Progress Report [John]

Here's an approximate summary of where we are in making the Firedome Estate Wagon functional and handsome. The table shows our initial inventory of needs, far from complete as it turns out. The next section tabulates the additional issues we have found so far, and the last section lists improvements we thought we might want to make.

	Status	Notes
Needed Improvements	March 2014
Side mirrors	Done
Air cleaner	Done
Tune up	Done
Gas cap	Done
Tailgate logo letters	Done
Side moldings	Done
Replace gas filler grommet	Done
Detail dash	Gauges now work
Replace rear license bracket	Done
Front plate bracket	Done	Not original, but functional
Fix hood hinges and hood fit	Done once	Springs are weak and fit is poor
Deal with driver side armrest	Done	Both front armrests renewed
Detail interior	Partial	Needs floor covering
Clean up engine bay wiring	Mostly done
Fix cowl vent; replace gasket	Mostly done
Get all lights to work	Mostly done	No interior lighting
Fix tailgate rust; chrome or refinish hinges	Needs repair, soon
Replace weather stripping
Detail or repair spare tire well as needed
Replace window rubber
Fix horn if needed		Have horn, needs repair
Research correct color CA plates and get personalized plates to match		Maybe
Wiper arms and blades. Motor and linkage?
Clean paint off rear window frame
Dash pad
Repair windshield frame rust
Front carpet or floor mat
Rear bumper brackets
Fix heater (might need core)
Repair radio or new radio
(Maybe) repaint
Replace visor		Rust in roof frame must be repaired first
Discoveries
PS unit required rebuild	Done
Brake cylinders leak	Rebuilt	Master and all slaves
Install included wire wheel covers	Do not fit; made for some other car	Sell on eBay
Carburetor didn’t work	Rebuilt
New points, cap, rotor don’t fit	Not an issue.	Engine has been swapped. Has 330 ci Firedome from a 56 S-23
No plug wire covers	Done	Found new ones and decals
Lost “S” from hood	Done	Found another
Transmission doesn’t downshift	Fixed	Control circuit winding missing
Turn signals, brake lights don’t work	Done	Mostly bad grounds
Tires leak	Done	Bad bead seal against rusty wheels
Exhaust leak	Done	New flange gaskets
Idles too fast	Disabled choke	Pugged vacuum leak on bojack pipe to manifold
Electrical short makes ammeter twitch	Fixed	Stoplight switch wires had draped across the exhaust pipe and shorted
Fails to crank	Fixed	Replaced ignition switch; taped bare wires in dash
Weak battery	Done	Replaced
Engine wouldn’t run	Done	Changed fuel pump. Tried three fuel filters.  Boiled out and lined fuel tank.
Gas gauge doesn’t work	Done	New sending unit, adapted for the wagon’s weird tank
Temp sender not connected	“Done”	Jury-rigged. Car’s sending unit won’t fit 330 engine.
Wiper towers missing	Done	Found replacements in South Dakota
Battery tray rusted through
Grill and bumper rechrome is rough
No kick-panels
Heater controls are very stiff.
Cowl vent is dirty, leaky, and hard to close.
Options	January 2013	March 2014 outlook
Swap tires, maybe wheels,		Probably not
Improve stance	In work	New front springs in hand
New shocks		Not needed
New upholstery, or new seats		Probably not
Seat belts	Rear added	Need front installed
Repair and chrome rear bumper
Refinish or replace steering column		Might repaint
12V conversion		Probably not
Hop-up existing engine		Probably not
Manifold and carb	Have 4V setup	Probably won’t install
Cam		Probably not
Distributor and ignition	Tuned up	Ok
Swap engine		Probably not

February - March 2014 [John]

It runs!

