1950 Chevy Pickup Resurection

[Nothing Special]

BigBrother-84 wrote

....  In this case, I learned that a truck simply needs to have a french name to become a French Truck.  Okay...
....

Gary is the first person I've heard call a Chevrolet a French truck.  I always took that as a good-natured jab at the "other" brand on a Ford bulletin board.  Much like how on a Bronco bulletin board "Jeep" is spelled "J**p" as if it was a swear word that was being bleeped out.

Plus Chevy has always promoted itself as the iconic American brand.  Do you remember its "baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet" ad campaign from a few decades back?  So calling Chevy a "French truck" is sort of the ultimate slam.  But again, good natured I believe, especially coming from Gary, and especially when he's talking about his own truck.

For what it's worth, back when I was restoring my 1929 Ford Model A I ended up in a guy's barn looking for wheels.  He had probably dozens of old Fords, mostly Model A's, all in whatever shape he had found them in.  And among all the Fords he had one old Chevy.  He told me "Chevies are like belly-buttons.  Everyone has to have one, but they're really not good for anything."

[Gary Lewis]

Nothing Special wrote

He told me "Chevies are like belly-buttons.  Everyone has to have one, but they're really not good for anything."

I like that!  

Oddly enough, I grew up on Chevies.  My first car was a 1958 Belair and the next was a 58 Impala.  For his to-work cars Dad had a 34 Ford, an earlier Olds, a Willys, a 54 Plymouth, a Kelvinator (Nash), and a 55 Chevy pickup that was HOT.  But the family had a mix of Buicks and Chevies.  So I learned to work on all of them.

When I got into Bullnose trucks I was appalled by the fact that you can't swap transmissions willy-nilly between engines.  In the Chevies I was around you would swap transmissions any which way.  So that was a bit of a bummer.  But now that I've found this horrible design with bolts inside the bell housing I'll take a Ford any day.

As for the next step, Monday I'm going to put the engine down on the floor on its side.  That will let me put more force on the pry bar than with it hanging by chains on the shop crane.  Maybe it'll come loose.  If not I'll pull the pan and pull the rod caps to see if I can get the crank to turn.  Worst case I'll use the sawzall on the crank at the back.

[viven44]

Probably the most locked up 'intact' one I've seen. I can see the difficulty in even accessing all the rod cap bolts

https://youtu.be/XHveB7IJOoo?si=y-LESQMTCIPxDNQX

[85lebaront2]

I actually have owned two Chevies, both air cooled, a 1964 Monza and a 1965 Corsa. I have owned at least one of every GM line except GMC and Cadillac.

Fomoco, I've owned Ford, Lincoln and Mercury, and both cars and trucks in the Ford line.

Chrysler, owned Chrysler, Dodge and Plymouth, and drove a Desoto to college.

No AMCs, but did own a Packard.

Imports, Jaguar, Mercedes, Subaru.

[BigBrother-84]

Gary Lewis wrote

Oddly enough, I grew up on Chevies.

I like jokes about Chevy but guess what, I drive GM brands since 30 years.  Simply because my good friend is the local dealership, and I am faithful to my friends.
And when he had to demolish his old garage to rebuild it accordingly to modern GM standards, I did the plans.  That's the way friendship goes in small towns.
So I drove Safari, couple of Pontiac Montana (Chevy Uplander), couple of GMC Terrain (Equinox), plus my Volt.
I'm not allergic to Chevies, and I like to see members teasing each other with humor.

In fact, my single and only Ford is Big Brother, and I love this ol' truck!
I suppose Chevies are more like pimples in my case, and Big Bro is my bellybutton.
 

[Gary Lewis]

Vivek - That's pretty much what I expect to find when I get into this engine.  But I'm not going to be as gentle as he was as I don't care to salvage anything but the bell housing.

[85lebaront2]

I enjoy his teardown videos. The one he had been trying to get forever was a Ford 300 six as they like the Chrysler slant sixes are almost indestructible in stock form.

[85lebaront2]

If you pull the rod caps and loosen the main caps you may be able to turn the crank. Try some Kroil or similar in the plug holes before you lay it on it's side.

One thing I do remember about old Stovebolt sixes, the balancer is a press fit and I do not remember what we used to remove them. I do remember what I made for doing the T-bird Y-block balancers and probably still have it somewhere.

[Gary Lewis]

We squirted PB Blaster in the cylinders last Spring.  May do it again before I lay it down - probably tomorrow.

Hoping I don't have to remove the balancer as it has the "ears" which the hand crank fits in.  I use that and the pry bar on the flywheel for encouragement to turn.

