Flaring Tool
Soaring’s ride:
1965 Mustang
I’m now at the point where I can re-install the valve covers. I’ve painted them and cleaned up the gromets (for one of my vette buddies who was dismayed when the saw the interim pics).
If you remember I had to remove a few things including vacuum hoses, spark plug wires, a/c parts. In addition the bolts that hold the covers down had spark plug wire holders and other brackets for hold wires.
Brackets that would mount through with the bolt for the covers passing through.
Keep this in mind as I explain what I learned from my decision to use Fel-Pro gaskets.
Ok..fine enough dramma..lets get to the lesson I learned (which is often learned the hard way when you have average skills and less than average experience).
I am not smarter than the engineers at GM. They knew what they were doing when the used permatex…it was all about the bolts. Specifically, the length the engineers decided do use, or maybe it was the budget guys. They knew how to follow the build sheet. Here is the bottom line. The length of the bolts supported the thin layer of the permatex and the brackets shown above and that was it.
They did not support the thickness of the gaskets. They were just under a 1/4 too short. With the brackets and the Fel-Pro gasket in place barely two threads poke out, not enough to catch the thread on the engine. errrk….When did I know this and what got into your head to do it anyway?
Fare enough question. I found out when I queried a couple of Corvette forums about what gaskets to use. I got a lot of responses, everyone has an opinion..ya know!!! But only one had actually done an 84 C4 and he said..if you don’t use permatex you are going to have to get longer bolts and BTW your bracket for the spark holders won’t fit. So I knew this before I picked up the valve covers (but not before I ordered the set from the supplier).
Why I didn’t go with the permatex solution was the amount of space and jostling what I had to do when I took them out. I was pretty sure getting them back in would be worse and the changes of wiping off the some of the permatex and messing up the seal, making the odds of redoing it high.
Finding the longer bolt took some doing. The auto parts store…yes..yes.. the same one that said they didn’t have anything but cork and when querying another employee show me what I and originally asked for..didn’t have the proper bolts. The 84 C4 was all metric, bolts and nuts, you can even switch the digital the dash from US to metric. The heads are 11mm the threads were 6mm and the pitch was 1/4.
I ended up at ACE hardware and the only thing that would work and look good were the chrome. Ok…average guy with average budget…warning..they weren’t cheap…I know that when the manger took me to the back of the store and showed me a stack of boxes that were padlocked shut. They lock them up!!!! They were over $2.00 each, washers were nearly a $1.00.
So I decided on the chrome but they only had 7 bolts..I needed eight with washers as well, they only had 1 washer. When did we as a nation have a shortage chrome??? Any way I went ot another Ace and the guy there didn’t have any, but tried to tell me the ones I purchased at the other ACE wasn’t correct. He had the washers so I picked those up and traveled to the next ACE (they’re a lot like Walgreens..they’re on nearly every corner here in Tucson).
Replacing the covers was about the same as removing them and while doing it I was very glad I didn’t use the permatex, most of it wouldn’t have made it on the covers or the engine. I’m thinking at the GM factory they put the valve covers on before the AC and all the vacuum hoses and alternator…etc.
Tomorrow I’ll finish this up….well maybe…one more lesson was in store.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Often if you get the right size radiator or heater hose it will be a tight fit(eerrrkkk….don’t tighten the clamp first!!!!….just kidding…eeerrrkk) getting it over metal fittings. You can buy them bigger but you are asking for leaks!!!! Here are a couple of tips. One I’ve used and the other I haven’t tried yet.
1. I live in Arizona, and it’s hot here and normally if you are going to have problems it will be from over heating in the summer time. I’ll take the hose and leave it on the concrete driveway for a while in the hot sun. That often softens it up enough to slip on.
2. This one I have not tried. If you have clear wire-pulling compound, you can rub a light amount around the inside of the hoses and it will slide right on. Here is a link where you can find some. http://www.twacomm.com/catalog/dept_id_608.htm
Thanks for reading.
Don’t forget our project car contest. $100.00 online shopping gift card to your favorite auto parts web site.
Tim
So if UPS has its act together I should be getting a set of valve cover gasket and engine paint to repaint the Valve covers and installing them all on Saturday and part of Sunday if necessary.
I could have got the gaskets locally, but only in cork. What I’ll never understand is the thought behind using cork in cars where the average engine coolant temperature is over 200 degrees. Yeah..really.
