Time to dust off my EK!

[muza]

good read mate!! you must be stoked at the moment!

[Marty K Bird]

I have spent most of this week rolling around under my car cleaning underneath it!!

Part of me is not really sure why besides one of my first goals which is to clean everything ..... and i mean everything lol!!
My car is up on four stands with safety net tyres and i dont have a fancy workshop mechanics creeper thing ...instead i have an old cushion off a lounge in one of those 20kg chook food bags ..... fairly waterproof and very comfy!!
Its been a rewarding experience as i am really getting to know every nook and cranny of the old girl.

A few spots that i thought were bad underneath are nothing but flaky old mud not flaky rustiness!!
Im really surprised with how clean the whole car is underneath i thought the underside of the floor pans were rusty ..... they just have road grime and dust with a small bit of surface rust that kinda washes off.

Today i had a good yarn with my uncle (dads cousin) who my dad purchased the car from, over 25 years ago (which probably is as long since i have spoken with him).
With no log books or anything in the car there was little known of its history, so the call provided a bit more insight on the old girl.
He recalled he spotted the car for sale out the front of a house in Lyons in Canberra. It had a bit of a dingle in the front left and was then put up for sale.
After he bought it he fitted a new mudguard and also new upper and lower wishbones on that side.
I told him i was going to do it up ... and he said" well it shouldn't have any rust in it" as he new it was a fairly clean car when he had it.
He drove it around for about 8 years so that gives me a bit more of its history of the last 30 years or so of its life. He never had the books for it, as he said they probably were taken out by the owners who had brought it new from Beazley and Bruce in Canberra.
I also quizzed him about the rocker cover and unfortunately he didn't remember anything about it....so no stories of any other matching racey internals that he knew of.
I told him it hadn't been around the clock yet on the speedo but dad always thought it probably had and was going around again .... but he reckons it would be the original mileage as it didn't have a lot on it when he got it. He also said that it would be the original motor and he said it never skipped a beat!!
So yeah im kinda happy to know a bit more about the car and i have promised to give him a drive one day. He was really happy to hear it is still alive and in the family!

It has 96,422 miles on it so it isn't anything special i suppose, but to me i think that's kinda cool ... especially to think that I will get to see the clock tick over for the first time!!

This cars taking me places and it hasn't even left the shed.....
Loving it!



Pics to follow~

[Marty K Bird]

Put in another big day on my K Bird this week..... had a mate come and give me a hand to finish bleeding the brakes and to help get it running better...
He is a die hard F@$# fan but he likes to tinker ....

We bled the brakes but one of the new bleeders was being a pain so we chucked in one from the old slave cylinder and it works.
Seemed to get the bleed done but the brake needs to be pumped otherwise they go to the floor quick .... not sure whats going on ... shoes need adjusting out some more i guess??? (any ideas on this)


I plan to redo the front end once i get the guards off ... but this is alot neater for now..

Had fuel leaking out the bottom of the fuel pump so we took the one off the spare car and used its bottom with the original top. Had a chance to clean it too whilst it was out. It seemed to work fine but hopefully you can still buy diaphragms?? so i can redo the old one.

Put in a new set of plugs, and went to the former Holden garage which lost its franchise years ago and is now just a NRMA office and one mechanic doing stuff. I went to ask about drum machining and i also asked if they still had some Holden parts .... they then dug out a new accelerator pump they gave me for free!!! Bonus!!

Also cleaned the points and dizzy cap and tried the motor again and it still had a bad flat spot...

Anyway i thought it be able to drive so we took it off the stands for the first time in ages. I had one old tyre on the front that had a leaky valve ... i replaced it and I reversed it out. We did a couple of quick laps around the house paddock then I decided it was time to hit the road!

I headed it out the gateway and out along an old dirt road near home .... it was coughing and farting but when the revs got higher it started to sing.
It was such a joy to put it in second gear for the first time in over 20 years!
I didn't get the change right lol ... oh well them dirty teeth needed a clean im sure. After a while the gear change shuffle started coming back to me .... as we trundled along the dirt track with me laughing nearly all the way ... so god damn happy to be in the old girl again .....and when i looked over to my oval badged mate i seen him even smiling!!

I went probably 5km's out then decided to check the tyre and it was going flat!!!
I didn't have any spare with me so i headed it for home.
Drove down through my neighbours farm and was going to pinch his compressor but when i got out the tyre was cactus. DOh!!!!!

