Losing hope on this car. Not sure what to do with engine and trans.

groberts101
- The transmission is toast, 3rd gear doesn't grab when shifted under power, so over 3k. I don't believe a band adjustment would help for that.
- The valve train is all tight. The ticking leads me to believe a lifter is going flat, and the puffing/brrr noise in the exhaust occasionally makes me believe that one of the exhaust valves is not seating properly. Would be pointless to redo the heads and not the bottom end. I have not done a compression/leak down test yet, it's on the list, but am confident that the numbers would not look good.

Krazy Comet
- I agree with you on that.

 

I suppose, here's a link to that exhaust flutter. Keep in mind, the car has a new HEI distributor, plugs looked new, and new wires. This also happened with the old points ignition, the reason why I went HEI. Also this has only happened a couple times. Runs fine now.



I say bad exhaust valve.

 

I am sorry about the troubles you are having with your car. I would suggest, like others have said, to try and fix everything to be the best it can be without throwing more money at it. If you are saving for a house, that is more important than a beater Maverick.....maybe not more fun, but more important. Also, when you can pull the trigger on a house, you may wind up with a garage too. At that point, (and after the house quits eating your lunch) you will be better set up to deal with cars. Your car will ALWAYS be a money pit, and NEVER give you a return on time and money spent. 10 years from now you will be glad to have a house, or sad the car thwarted that, and ten years will pass by like it was a vacation. Rust repair is more labor intensive, and cost more time than money relatively. Do stuff that cost little to nothing. Take out your heater box and clean the crud out of your cowl, and get a better assessment of it. A new heater core and blower motor is about 110 bucks, and will be a blessing when it gets cold and you need a defroster. It is possible the drains are partially plugged, the hat is rusty half way up, and water is getting in instead of draining. I am the ultimate cheapster......I cleaned my cowl out, flushed it thoroughly with a long bottle brush doing a roto-rooter on the cowl drains, let it dry for 2 days, bent some 4 inch weenie rollers to roll right and left, covered the carpet, put on gloves, and ran 1/2 quart of POR 15 around my hats on both sides. All the water runs out swiftly, and the rust (no leaks to begin with) will not be a problem until after I am dead. I cleaned out the heater box.....and the car smells better inside too.

 

stumanchu
I actually ran a hose in my cowl today, and it is water dripping through some rust on the driver's side. Can't see a hole, just running through the rust, stuff's probably pretty thin. For a temporary fix, less than a year, it's high up on my priority list, I'm just going to silicone the "hole". Beats having soaking wet towels to deal with.

 

I bought my car fairly cheap, but there were no keys and the trunk was locked. When I finally got it opened, it had been leaking, and under the mat was crusty rust and chunks stuck to the mat, and the rust went into the gas tank and rusted pinholes through that. Icky!!!!! Sorta like your floorboard episode.....but in a place less irritating.

 

http://mmb.maverick.to/resources/trunk-pan-and-floor-pan-repair-for-the-non-fabricator.138/

Jeff coated the complete inside of his car with...Rustbullit.

I did the cowl delete to my car...

"leaky cowl"

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Thanks Chip...

 

I based my response on shift flare not slipping trans. Everything I mentioned is free, well except for the shift servo which you'll eventually need anyways and doesn't cost big $$?, and all have worked for me at one time or another when I mod'd or built these things through the years. I've seen and had crappy shift kits do this on perfectly fine but soft stock shifting transmissions in the past too and much has to do with the orifice/drillbit sizing on the separator plate being too big in relation to other existing hardware and line pressure. Much has to do with people, myself included at one time or another, going overboard to "race shift mode" when selecting drillbit/orifice sizing with" some is good, so more must be better" attitudes. New separator plates are cheap enough to get back to a stock orifice baseline once things have gotten too big rather than using a soft crush plug to fix a too big hole.

