hemigeno's Daytona restoration - a few more tweaks... again!

[hemigeno]

Even while idling the car around my shop and such, I had noticed that my red Brake System warning light came on and off intermittently.  While we were looking at the car on the rack, I noticed that there was some brake fluid on the backside of my brake backing plate.  Vance and I took off the front drum for a look-see, but there was no evidence of leakage in the wheel cylinder.  Best we can tell, it might have been a little bit of seepage from around the connection of the rubber flex line to the hard steel line at the frame.  Vance worked the connection together back and forth, hoping to get a better seat at the flanges, so hopefully there won't be a repeat of the leaking.  There was no appreciable decrease in brake fluid levels, but it will be something for me to keep an eye on.

The second photo was intended as a "before" shot of the torsion bar orientation.  While there is not a way to say it could NOT happen, I've had people comment to me before that the drips on the torsion bars should probably not point down.  I suppose that since the bars have a hex end on them, chances were only 1 in 6 that the drips would point down.  Both of mine were oriented this way, and when I mentioned something about that to Vance, he quickly jumped in with the wrenches and we had both sides changed in about 15 minutes flat.

[hemigeno]

Here's Vance applying what he called his NOS torsion bar lube...  plus some shots showing the "new" orientation.  We made sure both sides were different, just so we didn't get in trouble for being too consistently inconsistent.

[hemigeno]

The next three are shots of the new repro K-member seal from David Patik that I got from him back when we were experimenting with different post-cure methods to stiffen the masticated rubber material.  The stiff-as-a-board original K-member seal is now resting comfortably on the shelf.  I was worried that it would continue to tear in places where it's subjected to bending, or that any significant contact would cause it to crack since the seal won't really flex much anymore.

Before installing this, we removed the vintage radiator hoses and put on a fresh set of repro upper and lower hoses from Frank Badalson.  While the texture of the hoses is slightly different, they're missing the longitudinal striping and the orientation of the part # / vendor / pentastar inkstamp is different, the repro's are still rather nice parts.  Plus, I'm no longer pinning my engine's livelihood on 45-year-old rubber hoses.  The originals will still be kept around on the shelves, but I don't think it's wise to depend on them.

[hemigeno]

This next shot of the temp gauge was taken after we started the car and let it run in Vance's shop for between 10 and 15 minutes.  By this time, the old radiator would have been pumping coolant out the overflow in significant quantities.

You can see here that the temp is holding at maybe 180.  Neither Vance nor I could remember what temperature of thermostat we used, but if this is the operating temperature the car sees, it's fine by me.  After turning the car off for a few minutes and re-starting it, the temp did spike up to the upper end of the scale - but it started coming right back down after just a few seconds.

This was the result I was hoping to see.  While I still don't plan on pushing my luck by idling the car around any more than necessary (especially on hot summer days), perhaps this will keep the car from leaving a puddle.  I was more than a little paranoid that the car was going to leave a "deposit" on the red carpet at the Concours d'Elegance during the afternoon awards procession.  

[hemigeno]

Another item on my hit list was to replace the idle mixture decal on the inner fender.  That was about the only non-OEM or non-ECS decal still remaining on the car, and Dave Walden was kind enough to give me a correct decal as a replacement.  Problem was, the new/correct decal is slightly smaller than the old one, which would have left an outline in overspray of the old decal's size.  Vance removed the old decal, sanded down the overspray outline, installed the new one, and then got out his detail spraygun to apply a new batch of Creative Industries-inspired paint.  In the first picture, you can see the new decal completely covered.  This was right before Vance took a rag with some thinner and wiped most of the paint off... leaving enough around the edges to finish the effect.

[hemigeno]

Next up was to mask off for applying overspray to the K-member seal.  Vance only masked off the nosecone area because he was using a detail spray gun rather than the big one like he did the first time around, and we had the chin spoiler installed (which would not have any overspray on it).  Plus, he didn't want to build up too much fine overspray on the radiator yoke which would have not had too much "powder" on it originally.  Rubber surfaces like this K-member seal really soak up the paint, so it took him a bit to get the right amount of bodycolor actually visible.

