Got the two freeze plugs in last night. Had to clean out the holes in the head, which were in pretty good shape, and dug a bit of rust/dirt out of the water jacket. RTV'd the plugs, and tapped them in with a 21mm socket and a hammer.
OK, so not a very impressive evening. Still, I got something done, and Mrs. VCH seems happy that I'm being productive while at the same time not killing a whole evening out there. Maybe tonight I'll get the manifold back on?
Wife: Does it run again? Me: Almost!
After a quick razor-blade cleaning of the cylinder head and exhaust manifold, I never-seized all the studs and re-installed the manifold with its new gasket. The exhaust pipe bolted up, and the radiator topped off with water, I decided to imbue the wife with a bit of confidence in the project, and fire up the 383.
Luckily, all the plug wires were right this time and the little big block settled into a nice idle without much fuss. All the freeze plugs seemed to be holding after several minutes, and everything looked good. But wait...why's the windscreen fogging up?
And why is brown water pooling on the floors? sigh Must be the heater core. I feel like I'm playing the automotive edition of "The Weakest Link" with this cooling system. Even with only a 13 lb cap, the heater core couldn't stand the pressure.
Since it's not immediately essential to getting the car road worthy, and the brakes, um, are, for now I'm going to bypass the heater with a garden hose fitting and focus on getting the ox-cart era retarders to operate as intended.
EDIT:
And, look at that! Rock Auto has the heater cores! $53? I'll take two!
Yikes, it's been 2 weeks! Need to get cracking...well, at least I have an excuse. Me and the family made a trip to SC to visit my in-laws, and clean out our last storage unit from the move. This week has been playing catch-up with household chores. But, i did start and move the Town and Country under it's own power the other day. It idles pretty poorly, though it's still on the original plugs and wires from nineteen-whenever. I keep finding 4 barrel spreadbore manifolds on ebay and locally, and I'm really tempted to swap a Q-J onto his puppy and jettison the 2 barrel of unknown provenance.
Then, of course, there's the brakes and the heater core.
Unfortunately-ish, my Automotive ADD kicked in again as I found out about a Volvo 122 wagon for sale near me. Next thing I know there's another Amazon in the yard. I couldn't pass it up. It's an ex-California car with little rust and Black plates. It also has 4 pretty new tires, an alternator conversion, and the IPD header. It needs a timing gear and brake job, and the seats are pretty grody, but, shoot, I just love these little wagons. 
How much do you want for the wagon?
Also, is the cap new? I went through the heater core, the radiator hoses, the turbo and the head gasket before I figured that out with the Turbobrick. I finally tested it and it was holding something like 35 psi.
The cap is brand new. I agonized over what pressure to use- they have caps available up to 16 lbs. In the end I settled on lucky 13 psi. I think stock was actually like 14 or higher. When I got the car it had a 16 lb cap...and no thermostat. WTF--??
I had the radiator pressure tested to 16 psi and it held. I might go ahead and order a lower pressure cap with the new heater core, though. The extra pressure might get me 10-20 degrees of boilover headroom, but if this engine's running hot enough to boil pure water, something's wrong anyway.
@iadr: When I got the car the cooling system was full of what I will describe as a mayonnaise of mud and rust, with some water. I flushed it for like 30 minutes.
@tuna: I now have 3 Amazon wagons:
Wagon1 is my daily driver, a late 1967 model. Cosmetically it looks worse than 95% of the cars in any given pick-a-part, but has been the most reliable car I've ever owned. It has some Flintstone-esque qualities about the floors, but in general is a pretty solid car. I've owned it for about 8 years now. It would take a bunch of cash to pry this car out of my hands.
Wagon2 is a car I pulled out of the Virginia woods about 3 Christmasses ago. It needs everything, but the engine is free and a free-turning B18 is a spark and some gas away from running in my experience. Some prior owner cut out about a 1' x 2' section of the floor at the driver's feet, so that needs to be replaced before it can run. It's a 1968 model, so it has big side marker lights, more padding on the dash and under the dash, a different steering wheel, a dual master cylinder, and the collapsible steering column. It was probably the safest car under 3000 lbs you could buy in 1968!