After we got the transmission to shift, we took the car back to the carb expert. He quickly noticed that the pipe from the exhaust manifold warmer to the choke was loose and leaky. After he removed the defective pipe, capped the choke fitting and tweaked the idle mixture, he set the idle to a nice low speed, probably near the recommended 475-500 rpm. The car now drives and shifts fine. No longer stalls at stops, upshifts when you lift your foot off the gas and downshifts somewhere below 8 mph. Only thing missing was a kick-down switch from the '56 carburetor. By 1956, Desoto was using the Powerflite transmission, a real automatic, and it didn't need the electrical kick-down switch the M6 Tiptoe Shift transmission required. We hid a horn button under the dashboard and connected it to the transmission governor. Now a touch of the button shifts from 4th to 3rd or from 2nd to 1st. I think we are done with the transmission and controls.

An increasingly noisy exhaust was traced to leaking (blown, actually) gaskets on either side of the exhaust heat riser valve. Small-block Chevy gaskets fit. I noted the vane inside the valve is welded into the open position, making it function-free, but the valve serves as a useful spacer, since the exhaust down pipe has been fitted with the valve in place. Much quieter now, just a low rumble from the stainless, two-into-one muffler that was already on the car when we got it.

It's prettier!

Bought and received the missing side moldings we had located some time ago. They are now installed, giving the car a much more completed look. There is a little pitting on the chrome, and we had to drill out the stripped quarter-inch lugs to 5/16 and tap them, but the result is great. 

New rear fender moldings match the car well

We painted the unused plug wire covers we found some time ago, and installed new decal lettering on them. Makes the valve covers look like they need to be stripped and refinished. Someday maybe.

No more unsightly plug wires!

Next: 

• We ordered and received new coil springs for the front suspension. We'll have a shop replace the old ones and then evaluate whether any additional work is needed on the rear. 
• We were advised to replace the original steel fuel line that runs the length of the car. It's probably obstructed, judging from the condition the gas tank was in.
• The rusty tailgate hinge mounts have deteriorated to the point we have to address them soon. A recommended body shop agreed to fix the tailgate, but can't get to it for a few weeks. Once in the body shop, we'll need to decide what other body issues to address -- there are other areas with rust. The driver's side visor is detached, and on inspection it's clear that the roof reinforcing panel it should attach to is rusted and gone. Fixing this will likely destroy the original headliner front section. To be decided. There are also rust bubbles around parts of the windshield and on some of the doors. We also found some approximate fender straightening that prevents the trim from fitting correctly.

Tailgate hinges attach to the skin, which is very weak. There is worse rust inside from
sloppy repairs done year ago. Hinges were chrome plated when new. 

Valentines Day Update [John]

Parts found

Found a salvage yard in South Dakota that had some of the stuff we need, parts I wasn't sure we could ever find. We got and installed used letters for the tail gate,

All in decent shape, not perfect, but suitable for this car.

the missing S for the hood,

New S matches perfectly. All letters are now fastened down.

and chrome towers for the wiper arms:

Most glaring need for parts now is the rear fender moldings that we've never had with this car.

First steps on interior

Some of the seams on the front seat had come unstitched and stuffing was starting to pull out. Resurrection Upholstery, a local shop, pulled the cover off and repaired it with new stitching and backing material. Nice shape for its age, but it is pretty old. Also had the front armrests rebuilt and recovered.

To fasten letters to the tailgate we took it apart. It has been repaired, a bit crudely, but seems structurally OK now. It had clearly been rusty. There are still visible rust stains around the hinges, so we will probably revisit this later. Cleaned up the renewed wood paneling in the rear compartment and replaced several missing or rusty screws. There is a bolt shop just down the hill from here (Ababa Bolt) that has had every stainless screw we have gone looking for. Might have to buy 40 or 100, but they have them. We will be back.

Making it run

When I last posted, the engine had left us stranded a few times when warm. The battery was new, and on one occasion of no cranking, light jumper wires from the main battery junction block to the coil and a nasty, untaped joint in the cranking wire started the car. A new ignition switch arrived, and when we replaced the old one, we replaced or repaired all the old wires that serve it. That seems to have resolved the failure to start. 

