Actually been here in Sacramento almost a year now from Miami. My girl grew up out this way and her dad isn't well so we left our lives out east and headed to Sac so she could be near her family.

I'm a bartender by trade (22years now) and I owned a small vintage motorcycle shop in Miami with my buddy Ryan. He was going to keep the shop going while I was gone but he closed it d down a few months ago. Brought most of my tools, blast cabinet, compressor, etc. Except most of my tools are metric, so won't help much with this project.

I just picked up 1966 Ford F250 Camper Special Custom Cab. Barely ran when I got it. But I did manage to drive it home from the delta area. 45 mins to get there and another 2 and a half hours to get back. Stalled every chance it got. While it's still not tuned and needs a lot of work before it'll be a reliable daily driver, I'm putting in the time and at least I can drive her around without stalling now. (Although part of me wants to find find a good 'ol boy mechanic that knows the FE 352 engine and could just dial her in) I may take twice as long to figure out a problem and make twice as many mistakes along the way, I have never met an engine to couldn't master in the end.

Besides my truck, I'm rebuilding my girls Explorer sport's transmission. Has the M5OD aka M5R1. Well, actually I pulled one from pick n' pull a couple weeks ago that I'm rebuilding (got it taken apart, cleaned up and ordered the parts today) so hopefully that'll be rebuilt by next week

Anyway, I'm Joel. Anyone else like wrenching around here?

 

Welcome to Norcal and FTE lots of good info and a few people near you. There is a forum here that covers the FE motors. I have 66 T-Bird with 428 that I built so I know a little about them. The best placeI have found for information on the FE motors is on fordfe.com. Bunch of old racers, ford engineers, and Fe fanatics but they know everything about those engines. I'm also a member there and there are a few members from there that are close to you as well. I'm in Ceres, over by Modesto. I'm going to guess that if you have already did basic tune up (Plugs, wires, ect) so you may be looking at a carb problem. How long did it sit before you bought it. Bad / old gas could have varnished it up and may just need a cleaning and rebuild kit.

So before we just start throwing ideas let us know where you are on it, what you have done, and more detail on what it is doing. Start with basics, Compression check, plugs, ignition and work through it. The hard part is not knowing exactly what you got yet. Has it been rebuilt? If so what is in it.

Again welcome to the west coast.

Peace,

 

Hey Darrell, thanks for y the input. I didn't go into specifics here cause I figured this was the wrong section for that. But I'm not getting much love on the vintage forum thread and since you asked, here goes.

It's a 66 F250 with the 352 V8. Just bought it from a guy that had it in storage for six years. Took it out and did the basics trying to get it started. Plugs, wires, put a remanufactured carb (motorcraft 2100 or 2150 with manual choke), distributor cap, canister gas filter, etc. Well at least that's what he said and I can at least vouch for the carb, the distributor cap, wires and the filter as I've checked those or they are just obvious. Haven't popped open the cap yet to look at the points, nor have I checked vacuum pressure yet as my lines are all steal. I did buy rubber vacuum hoses and I'll be replacing the steal lines soon. Is there a manifold port somewhere in the manifold that I'm missing? The vacuum test was such a big deal back in the day that I have trouble believing they didn't make it easier to test?
Anyway, I adjusted the carb and got it to run well enough to drive it home, but it would stall out every time I would give it gas from a stop. Took hours to make a normal 45 minute drive, but I got it home. I messed with the carbs some more and the stalling stopped. But half way through the day yesterday, while doing lots of city driving, it started stalling in reverse. Hmmmm.
Still idles erratic, starts hard, not very responsive and the steering is loose (actually not sure what the steering is suppose to feel like but to stay in a straight line I'm constantly turning the wheel back and forth about a full half turn) No power steering or powder brakes, or brake booster, etc.
I bought a dwell / tach meter and vacuum gauge in the last couple days and I'll find some time to play with them in a day or two.
Did I cover everything?

Thanks again for asking and I look forward to meeting people in the area with grease under their nails.

Joel

 

I didn't see were he said he dumped the old fuel. If he put new gas on 6yr old fuel it would run like crap. Vacuum gauge will be your friend on this one. You might start with fresh fuel.

I don't know what intake you have on you engine but you are going to want to hook up to Manifold Vacuum. Look behind the carb on one of the runners. Should be a open port there somewhere. Not the one under the carb that the advance is on. There should be no vacuum on the "Ported" vacuum port under the carb at idle.