Wagon3 is the one I just bought. Basically, my plan is to sell Wagon2, as it will take more effort to get on the road than Wagon3, and then keep Wagon3 for around-town wife transport, Wagon1 for me because its the most awesome car ever, and the Town and Country for long distance hauling.
I'm going to pull Wagon2 out sometime this weekend or next week, clean it out, and take pics to list it here, on Craigslist, and possibly eBay. The purchase of Wagon3 was contingent upon the future sale of Wagon2 (among other things...) 
On Saturday I helped a friend of mine tear down an old garage, with the promise of keeping whatever building material I wanted. As it turns out, the garage was mostly comprised of termites and rotted wood, but I did salvage some good metal hardware and a lot of aluminum scrap. Plus some cool old windows, a wooden vegetable crate, and a door, which Mrs. VCH loved.
Sunday, being sore and worn out from the demolition, I decided to spend a relaxing afternoon putzing on the Town and Country. I finished the rear brakes, and went through the front ones. The fronts looked to have been "done" at some point pretty recently, as the springs were nicely painted and the wheel cylinders were clean. Still, they suffered from the same poor workmanship as the carb had; i.e., the person doing the rebuilding simply removed old parts and installed new. There was no evidence of anything being cleaned or lubricated. So, I did it all right.
The brakes bled out OK and for the first time I had pedal. The engine was still running somewhat crappily, so I decided to install the new plugs and wires I had on hand. This immediately made a marked improvement in the engine's tune. Feeling ballsy, I backed the car up a few times to self-adjust the brakes, and then headed out for a cruise down the street. The engine ran beautifully and the transmission shifted through all three gears nice and cleanly. There was, however, a pronounced roaring noise from the rear wheels- upon inspection back at the house I noticed the brake backing plates were extremely hot. New wheel bearings are on order.
While doing the right rear brake, I had the car jacked up just on that side; the driver's side wheel was still on the ground. I went to rotate the wheel to check out the drum-shoe clearance and the wheel seemed stuck. The transmission was in neutral, so I couldn't figure out what was wrong. So, I jacked up the other wheel, and when I went to turn the tire again, I glanced under the car and saw that the other tire was spinning- in the same direction. Sure Grip! Jackpot!
I told Mrs. VCH about the Sure Grip, and she said, "Oh, you mean 'positraction'". Yes, my wife is a GM girl (and also a fan of the movie My Cousin Vinnie).
Anyway, yeah, Sure Grip!
Pulled both rear axles last night. Oddly, the driver's side needed a slide-hammer to extract from the vehicle, the driver's side came right off. The bearings are pressed onto the axle shafts, so I'm going to take them down to a garage tonight and get the new bearings and outer seals replaced.
Also, this weird little cylindrical stepped metal thing, about 1/2" in diameter and 3/4" long came out when I pulled the passenger side shaft. It looks like some sort of plug that goes into the differential. I have no idea how I'm going to get that back in there when I replace the shaft. Any help?
Awaiting bearings...
May be the adjustable thrust spacer from the center of the diff.
What wheel bearings are you using? Green, toss it. Adjustable tapered, drop the pumpkin and reinstall.
I'm using factory style adjustable tapered. Timkens. Actually made in the U.S.A bearings. I was hoping to not have to drop the chunk, but at this point I guess it's a relatively trivial matter. Heck, guys used to do this at the drag strip all the time. I'll get to check out the chunk, too, and make sure it's healthy. Peace of mind.
Found a local shop that can press out/ in the bearings and outer seal for me. Going to take it there tonight.
So, last night, I dropped the pumpkin.
One one side was a tag that said "Use Sure Grip Lube". On the other side was a tag that read "2.76", which is the gear ratio.
And the other Axle Thrust Spacer (what they seem to be called) was lying in the bottom of the diff housing. I fished it out. Here's the first one:
One of these little spacers goes in each side of the diff to help center the axles. When the axles are installed, the spacers are captive, but sans axles, they maddeningly just fall out when you try to install the chunk with them in there. I'm thinking some grease or maybe adhesive to keep them in place until the axles go home.
Soon, it got dark. I went inside.
i use vasaline to hold them in.
