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Bronze’s 1963 Ford Galaxie Hardtop


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So, i noticed a week or so ago that fuel mileage had gone from silly-ridiculous to absolute fucking joke, and combining that with the powers of my nose I deduced something was not quite right. The accelerator pump diaphram was pumping gas out into the intake valley, making a lovely fuel reservoir. Also a bit bad. So I got a kit and hit this the past couple of nights. Bolt on tomorrow and see how she runs. It's a quicky job and I should ht some other things while the carbs off, like lift the manifold and replace the leaky gasket, but it weighs 40 odd kgs apparently and short longterm plan is replace it, so it'll hold a month or two, especially coz i wont be driving it too much till the weather is better.

 

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befores...

 

Inside...

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After...

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  • 3 weeks later...

After big upsing my carb rebuild I've probably pulled it apart three or nine more times. 

 

I had a repeated flooding problem that at first I thought was the float levels being shit. Turns out that the rear seat had actually split, possibly from over-torquing, possibly from shit quality. So after finally figuring that out and replacing first with the old seat/new needle, then old seat/old needle1, then old seat/old needle2 I was still having mares. Then by sheer luck pulling it apart for the whatevereth time, a piece of old thread that had been blocking it from seating properly emerged on the end of the needle. tiniest thing f.ed everything up.

 

Another test this weekend, then hopefully mobile.

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  • 3 months later...

So, mainly I've just been driving this with a mis-timed motor and disfunctional windscreen squirters. I know right? Dodgy. So I spent Saturday pulling apart the old washer motor and retrofitting a super pumpy new motor from repco. I diligently and carefully dremeled out a perfect circle in the old mount, and subtlely rewired and replumbed the lines so that the new unit would fit discretely inside the body that housed the old unit and look legit, but with modern functionality. So the very last stage was refitting the alloy/tin cover over the whole unit. In taking it off one of the tabs had snapped due to being old brittle metal. in refitting it the other tabs went. So, all in vain really.

 

Oh, and adjusted the timing, so much nicer. Need to re adjust that mixture again.

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  • 5 months later...

Many things have happened. Okay, not many, but some. New manifold and gaskets around the top and the sump, installed a stereo, and now it's in theory better but I'm having a shit of a time with the kickdown not working, so my ability to kickdown, drop smoke and piss off is reduced. This makes me sad.

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So, i spent the afternoon pulling off the door skin to get the vent window out. It's been flapping around in the breeze since i got it back from the importers. I was guessing some wharfie type got confused by the two windows and turned it to breaking point. turns out the inside mechanism had been fucked for a while, with the back of the screw-drive regulator floating around in the bottom of the door.

 

I'll redrill that and see if it can be re-assembled. pretty sure it can be patched.

 

The pin that connects the vent to the regulator is also broken, which is a bit of a fucker as i'm nervous about welding it with glass in situ, but pulling glass out will mean new rubber which means importing one, which means arsepain. I'm gonna mull it over.

 

Meanwhile having the door off gives me the chance to grease everything, and see how fagged the window felts are. I was planning on doing some of them already, So it might be bite the bullet and do another big import order.

 

Also tempted to begin pulling off the external trim while i've got it all open, because long term, shaving it is on the cards. 

 

I also tracked done one of the weird wheezy noises under the bonnet to a split hose connecting the booster to the trans - replaced all that but didn't help the kick down problem. Did manage to leave some smoke at the end of my street though, so I felt a bit happy about that.

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  • 4 months later...

So in the interim I took off the other door panel to discover the quarter vent regulator on that side was fucked too. Rebuild it. Reinstalled and reassembled today. Also took pics and measurements of door panels because eventually they need replace/retrim, and with the panel off I found a nice big hole that'll fit a speaker discretely. Also fish oiled inside the bitch and lubed the locks and mechanisms. It now opens so smoothly i almost forgave it for being a big fuel guzzling money swallowing bitch of a thing. Then I noticed the flapper had flapped it self to shit and was ripping. More pain and money.
So, two questions for the audience:

1 - I need to reattach this shaft (pic 1) onto the bottom of this quartervent frame - it's pot metal, and the frame has chromed - so a bit of a welding challenge? Anyone know someone who could do it without melting/destroying the two parts?

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2- All these interior windscreen chrome surround bits need a clean up, and rechrome. Is it something I can hit  with a dremel, or just send it to an electroplater and it'll come off in the chroming process? Never got stuff chromed before

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Oh, in other interesting news, I remembered i'd heard that sometimes you can find the buildsheet under the seat, so I had a fiddle, and some very brittle 50 year old paper crumbs fell out, it seems most of it has been lost in the past, and it falls apart when touched, but i did some CSI and got a bit of it together..

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Cool, huh? 

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  • 1 month later...

I decided to channel my emotions into some masking and cutting for the fuel flap and headlight surrounds where the blackouts need freshening up. Pics below indicate whats involved. The etch primer is drying at the moment so finished pics later. There are vinyl masks you can buy and use instead of painting it but I really can't see why you'd bother. Vinyl peels over time. This is the easy stuff, the entire rear panel between the tail lights (refer pic above) needs done too, but I'm going to do that when I have the arse apart later.

 

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2 months later...

headlining in. 

seat rails greased. 

seat mount bolt broken in process. fucker.

seat rails now move and bench seat is straight.

 

new smaller supplementary plate arrived. 

'supplementary' scrubbed off with thinners.

drilling to fit and replace bent oversized standard plate.

 

it's the little things.

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  • 2 months later...

Pertronix fitted today, need to adjust tune but seems like a winner. Smells less fumey already.

Bumper bolts dowsed in 5.56 in preparation for removal to get tail off.

Fitted some repro tail light rubbers last week - shit fit, and got a new repro tail light surround ring which was 1/4-1/2 inch too small in diameter. Annoying.

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  • 4 months later...

This now has a pair speakers in the rear, in a custom made tray, with deadening underneath, it's painted black for now, and then added a pair of 4inches in the front, all nicely tucked into a little mount i made. And then i figured why not chuck a sub in the boot, so i did. And all the wiring is tucked under the carpet, which meant seats out.

 

First thing I listened to: 2001, because masterpiece. I need to figure out how to set up the eq because so far it's under-fucking-whelming.

 

Also metalflaked the spare wheel because I could. And took out all the door panels and lubed all the windows. Bumper still off; keep breaking bolts. 

 
Oh, I never updated with pics of the masked and resprayed checker things in the tail trim. Suffice to say it was a shit of a job, but now it's done and I felt happy until I found more things in the process that need fixing.
 
That is all for now.
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  • 1 year later...
  • 8 months later...

Option 1: Replace end - http://www.northwesternford.co.nz/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=starter&search_in_description=1&x=0&y=0

Option 2: Replace whole unit - https://www.trademe.co.nz/motors/car-parts-accessories/ford/electrics/auction-1412687333.htm

I know it's a 50 something year old part, but aside from the cog shitting itself, it worked fine. But, it is a 50 year old part...

Discuss. https://oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/39341-1963-ford-galaxie-hardtop-of-glory-the-bronze/

 

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  • 1 month later...

Yesterday: tumblr_oyh1eqvDI71snjz6bo3_1280.jpg

Today:

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Finest quality rattlecan rebuild. 

Turns out this was a leaky bung replacing a frost plug, small seep that only really showed up with the paint. So thats out now, and a fair bit of old shit that'd been inside the block. 

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Next up his scrubbing up the bay...

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I didn't get a before, but believe it or not this is an improvement.

Really wanna find a dual plane edelbrock manifold cheap while i got it out. No fucker seems to have one to sell.

 

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