed there. The oil looks like it was changed yesterday, and it was right on the full mark. I changed all the spark plugs. The previous ones were put on in 1994, 16 years and about 7,000 miles ago. Certainly not old as far as miles go, but the electrodes were covered in black, and I'm assuming that's because those 7,000 miles were mostly short, in-town drives, and the engine may not very often have fully warmed up. The carburetor was rebuilt twice over the car's life, last in 1995 with about 96,000 miles on it. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I took the air cleaner off, and the carb looks clean enough to eat off of.

While I was out yesterday, I stopped at the gas station and added about 5 gallons of gas. I had also put in two gallons at home from my lawnmower/snowblower cans, so that's about 7 gallons, which moved the fuel gauge from just under 1/2 to about 3/4. I'm hoping to get the old gas burned through as it appears that the tank was about 1/2 full when the car was parked in 2005. It started up and ran on that old gas, but it seems to be getting slowly happier as the new gas mixes with the old.

The gas tank itself is a bit interesting as it's not the original. According to the service records, the original tank was replaced back in 1981 when the car had about 62,000 miles on it (62,111, to be exact). The reason for the replacement was not given, but that does seem early, both mileage and time-wise.

Then, the current tank was removed, cleaned, and "limed" back on 12/28/04 when the car had about 102,000 miles on it, which was only about 600 miles ago, as the car now has 102,600 miles on it. So I'm assuming the gas tank is good and clean and happy, and I was pleased to see the gauge move when I added gas after having had problems (and still having them) with the sending unit on my '67 Delta 88. But the fix for that is coming, too, as soon as the weather warms up a bit.

Next will be removing and testing the tailgate motor with a 12-volt power supply I have. I did find out that the circuit breaker for the tailgate motor circuit is supposed to be mounted right on the fuse panel. I'm hoping that the motor is fine and that the circuit breaker is fine and it just turns out to be a bad ground.


One last thing for now. I received the 1973 Fisher Body manual. The chassis manual is still on order. I wanted the manual because another thing I need to do is adjust the hood so that it aligns properly with the cowl and fenders.

Well, if I asked you, of the two manuals, chassis and body, where would you expect to find instructions on how to adjust the hood, you would likely say the body manual, right? So did I. I was wrong. It's not in there. All they have about the hood is information on the release mechanism you pull on under the dash.

So I dug out my two manuals for my '67 Delta to see in which of them was the hood adjustment instructions, and sure enough, they are in the chassis service manual. I'm guessing that the hood hinge technology and thus the adjustment method didn't change much between 1967 and 1973, so I'm assuming the instructions for 1967 will apply to the '73 if I get impatient and want to work on it before the '73 chassis manual arrives.

But getting back to my original point, to ME, the chassis service manual should cover everything under the hood and anything else on the car below about my knee level. Because that's where the @$%#^ chassis is! The BODY manual should cover anything above knee level, and that's where the hood is!


P.S. One last thing I forgot to mention. While I had the car out on the road yesterday, three people came at me with swords in an attempt to take the car from me and use it in a demolition derby. I grabbed the oil dipstick and valiantly fought them all off.

 

excellent news! fyi on the gas gauge, my 1st oh say 1/3 takes a long time to use, the last 1/2 goes quickly. I believe AllanR had the same warning, and I know that my other 2 cars are like that as well. Always been my experience with 70s GM that the gauges took a long time to come off FULL.

That said, the wagon float is set up differently that my other 2 as well... if I have a half tank, say, and I take off from a stop, the needle falls.

In the wagon, on takeoff from a stop, the needle rises toward F

Same thing with stopping, the Toronado and 88 rise toward F, the wagon falls toward E

Also an interesting fact on the fuel of these big mamas, small ass tanks if you ask me!!

Toro and 88 have 26.5, wagon has 22

I get gas every 3 days LOL

How did you get the tailgate to stay up?

 

Excellent progress, Jaunty.
Just a few suggestions -
- Maybe a new fuel filter wouldn't be a bad idea, since the wagon's been sitting so long.
- Lube those hood hinges. If there's some resistance to closing the hood, you may end up folding the hood in half. GM trucks of the 70's were notorious for that.....

 

hood hinges have like 10 pivot points per hinge, I am notorious for white lithium grease disaters, but a brush is tough. I like a can of spray white lithium grease and kind of make a tent around the with a large rag hinge to protect the corners of the eng compartment and fenders ... very hard to get to to clean oversprayed grease

 

Jaunty,

Just a thought about your question on the tailgate not rising all the way by hand...is there perhaps gunk in the tracks where the gate stops moving?

I think in an earlier post you raised the question about replacing the tires, saying they were old, but hardly any wear..? Lemme tell you, I just replaced all four of mine for the same reason. Mine dated back to about 1994 but still had about 80% tread. I ran over a pot hole one day with the FL tire and the car immediately began pulling severely to the right. With the help of a tire shop, I discovered a HUGE bulge dead-center on the tread and a smaller one on the outside wall. A closer look revealed a tiny bulge forming on one of the rear tires too. The first thing the tire guy asked me was, "How old is your rubber?"

After he turned red and we shared a chuckle, I recalled seeing a chalk mark on the spare that read "9/1994". He advised me that age was just as important as wear when it comes to tire integrity, and that I was an accident waiting to happen. Food for thought...hope it helps.