The entertainment value

[36 sedan]

like most of us, I get considerable enjoyment out of working on my hot rod, I have even been known to call it entertainment, almost as much as I enjoy driving it.

Recently I encountered a slight smell of gas the last time I parked, I decide to check the fuel system, working from the gas cap back to the motor checking for leaks. After starting and running the motor for a few minutes I noticed the smell of gas returning, and upon further examination I could see fuel seeping slightly at the top gaskets of both my carbs. A bit unusual for both carb’s needle and seats to wear out at the same time, I suspected I might have a fuel pressure problem, testing proved this to be the case. Although a bit unusual for a mechanical pump, mine was putting out slightly over 6lbs at idle and over 8lbs when accelerated.

Time to installed a pressure regulator.

Sounds easy enough, just find a place to mount the regulator and plumb it up. Except things are seldom that easy (we’ll at least not for me). Now I'll admit I might be a little picky (aka anal, so I’m told), but I like things to look a certain way (ok, it is anal). In my defense though I don't have an over abundance of room under my hood and not wanting the regulator to be the first thing seen when the hood is up, I decided to mount the regulator down on the inner fender plate of my 36 ford just in front of the motor where less heat exposure would be (or so I convinced myself for not being able to see it).

All easy enough right, drill a couple holes mount it, plumb it and on my way.

Except, there is not enough room to fit a drill in to drill the holes, not even with my small right angle drill and a shorty bit? No problem, just remove the inner fender plate and drill it on the bench. Problem solved, NOT! Seems the inner fender plate has two nuts at the bottom inside the frame rails that are boxed in, need an open end wrench about a foot and a half long with a couple of bends to get at them? A little wrench fabricating, then some contortioning in ways I didn’t think I could any longer (and later wishing I hadn’t), about four hours later the fender plate is back in place ready for the regulator to bolt on. Another 30 minutes making new braided fuel lines and I'm ready to go. Well not quite, my new bottom fuel line is leaking, and tightening the fittings doesn't help. Off with the fuel line for a closer inspection and low and behold the hose is deformed inside at one of the fittings. Thinking I probably damaged the hose as I installed the fitting, I cut a new piece of hose, blow it out with air to get the residue out and for some reason this time I take a peak inside the hose to make sure it is clean, the new hose is pitted about an inch long inside? Pays to check inside the hoses! Anyway, fuel leak is fixed, regulator adjusted, needle and seats in the carbs replaced, and everything is looking and running good!

Of course, you know the story doesn't end here, lol!

Out for a short cruise to be sure everything is ok, you know make sure the carbs are getting enough fuel and blow some carbon out of the motor. About five miles down the road one of my cooling fans stops working, probably just a fuse and I have two fans, temperatures are cool not a big worry. I turn around and head back to the man cave. Once parked, I smell burning plastic? Yep, fan had a melt down (of course it wasn’t a fuse). Well, it's not the end of the world just change the fan, after all it is less than a year old and still warrantied. Except (and there’s always an exception isn’t there), to get to the fans I need to disassemble the front grill housing. About five hours and a few expletive deleted’s later, fans are back in business.

Ahh, back on the road. But wait! (this is starting to sound like a Ronco commercial), lol!

I'm cruising down the road enjoying myself, when over the radio I hear a noise from the left front? Thinking I may have thrown a rock up from a tire, but no, the steering wheel shimmy is telling me otherwise. Back to the man cave!

Did I mention the entertainment value? LOL!

[34_40]

OOOoooo.. I cannot wait for the next installment to this story! I can hear it now.. "When we left our hero he was hanging onto a bucking steering wheel with white knuckles..."

Don't you love the entertainment!!! LOL..

[rspears]

Gotta say I identified with the story line in the first segment.....

[randyr]

Ah yes, this story has familiar elements for me, too.....on my '37, what started as a radiator replacement turned into a complete & total rebuild.....of everything!!!!!
One thing always leads to at least a thousand more..... but it sure is fun!

[36 sedan]

ENTERTAINMENT VALUE, PART TWO (the hot rodder’s saga)

Got the wheels balanced, back on the road and the shimmy is gone. Just a thrown wheel weight and air in my power assisted rack and pinion steering. Turns out, that turning the wheel without the motor running causes air to enter the power steering system, oops.

Back on the road and having fun! The other radiator fan is making noise? Off with the grill and sure enough the second fan is rubbing internally. Contact the supplier and they agree to exchange both fans, so I order two new fans. This time I upgrade to all metal fan with ball bearings (no more plastic), more cost but I’m tired of playing with fans.

New fans arrive, they require additional mounting fabrication along with a few other modifications to fit them in place. While I have it apart I decided to rework the fan relays, piggybacking two relays per fan motor wired in parallel doubling the current capacity, plus in the event one relay fails I’ll still have another (I may be a little paranoid). Along with resettable circuit breakers to replace the fuses, I should be done with all the trouble. Also, to make things easier next time I decided to replace the grill nuts & bolts with blind clips and body bolts to make removing/installing the grill a little faster (not like I’m doing that much).

