Back on track

We've got our replacement motor all hooked up and looking good. The carb came back from the rebuild shop and we immediately bolted it on. Hooked up the gas and she fired right up. We're using the old fuel pump that came with this motor for now as it seems to be working fine. Daniel took the car for another spin around the parking lot and proclaimed her to be "real peppy"!

Motor #2 all hooked up

I was able to sell the automatic transmission that came with the motor, so now we're only down $140 bucks. There's a few good parts that I think I can sell on eBay to recoup our cost.
We hit another snag as we were backing the car back into the shop for the day. For some reason, the brakes locked up. At first I thought it was the emergency brakes, which don't work very well to begin with. I was able to get the car in, and we jacked up the back to find the wheels spinning freely. We went around and lifted up the front to find the front wheels solidly in the grip of the calipers. Now, this is a brand new system that has been working fine every time we've driven the car. I was--and still am--at a loss as to what's going on. As an experiment, I cracked the bleed valve on the left front, expecting fluid to shoot out under pressure. Fluid did weep out, but nothing dramatic, so I re-tightened the valve and called it a day. At that time I didn't check the wheels again.
This morning I came in to find everything back to normal. The wheels were free spinning once again. I don't know if it was due to my bleeding the line, or if they just released on their own. We'll just have to continue to take test drives around the lot to see if it happens again.
This afternoon I decided to take some time and try to get the driver's door hardware back in. The driver's vent window on our car had a broken bracket, so I had secured another one off of eBay last month. I discovered that it is a reproduction, and the window channel is larger than the original, so the felt channel for the window won't clip in. I'll have to drill a couple of small holes and run some flat head screws in to hold in in place. The obstacles just keep coming!
Thwarted by the door, I turned to aligning the passenger fender. We had hung it temporarily last week. After a half hour of adjusting, I felt like it was as good as it was going to get. Empowered, I turned to the driver's side and got that one installed as well. There's still some adjusting to be done with the driver's door, which I'll need Daniel's assistance with.

Starting to look like a car again!

We're trying to get our sheetmetal installed by the end of the weekend so we can begin some serious sanding and smoothing of the body. My goal (and hope) is that with Daniel's help we might get him driving this thing to school at least for the last month of the school year. It will be in no way done, but he can at least show it off to his friends.
The Spring swap meet arrived in Daytona this weekend. We have yet another list, but this time it's very small, which I hope is an indication of our progress!

A major setback for the project

As I wrote in my last post, I've been chasing small leaks for over three weeks. The nagging oil leak from the fuel pump continued to drip. The coolant also continued to drip off the rear of the block. To add insult to injury, I discovered that our rebuilt carburetor was dumping gas down the intake at an alarming rate. This hadn't been apparent before, with the engine idling high. Once we began fine-tuning the motor, though, and adjusted the idle to where it was supposed to be, the engine couldn't burn off all of the excess fuel. A quick look down the carb with a flashlight told the story.
My first thought, and the obvious issue, was a speck of debris in the needle seat. I called the carb shop, and they suggested I take the carb off, turn it upside down, and apply a tiny bit of air into the fuel intake. I did that, reinstalled it, and still the fuel gushed forth. Frustrated, I packed it up and shipped it back for a professional evaluation.
Turning my attention, again, to the leaks, I took last Saturday morning to raise the car on blocks and drop the transmission. The leak had to be coming from the real freeze plug, which was the only one I hadn't replaced. The tranny removal went pretty smooth, as would be expected on a nice clean engine and car. Even on my own, I was able to get everything disassembled in about 90 minutes. Daniel had been completely booked for the previous week with school and work, and was so this day as well. It was just as well, because I felt somewhat responsible for this problem and I didn't want him to get discouraged. So, in the peace of the morning, I popped out the "bad" freeze plug and installed yet another one. I couldn't see any signs of drippage, but where else could it be coming from?

Hiding behind the starter

Confident in my repair, I filled the engine back up again with coolant and set about reinstalling the flywheel, clutch and pressure plate. As I torqued the last bolt on the bellhousing, I was bombed right in the forehead with....a drop of water!
After lying under the car for a good five minutes of total frustration, I took the drop light and a dry rag and began going over every possible joint and seal. I could see the coolant oozing along the gap between the oil pan and block. Like a trail of tiny ants, I continued to follow until the trail stopped, about halfway forward of the block. OK, it has to be somewhere in this area. The freeze plugs look good. Nothing coming from the head. The side of the block...wait!
There, ever so faint, and normally hiding behind the starter, was the problem. A nice six inch crack in the water jacket of block. Our engine, at least the block, was junk!
Dejected, I packed up and went home. After rallying my spirits (I still hadn't told Daniel) I again turned to the Internet. I learned that there are many folks who swear by various home remedies, such as JB Weld or brazing or pinning, but nothing is certain. I briefly contemplated grinding a valley along the crack and gobbing it with JB Weld, but my better senses prevailed. We had to get another motor.