Finally got around to installing the new spark plug wires, insulators. and distributor cap. The rotor looked new, and besides, CarQuest didn't have it in stock. We've had these parts for months. The wires came in assorted lengths, and we eventually figured out where to put them to get a neat installation. No cutting at all, but we did have to assemble the insulators and the terminals for the distributor cap.

Neat, and easy enough -- once you get them matched up. 

Phil found and bought Firedome plug wire covers, but we haven't painted them yet, so installing them will wait. Maybe we ought to refinish the the valve covers to match. The plug-tube gaskets around each tube are hard and brittle, so we plan to replace them. 

We checked the agreement of wires to distributor cap towers with firing order three times, just to make sure we had it right. Dwell measured 33 degrees, close enough, I decided. When we fired the engine up, it ran like new. Runs smooth, idles, fast response to a throttle blip. Why didn't we do this sooner? The old wires were either misconnected or several were broken. I think at least two cylinders must not have been firing at all. The car now cruises up the hilly streets in our neighborhood and accelerates smartly at freeway speeds. Be nice if it had a higher gear though -- I think its rear end would be perfect for 50 mph gravel roads. We don't drive on those much in San Diego. This engine work was all done last weekend.

Now, about that transmission

Today we got out the shop manual and began diagnostics on the M6 Tip-Toe Shift semiautomatic. The M6 is a four-speed, with two manually selected driving ranges (L and D). Each driving range has an under drive via a countershaft in the main box and a direct drive. The driver selects the driving range with the gear lever, depressing the manual clutch whenever the lever is moved, and an electrical - mechanical - hydraulic system shifts between first and second if in L and between third and fourth if in D. Theoretically.

On this car, upshifts of 1 to 2 and 3 to 4 seemed to work normally. But down shifts were very rare. The driver instructions note that you can drive all day in D, letting the control system select third or fourth as needed. But not on ours. It almost never downshifted at full stops, let alone when speed dropped below 10 mph. Starting out in fourth is disappointing.

The shop manual tells you in a dozen simple steps how to diagnose any M6 difficulty. We used a voltmeter instead of the insulated test lamp it calls for. The problem turned out to be fairly simple: there was no power being supplied to the control elements (solenoid, governor, interrupt switch) and what wiring there was was damaged and incorrectly connected. In a couple of hours, Phil and I made up the wiring harness we needed and ran the checks.

The little box at the coil contains a 20A circuit breaker (top) and a 10 Ohm resistor (bottom). Current from the  BAT terminal on the coil supplies power to the control devices on the transmission through the circuit breaker. One of these, the interrupter switch, momentarily shorts the DIST side of the coil though the resistor, killing engine ignition during automatic gear change. We found none of this connected. 

At the transmission, power from the circuit breaker arrives at one terminal on the solenoid. The other is connected to the single terminal on the governor. There are also leads to an interrupter switch under the right-most round cover in this photo.

If engine speed is decreasing from 15 to 8 mph, internal points on the governor close, grounding one side of the solenoid (on the left). This energizes it, it opens a ball valve, causing oil pressure on the shifting piston to fall. The shifting fork moves rearward, shifting the gear set to 1 or 3, depending on whether driving range L or D is selected. When the fork moves, it activates the interrupter switch, killing engine power briefly to ease the shift. None of this was correctly wired, but it is now.

The checks indicated everything was as it should be, except that this '56 engine lacks a kick-down switch and an anti-stall device on the carburetor. Driving it confirmed that it all works as it should. As a bonus, we were able to show that if you connect a test lead to the governor's single terminal, and you ground the other end of the lead while in second or fourth, the transmission instantly downshifts to first or third. I think we might add a push-button switch on the dash to force this kick-down on the relatively rare occasions it might be needed.

So, how's it look?

Given the improved engine performance and the functioning transmission, I think we should forget about motor or transmission swaps. We need a few days to think about what's next.