It been a long day and we did not want to walk so i limped it back down the dirt driveway towards home. Just made it into the gateway and the tyre started to slap so i stopped ... then the motor died...

Popped the bonnet to find a battery lead off ... went to put it on and it started arcing out and nearly melting the battery terminal!! !WTF!!!
Looked like a major short ... then i noticed the left over from the engine bay clean ... the positive lead to the starter wasn't in its metal tag holder thing... and it was now melted to the extractors!!!!
So there the old girl sat ...so close to home ...till i fetched another wheel.

Gave it a wash and started to polish the bonnet with 1500 grit you beaut polishing paper before putting it back in the shed.
The paint is so crazed in spots it would eat sponges for breakfast!
Woke early the next day and did some more paper polishing and ended up going over the whole car besides the roof.... then started buffing it up by hand.
Was a great chance to get to know the bodywork and i found another couple of small bubbles but nothing major.

Also went to the Men's shed to see the old mechanic to see if he had any tips on the carby. He gave me a rundown on it and he said he has the original jet tool in its box somewhere amongst his collection of stuff (including an original radio ).

This week i also attacked the rusty bit on the RHR 1/4 panel and took some of the paint off around the area. It was a bit bigger than i thought and i do need to take some more paint off .... but it was a good start.


Yesterday I got the carby tool and stripped the carby down...
No wonder it was running rough with all the crap in the bowl and clogging up everything!!
Scrubbed it all down, blew it all out and also polished it up till it was shinning!!


Wacked the carby on and fired her up ... and it was purring like a kitten!
Today I had some work on at the farm across the road so i drove it up there. Our driveways are almost opposite so no major laws broken.
She went well and it was awesome to be able to use it Off to work in it again tomorrow.

Still have a lot of cleaning and polishing to do on it before stage 1 is complete.
Have been working on cleaning the engine bay, but it still has a few sessions to go (degrease the motor and gearbox next)... but looks alot better then when it had rat poo on it!


Digging it!!!

[parisian62]

Hi Marty

That's the best thing I will read all day...it put a smile on my dial

After a while the gear change shuffle started coming back to me .... as we trundled along the dirt track with me laughing nearly all the way ... so god damn happy to be in the old girl again .....and when i looked over to my oval badged mate i seen him even smiling!!

Good times!!!

Stewart

[WayneXG95]

Dam more competition...

Good work Marty, on ya buddy.

[Devilrod]

Good stuff Marty. The ol girl is cleaning up alright.

[Cal]

Yeah, quite a transforamtion on the engine bay, just from a decent clean

[bootlegger]

Engine bay looks great.

[muza]

Love what ya doing mate!!

[MyEKisdriven]

carbie looks like a brought one.
Amazing what a little elbow grease can do

looking great Marty..

[Marty K Bird]

Thank you all for the comments .... as i am sure alot of you know they are very encouraging and i do hope to contribute more by doing the same myself

Wayne not sure what you mean by competition .... your a long way ahead

Tim would love to put rego on it but the funds are low .....well bordering on non existent at the moment...
The plus side of this is I have lost a fair bit of weight in the last two months as spare money goes into my car not into junk food lol....and so busy on it i sometimes forget to eat..

I have decided to sell my HK Ute, 76 Celica and VK commodore and hope to raise at least 2 grand from them to put money into the K-Bird... if squeezed i will offload the spare Kleinig cover.

I am also applying for a job on Monday so fingers crossed that will help things along. There's also another job going as a tyre fitter ,,,,, that could be handy!

I also seen my tax agent about my several years of not doing my tax ... and it looks as though i will have a few bucks from that too !! (I knew i was slack for a reason)

Besides the bodywork bits (perhaps a rear 1/4 rust repair section and 1 sill for the LH side) plus paint, prep stuff, new compressor and sander/buffer my list of bits to buy includes:

(Needed for Rego)
New exhaust from manifold to muffler box ... I am sure that it has the original muffler box still on it
Four new tyres for the stockies
New Brake shoes and drums machined
Carpet

(not needed for rego but bits i want to help complete it)
Front seat fixed up
Alloy timing gear.... peace of mind
Front and rear obsolete rubber mats
New scuff plates
1/4 vent window rubbers plus weather strips all round.
LHF door trim
Mirrors
Door rubbers
venetian
EK Hubcaps

Oneday ....new chrome

...

