Glad to hear about the 76 running and performing so well. Carburetor issues are to be expected when a vehicle sits for a long time though. Those seals just don't hold up when they dry out. Wishing you a good fun trip home. Keep us updated.

 

Ok, the trip down to SoCal went well. Ryan decided to use the carb he had and just mess with it. About a half hour down the hill we stopped to check everything out and refuel. The carb was idling terribly so we went to adjust the idle mixture and wallah the screws actually did something and adjusted as they were supposed to. So some crud prolly got cleared out of the idle circuit. However later more of same, ran great at speed but the idle circuit is toast. The upshot is it made it home great and the carb is being rebuilt today.
Here it is leaving the ranch and climbing a very stout hill to the highway. Notice how clean it's running.


Now back to the build.
When we started we knew we had an engine that almost ran that was sitting around for quite a few years. We had no brakes, no brake lights, no dash, the fuel pump didn't work, a huge exhaust leak and a drive train that worked but we had no clue as to what it needed.
So get the engine running and make it safe were the watch words.

The engine turned out to be very clean inside. No sludge at all. It looks as if it had recently had a valve job at least as the heads were looking newer than the block.
Also surprise, surprise there was a Streetmaster intake on it.
Next question was did it have a cam? Turns out it's either smallish or stock.
Here's the Streetmaster.



The floors inside are the best I've ever seen on a dent. Pristine.








The brakes were pretty easy except we didn't have the right pivot bolt for the pedal to plunger connection so that has to be ordered or found. So we cleaned up the booster an stuck a new mc on there and had good brakes. You just have to give the pedal a nudge towards you to kill the brake lights until that slack gets dialed out with the right bolt and bushing. But the brakes work very well.

The dash is a whole nuther story. When we pulled the original dash a couple years ago it crumbled in our hands as most of you know the mid 70s stuff will do. So we found another at a pic n pull and found the right number printed circuit to go with it. However flash forward to now and I could not get the oil and water gauges to work. So we'll have to recheck numbers and figure that out.
Swapped in an earlier speedo unit (with no 55 mph crap) and rolled the mileage back to 0. What a rubics cube bitch that is. Don't tell the feds.



The exhaust leak took two guys pretty much the whole day to repair. It was a log manifold with a donut for a gasket where the pipe meets the log.
The manifold was in horrible shape and the donut was to big. So the manifold had to be replaced and of course that mean pulling it off and most of you know that that means broken bolts and redrilling. Then using a nut on the head side of the uppers for now. That and reshaping the donut and rebuilding the exhaust was an all day deal. As well as filing the manifold to make it flat.
Short story is that it worked. It's nice and quiet now.


Had to replace the ps pump low pressure return as it had a huge crack in it.
Replaced all the fuel supply rubber in the truck.
Also replaced the fuel pump, one of the most fun jobs on a together FE, not.

The transfer case had no oil in it but seems to be ok. Those damn things are bombproof. It's a 205.
The whole driveline was pretty dry. All better now.

Here's Ryan jumping in right before we took the hood off.

 

Glad to hear you made it home Marc. And yeah those ole 205's are bombproof x-cases. I had all the seals blow out of the one in my old Bronco and didn't now it until I got the truck home. Drove at least 50+ miles with it like that. Didn't hurt a thing. I also think you should make that face shot/chuckle your trademark each time you post a video when working on one of your projects. Hehehe.

 

Ok, I now have an account, and a t-shirt!.
The drive from NorCal put 449 miles on the "re-done" odometer and that's about all the old Holley 600 was worth. The truck died at the back door of the shop this morning and have not been able to make it run since. Will make an am trip to Marc's to 'borrow' a 700cfm he has so I can get this thing moved from blocking the roll-up door. I ordered new power steering hoses today and once those arrive we can fix the ps fluid leaks. Noticed another drip near the transfer case, actually coming off the CV joints at the top of the rear driveshaft. I'm assuming this is gear lube coming out of the rear bearing retainer & seal assembly but have not yet looked close enough to be sure. Despite the carburetor issues, the engine runs like a champ. So, global plan is to make the truck right; electrical, interior, body, paint & trim. Then go after the driveline.
But first I have to catch a breath from the four day thrash. I'm looking forward to meeting all of you in the coming months as she regains her former glory.
Ryan

 

Congrats on the new to you truck. And welcome to FTE. Looking forward to seeing more of this beautiful truck.

