1968 Ford Wagon - Fergus

That's the best part of GRM! Nice score on the trim.

I picked up a bottle of radiator flush stuff to run through the car before I change the water pump. The directions say for a deeper cleaning I should follow the directions and then do my daily driving for 3 or 4 days. For this car that means that I would let it sit and maybe drive it once for half an hour or so. I'm pretty sure that's not what they mean. Perhaps I should start it and bring it up to temperature twice each day?

i doubt youll gain much but heat cycling it more than the directions call for for a "normal" clean

When I bought Fergus there was some trim missing. The top part of the rear window is supposed to be all shiny. Only the drivers side corner is. The rest is missing. It looks like I only need two pieces. Right?
Because I wasn't sure, and because I had a similar situation inside the car, I had the junkyard grab me everything that is trim on the back window, inside and out. $150 plus shipping. I knew I was paying for more than I needed, but I really didn't want to get less than I needed. This was good. It turns out that I really needed four pieces on the outside. The front sheet metal on the 67 and 68 wagons is very different, but the back of the cars is the same, which is good. Even though that's the case, there are some minor differences in fit and assembly methods between the two years. I ended up having to take off the drivers side curvy piece and replace it with the one from the 67. They look basically identical, but they don't fit the same. I ended up using the two corners, the center section, and there was also a filler panel that I didn't know about. Here is the end result.

I'm happy. The missing trim bothered me more than it should. If you count the inside trim that went up as well (the pictures suck) then I ended up using 9 pieces of the trim I bought which is about half of it.

Most excellent. The details make all the difference sometimes.

The water pump is out. I pulled it apart and it looks great inside. I'm afraid when this is all said and done I'm going to end up with a car that likes to run at 215. Great.
I also pulled the condenser because I have to do that in order to get another one when I make the AC work again. The side benefit is that it won't be sitting in front of the radiator blocking air. Once all of that was out, everything was pretty empty.
What to do? Should I just to a basic cleaning and put it back together? Or should I take out the few remaining things and paint before it goes back together? Someday the whole front is coming off and I'll paint properly, but what now? I really don't want to chase one thing after another and end up with stationary garage art. I just cleared that out.

If it was me, and I was planning on painting it later anyway, I'd paint it later. Drive it now.

Those old F blocks are big damn chunks of iron. Sometimes they just run warm, but that still seems a little high....

I really don't like dirty engine bays. With this one the way it is, it can't ever be clean. I'll snap some pics and show you what I mean. Just enough rust to always hold dirt and grease, but not so much that it's any kind of impending disaster. Except for the battery tray. That's right on the edge of disaster.

Link to the other thread on painting your engine bay, to avoid repeating myself:

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/paint-to-paint-over/71239/page1/

Bryce

Thanks Bryce. I wasn't trying to blast the forum, I was just hoping for advice from people that had no interest in old American wagons too. I think I'll clean clean clean and decide what must be painted, and what can just be cleaned. The battery tray and the surrounding area and the area under the radiator are pretty free of paint right now. I'll have to get something on at least those two areas.

I cross posted the link so that if I didn't lose my mind when I didn't see what I typed about your car in the thread about your car. It was as much for me as it was for anybody else.

Bryce

This may amuse you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YBFJp2F3d4

With the pump out, direct a garden hose with a sprayer set to stream in the water jacket, Or a power washer if avail, see how much junk comes out.

In reply to Ian F:

That was awesome, and a 67 I believe. Stacked headlights was 67 and the went side by side in 68. I'm becoming a Ford wagon nerd. God help me.
Life is busy. Orthodontist, sick kid, teacher conferences for other kid who is being a kid, rallycross. The usual stuff. I've only had a few minutes here and there to assault the engine bay with a variety of cleaning agents and brushes and polishes trying to get a handle on things. I'm 99% certain I'm not painting anything but the new pump and the brackets. Good advice on thorough cleaning has revealed a lot more paint than I originally thought as present.

The new water pump is blue.