It's hard to say if Creative Industries masked off much of the tires apart from their outside faces.  They may have done the same thing as with the engines, where a blanket was draped across what they could easily protect.  But, with the smaller paint gun, there wasn't as much concern with overspray as  Vance would have had to worry about with the initial application.  This was a much less messy process.

[hemigeno]

And finally, a couple of shots of the finished product (at least of the K-member seal).

Hopefully these types of changes will make the car a little more reliable, even if it'll never see daily driver duties again under my watch.  I still have a few more longer-term items on my changeover wish list, but this is a good start.

[tan top]

   amazing detail to factory & Creatives handy work   

awesome Job 

[Charger-Bodie]

Hey Gene, if you want it to run even cooler pour in a couple bottles of water wetter. My former clone runs at 170 -180 all the time. Same radiator you got from Bob other than mine said 054. And that was a 526 striker hemi. Water wetter really does work well.

[UFO]

Gene, Check the switch connection at the E-brake. It might be adjusted close enough to flash the brake light.

[histoy]

Hey Gene, if you want it to run even cooler pour in a couple bottles of water wetter. My former clone runs at 170 -180 all the time. Same radiator you got from Bob other than mine said 054. And that was a 526 striker hemi. Water wetter really does work well.

I can attest to that.   This is the coolest running Mopar big block that I've ever owned.

[Mytur Binsdirti]

You're a detailing nut!   

[moparstuart]

You're a detailing nut!   

[resq302]

Gene,

One thing I would improve on and I sent you an email about it.   

[hemigeno]

Thanks for the compliments, guys.  While I miss researching the details of these cars a bit since the restoration has wrapped up, that day in the shop was enough to get my fix for a little while.  Maybe there's hope for me yet.




Nah.

Hey Gene, if you want it to run even cooler pour in a couple bottles of water wetter. My former clone runs at 170 -180 all the time. Same radiator you got from Bob other than mine said 054. And that was a 526 striker hemi. Water wetter really does work well.

Brian (#1) , thanks for the advice.  I've used Water Wetter in my 2-ton truck's cooling system and it did seem to help it run cooler.  My plan with the Daytona was to find out how much of the problem was radiator-related before doing anything else.  So far it seems like the new radiator is up to the task.  At the moment, the problem is that the cooling system is topped off and the K-member "diaper" is installed... making a partial drain-down of the radiator a not-so-fun task.  I may run it for a while just like it is, and wait to see if it has any other overheating issues.  Water Wetter is about the last bullet left to fire, but I appreciate hearing the good results you (and histoy) had with your stroked Hemi.  That is great info to have.

From my recollections, don't they recommend using just plain water and the appropriate amount of Water Wetter without antifreeze?  Or is my memory that far off?

Gene, Check the switch connection at the E-brake. It might be adjusted close enough to flash the brake light.

Brian (#2), back when I first noticed this, I pulled up on the E-brake pedal when the light was flashing to see if it made a difference.  It was such an intermittent problem, it was difficult to tell if it was related to that or not.  The light would just flash for a few seconds - and was often out by the time I noticed it and could pull up on the E-brake pedal.  Regardless, I went out this morning with a flashlight and pair of pliers to make sure that when the pedal was at the top of its travel, the switch was fully depressed (which would keep the light off).  Not a bad piece of advice.

One thing I would improve on and I sent you an email about it.   

Brian (#3) - thanks for the offer!  I sent you a reply back which explains why the car looks the way it does.  It wasn't an oversight on our part, and your observation would normally have been absolutely spot-on.  I really do appreciate your generosity!!

[hemi68charger]

Awesome updates Geno.. I may well invest in the future in a Glen Ray radiator.....  I hate being paranoid about driving mine in Houston and the temperature spiking.....

[hemigeno]

A brief update on a few issues:

Back in the fall I did a shakedown cruise around town, and noticed a couple of things weren't quite right.  So, a couple of weeks ago I finally caught a break in my schedule and took the car back to Vance's for what is almost certainly its last stayover in Muskegon.  "Yeah right", you say... "heard that one before."     Most of the items we addressed were quite minor, but one thing I felt is worth mentioning here was the cooling/overheating problem.