 

Awesome
Ryan joined FTE
Here's a couple more and let me be the second to welcome my bro to FTE.

 

Man I love the look of that truck!

I'd love to have one of my (6!) brothers catch the truck bug, but that hasn't happened so far. BUT my brother-in-law is now looking for one - and I may have found him one (79 F150). He is going to check it out.

Have fun with this one, boys.

 

Nothing better than working on something you love with your family, be it your dad, brothers, sons or daughters. Soon I'll have my grand kids out there

 

That is so true Marc. Can't think of a better way to form a bond with family. Especially if it's between a dad and child.

 

Ryan got a brand new 650 Holley from me and tried to start it again.
No go.
So today he yanked the front of the engine with his son and replace the timing set and wp.
The old set had over an inch of slop in it.
They're still at it.
Will let you know what happens.

 

Update: after replacing the carb with a perfect one off Marc's '74 we still could not get the engine to do more than a very rough, low rpm idle, eliminated ignition issues (or so we thought, more on that later) by re-wiring the hot & ground to the coil. Eliminated carb issues by replacing it, eliminated possible plug issues by replacing them. Skilled deduction lead me to one conclusion, Timing Chain. I reasoned this was it because; A) no amount of ignition timing change produced any different result until I got so far off that it coughed & quit B) throttle signal was non-existent, gave it wide open T & no difference C) we had eliminated everything else I could think of. So my son Caleb and I decided to have at it.



Just about down to it..


I expected to see missing nylon teeth from the cam gear; nope, steel cam gear, the chain was Oh Too loose but crank & cam gear timing marks could still be lined up in the vicinity.


This is a really bad shot of the timing chain nearly climbing off the crank gear, one good sneeze and it may have jumped a tooth..




Better indication of T chain play, easy 1"



Though an inexact method of measure, I did my best to align the two chains, old on the bottom, new on top. Perhaps an extra half-link? Combined with the wear on the two gears it was very sloppy and could have retarded valve timing 8 or 10 degrees.




Though the chain & gears were sloppy thus making the cam timing retarded it was still in a place where the engine should have run so we began to ponder anew. Broken cam? Nope, took off the driver side valve cover and valve train was functioning perfectly.
Onward, we installed the new timing set and re-assembled the engine, just over 6 hours after draining the coolant, she was back to form. Took a little to burn the excess fuel from the cylinders as the old carb was just pouring gas but once that was cleared Black Beauty was was back.
About that ignition; my son Caleb -another of the family engine brain trust- had pulled the hot wire to the electric choke while I cranked the engine on restart. Once the engine was warmed up he re-connected the hot wire to the choke, engine nearly died and began the rough-idle as before. The story is not over as I now have to find out what's going on with the electric choke drawing power form the ignition coil -this is where I ask for any input from all of you experienced FTE members- but the engine is now stronger than before due to a perfect carburetor, proper valve timing and it has a new water pump! I'll finesse the tune up today.
No down-side other than a long night working on my truck with my kid.. come to think of it, No down-side at all.

 

Where is the choke power coming from now?

 

Little update.
Ryan had the problem diagnosed well.
After they installed a new timing chain the engine is running good and strong.
He's flying back to Iowa today so I'm stepping in to post.
He has to figure out where to get choke power, but that's not a big deal. The only problem is the harness is so hacked up from the po it's been a bit difficult.
But the upshot is that it's running well.
And of course while he had the front end off he replaced the wp.
Gonna take a while to get the wiring and dash back in top shape.

 

Ahh, the dreaded "PO" strikes again.
Wiring seems to be a favorite target of previous owners.
Glad he got it running though. It's a nice, solid truck. Good that it's back on the road.

 

Yeah it had me scratch in' my head Mike. God bless the po's pointy little head.
I was really surprised to see the amount of chain slop he had in the timing set.
Maybe one of you out there know if they (Ford) put a steel set in there in 76.
I thought that they were all nylon.
If they were nylon and that is a replacement chain set it is surprising to have that much slop.
But you are correct it's a dead solid truck.