Starting over. Looks pretty good

Back to Craigslist. There's always at least one six cylinder for sale locally as people dump the little motors in favor of a V8. Sure enough, I immediately found a complete motor and automatic tranny in
Orlando for $300. My wife, the Wise One, knew that I'd be hitting the road early Sunday morning, and she was right. Daniel had been advised of the bad news, but I begged him not to give up hope.
The motor turned out to be out of a one-owner '67 with 85K original miles on it (supposedly). I looked it over as best I could (it was already out and hanging on a cherry picker) and asked the guy what would he take. When he replied $200, I slapped the cash in his hand. Within 10 minutes I was back on my way to Daytona. The plan was, and is, to salvage what we need, and resell the rest to recoup our costs. With some luck, we may be back whole with two weeks of lost time to show for all of this.

All the new parts off our bad motor

I've been poking at the motor all week, and from what little I know, it appears to indeed be a lightly used engine. The real main seal was bad, which I knew, and today we replaced it. It went in without a hitch. Right now the motor is on a stand, upside down, awaiting the oil pan to be reinstalled.
The Wise One is gone for the weekend, so Daniel and I have plenty of time to focus on the project. I told him that if he could stick with me for three or four hours each day, we should have the motor reassembled and back in the car by Sunday afternoon.

Out with old, in with the new

Our carb has yet to return, but should be back Monday. The rebuild shop could find nothing wrong, so we are figuring that the aftermarket fuel pump I installed might be putting out too much
pressure. To that end we'll keep the dirty old one on our "new" motor and see what happens.
If nothing else, these past few weeks certainly have been character building!

All put back together. Keeping our fingers crossed!

More hurdles

There's still a lot of stuff dripping on the floor beneath the Mustang. Coolant continued to drip, even after our freeze plug repair. When we filled the engine back up we noticed one of the new heater hoses was poorly clamped on the fitting going into the block. An adjustment of the hose clamp and a few extra turns seemed to resolve that.
We then turned our attention to the oil drip. It was coming from the driver's side, and all I could think of was that we hadn't gotten a good seal on the oil pan gasket. So Sunday morning we drained the pan and dropped it low enough to apply a layer of Permatex on the block surface. We reinstalled it and snugged up the bolts and refilled it with oil. Fairly confident that we had solved our leaks, we left the motor there for the day.
While Daniel was turning wrenches on the oil pan, I turned my attention the the heater box. I had removed it about six months ago and found it to be full of leaves (no surprise there) and most of the metal innards were rusted away. I had purchased a number of pieces from a Craigslist contact, and up until now they has been sitting awaiting their turn. Sunday seemed like a good day.

Before opening. A nice pile of leaves and rust sits inside

In addition to the replacement parts, I had purchased a gasket set and a new heater core. I had read that the aftermarket cores, while a good bargain, were ill-fitting, and this proved to be true. However, a little attention with the Dremel and the core tubes fit right into the "new" holes in the heater box. I also confirmed that the two rubber end caps for the core would not allow the new heater core to fit properly, so I decided to go on without them. I couldn't se any real problem with doing so.
Our heater box was in fair shape. A few cracks in the old fiberglass, but on the whole still serviceable. With the new gaskets, new defroster box and a coat of matte gloss, it didn't look too bad. And, it seems to function properly. In an effort to salvage something of the day, we reinstalled the heater assembly and ran our heater hoses to the engine. Cooling system complete (we hope!).

New gaskets, all clean and ready to blow

Today, Monday, I peeked in on the car this morning and found--a puddle of oil and antifreeze! There was even an oil puddle under the back of the motor. Could we have messed up the rear gasket of the pan when we dropped it?
Now I was really getting frustrated, and feared Daniel would soon lose motivation with all of this. I crawled back under the car and began to again remove the oil pan, when I happened to spot a drip coming from the bottom of the fuel pump. Of course! That could be the only explanation of why the "drip" was forming more or less a line on the floor parallel and below the edge of the oil pan. As it dripped off the fuel pump, the oil would run along the edge of the pan, even so far back as the transmission. Confident that I identified the problem, I pulled the pump off and noted that the gasket sealer wasn't really applied well along the face of the block. A better coat of gasket sealer should finally resolve the problem. Another hurdle possibly passed!
My mechanic loaned me his cooling system pressure tester, so this afternoon we hooked that up and pumped up the system to 13 pounds pressure. As soon as the gauge hit "13", we hard a slight hissing coming from the front of the motor. Craning our necks with a flashlight, it appeared that it was coming out from the bottom of the thermostat housing. Now I had become even more frustrated, and sent Daniel home before he could pick up on my bad mood. Throwing myself once more at the engine, I drained the coolant again and removed the housing. The gasket looked OK, but for certainty I applied MORE gasket sealer and bolted it back on. Coolant refilled, pressure up and--more hissing.
I can't get low enough to see where this leak is coming from, but the only other thing on the block in that area is the top of the water pump. To remove it will require draining--again, pulling the radiator and taking off the fan belt, fan and pulley. Looks like tomorrow is already planned out for me.
I'm obsessing about these leaks because I know how aggravating it can be to always have that little oil or water drip on the garage floor. I want this car to be as reliable as possible for Daniel, and having to always put something under it when parked, or constantly adding more water or oil, would not fit that criteria. I'll be taking the water pump off tomorrow, before Daniel gets to the shop, in the hope that this will be the last time.
Hope springs eternal!