$84.97
That's the bill for removing the old bearings from the axle shafts and installing the new ones (which I provided). And replacing the outer bearing seals. Not a bad deal. That's like, about an hour of shop time. I would have probably spent all damn day doing that. Sometimes the checkbook is the best tool in the box.
volvoclearinghouse wrote: $84.97 That's the bill for removing the old bearings from the axle shafts and installing the new ones (which I provided). And replacing the outer bearing seals. Not a bad deal. That's like, about an hour of shop time. I would have probably spent all damn day doing that. Sometimes the checkbook is the best tool in the box.
everyone needs to know when it is going to be better to let a professional do something rather than try to do it yourself. IMO building axles is one of them.
MrChaos wrote:volvoclearinghouse wrote:everyone needs to know when it is going to be better to let a professional do something rather than try to do it yourself. IMO building axles is one of them.
I've set up a differential (successfully) and swapped center section in a Dana 30 where you have to "spread" the diff housing. But yeah- some things, I know how to do them, and I know I could do them, but...
volvoclearinghouse wrote: I've set up a differential (successfully) and swapped center section in a Dana 30 where you have to "spread" the diff housing. But yeah- some things, I know how to do them, and I know I could do them, but...
Just be careful when reinstalling the rear differential. I'm not sure if those SureGrip diffs need to be properly clearanced or not when reinstalling the gears. I heard of a guy who swapped in a new differential in his backyard and just tightened everything down as tight as he could and didn't properly check the clearances in the differential and the car sounded like a buzz-saw going down the road. He didn't even drive the car 20 miles and he had chewed up all the gears! He bought another new set of gears and wisely took it to an expert to have the differential properly setup.
If you're going to do it yourself, just be sure you have a shop manual with all of the specs listed, a torque wrench, and a set of feeler gauges and you should be all set, hopefully.
Good luck with it. I've pulled the axles out of my truck a few times, but never scooped out the whole contents of the pumpkin before. The Chevy was pretty simple to do the rear wheel bearings on though. Pull the 2 C-Clips in the differential and the axles just slide right out. A slide-hammer made quick work of the old bearings and oil seals, and then just hammered in the new ones using the old bearings and a block of wood to avoid damaging the new bearings. Done and done in about a couple of hours.
(Press-on bearings on the axle shafts isn't very fun though... I guess one of the few things Chrysler didn't do very well back then...)
The nice thing about the chunk style rear ends (Chrysler 8-3/4, Ford 9") is that you don't need to mess with clearancing gears as long as you are just removing and reinstalling chunks. The gearset is all pre-clearanced in the chunk. You can literally swap ratios in less than an hour if you're good and the axle isn't covered with 40 years worth of grime and crap. I'm sticking with the 2.76 gears, though.
Went camping this weekend, so nothing got done on the car. Also spent Sunday gathering firewood for the winter, and replacing a shot shock absorber bushing on my daily driver 122 wagon. It's amazing how much a loose shock can sound like the whole front suspension is about to fall off.
Let me preface today's update with a spoiler: I have no pictures of what went down last night.
Partially this is because I left my cameraphone inside last night. Partially it's because I was too unmotivated to go find it. And partially because, it was really berkeleying dark last night outside.
So, let me say this: I hate Daylight Savings Time. Really, berkeley DST. The baby's schedule gets thrown off, I end up commuting in blinding sun and deer-active dusk, and when I get home at night, rather than having an hour or so of light, I get darkness.
Screw it. I ran extension cords and illuminated the Town and Country with brooder's lamps. I laid on an old Detour sign in the cold and dirt and dark and got E36 M3 done.
I got started about 5:30.
First, the new inner axle seals had to be tapped into place. I cleaned out the inner race of the axle with a green scrubby pad and degreaser, then used my handy little Horrible Freight seal driving kit to install the two seals. Well, that was easy. Peering down the gunbarrel of the axle, I noticed the two spacers (mentioned in an above post) were still where they needed to be. So I figured I'd install the axle shafts. The passenger side shaft went in fine, but when I went to put the driver's side in it got stuck and wouldn't go in any further. Huh?
Turns out, when I put the chunk back in place in the axle housing, I'd only used two nuts to loosely hold it in place. When installing the 2nd axle, it somehow cocked to one side and the axle splines wedged in at something other than parallel. Awesome.