The spec book on the 1984 C4 Crossfire engine has the thermostat requirement at 195 (degrees). That means the engine has to reach nearly 200 degrees before the thermostat opens and allows the coolant to flow. What more the Crossfire engine is came equiped with an electronic fan for the radiator and the is factory set to come on when the temp reaches 223 degrees.
Now that’s pretty hot for an engine. Rarely does my corvette digital temp gage find it’s self under 200 degree during while operating, it normally round 210.
So knowing that, Chevy still put cork valve cover gaskets on the car. If you’ve ever worked with those, you know that if the engine runs hot, they will eventually “cook” on and dry out and leak. So I went with…. errrkk…. cut/paste “Ultra-Seal material provides a positive seal through controlled swelling of the gasket once exposed to hot engine oil. The polymers used in Ultra-20 also ensure gaskets will not harden and fall apart like others can. Gaskets are coated with an easy release material which helps prevent tearing when the valve covers are removed.”…end errrk and cut/paste.
The painting shouldn’t be a problem, it’s just to spruce them, but I’ll need to prepare them. They are textured magnesium and can take a lot of heat but they do stain easily. I’ll show close-ups of the before and after.
Actually you can see some of it here.
errrkkk….Normally my engine isn’t this awful looking. But it’s been a wetter than normal winter and I haven’t kept up with it like I should. Plus I haven’t been too worried about, know that I had to do these gaskets and hopefully, soon, I’ll be putting on the newly designed Crossfire intake.
Hey..don’t forget the Project Car Contest $100 online gift car to an auto parts house.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Well after the bout of bad video uploads I decided to stick with photos for the rest of this project.
This blog entry (I like the sound of that…’blog entry’) I’ll show some pic of the area behind the dash and the removal of the gage panel and bulb replacement.
As I suspected and as to be expected, the dash and gages have been out of this car before. No big deal, it 40 years!!! Clearing you can tell that because the screws are not matching that hold the gages in.
Right side of the gage cluster had philips screw with washer.
After the dash pad was removed there were really only 2 screw left that held the panel/cluster in place – seen above and below.
The Left side was not a philips
After these were removed the gage panel/cluster (ok….I’m just going to call it a gage panel…if you like cluster…read as “cluster”). The only thing holding it in were two connections to the wiring harness. Those just clip together..sorry….I had those on video… and pull off easily.
Part of the wiring harness
As you can see other than just being dusty, all the wiring was in good shape. I had expected some issue due to age, but nope..not a one. (That’s not a complaint…no way…I hate electrical work…..I had a bad experience 🙁 )
This pic is of the panel on the right side of the and there is a LOT of space behind there. A cd changer should slide back there as well as adding a dvd player to the plastic panel. No I don’t believe I would, actually add one…..hmmmm…..I guess if someone donated an item I might consider putting it in…..or not.
The right side panel...lots of empty space.
Look at that room...for a donated dvd player....:)
So I did blew that out to get rid of some of the dust and wiped it down with citrus cleaner.
As I removed the two screws from the panel I thought it would pull right out but nope..the cover for the steering column had to be removed first. Simple enough.
Cover for the steering column
Then……( insert…dooms day music)…a piece fell out!!!!! See below
queue the dooms day music...the loose piece.
Ok..not really a big deal. It was just a clip that held the to pieces of the steering column cover together. It screwed back in slide of the two ends.
Now I didn’t take the gage panel out of the car didn’t really need to since the wiring was all fine. I pulled it out enough to allow my had to go behind and pull out the bulbs.
The position of one bulb.
Here is what the bulb and socket look like, together and apart.
Bulb and Socket
Bulb removed from socket
They come out of the housing by a simple twist. The socket has two copper conductors (you can see them in the pic above…one on each side) that come into contact with the electrical ribbon and provide the power to the bulb. Most of the bulbs were still functional, very dusty..but I replaced them all.
Ok that’s about if this “blog entry” (come on..you like it too!!!…say it with me “blog entry”….I CAN’T HEAR YOU!!!!….BLOG ENTRY!!)
I’ve actually placed it all back together today and I’ll post more tomorrow. But you want to see it before that, I’m driving it to work tomorrow…it not that long of a drive to Tucson…come down…I’ll spring for lunch….. 🙂
Thanks for reading.
Sorry for the technical issues with the videos. It seems that WordPress has issues with longer videos, so I’ll have to keep them a bit shorter.
These next links will take you to the videos, but you’ll have to click the back button to get back to the blog.
This first video is when my son and I discovered that there was an additional bracket under the lower trim pieces.