I also flushed an amazing amount of water through the block before it came out clean. I caught something like 30 gallons in a catch pan and a bunch more ended up on the garage floor. I also pulled the power steering pump and bracket off the block and am cleaning them. I wasn't sure if I was going to do that because it didn't need to be done, but it was really really gross and I'm glad I did. The bracket is actually a very nice casting. It's pretty.

Final bracket and bolt painting.
More and more cleaning as well. Attacked the casting for the oil filter this morning. Not completely done, but close. When I started this was just a black fuzzy mound of oil and sand. I couldn't even tell that there were ribs in the casting. It's quite an attractive part.

In reply to mazdeuce:

Man you have really poured some heart into this one. Great job. Way to keep plugging

BBC

It's really a joy to work on. I could probably put in a couple of hours a day for the next few years and not get done, but enjoy every minute of it.

Now i've finally read this thread too.

Have you run the car since flushing the block? Also, have you considered a 180 degree thermostat?

The car should go back together this week and then we'll see what is what.

I just knew I wanted a large Ford station wagon

Fergus is back together again. I need a little more power steering fluid before I take him out for a drive, but sitting around at idle the temperature seems pretty solid right above 200. Interestingly, after I shut the car down it burped a bit of coolant through the overflow (I didn't put the catch back in). Maybe it's always done this but the overflow was doing it's job? Fired it up again and let it run for 10 more minutes and nothing. Shut it off and a bit more came out. Tomorrow I'll take it for a drive and see how it does.

I didn't look at that part of the car very close when i was there but my experience is that older cars generally are intended to have some air in the cooling system and have a 'one way' overflow system (only goes out, never back in).

So when you're filling the cooling system you leave an inch or two of air in the top of the radiator and that air compresses to absorb the change in volume of the coolant as it heats and expands. If you fill one of those cars up to the tippy top it will push some out to make room for the expansion of the coolant.

I say one-way overflow because it typically just dumps in from the top of the reservoir. On a more modern car you fill the system to the top and the overflow is actually plumbed at its bottom so that when the coolant cools and shrinks in the engine/radiator, the vacuum created will actually suck coolant back into the radiator from the overflow.

So, if your car has a one-way overflow and you filled the rad to the tippy top i would say just wait for it to 'purge' the excess, or pull out enough that you have an inch or two of air at the top, and then see if it stops happening.

Anyone know how to bleed the power steering on these old fords? I put fluid back in the other day and it promptly leaked out a hose that hadn't been tightened enough. The pump is making noise like it needs more fluid but it's full. I'm stumped for the moment.
In other news, after my matinee date to see Rush with my wife I hopped in Fergus and took him for a drive. The temperature still went up to about 220. Crap. Well, if that's what he wants to run at and he won't overflow, then fine, so be it. This evening was soccer practice and I had to paint the lines on the field so my son and I hopped in and headed up early.

Again the temperature went up to 220 or so but it didn't boil over. When we got there I decided to switch the vacuum source for advance from the manifold to the carb. Soccer went well and we headed home. My wife followed me because she's still not entirely convinced that the car will ever make it from point A to point B. With two of the four kids in the car we headed home and I was super happy to note that the temperature was now at a steady 195-200! Success! I probably should have checked that after I got the temperature gauge but before I decided to swap the water pump.
So I'm cruising along, windows down, showing my daughter how the nose rises when you floor it at 55 and....... alternator light. Crap. Voltage goes to 11. Crap. I turn off the lights (it was just a bit dusky) and wonder how long the car will continue to run with no alternator. The only draw aside from throwing sparks into the cylinders is the gauges. There's just nothing else in the car. We make it the 10 miles home without any drama and I explain to my wife why I had turned the lights off. "That explains the belt I saw come out from under your car" Yes, yes it would.
So tomorrow after soccer I'll try to figure out how to successfully measure for, and get a new alternator belt. Driving Fergus makes me happy.

It's been awhile, but:
1 - fill the reservoir
2 - slowly turn the wheel from lock to lock
3 - check reservoir, top off as required
4 - repeat until you don't have to add fluid.

You know... now that you mention it... the distributor vacuum line on my US carb'd cars always connected to a nipple on the carb.