I had to use a hammer to tap the axle shaft back out, and, of course, the vibration from the hammering knocked the little spacers out of their homes in the pumpkin. So now, both axle shafts have to come out, and the chunk has to get pulled, again.
It's now 6:30.
The wife seems OK inside with baby Carmella, so I went back out and took everything apart. To keep the axle spacer halves in place in the chunk, I coated them with red grease before slipping them back into the deep recesses of the chunk. And oh man, do they go way in there. I have pretty large hands, with long fingers, and I was only just able to get the spacers in where they needed to be.
Put the chunk back in (square to the axle housing this time, so the axles splines line up) and put the axles in. And everything's going great, and I'm tightening the plates that hold the bearings into the axle housing, and I'm thinking I'm so awesome and this is going to be a productive night after all...
And then I realize that I forgot to put the axle housing gaskets in.
Well, there's nothing else to do now but pull the axles back out...and, by some divine intervention, the spacers actually stayed put, so I did't have to pull the axle pumpkin for a THIRD time...installed the gaskets and then, finally, after all that, got the axles put in place and the bearings all lined up and everything else that goes along with making a happy rear end.
I got inside at about 7:20. The wife was making dinner- beets and kale and beef liver and goat cheese over linguine with avocado on top (I like to add chili pepper to mine, too). Mella was on the floor with the dog, so I read a few articles from this month's GRM to our daughter and the dog while hungrily awaiting food. I think Carmella will be very interested in a 2016 Miata in about 16 years when she's ready to drive. 
volvoclearinghouse wrote: The wife was making dinner- beets and kale and beef liver and goat cheese over linguine with avocado on top (I like to add chili pepper to mine, too).
OK, reading about the wagon was great, but this sounds amazing. Do you always eat like a king?
Katie's breastfeeding, so we make sure she's well-nourished; as a side effect I usually eat whatever she's eating. She's 110 lbs, and I'm 180 lbs, and we both eat roughly the same amount of food. And she's still losing weight from the pregnancy. B-F takes a LOT of calories.
Neither one of us had ever eaten liver before she got pregnant, and now, well, like yesterday at work, I was actually looking forward to liver for dinner. I laugh when I wonder what my teenage self would think of my current eating habits. We also will often go several days between eating meat, but as you can imagine, it's rarely missed.
Your always getting your hands dirty and you have a little baby. How the hell are you keeping your hands clean enough to handle a baby?
Lots and lots of this:
I used to make fun of guys that used nitrile gloves when working on cars. But now I can't imagine living without them. They are tough, don't reduce sensitivity much, and allow you to repack wheel bearings without ending up looking like a grease monkey. I highly recommend them. They work wonders and wives appreciate clean soft hands. When baby's here, I'm sure she'll appreciate them too.
I tried the nitrile gloves last night (I have a box of 100 collecting dust on my shelf). They work fine for smearing grease on things but when it came down to threading on fasteners and fiddling with needle bearings I had to toss them.
So, last night was sort-of productive. I got the driveshaft back on and got all 5 bearing plate bolts on both axles torqued down and the lash set on the rear axle.
Oddly, though, the passenger side axle has a little free axial play in it (as it should) but the driver's side is slightly tight. In fact, if I loosen the 5 bolts that hold on the bearing plate, the axle spins more freely. There's no lash adjustment on the driver's side- it's supposed to all be done on the passenger side- and no shims. I'm not sure what's going on here- perhaps the bearing wasn't pressed on all the way? I'm tempted to drive it for a few miles and see if it loosens up. It's not tight tight, I can still spin it by hand, but it feels like it should be a little looser.
Anyway, I played with this until about 7PM, and then went in for dinner. For those who are interested, tonight it was Quinoa cakes fried in olive oil, and a spiced pumpkin/potato/apple soup. Carmella also got some more GRM and Dad time.
Tonight's supposed to rain, so no car work. I hear tell the attic needs insulation, though...
maybe something is slightly bent, or like you said the bearing wasn't quite square.
I have no experience with these things but I would be tempted to try the 'drive a few miles and check' method too.
What would ma Mopar do?
(ship it)
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