As noted earlier, last August we swapped out the 2-core (but 100% correct) 055 radiator for an industrial-strength GlenRay version.  This was hoped to be a fix for persistent overheating if the engine ran much more than what it takes to get on & off the trailer.  I didn't talk about this very much on the forum, but it really bothered me - to the point that it prevented me from taking the previous owners for a drive in their former car back when I got to meet them all in 2012 at Smithville Lake  (thanks again to STUART SUTTON for all his help that day   ).  That opportunity may never happen again, and I was disappointed to let it pass, even though I knew there wasn't really a choice.   After the radiator swap, I thought the new radiator had fixed the overheating problem... but my short shakedown cruise proved otherwise.  

Vance discovered that the culprit all along was the 160* Mr. Gasket "hi-flow"    thermostat.  While working through my list, he too observed the same overheating problem I reported, even though I had added Water Wetter additive to the coolant mixture since my trip.  One of the first diagnostic checks he made was to remove the thermostat and do a temp test to see when it started to open up... which wasn't until around 215*.  That's not a typo -- and that's just when it BARELY STARTED to open up.  We don't know that it ever opened up all the way - but the engine probably would have cooked itself long before it fully opened anyway. There's no wonder the car was having problems cooling down... the coolant flow was being plugged up by a defective part from the beginning.  Even the $7 factory-style Stant piece would have flowed WAY better than this "hi-flow" part.  So, Vance gutted the mechanism and installed just the shell of the T-stat back into the waterneck to act as a baffle, since some restriction in the system is still needed to ensure the heat exchanger (radiator) has enough time to transfer the coolant's thermal energy to the air flowing through.  The result was an instant improvement/lowering of coolant temps, including during one or two additional shakedown cruises where NONE of the earlier symptoms continued.  The temp gauge now comes down quite nicely after it's been brought to operating temp & shut off for a few minutes.  We did do this test earlier too, but only with the engine idling in the garage rather than having brought it up to true operating temp.  About the only thing he didn't try was getting stuck in a traffic jam in 90+ degree weather... which I would avoid like the plague even without overheating issues.  Since this car will never see duty as a winter weather driver, the lack of a thermostatically-controlled restriction should never be an issue - it flows the same maximum amount as if the temperature is 160* all the time.  With the inherent airflow restrictions of the Daytona nosecone, it doesn't take long for these things to get up to temperature anyway.  Win-Win, if you ask me.

Moral of the story?  If you have any suspicions about the cooling capacity of your wing car, make sure your thermostat isn't the problem.




FWIW: after doing some research, other DC.com'ers have mentioned the same problem with Mr. Gasket 'stats in a couple of previous threads.  I'm just adding my experience to the pile...  here's one old(er) thread/reply:

http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php/topic,60599.msg946205.html#msg946205

[Aero426]

It is probably true that other "new and improved" replacement parts that you believe to be "name brand" can no longer be trusted. 

[moparstuart]

 

[resq302]

good to hear about the updates !  Hope that fixes the problematic cooling issues these cars had !

[FJ5WING]

A quick note to anyone else suffering high temps.
I asked about this for my R/T and was suggested to me by Mike (Dayclona) to run the Zerex G05 with 50% distilled water and a bottle of Water Wetter. I was replacing the water pump anyway so I went with the new mix and my temps dropped +30* in hot Carlisle weather. It did run back to about only a 10* drop while on the 2-1/2 hour ride home.

I plan on running the G05 once I get the Bird running.

[hemi68charger]

A quick note to anyone else suffering high temps.
I asked about this for my R/T and was suggested to me by Mike (Dayclona) to run the Zerex G05 with 50% distilled water and a bottle of Water Wetter. I was replacing the water pump anyway so I went with the new mix and my temps dropped +30* in hot Carlisle weather. It did run back to about only a 10* drop while on the 2-1/2 hour ride home.

I plan on running the G05 once I get the Bird running.

I have run distilled water and Water Wetter in my Daytona now for over a year and haven't had an overheating problem since, both with the former 440 and now 426 Hemi...

[held1823]

just pulling this to the top, for no particular reason.....

[Mytur Binsdirti]

 

[taxspeaker]

Thanks for bringing this back-good info on the cooling issues that we continue to encounter as well. Somehow I missed the discussion on the Mr Gasket thermostat, but more importantly the consistent comments on the benefits of distilled water rather than tap water, with no downside. Thanks again everyone and Gene in particular.

Bob