Getting to Know an Old Jalopy Roadster and Making It Work

[hotrod937]

Got this 1931 A off eslay. Bought sight unseen in person and went off what I was told by the seller. Putting faith in strangers is a real exercise in humanity. The car showed up supposedly built and ready to drive. I was told it's an old hot rod found as is with cracked Winfield (replaced with stock head by seller) It's solid with a little rust, bad floor work, two 97's and a Wico JEM. Very nice chassis with z and fresh looking motor. These are the old good things..


The car is put together not so well and leaking from seemingly everywhere. When we attempted to get it running and it wasn't wanting to run at all. First step was looking inside the tank. Found a mouse nest of cotton in there and assumed it's also in the carbs. Got another tank and fully rebuilt the carbs with all Stromberg parts. Here's the carb rebuild vids.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2FHaX8pIJc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KoQv7jOjtk


Now it runs and will stay running. Time to take it for a drive up and down our culdesac. OMG! I knew mech brakes might be a handful but this was insane. Car was wildly uncontrollable when stopping. It locked up random tires and sent you in many directions.
Here's video of the car running and driving after the carb rebuild. Notice the brakes are funky..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3H6x2BTctI\

After reading everything I could find on mech brakes I was confident in my ability to get them working. I made a call to an old timer friend of mine in the local A club who not only gave me some good advice but let me take out his restored 5 window to see how an A should run and stop.


The drums and shoes were newer looking and it looked like all four corners had springs kits. The adjusters are funky and the working hardware should probably be replaced. I made my wood pedal tool and found that the pedal didn't engauge the rears. I took off the drums and found the rod for the e brake was engaging the main shoes and the pedal engaged the worn and glazed e brake shoes. I switched the rods around adjusted all 4 corners per online recommendations. The rods hooked up wrong and the rats nest in the gas tank among other things lead me to believe that whom ever put this car together didn't know what they were doing.

So now the car runs and stops amazing. I took it out on the main road to find that the car breaks up bad after running down the road. It pops, misses and back fires. It's the timing. I played with the timing and it purs like a kitten in the driveway but after getting out down the road it continues to break up. I sanded the points in the Wico and set the gap at .019. Car seemed to run amazing but keeps getting out of time.

While playing with the mag and watching the rotor I noticed there is a massive amount of play in the turning action of the body to how the rotor moves. Took it apart to find the drive rod is very worn. also the drive on the mag is worn and I'm assuming the oil pump gear drive is also sloppy.

So I break out the Macs catalog to order the parts and a full gasket set. The oil leak is still pouring and I believe there's preasure building up in the case. My cap is good with tabs in place and no wool inserted. It drips a little sometimes after running and others times it pours. I never let the oil get past half way between f and add. The car got severely out of time the last test drive and I limped it home about a mile popping and banging. I didn't hear any pining and the plugs looked just right. So in my desire to want things to be right and knowing the dumb mistakes a previous owner had made I decided to pull the motor and just check everything over on my own. Currently the motor is sitting on a tire and tonight I'll mount it up on a stand and pull the pan. Here's my farm raised neighbor helping me pull the engine. Took us about an hour.



Side note: as for the look of the car, I can't stand how it sits with the z kick in the frame. I want a stock dropped axle for now until I find a stock frame. After I get this thing running, steering and stopping how it should, I'll probably do a frame up mild resto on it and fix the body up and make everything nice.

[Big John]

another period hot rod will bite the dust.....

[luckyal]

Not to be cynical but I sure hope you did not pay to much !!
Al

[Vanspeed]

I like it! I had a similar 29 that I dragged out of a basement in Downtown Detroit. It is now living somewhere in Northern California.

[todd3131]

I have a restored 31 roadster that is very nice but I do like the heck out of this one. It is a fun car and the mechanical work is the kind that can be fun to fix if it were mine I would be tempted to find a set of 32 rail to put under it.
Todd

[1931 flamingo]

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I like ! ! Period perfection. Ck the timing gears as long as you've got the engine out. Keep us posted.
Paul in CT

[29ModelA]

I'd drain the oil and put the proper amount in keeping in mind what stays in the dipper tray. It may be getting overfilled.

[hotrod937]

I was thinking that we might be overfilling it. I've since drained the oil and pulled the motor. Pretty sure we were overfilling the rad also as it was coming out of the overflow. Seems to like being 3/4 full.

Side note: Not sure about how strict you guys are round here. I mostly live on the no holds barred, member's police themselves Pirate4x4. I'm also active on the HAMB, Practicalmachinist, hotrodders, hondatwin and several other boards. I understand what this board is and was told to come here from the HAMB board as my cars issues are mostly stock. I know that most A guys would scrap my car as it's not the club car standard. I'm sure when I take it to my friends above with the stocker A he will probably drop right there where he stands when he see's how hacked this car is. We probably paid too much but it's what was available when the money was ready to be spent. I'd also hate to take a nice one and gut it up. I'd rather take a rough one and make it nice.