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/mm296/timsweet2200/?action=view¤t=MVI_6869.flv
This next video is view of the partial removal.
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/mm296/timsweet2200/?action=view¤t=MVI_6876.flv
This last is the rest of the removal. I tossed a little humor in there about feed my son Ryan only if we worked for the meal. Not sure he thought that was too humorous..but I’m his Dad..he has to deal with me. 🙂
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/mm296/timsweet2200/?action=view¤t=MVI_6877.flv
Again, sorry these take you out of the site, I will work on this for the next video uploads.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Reminder: PROJECT CAR CONTEST..GET YOU PROJECTS IN!!!!
So the process was fairly straight forward. Only thing not obvious was the removal of two trim pieces that hid the front bracket.
Philips screw..wow how ugly was that old dash???
Top screw removal
There were 3 philips screws along the dash next to the windshield. A nice long screw driver worked nicely. The holes in the dash cover for the screw were pretty deteriorated, but it was good do know that the dash was really metal covered with the padded vinyl so the screw would hold forever.
passenger side screws – remove and done!
There were 4 more screw on the passenger’s side. Now if this were a Mach I it would have a clock located there, but instead there is just a plastic panel. You could actually place a LCD monitor there for DVD player. The panel is below:
passenger’s Side Panel
The next set of two screws that needed to come up were located above the radio. These were a bit awkward to remove. But they weren’t philips screws..that pieced together with what we found after taking the dash pad out led to a conclusion of…well I’ll hold off mentioning that until I give you the other piece.
Arrows show the position of the two screws
After removing these two “non-philips” screws (flat) the dash pad would lean forward and you’d think it would pop right off …but nope!!! The next photos show why.
Dash Pad leaning forward.
Additional Trim piece that needed to be removed.
One screw and off it came.
Caption is wrong here the side screw was removed but there was still one below.
Bottom screw had to just be loosened and the pieces sliped off
One this pieces of trim was removed you can see the screw/bolt that need to be removed.
Not a great pic..but you get the idea.
One on each side and the dash pad was ready to go. Check out the videos. If the videos don’t work..let me know.
I enlisted the help of my son Ryan. He was over for dinner and he lent me hand, so I could film as well.
This first video shows us discovering the front brace hidden under the trim piece.
Here is the backside of dash pad.
The paper tag on the bottom of the dash pad.
Reading that you can see the date of 1972 on the tag. Since the Mustang is a 1970, the date doesn’t make sense. Adding that the screws near the radio that don’t match (straight vs. philip for the rest) I wondering if the dash wasn’t replaced. The original owners didn’t mention it, but there was no real reason too. This could mean that the dash was replaced with what appears to be NOS (new old stock) (from 1972)..that’s a possibility. I’ll do some more research just to find out.
The last few pics are of the other markings.
The two eights – one upper in maker and the one in the glue.
Parts code perhaps 3 24 (d) 2
Sorry..that one’s upside down. 🙂
The original Ford speaker.
Speaker with part number.
So what’s next? I’ll check out the wiring and pull the gages if I need to for repair (although all the gages are working fine). Oh..yeah..do a bulb replacement.
More to come
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Spend the last part of today taking the dash out of the Mustang. It went very smoothly.
I was originally worried about rust up near the windshield. But a quick check showed nothing major. I’ll be giving it a good look tomorrow.
I still have to go through the videos and pics, so I’ll post them up late this evening or tomorrow.
Stay tuned.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Happy St. Paddy’s day!!!!
3/15/1960 Mercury Comet is brought to dealership windows.
3/17/1949 Porsche appears as the Geneva Auto Show and Gottlibe Daimler born in Germany in 1834.
3/18 a couple of notable birthdays. Andy Grenatelli was born in Dallas (1923) and a little bit before that Ruddy Diesel was born in France in 1858. Ok..Rudolf ….only close friends were allowed to call him Ruddy. Guess what Ruddy is famous for?
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Follow the steps and you’ll be able to remove those rusted exhaust bolts and it makes using an easy out on broke bolts…um…well… easier!!!!
1. Heat the bolt or stud with a torch errrkkk….”Yo…us averaged guys don’t have a torch set!!!!” Yeah, I know…I use a regular propane torch from ACE Hardware. ….errkkk Double nut the studs.
2. Once it hot…doesn’t have to be glowing red, touch a candle to it, until there is wax penetrated between the threads.
3. Remove the bold or apply the easy out and you are home free.
If you have a tip, post it here in a comment.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
