The Ford Barn

zoegrant · 12-24-2019, 04:50 PM

To all who are following this thread.....here is where I stand on this overdrive issue.
I tried what JIMNNN suggested to unlock the pawl from the blocker ring, info he stated came from Randy Rundle`s book on overdrive issues. Jimnnn thanks for that info as it did unlock the pawl/blocker ring and then the solenoid was installed and functioned properly.
A big thanks to 40cpe for solving the voltage drop when I installed the solenoid.
OK, so I still have a problem...with the OD cable pushed in (engaged) the tranny will freewheel and when I push the accelerator down to drop into passing gear nothing happens...it could be that the switch is bad or I have the switch wired incorrectly.
This is how I have the kickdown wired.

with the plunger facing away from you the two front connections are #1...red wire with red tip goes to throw switch on the relay....#2...all white wire goes to governor.
The two rear connections on the kickdown, one green with orange tip with goes to ground on solenoid (#6) one white with red tip goes to distributor.

Two questions..1...does this sound correct ?
..2....does it matter on the location either right or left side to where the wires are located ?
In other words with the kickdown plunger facing away from you, on the right front side of the kickdown I have the wire that goes to the distributor hooked there. On the left front side of the kickdown I have the governor wire hooked there
DOES IT MATTER ?

40cpe · 12-24-2019, 09:17 PM

If your transmission is free wheeling it is NOT in overdrive and can't "kick down" because it is already in direct drive. I don't think your problem is in the kick down switch. If your solenoid is energizing by manually grounding the governor terminal on the relay, it leads me to think your governor isn't grounding the relay. Have you verified that the governor is grounding the relay at about 30 mph?

zoegrant · 12-24-2019, 11:26 PM

40cpe...the only test that I have done on the relay is to bench test it using a wire wheel up against the drive gear of the governor using a test light hooked to battery and governor lead.....the test light does light up.
IS THERE ANOTHER TEST I COULD DO TO THE GOV ?

40cpe · 12-25-2019, 09:34 AM

It has been many years since I had a car with BW overdrive, but I could always hear the faint "click" when the relay was grounded by the governor while driving the car. I suppose there are several ways to check for governor/relay operation. Someone before mentioned running a temporary wire from the solenoid terminal on the relay to inside the car to a light bulb and see if it lights while driving. You could run a wire from the governor terminal inside to an ohm meter to monitor when it grounds the relay. You could monitor the relay while running the rear wheels up to speed on jack stands, though I prefer a real world test on the road.

zoegrant · 12-25-2019, 10:26 AM

40cpe...awoke up thinking about the light hook up to the relay as you suggested.. great minds think alike...no work on car today but tomorrow will try out the idea and report back...MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL.

Anteek29 · 12-25-2019, 10:53 AM

Sponsored Links (Register now to hide all advertisements)

Zoegrant...I know this is a frustrating experience for you but at the end you WILL have a functioning OD and you will be an OD expert!

Merry Christmas!

zoegrant · 12-25-2019, 11:53 PM

ANTEEK29...thanks for the words of encouragement.... I have no doubt this will be solved.
its not like have to do this for a living...

zoegrant · 12-27-2019, 10:25 PM

Here is the update I said I would post.....MY OVERDRIVE IS NOW WORKING 100 PERCENT.
There ended up being two issues.
#1...the plunger in the solenoid somehow jammed the pawl into the blocker ring and following a post from JIMNNN I was able to unlock the pawl. The information had been in Randy Rundles overdrive book available at fifthavegarage.com.
#2...The second issue was an item that 40CPE mentioned again which had to do with the governor. I had previously removed the governor and bench tested it spinning it against a wire wheel and using a battery and a trouble light the test light lit up proving the GOV was ok. During the test I hooked the battery to the short pigtail wire that was on the GOV, little did I realize that the GOV wire was broken and would only work if the wire was in a straight position which it was during the test and hence showed that the GOV was ok. There was a kink in the wire and when I straightened it out the wire fell off in my hand....I had found the last problem. I put on a new pigtail wire and road tested the car and the overdrive worked as it should...what a project....learned a lot...thanks to all for your input.