Back to the topic at hand. What do you guys know about the oil pump gear and the 4 thou and 10 thou oversize? How do I know which one to get. I guess I'll just measure the slop and see how bad it is. What are your thoughts. I'm going outside right now to take the thing apart and would like to order some parts tonight from Macs. Thanks.

[gz]

Chances are the 10 thou one will work just fine. For example, on a 1929 tudor I just got running, I had enough play in the distributor I could rotate the rotor about 20-25 degrees. I installed the 10 thou oversize gear and completely got rid of the play. I actually bought both oversize gears from Snyders and tried them both. They took back the one I did not use.

Initially, you may want to remove the magneto and replace it with a stock distributor. A stock distributor is easier to time and does not have as many variables that can go wrong like the magneto does. Get the car running well with the stock distributor, and, in the meantime, have your magneto professionally rebuilt by someone who really understands magnetos and then re-install it. You might also find you don't really need or want the magneto.

Nice looking roadster. It is rare to buy a car that doesn't need any work-despite what the seller says. Keep at it and you'll have neat looking and driving car when your done. I certainly enjoy my 1928!

[George Miller]

I think you will find that you are running out of gas at high speeds. You need a fuel pump with your set up.

[Step-down]

HotRod937 I enjoyed reading your thread, A breathe of fresh air. Looks like your enjoying the Hell out of this project ....

[QGolden]

Originally Posted by hotrod937

I'd also hate to take a nice one and gut it up. I'd rather take a rough one and make it nice.

Welcome, I agree with your philosophy, my current project is one that has been cobbled together, and then orphaned many times by many previous owners. For me it will be a Speedster, and the sum of its parts will be better than what I started with. Like you, I will be able to say that no Model A's were injured in the creation of this project. Drive on and enjoy the journey until you get it to where you want it to be...

[mhsprecher]

I love your initiative. I'd be frustrated as heck right now if I were you, but you have laudable persistence. Keep it up. I often appeal to the patron saint of lost causes to keep me going.

[hotrod937]

Well I'm still working on getting the engine on a stand. I pulled the side cover and everything looks good in there. No broken springs and all valves move up and down as they should which means not too much newer non zinc oil has had the chance to round off any cam lobes. I can see that my oil pump drive gear slot is beat just like the rod. Heads up on the 10 thou one. I'll probably by them both like you did. You think the stock size oil pump dist drive gear is for sure a no no?

I also pulled the oil fill tube with zero clogs though it was clocked 180 out (no biggie as it just doesn't let the oil drain as easy).

I pulled the clutch and it looks good but worn. I'm thinking I'm going to get the 1939 trans conversion and use one of the two I've got sitting. Should I just get a new clutch while I'm in there? If it's not too cheap. Damn, now I'm thinking new babbit and counter weighted crank with a light weight flywheel. I need to focus on the oil leak for now..

So I turned the crank back and fourth to see if there was any "slack" and didn't feel any but when I moved it fore and aft there is a bit of thrust wear. What is spec thrust on an A block?

After dinner it's pull the pan and look inside. I've never had one of these apart so I'm pretty excited.

[midgetracer]

George Miller is right. You will need a fuel pump with this carb setup. Make sure the fuel pump you get is not the solenoid type, as they do not last with gasahol. I fought with one of these carb setups on a customer car for a couple of months until he finally agreed to try a fuel pump. No more stumbling as you accelerate past a certain speed.

[gwhite]

...or a period-correct fix would be pressurizing the fuel tank. I'll be running a Winfield SR-B downdraft on the A motor in my T RPU project (fuel tank is in the bed), so here's what I came up with;

1918-ish Dodge pressure gauge & 1922 Cadillac hand pump mounted on a modified late teens-early 20's AutoLite switch/ammeter bezel.

Love your project by the way...hope you get her on the road soon!

[Tom Wesenberg]

The end play for the crank is about.006" and try to keep the oil pan down until you remove it so all the babbit pieces and oil will stay in the pan, so you can see what's in there. When I bought my 29 Tudor and pulled the pan I found a lot of babbit pieces in the bottom of the pan.

[Mike V. Florida]

Amazing how properly restored mechincal brakes work is it not?

[hotrod937]

As for the gas issue I try not to run any whiskey gas. My other hot rods don't like it. I'll only run the good stuff with lead and some oil mixed for lube sake. I've got a spun tank and Mr. Crapsket (which I already had to replace from mid jan and almost zero running and driving) 2-3psi pump for now just to get her going. Feeds them two 97's good as far as I can tell.

I just spent about 4 hours getting this thing on a stand. I don't work well when confined and surrounded by oil slick and tools everywhere. Took me forever to make the setup but it's on there. I couldn't wait to get the pan off and see what's inside.

I noticed a chipped tooth on the timing set. How do I get the fly wheel off?

I don't really know what I'm looking at just yet but I'm stoked to see something different.. And OMGeez! Those mech brakes are amazing. Makes me wonder why anyone would go juice.

[fordcoupe]

Thanks for the great photos nice roadster