Changing the oils(s) [John]

According to our best sources, the engine takes 12 or 13 quarts of SAE 30 oil. Not everyone carries it, but we found some and bought it. The M6 Tip-Toe shift transmission takes SAE 10 (no one has that, almost) or ISO 32 tractor hydraulic fluid, 3 pints. The torque converter, if engine-fed, takes about 7 quarts of the engine's oil. Ours has to be engine-fed because there is no reservoir under the converter housing. Also found an allegedly correct oil filter cartridge. I took the filter, oils and car to a local garage and asked them to change them all. The owner declined. "We don't know how to work on that kind of car. But, tell you what. Come by on Saturday and you can borrow my hoist and do it yourself."

First step was drain the torque converter. I opened the drain plug enough to see a couple drops of fluid, then gave it another turn. Dirty oil, warm, but fortunately not hot, sprayed all over the floor, my shirt, my face, hair, and glasses. After that, it didn't take long to drain it. Looked like almost 2 gallons came out, although we didn't measure it. Noticed right away it smelled like automatic transmission fluid (ATF) and was not viscous at all. According to the shop manual, this car either had an engine-fed or pump-fed torque converter, and this was neither. Maybe it came with the 56 motor? But 56 didn't offer a manual transmission behind the torque converter, and ours has a manual clutch bolted to it. There was a fluid coupling used on some 53s, so maybe that's what this is -- fluid couplings predate torque converters and resemble them: they are torque converters without the stators inside. They don't convert torque though, they just throw it away. My current theory is, that's what this is.

Changing the transmission oil went smoothly enough. We also drained the engine oil and changed the filter cartridge, working under the car. This was a mistake, I learned, when we lowered it and saw the easy access from the top. Adding 5 quarts of engine oil to the crankcase indicated over-full on the dipstick, confirming that this engine does not feed oil to the torque converter.

Next was refilling the converter with ATF. This took hours! Small fill opening, accessed through a removable floor panel. No funnel could reach it, the funnel with attached hose I had bought fit tightly in the fill hole, blocking escaping air and trickling oil slowly in very slowly. What finally worked was a bulb-type turkey baster. Took forever!

Finally we lowered the car and started the engine. Noisy lifters and fast idle. After 30 seconds, Phil yells "Stop! Shut it off!" Oil was spraying out the top of the filter can and hitting the inside of the hood and going over the top of the fender. A quart or two of beautiful clean oil on the floor. Obviously the filter was the wrong one. When we put the old one back in and buttoned it up, no more leaks. Another quart of oil brought the level up to full. Turns out the capacity is 4 quarts, not 5, so we had initially overfilled it.

Cleaned up, paying for supplies with a generous tip, we were ready to go home after only about 5 hours. I congratulated Tony on his wisdom in not taking this job on. Get in the car to drive off and it won't crank. It's done this to me a few times, usually miles from home. Wiggling battery cables, tugging on stuff under the hood eventually makes it go. Did I mention the new Optima battery? Made no difference. We stopped for gas on the way home. I had noticed the ignition switch was loose in the dash and asked Phil to tighten up the lock screw while I filled the tank. He did.

Got back in to drive off, and I couldn't turn the key at all. Maybe that lock screw is too long. Pulled the key out after loosening the screw, but could not turn the key after many attempts. Now what? Only slightly irritated, I remembered some test leads I bought with my new Volt-Ohm meter, just arrived from Amazon. I had tossed them into the parts bucket in the back. I've seen people hot wire cars on TV -- how hard can it be? Found a wire with a splice in it going from the firewall down towards the starter . Unwound the tape, connected the my yellow test lead between the splice and the battery post, and the engine cranked fine. Used the red test lead to connect the battery post to a terminal on the coil (the one I could reach, hoping it was the right one) and tried it again. Started right up.

The new Optima 6V battery is half the size of the battery it replaced. Note the new, red, ignition wire.

The business end of the red test lead puts -6V on the coil BAT terminal. 

My new theory on the starting problem is a defective ignition switch. Or maybe some of those old, bare wires behind the dash really do need to be dealt with. The new switch is on order. Hope it fits.

