Restoring Rusty

[Gregski]

a year later the rust came back

[Gregski]

so I neutralized them in baking soda water and then bathed them in Phosphoric acid this time, then I shot them with paint over rust primer and than a couple coats of semi flat black paint

you have no idea how much I dreaded doing this over again

hey if Hot Rodding was easy everybody would be doing it!

[Gregski]

now a good way to test if your hinges are shot is giving them the good ol' wigglability test, there should be no play in the rivets, you will know what I am talking about, best to have the hood off for a true wiggle test of one hinge at a time

mine believe it or not are nice adn solid, no free play, so I just needed to grease them before installing them, I thought about using a suringe or something to get some whitle grease in there but the tolerances are just way too tight, so I shot them with my trusty chain lube that my garage door guy turned me on to, and this stuff is AmazeBallz good, a few squirts with a can with the red straw attached for pin point accuracy and they were ready for another 40 years (provided they don't rust up again, ha ha)

[Gregski]

let me show you the best way to clean your old rusty bolts...

... BUY NEW ONES!

be nice to me and I may even tell you my supplier

I used to clean them, I used to wire wheel them and sometimes they even cleaned up pretty good, but then what do you do with them how do you prevent them from rusting up again, how do you coat them, that silly Eastwood black coating kit is a joke and a total waste of money, so these are so cheap when you buy them in bulk and all the threads are perfect, it's becoming a no brainer

[Gregski]

How do you prevent the hood from popping up at 75 MPH on the highway?

You install a second hood latch!!!

No just kidding, I had to buy a second one cause the big spring broke in mine.

Funny story actually. Originally my little spring was broken, so I bought a used baby spring at a junk yard, then after I painted my latch I noticed now my big spring was broken, so I thought that's strange, how could I have missed that, and why would I have painted a broken latch (it's all riveted so it's hard to just replace that big spring)

So I bought a second latch with both good springs. And so I dipped this one in a light bath of water and Phosphoric acid (like a 25 to 1 mix) to take the rust off and a day or two later I go to take it out, and its all shinny and rust free, but low and behold the baby spring is half gone, the acid must have ate it... which is what I think happened to the big spring on my original latch.

So are springs made out of some type of different metal that does not respond well to acid baths?

[Gregski]

what, this is boring?, I know right, well the point is there was a ton of work in this radiator core support replacement Willy, and you know what they say the devil's in the details... but hold on, we are almost done, I promise...

*** Added a TABLE OF CONTENTS to the very first post with the Thread Numbers. ***

[Gregski]

with the belly of the hood re POR15ed I thought this was a perfect opportunity to try out my Summit thread chasing set, and it worked great, though I didn't know if I was supposed to lube it with something or not, so I used what I had some good ol' trusty WD40

The Greg is trying to do things right, trying to do it right, that's all

[Gregski]

I even managed to get that big hood release spring back in while keeping the scratches in the new paint well within the recommended tolerances, ha ha

not too shabby if you ask me

[Gregski]

one last thing I had to do before putting the hood back on was to take a stab on troubleshooting that ticking noise as it was driving me crazy and preventing us from hearing that wonderful Flowmaster note (yeah remember we got a new exhaust on...)

so we took the distributor cap off of that ProForm H.E.I. unit, and wiggled it to see if there was anything a loose in there, and nope, it seems solid

[Gregski]

this exposed the white rotor, so we pinched it between our index finger and thumb and wiggled it a bit back and forth and it seems like there is a bit of play there and it's not as tight as we expected or would have hoped for

so we took the white rotor off to take a peak underneath, and I gotta tell you this entire weights and shafts and cams conglamoration is loose like a goose, I mean it aint gonna come apart and granade itself but it clunks and tings and pings when I wiggle it

so I took some white lightning grease and using a tiny flat screw driver lubed it up some, now I don't think I is supposed to do that as it will probably fly right off, but a few dabs here and there at least to keep it quiet during a test drive would be a win, would help us pin point the culprit

but no, the tapping noise is still there, mostly on accelaration now, but I am still convinced it's coming from that distributor

I just wish I had a stock OEM GM factory HEI distributor to wiggle to compare it to, I have said this before, we learn tons from staring and comparing, and in this case tandem wigglin'

Gentlemen I believe a GM Chevrolet Performance H.E.I. distributor part number 93440806 will be on our door step early next month in a brown box with the words Summit on its side, as the finance minister won't allow it this month, ha ha

[Gregski]

f i n a l l y

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by rusty76

How come you didn't just come off the very front of the intake and into the pump. That's where the bypass hose was on our work truck. Just curious. Looks great either way. The engine bay looks great

Thanks, and I thought I did, are you looking at the last picture? Was the work truck a big block by any chance, they have different intake manifolds I recon.