40cpe · 12-27-2019, 11:35 PM

I'm glad you stuck with it and got it working. Thanks for letting us know the outcome.

Anteek29 · 12-28-2019, 01:12 AM

HOORAY - Pleased to know your tenacity paid off! That was quite an adventure.

JimNNN · 12-28-2019, 01:32 AM

Yay!

Quote:

#1...the plunger in the solenoid somehow jammed the pawl into the blocker ring and following a post from JIMNNN I was able to unlock the pawl.

Well you did it better than I did! I'm going to try that procedure again when I get a chance. I think my problem was that I spun the tire around once like I should, but when I loosened the solenoid mounting bolts and put the spacer in, I turned the tire 1/8 turn...then kind of backed it up a little because I thought I'd gone too far. I didn't think it mattered at all at the time, but it probably did.

As to WHY this problem arose in the first place: Is it possible that you may have locked out of overdrive while the car was still moving?

BTW, now that you have your OD fixed AND you have a new tach, what kind of RPM's is your Y block making in OD at highway speeds?

40cpe · 12-28-2019, 10:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimNNN

Yay! BTW, now that you have your OD fixed AND you have a new tach, what kind of RPM's is your Y block making in OD at highway speeds?

Years ago I had a BW overdrive in a '57 Ranchero with a 3.89 rear ratio. Out of OD at 60 MPH showed 3000 RPM, in OD the RPM dropped to 2000. There might have been a slight variance in the difference as I was using an analog tach and reading them exact is difficult.

JimNNN · 12-28-2019, 01:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 40cpe

Years ago I had a BW overdrive in a '57 Ranchero with a 3.89 rear ratio. Out of OD at 60 MPH showed 3000 RPM, in OD the RPM dropped to 2000. There might have been a slight variance in the difference as I was using an analog tach and reading them exact is difficult.

Amazing difference. My '54 Ranch Wagon 239 was doing 2900 rpm at 55 mph locked out of OD. Your '57 was more powerful than my car, but your ratio was lower, too.

zoegrant · 12-28-2019, 03:43 PM

I had a 56 t-bird that originally had been an automatic converted to a standard with a T85 R11 overdrive... believe the automatic was a 3.31ratio. I was running 6-70-15 tires.
In direct drive at 70 mph the digital tach would read 3100 rpm
In overdrive the rpm dropped to 2225 at 70 mph.
That's when I fell in love with overdrive....
Now that I have a 6v tach, I am looking forward to installing it in my 55 with overdrive to see what it reads. The tach is analog so it will only give me an idea, wont be a precise as a digital.

12-24-2019, 04:50 PM	#21
zoegrant Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: tolland CT Posts: 773	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant To all who are following this thread.....here is where I stand on this overdrive issue. I tried what JIMNNN suggested to unlock the pawl from the blocker ring, info he stated came from Randy Rundle`s book on overdrive issues. Jimnnn thanks for that info as it did unlock the pawl/blocker ring and then the solenoid was installed and functioned properly. A big thanks to 40cpe for solving the voltage drop when I installed the solenoid. OK, so I still have a problem...with the OD cable pushed in (engaged) the tranny will freewheel and when I push the accelerator down to drop into passing gear nothing happens...it could be that the switch is bad or I have the switch wired incorrectly. This is how I have the kickdown wired. with the plunger facing away from you the two front connections are #1...red wire with red tip goes to throw switch on the relay....#2...all white wire goes to governor. The two rear connections on the kickdown, one green with orange tip with goes to ground on solenoid (#6) one white with red tip goes to distributor. Two questions..1...does this sound correct ? ..2....does it matter on the location either right or left side to where the wires are located ? In other words with the kickdown plunger facing away from you, on the right front side of the kickdown I have the wire that goes to the distributor hooked there. On the left front side of the kickdown I have the governor wire hooked there DOES IT MATTER ?

12-24-2019, 09:17 PM	#22
40cpe Senior Member Join Date: May 2010 Location: Star, MS Posts: 4,024	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant If your transmission is free wheeling it is NOT in overdrive and can't "kick down" because it is already in direct drive. I don't think your problem is in the kick down switch. If your solenoid is energizing by manually grounding the governor terminal on the relay, it leads me to think your governor isn't grounding the relay. Have you verified that the governor is grounding the relay at about 30 mph?