As for the cam lobe/lifter being wiped or burnt valve.. you sound very pessimistic and cynical like me by assuming the worst case scenario. lol I can tell you for fact that the valveguides on those little motors are downright horrible, some start going away in as little as 30k from new with little tale tale puff of smoke on startup, and leaking valves could be as simple as carbon and/or oil coking the valve head and seat. But as you said the compression test will only tell you so much and a leakdown test is the proper way to diagnose an issue. But neither of those will tell you for sure if its a burnt valve or sludged seat. There are tons of more expensive cleaners out there these days to clean induction deposits but I would suggest trickling trans fluid down the carb during real high idle speeds, 2000'ish rpm, and then pouring in more quickly till the car bogs and dies. Let sit over night to soften deposits and then run at high idle with occasional throttle wings to a little over 3000 to clean up the deposits. The follow that up by trickling about 2-3 cups water down the carb at high idle to steam clean the rest out. Depending on ring seal and volumes used you may need to replace oil but this old mechanics trick works very well for higher mileage or low trip length engines which are known to have accumulation buildup.

Hers'a a quick link from others who've experienced the same things I have in the past. One post even goes so far as to talk about the relationships between line pressure and orifice sizing. Like I already said, the band adjustment is free and that would be my first go to test before spending cash on the shift servo. I'd tighten the band up about a 1/4 turn and see what affect it has if any. I'd actually adjust both due to lining wear loosening things up. If nothing improves then loosen it/them back up.

https://www.yellowbullet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=446854

PS. video above doesn't work.. says "video not available".

 

I just read my post and realized that I didn't mention that the C4 I took OUT of my Daughters Maverick IS
Rebuilt .. I just put a Performance C4 behind her stroker. The tranny HAS already BEEN Rebuilt if you're still
interested. Waynes Transmissions her

You're Welcome Sir !! I've been viewing some of your posts .. Nice Work .. Like the clean sanitary look of the
Rear End areas also ..
Chip

 

stumanchu and 71gold
- I'll be lining everything when I get the rust repaired.

groberts101
- I suppose I will tighten the bands. Video should work now.

cometized
- Even still for that price, I don't believe I could justify purchasing your transmission, as I'm rebuilding the transmission myself. Plus I'll need a built transmission, depending on what I do motor wise. I have a 351w now......

 

I finally listened to that video. Doesn't sound like an exhaust valve sealing issue at all.. sounds very much like a misfire related to ignition or fueling. My money would be on ignition.

 

It'd be wise to run a compression check, if it has at least 100 lbs on each cylinder, cylinder sealing is not a issue.

The original engine in my Comet had between 95 & 105 lbs on every cylinder, idled so smooth could barely tell it was running. Yeah those figures are low, but shows having 140-150 lb isn't necessary to idle correctly. When the old 5.0 in T-Bird started idling/running poorly I found it had 170 psi on 1 & 2 but only 35 on 3 & 4, that's a issue.

 

Thanks for the replies, I will run a compression test this weekend. This is a new distributor and wiring, but not new spark plugs. So i guess groberts101 could be right, in that it's a missfire, and not a compression issue, in that the spark plugs could be bad. The odd thing is that the "flutter" comes and goes. But a compression test will tell the truth I suppose.

 

Welp, ran a (cold) compression test, "sadly" it looks all good.
1. 105 psi
2. 110 psi
3. 100 psi
4. 100 psi
5. 110 psi
6. 120 psi
7. 105 psi
8. 105 psi

All of the spark plugs looked brand new too. So I think I'm down to that I have a bad lobe on the cam/flat lifter? Remember it was ticking badly that one time, then just shut it off and started it back up and it was normal. There was quite a bit of metal "paste" down in the pan when I re sealed it. Like the whole sump section was 1/8" thick of paste. And there wasn't any sign of copper/brass/bearing material in that paste. And it has a complete new HEI distributor, wires, and will be putting new spark plugs in (just because last resort kinda thing). Also there is a positive 12 volts going to the distributor when running.

Also all the valves seemed to be the looser side, cold I could spin most of the pushrods, hydraulic flat tappet I've always done tighten till you can't spin the pushrod, then a half turn. Dependent on fine or coarse thread nuts.

 

If cam were bad, compression readings should be skewed. With a wiped cam the valve doesn't open, no air in, no compression(at least not much). When exhaust is wiped cylinder usually builds some compression but not full amount. Running engine with valve covers removed, it's easy to see if rocker(s) are not operating.

I've seen a 340 Mopar engine with wiped cam idle smoothly, but was down on power.. Eventually developed a stutter and backfire at WOT.

After valve adjustment, it's common to be able to spin push rods that are not on lobe. Requires some oil pressure to keep lifter pumped up.