Went to the old mechanics place today to have a look at his stuff .... or junk lol
He has a FJ panelvan which served as a SES vehicle its complete ...a FJ Ute and 2 FJ sedans in bits, 2x &*#@ Zephyr MK2 convertibles, 2x A model fords (badly rusted bits but good chassis and shells), HQ Panel Van, EH Wagon that I have helped talked him in to giving to my mate (his son in-law), a Vauxhal viva, LH Torana... and a few more things!!!!!!
He has a better coolaride sunvisor then mine for an EK, a warmaride heater sitting out in the open ...plus a couple of HR Disc brake front ends and tonnes of stuff!!
Found an old Ferris Volumatic 9 Superfringe Radio that looks the right era lying out in the open that he gave me .... it will be stuffed id imagine but i will give it to my electronic wizard mate to have a go at. If it is crap i plan to fit switches behind the push buttons which will switch on a hidden mp3 player loaded with hits from the era and also switch some other stuff.

I like the idea of putting some technology into the old girl but having it hidden .... something is going under the speaker grill which can be popped up or closed via a switch.... might be a lcd screen or digital gauges or something like KITT hehe.

[Marty K Bird]

Houston we have a problem!

Yesterday when i went to fire up my car it coughed and spluttered and sounded rougher then when i drove it the other day.

Today i went to check it out some more .... i took the plugs out one by one to clean them.... also tested each lead to make sure they were giving spark...all ok
I gave it a couple of revs thinking something might blow the cob webs out ...but when the bonnet fell shut from the vibration i thought it was telling me to ease off lol

I did the dance of the plug leads and worked out one cylinder was crook.... so i took off my rocker cover.....(been wanting to polish it anyway)

Found one of the pushrods is disconnected ???
I haven't consulted the good book yet, but i have searched the forum and gathered a bit of info...
I read something about problems with motors that have sat for a while ....mine being one of them!

I guess what has happened is I have a sticky valve and it stuck when the pushrod went down and then it came adrift.

So what do i do ... wind the adjuster back up ....learn how to adjust the tappets .... spray inox and tap the sticky valve with a stick .... and all should be good??

Also I kinda of want to clean it all up but i guess that is not a good idea unless i remove the head (not wanting to do that). Is there anything else to check or do whilst the cover is off?? Blow out the oil gallery things??

-


/UPDATE

I'm going in!!
I consulted the good book this morning and it mentioned about cleaning the rocker shaft assembly!!
So I have started to pull the bolts out (making sure I don't drop a washer) ... the rocker cover bolt was tricky I put the nut back on to make the two nuts lock together so i can undo that bolt...

Just got off the phone to my old school days mate who is a King tinkerer who talked me through the process....

So the plan is remove the rocker shaft assembly, clean it all up with some petrol and air compressor then also clean around the top of the valve springs and top of the head making sure i don't get crap down any valve holes!

Then i am going to twist and pull the pushrods out and clean them too ... making sure i do them one at a time so they stay in their right order as they are bedded in to each other....

I will then reinstall it all, inox the valve stems and ad some oil via my oil pot....
After its all back together i will take all the spark plugs out and wind it over by hand to check it all and then maybe key it over and make sure everything looks ok (looking out for a possible sticky lifter).

If all goes well i will set the valves cold then warm it up and do them again....

And hopefully it will purr a bit better!!

I have never done this stuff before but i know it's well within my capabilities...

Love tinkering!!

[Marty K Bird]

Bent pushrod!!

I have a spare motor!!

Can a pushrod be plucked out quicker through the side plate? And should i get the other lifter and rocker arm to match ??

[fingers]

Bent pushrod!!

I have a spare motor!!

Can a pushrod be plucked out quicker through the side plate? And should i get the other lifter and rocker arm to match ??

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Whats telling ya its bent mate ....you should be able to loosen the valve gear on that rocker and pull the tappet to one side and lift the pushrod out ...not 100% sure ...fingers

[MeFB]

Bent pushrod!!

I have a spare motor!!

Can a pushrod be plucked out quicker through the side plate? And should i get the other lifter and rocker arm to match ??

Personally, I'd leave the lifter in the motor (if it isn't damaged) because maintaining the the cam-to-lifter wear pattern would be more critical than the lifter-to-pushrod wear pattern

I also wouldn't go to the bother of replacing the rocker because then the rocker-to-valve interface would be changed.

Be careful that the pushrod that you replace it with is the same length. Grey 138's up to engine number B65280 are 10 5/16" and after that are 10 1/8"