12-24-2019, 11:26 PM	#23
zoegrant Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: tolland CT Posts: 773	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant 40cpe...the only test that I have done on the relay is to bench test it using a wire wheel up against the drive gear of the governor using a test light hooked to battery and governor lead.....the test light does light up. IS THERE ANOTHER TEST I COULD DO TO THE GOV ?

12-25-2019, 09:34 AM	#24
40cpe Senior Member Join Date: May 2010 Location: Star, MS Posts: 4,024	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant It has been many years since I had a car with BW overdrive, but I could always hear the faint "click" when the relay was grounded by the governor while driving the car. I suppose there are several ways to check for governor/relay operation. Someone before mentioned running a temporary wire from the solenoid terminal on the relay to inside the car to a light bulb and see if it lights while driving. You could run a wire from the governor terminal inside to an ohm meter to monitor when it grounds the relay. You could monitor the relay while running the rear wheels up to speed on jack stands, though I prefer a real world test on the road.

12-25-2019, 10:26 AM	#25
zoegrant Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: tolland CT Posts: 773	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant 40cpe...awoke up thinking about the light hook up to the relay as you suggested.. great minds think alike...no work on car today but tomorrow will try out the idea and report back...MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL.

12-25-2019, 10:53 AM	#26
Anteek29 Senior Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Santa Maria, CA Posts: 985	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant Sponsored Links (Register now to hide all advertisements) Zoegrant...I know this is a frustrating experience for you but at the end you WILL have a functioning OD and you will be an OD expert! Merry Christmas! __________________ Alan 1929 Special Coupe 1941 Pick-Up 1955 Victoria

12-25-2019, 11:53 PM	#27
zoegrant Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: tolland CT Posts: 773	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant ANTEEK29...thanks for the words of encouragement.... I have no doubt this will be solved. its not like have to do this for a living...

12-27-2019, 10:25 PM	#28
zoegrant Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: tolland CT Posts: 773	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant Here is the update I said I would post.....MY OVERDRIVE IS NOW WORKING 100 PERCENT. There ended up being two issues. #1...the plunger in the solenoid somehow jammed the pawl into the blocker ring and following a post from JIMNNN I was able to unlock the pawl. The information had been in Randy Rundles overdrive book available at fifthavegarage.com. #2...The second issue was an item that 40CPE mentioned again which had to do with the governor. I had previously removed the governor and bench tested it spinning it against a wire wheel and using a battery and a trouble light the test light lit up proving the GOV was ok. During the test I hooked the battery to the short pigtail wire that was on the GOV, little did I realize that the GOV wire was broken and would only work if the wire was in a straight position which it was during the test and hence showed that the GOV was ok. There was a kink in the wire and when I straightened it out the wire fell off in my hand....I had found the last problem. I put on a new pigtail wire and road tested the car and the overdrive worked as it should...what a project....learned a lot...thanks to all for your input.

12-27-2019, 11:35 PM	#29
40cpe Senior Member Join Date: May 2010 Location: Star, MS Posts: 4,024	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant I'm glad you stuck with it and got it working. Thanks for letting us know the outcome.

12-28-2019, 01:12 AM	#30
Anteek29 Senior Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Santa Maria, CA Posts: 985	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant HOORAY - Pleased to know your tenacity paid off! That was quite an adventure. __________________ Alan 1929 Special Coupe 1941 Pick-Up 1955 Victoria

12-28-2019, 03:43 PM	#34
zoegrant Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: tolland CT Posts: 773	Re: Westach 6 volt tachometer review, attn: zoegrant I had a 56 t-bird that originally had been an automatic converted to a standard with a T85 R11 overdrive... believe the automatic was a 3.31ratio. I was running 6-70-15 tires. In direct drive at 70 mph the digital tach would read 3100 rpm In overdrive the rpm dropped to 2225 at 70 mph. That's when I fell in love with overdrive.... Now that I have a 6v tach, I am looking forward to installing it in my 55 with overdrive to see what it reads. The tach is analog so it will only give me an idea, wont be a precise as a digital.