[85lebaront2]

If you have to change the timing cover it needs to come off. Description I found is use the two holes for a puller. I don't know on the 235s, but our 216 had a phenolic cam gear which it ate on dad coming around Norfolk and Portsmouth on Military Highway. He was able to coast into a gas station.

[Gary Lewis]

I think the mount goes on the outside of the timing cover so the cover doesn't need to come off.  I hope.  

[Gary Lewis]

Got to spend a little bit of time today trying to turn the 216 over to get to the other 4 pressure plate bolts.

I had it leaning to the driver's side so I poured a bunch of PB Blaster in each cylinder - which then ran out of the cylinder(s) with the crack(s) in the bore.  Then I layed it down on its side on the shop crane's legs and put the pry bar on it.  Nada.

So I used the shop crane and a ratchet strap to put more force on the pry bar than I could myself, and shown below.  Again nada, but I'm leaving it overnight to see if it might creep.  And you can see the force via the bend of the pry bar.

And, by the way, this is trying to rotate it backwards to the normal rotation so I can't use the "ears" in the harmonic balancer to put more twist on it as the pry bar comes out of the "ears".

So I wondered if I could put air in a cylinder via the spark plug hole to help the situation.  But these plugs are a lot bigger than modern plugs and I don't have an adapter that fits.  So I tried to make one.  I put a plug in the lathe and turned the crimp off that holds the porcelain insulator in.  But the fitting that would go in is 3/8 NPT and there's just not enough meat in the spark plug shell to create threads.  When I drilled it 37/64" the bit took the threads off, as shown below.  So, nada.  

[85lebaront2]

Gary, that is interesting on the plugs. The 1947 dad had used 10mm plugs, little bitty looking plugs.

[Gary Lewis]

Bill - These are 14mm plugs.  The 37 Chevy I had used the 10mm plugs, so I know what you are talking about.

14mm is 0.551".  The tap drill for 3/8 NPT is 37/64ths which is .578".  So you can see why I drilled the threads right off that plug.

The plug shell is too big to allow 1/4" NPT connections and not big enough to take 1/2" NPT.  If I really thought it would help I'd put the 1/4" connection in with a bunch of JB Weld.  Or maybe solder it in.  But I really doubt that 120 PSI is going to make a big difference since I don't know if any piston is near TDC with the valves closed.  And if it is the wall may be cracked.

So if I can't get it to move tomorrow I'll turn it upside down and start disassembling the bottom end.

[85lebaront2]

Does the clutch housing have a slot below the crank flange so the crank could be removed in situ as the Brits say? I suspect it might as bearing technology in the 40s was frequently poured babbit main and rod bearings. If it does and you can get the inside bolts out with an open end wrench, it might make the clutch/flywheel removal easier.

That pan will, in all probobility have oil dipper troughs and spray nozzles, and you will probably need to use it for the truck to clear the front axle. The 235 is probably a full pressure lube model as that was one of the improvements on the 235 car engine. It may still have main and rod caps that use shims to set bearing clearances even with insert bearings. Any machine shop that has been in business a long time probably has a shim kit for a 235.

Too bad you couldn't find an early Hydramatic from a pre-63 Chevy 6 cyl truck. it was what the panel delivery 6 cyl models used. One of them and you could put a good highway gear in it due to the 3.84:1 first.

Here is a Chevy 235 resource I just found: http://www.devestechnet.com/Home/Project1959235

[Gary Lewis]

I don't know if the clutch housing has a slot, but I'll look tomorrow.

Sure hope the pan on the 235 doesn't hit as I want to put it in w/o modification.  I guess I'd better take some measurements.

I'll follow up on that resource.  Thanks!

[Gary Lewis]

Got the engine turned over and the pan off.  Can't figure out why the engine won't rotate.  

[ArdWrknTrk]

I'd probably slice that last rod journal with a cutoff disc so I had something to grab in the vise that won't turn while trying to get the flywheel bolts out....

[Gary Lewis]

That's an idea, Jim.  I've not really thought through what to do next, but I'm certainly not against cutting that crank.  Everything in there is toast.

I was hoping to get the back end of the crank to come up with a pry bar, but it won't wiggle.  So I'm going to spend a bit more time trying to dislodge the crank before I start cutting.

[85lebaront2]

I do see I remembered the clutch housing design correctly. Is #5 rod broken? I think I have seen a worse looking piece of scrap metal, but it's been a long time.

It was a Chevy 292 ci 6 cyl race engine, aluminum rod in #2 cyl broke and almost sawed the block apart at #2.