Good Weekend

[PostalBGraham]

I had a pretty good weekend. I took my '67 Barracuda to a father/son mechanic shop. The father owns a '68 fastback and a '69 notchback. He loves his cars and kind of likes mine too! Anyway, he was helping me with preformance problems. We were going to swap carburetors. He had taken his old one off his 440 and replaced it with a new Holley. We were going to put his old one in my car. The linkage didn't match, so we didn't finish the job. We did put in a spacer though, so we could fit a replacement choke in, before putting my carb back on. The car had been running without a choke, and was not a happy camper on cold mornings. My engine is a 273 Commando. After we put things back together, he got out his timing light and the mark was off the scale. With a little adjustment, we got the timing right, and the engine idle increased and revved great. We were also able to reattach the vaccuum advance. I can actually spin the tires now!

I have a rebuilt 340 and 727 Torque Flight to go in the car, but the guy who's supposed to do the work for me is quite busy and I don't know when that will get done. Now that I have a choke and proper running 273, I'm not quite so anxious. I do still have the problem of disappearing oil, though. I'm using at least 1 quart per tank of gas. I don't see white smoke, just lots of black smoke when I first start the car. We are planning on replacing the valve seals. Any other suggestions, besides the obvious rebuild? I also have a set of disk brakes for the front, but I'm lacking the upper control arms. Does anyone have an extra set they would be willing to sell?

 

[Roberson_Tech]

valve seals good place to start has the motor been sitting for a long time or? Valve seals can get dried up, what kind of oil are you using? Glad it is ruinning better

 

[PostalBGraham]

The history of the car is not real clear. A guy from New Jersey inherited it from his uncle in California, and I bought it from him two years later. He has little knowledge of the car. He knows it was garaged it's whole life and was last painted in the early 70's. He only drove it 30 miles in the two years he owned it. The odometer read 69k when I bought it, but we're not sure the engine is original. The fender tag calls for the regular 273, but the engine in the car has the black crinkle finish valve covers and four barrel intake, indicating the high preformance 273. We've tried to read the numbers on the block, but it's painted too heavily. When we pull it to put in the 340, we were going to read it then. As for oil, I use Pennzoil 10w-30. Once I realized I was using so much oil, I used a can of stuff similar to STP in hopes of freeing up the rings if they were stuck. I also used one quart of straight 30 weight oil. Neither seemed to have any impact.

 

[Roberson_Tech]

If it is stuck oil rings you should see light blue smoke at hard acceration if that is the case then I would sugest seafoam see for usage info. If it is smoking more when sowing down then bliping the throttle open then I would suggest the valve guides seals. I used the seafoam and it seamed to make my jeep run better... It still needs rebuilt but it is worn out.

Pull the plugs are they gummed up?

Oil leaks? had a motor with high miles and it only leaked when driven over 55 for long enough to pressurize the crankcase, are there any oil leaks when sitting, idleing and when stopped after a freeway run...

 

[PostalBGraham]

I have not pulled any plugs to see if they are gummed. What would a gummed up plug indicate?

As far as I know, the car doesn't smoke at all while I'm driving it. Of course, I'm always in the driver's seat and cannot see the tail pipe. I guess I need to have someone follow me while I'm driving and tell me what they see.

There is never a drop of oil on the ground where I park, no matter how long the trip, 5 miles or 50 miles. Before putting the choke on, I used to let it warm up 5 minutes on cold mornings, and there was never any oil leaking.

 

[Longgone]

Years ago there was a product called Rislone that worked great for freeing up stuck rings and reducing oil consumption. I haven`t seen it around here, but I`ve heard it`s still available. You might give it a try ,and as mentioned ,your valve stem seals may be shot, contributing to the engines thirst for oil. HTH.