[rusty76]

It was a big block but I've noticed on your intake there is one plug. One that is directly over the water pump bypass connection. I just wondered if you could've used that spot or not. I'll see if I can get you a pic of the one on the truck at work. I replaced that hose a few years ago and it was a little bit of a bear. But we got it at autozone or advance auto one of those two. They're a tight bend but doable. I was just curious. Truck is looking great all together.!

[rusty76]

Here's a shot of what I was talking about. You can kind of see what I was talking about. Sorry about the pic. Not the greatest. But it goes from the water pump to intake. Piece of hose is four or five inches long. Maybe 1/2 inch heater hose I guess.

[rich weyand]

4000th post! 4000th post!

Truck looks really good, Gregski. Congratulations on getting it all back together.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Chaplain

100 pages...

huh? do you mean on this thread? cause I show 160? are our view preferences set different?

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by rich weyand

4000th post! 4000th post!

Truck looks really good, Gregski. Congratulations on getting it all back together.

Yup, you nailed it, and thank you very much, it took some doing but you all know that.

[hatzie]

Originally Posted by Gregski

remember how the Greg deleted the High Beam / Low Beam switch off the floor, well now no headligths work at all, IMAGINE THAT?

so next we had to install a loopback wire to get the lowbeams to come on, no that's not a fuse in the wire, we had to use a butt connector on two wires with blade connectors already on them since we did not have any spare blade connectors to build a new wire, yes we are poor right now

hey it's a temporary permanent solution, you know what I'm sayin' Vern?

If the floor button works on Low beam you could just plug it in and tie it up out of sight.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by hatzie

If the floor button works on Low beam you could just plug it in and tie it up out of sight.

yeah it did, and I thought about doing that but it's too bulky and the last thing I need is that thing getting stuck under the throttle pedal or the brake pedal.

[Gregski]

... a little air cleaner nonsensical progression

[Gregski]

gentlemen now that I have rebuilt the top end, got the Vortec heads on there, and the whole engine is looking cleaner, I find myself paying more attention to things and going through and making adjustments and fine tuning things

One question I have is regarding the Holley 4160 carburetor throttle cable linkage, I have noticed that in its current position I am not opening up the throttle plates all the way seems like I can go about an inch more, so should I move the linkage to the round hole towards the front of the carb, see pic

I think Holley sales a special adapter/stud to go in that hole to move the cable there

[Jeramy]

mr gasket part# 6026. its how we have my dads 57 belair ran,

2 piece bushing. Flat one goes in from the back side and your stud runs through it to hold 2 halves together
https://www.holley.com/products/fuel...age/parts/6026

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Jeramy

mr gasket part# 6026. its how we have my dads 57 belair ran,

2 piece bushing. Flat one goes in from the back side and your stud runs through it to hold 2 halves together
https://www.holley.com/products/fuel...age/parts/6026

thanks also found this one

[Jeramy]

yep all you really need is the washer parts

[Wgesnerjr]

Originally Posted by Gregski

let me show you the best way to clean your old rusty bolts...

... BUY NEW ONES!

be nice to me and I may even tell you my supplier

I used to clean them, I used to wire wheel them and sometimes they even cleaned up pretty good, but then what do you do with them how do you prevent them from rusting up again, how do you coat them, that silly Eastwood black coating kit is a joke and a total waste of money, so these are so cheap when you buy them in bulk and all the threads are perfect, it's becoming a no brainer

Gregski,
I am interested in cleaning my truck's bolts the same way you have discovered. Would you mind sharing your vendor? Ace hardware is getting expensive.
Thanks for all your documentation. Reading Your thread has become my morning ritual.
Carry on McDuff!