- Joined
- Apr 24, 2020
- Messages
- 1,237
- Reaction score
- 1,300
- Location
- Pittsford, NY
- My Car
- My all time favorite vehicle is our 1969 Shelby GT500
I am glad you chose to use brass core plugs, not steel. They are a little more costly, but the result is well worth it. I applaud your wife for her suggestion to use a yellow lens to better see the coolant leak. That was clever.Thanks, guys.
I've been working on wiring up the back half of the car while waiting on the freeze plugs to arrive. They came in this morning, so this afternoon, I was able to get them replaced. I had tried to photograph the dye trail, but it wasn't showing up. I told my wife, and she suggested putting the yellow glasses in front of the lens, and sure enough, I was able to get a picture of it. You can see the fluorscent green stream flowing from the bottom of the freeze plug in the picture below.
View attachment 63419
Two freeze plugs were confirmed to be leakers, and another was suspect. I changed all 6. I used some sandpaper to clean up the opening and wiped it out with some lacquer thinner just to make sure it was clean. I used a very thin layer of Permatex UltraBlack on the inside of the opening and around the perimeter of the freeze plug before tapping each one into place. Worked out well.
View attachment 63420
View attachment 63418
Tomorrow, I'll do a pressure test to confirm it holds before I drop it back into the engine bay. Slowly, but surely.
I also like how clean you have managed to get the engine compartment to look. The one panel for the electrical wiring needs in the inner fender near the battery looks especially nice. Nice enough to cause me to consider doing something similar with our 73 Mustangs were I to run out of things to do with them. The exhaust with the X-Pipe looks really nice also. Hell, it all look really nice!
So, have you made a decision re: using an AOD yet. Just curious. As an aside, I have twice bumped the Throttle Valve (TV) pressure up a little higher than the spec of 35 PSI. I am running at 39 PSI, and the upshift points are now right where I wanted them to be. The hazard with an incorrect TV setting is when it is too low, which reduces line pressure and can result in a smoked transmission. Sadly, in a lot of cars using an AOD the eventual wearing or breaking of a nylon/plastic bushing that has hardened over the years is enough to cause a low enough TV level to smoke a tranny. Back to the 39 PSI setting I am at now, I do not see a need for me to go any higher than that. If I still wanted a higher shift point, or a firmer upshift, I would now be considering a valve body performance upgrade. But, at this time I am leaving well enough alone. It seems the enemy of "good" is "better."