First set the timing by vacuum. Turn distributor to the highest, steadiest reading. Then up you can set idle mixture in the same manner, turning each screw to the highest, steadiest reading. then go back and see if moving the dizzy well get you a higher, steadier reading. once you find that spot back it off 1 deg.
If it gets hard to start you can back off the timing a little more but the target is the highest smoothest vacuum. the FE motors seem to like a little more advance then other motors. 10-13deg initial. about 32-36 full in.

 

Thanks again DarrellDarrell, you're full of info and one of the reasons these forums work. I'm not sure if the gas tank was flushed but I did pull the canister of the bottom of the fuel pump to double check the filter and everything was clean in there. I guess I should have also mentioned that I didn't feel like I was getting a very good stream of fuel when I looked down the venturi of the carb and revved the engine, and seemed a little weaker on the right side, well maybe. Not sure what it was suppose to look like but just didn't feel like I was getting much fuel. It's a brand new (reman) carb (two months old) so I don't want to think it is dirty inside but if he didn't flush the tank then maybe it did get dirty inside.... Hmmmm bummer.

Well thanks again,
It'll be a couple days before I can get under the hills again, but I'll metro you up to date.

Joel

 

Welcome to FTE and the Nor Cal chapter. I am sure you will like it here. And as you are finding out, there is a wealth of information here regarding Ford trucks.

Almost forgot, if you would like to join the chapter, just click on the blue link in my signature and I'll hook you up.

Jim

 

No worries. It took me 7 yrs to finally rebuild my wifes T-Bird. Sometime time, money, and projects never go hand in hand.

 

welcome hillbillybuddha best of luck and merry Christmas to you and you're family.. peace

 

Welcome HBB / Joel..I haven't been on here very long..but good stuff and nice people. What's not to like. I'm just down the road in Fairfield..Home to Travis AFB, Jelly Belly and Budwiser..lol
Mike

 

Joel, I posted greetings over in nor cal forum.
I'll be passing through next week enroute to Tahoe. I don't have much engine experience but enjoy getting my hands dirty. I was stationed at opa locka for about five years.
hope you and yer family is enjoying company today.
cheers man!

 

Bdpotts, when you coming through? And where you coming from? The rain hasn't really let me get out for the last week, well the rain and the flu. But when I get a chance I really need to change out the transmission on my girl's Ford Explorer. I just rebuilt a core for her as hers is failing in a hurry. I've never done a tranny rebuild or replacement before, but I guess most things I've done up to this point I had to do a first time.

I had a friend who was stationed at Opa-Locka USCG Air for a while.

 

joel, i think we are leaving sometime saturday morning. we'll be coming from oakland.
i was stationed in miami from the fall of '03 to the summer of '08. who did you know there at the coast guard base? theres a good chance i'll know 'em or at least heard the name.

 

I've been down with the flu, something bad. Today is the first day I've been out of bed in three days. bdpotts, have fun in Tahoe, hopefully I'll be up and about by the NYE, being a bartender by trade, that's always a big night.
The guy I knew in Opa-Lacka name was Matt, I honestly don't remember his last name. I called him a friend but really he was a bar regular, nice guy, kinds on the shorter side, like 5’6" or 5’7" lots of tattoos. That was like ’08 till about '10 when I changed jobs.

 

joel, hope you're making a full recovery from your flu sickness. did you feel well enough to work NYE? if so, did you make a killing? we are back in oakland from out trip out east. truck ran good but we are glad to be off 80.
there were lots of matt's i worked with. none with tats in 08 that ring a bell though. i left miami in late may of 2008 soooo.. i'm not sure.
glad to hear he seemed like a nice enough guy and not some jerk who would give us all a bad rep.
making any progress on the tranny rebuild? my truck could use some TLC.. i just don't have the space to work on it. you have a shop or garage? i've already been robbed here where i park my truck so i'm leery to full-on tear into it and have passers-by notice its out of commission and decide to help themselves to parts... so, it may end up in the dealership.

 

Thanks, I wasn't feeling all that great on NYE but I ended up working anyway. Made OK money, nothing like Miami money but not bad for Sacramento.

I did finish the trans rebuild, but haven't put it in her truck yet, I think I might need a few more hands for that job, and as long as doing it, I'm going to replace the throw out bearing, the clutch slave and clutch. So I need to order those parts.

I just have a garage and a gated driveway. I do most of my work in the gated driveway (damn does it hurt when you bust a knuckle in this winter weather)

Seems I have got a problem with my truck now, still diagnosing it, but I'm guessing a valve issue.

How was your trip?