OK, everything is buttoned back up and ready to test. THE FANS ARE NOT COOLING THE MOTOR!? And, it is a cool day! I'm really bummed!

I send an e-mail to their tech support, I explain that their fans are rated at 3300cfm each, a 1000cfm greater output per fan than the ones I removed, yet they do not cool my motor? We go through the installation, the wiring, everything is correct. Tech support is at a loss, saying their fans really do have more output and draw less current than the ones I'm replacing, so there is no reason why they would not cool my motor? Racking my brain, I’m seriously thinking about sending these back, exchanging them for the ones I took out. After all the old ones did cool the motor. Yeah, they were troublesome, yeah they pulled extremely high current requiring wiring upgrades and a high output alternator to keep up with them, yeah they blew fuses, and yeah they burned up in less than 6 months. But, they did cool the motor when they worked (when being the definitive).

As a last ditch effort, I decided to reset my digital fan controller to a lower temperature setting just to see if that will help. Oops, seems when I disconnected the battery it wiped out the program memory, the controller wasn’t controlling the fans correctly. Reset the controller and Wow, these new fans really work well! This is the coolest the motor has ever run! May have to increase the temp settings a little.

Isn’t it great to finish a project with everything working and………..aaah, the motor has a miss in it?!!!!!

[rspears]

Arrrrrrrrrrrgh!!

[techinspector1]

Makes a fellow want to take up knitting.

.

[MelloYello]

Glad it wasn't me HOWEVER, it was an ENTERTAINING story.

[34_40]

I'll trust that final sentence is just for "entertainment"?!?!?!

[Dave Severson]

Some days ya get the bear, some days ya shouldn't go hunting...... When we were still racing roundy-rounds and wrecked a car, blew an engine or other bad stuff Dad would say that we were having another "dedication check"!

[36 sedan]

I'll trust that final sentence is just for "entertainment"?!?!?!

Can't make this stuff up! I didn't notice I had bent the plug wire loom down slightly caused a wire to touch the header and burn up. LOL!

[34_40]

Can't make this stuff up! I didn't notice I had bent the plug wire loom down slightly caused a wire to touch the header and burn up. LOL!

ARGHhhhhh.. that hurts! I guess it's true, some days you're the bug... other days you're the windshield!

[36 sedan]

And the saga continues;

The engine miss was easy, I had bent a wire loom down allowing a ignition wire to hit the headers, burned up a wire. New set of wires, everything is good.

Except, just when I thought it was safe to drive in hot weather, FAN SHARKS!

I know this is getting old, and for me too. Turns out my first instincts about the new radiator fans were correct, resetting the controller’s temperatures only postponed the inevitable, in under 70* weather the fans cool the motor (yes, I said fans, meaning both), however in warmer weather it just ain’t happening. At moderate 75° + weather they do not cool, come to a stop or slow speeds the motor climbs to as high as 230° before I shut it down. In an attempt to make these fans more efficient, I fashioned rings to fit around the fans by cutting the bottoms out of 13” deep dish pizza pans hoping to increase their static pressure. While it did help a little, it is still not enough to cool the motor at a stop and low speeds even in moderate temperatures (I can only envision what hot weather will bring).

Back to tech support, they can not understand why their fans are not cooling my motor.

Just to confirm my suspicions; I remove the latest fans and re-install the original fans, the ones before the high outputs (previous to the last). Just to give you a little background, the original fans are rated at 1700cfm each, the previous high output fans are rated at 2200cfm each and these latest and greatest fans are rated at 3300cfm each. The original fans (1700cfm) cool the motor, and, they cool the motor running on just one fan most of the time. This confirms my suspicions that the latest fans are not up to their claims.

Giving up with the manufacture and their support.

I contact the supplier I purchased the fans from, their customer support representative tells me they can not take the fans back once they have been installed. I explain that the fans are not living up to their claims and ask to talk to a supervisor. I explain to the supervisor all events and he puts me through to their tech support, tech support reviews everything and agrees with me the fans are not doing what they claim. Tech support sends me back to customer support and they agree to take the fans back. Perfect, and the reason I buy through this supplier!

About now, some of you are thinking why did I change the fans in the first place? And, that’s a good question; while they did cool the motor most of the time, they did not cool it very well with the A/C on, and occasionally in hot weather the motor would run warmer than I liked in traffic, even with the A/C off.

Lesson learned, cfm ratings must align with current draw. And I knew this, just got caught up in the claims of a more efficient motor. So, I boxed up the latest and greatest fans and sent them back. Ordered the pervious high output fans that actually live up to their claims. However, the fans are out of stock on backorder, and not expected for 30 days or more.

I guess I’ll be using the original fans for awhile, along with old style A/C, windows down and fast. LOL.

[Dave Severson]

My usual response, If this Hot Rodding were easy everyone would be doing it!! It is good to hear of a supplier that stands behind his product!

[34_40]

Sorry to hear that you had another installment to this drama.. I don't remember you sharing the name of this vendor.. did you?