December 2013 progress

Fuel system
The fuel tank is now boiled out, squeaky clean, and coated inside. A few miles driving at freeway speeds and up hills confirms the fuel starvation problem is gone. The car has decent power and will go 70 with ease, although with a lot of noise through the bare front floor boards. While the tank was out we replaced the fuel level sensor. Phil sorted out the broken tank strap, and the fuel line king turned out not to be too restrictive.

Gauges
I noted earlier that the speedometer main bearing, at the cable connection was stuck. Freeing that up with a bit of old cable in a drill solved the problem, and we now have a nice, steady read from the speedometer. The fuel gauge gives a credible reading after splicing the float arm to fit the tank in this wagon and replacing the sending unit. I don't think the gauge reading is strictly linear with fuel tank content, but it is adequate to indicate a full tank and a nearly empty tank, all we need really. Oil pressure and ammeter appear to work normally, as they have since we got the car. The engine temperature gauge was harder.

The '53 car uses a vapor-pressure bulb with capillary tube to the gauge in the dash. The '56 motor uses an electric temperature sensor of smaller bore than the '53 bulb. Solutions we have thought of include replacing the existing sensor with a new, after market sensor and separate gauge, or removing the intake manifold and drilling and rethreading the cast iron to fit the '53 bulb. A local shop offered to solve the problem with a new sensor and matching gauge that can be integrated into the original temp gauge in the dash panel.

We confirmed the old sensor and gauge do work using a pot of hot water. After several trips to hardware and auto parts stores we found a set of pipe adapters that would accept the old bulb and fit the tapped hole in the manifold. Unfortunately, this places the bulb outside the water jacket, so even with the pipe insulating tape we added, the gauge reads quite low. But for now, it will probably serve to indicate abnormally high temperature. Normal reading puts the needle in the center of the E in TEMP.

Temperature sender kluge

The conclusion is that all the dash gauges are now working, sort of.

More

Turn signals, which worked once, were very unreliable. We found a compatible flasher and replacement socket on eBay, and corrected some ground faults on the signal lamps. The worst had to do with white paint sprayed inside the lamp sockets. They seem to reliably flash outside the car now, but the dashboard indicator flashes only for left turn. Need a little more troubleshooting here.

Next

Now that the engine runs fairly well and the car can be driven, we can focus on some other issues. The engine and transmission behaviors are of particular concern: 

• I think the engine idles poorly, and it may be missing at some speed-and-load conditions. We've replaced the distributor points and condenser, but we need to install the new cap, plugs, and wires that have been lying around for months. We'll do a compression check on a warm engine at the same time. 
• Transmission control is poor. The '53 engine, according to the service manual, had an electric dashpot and a "smart" kick-down switch that would shift the transmission from 4th to 3rd when the throttle was floored at car speed below 45 mph. Our carburetor has neither of those gadgets. We might need some kind of work-around -- maybe a manual downshift switch. Pictures of the '53 appear to show both devices well integrated into the carburetor, and I doubt they can be added to the '56 motor we have. We also seem to lack an ignition interrupter (cut-off) switch circuit that aids automated shifting. 
• Transmission behavior isn't right. After reading the shop manual description of how the M6 Tip-Toe Shift transmission works, I sort of understand it, I think. It should automatically shift from 4th to 3rd at 10 or 15 mph, so that at a stop sign, the driver doesn't need to use the clutch. The car can be driven in 3rd and 4th alone, all day long under normal conditions. We are finding that driving it in 4th alone isn't really tolerable. Moreover, the idle issues mean sometimes the engine will stall, and sometimes it idles so fast it's hard to hold the car with the brakes. 
• I think the mechanical clutch might be slipping. At speeds that should have the torque converter pretty well locked up, the engine sometimes races slightly and then settles down. Clutch slip seems to be the most obvious cause.
• The driver's side of the car is noticeably lower than the passenger side, most obviously in front. Probable cause is a weak coil spring in front. The rear leaf springs are a bit saggy as well. I had a local shop re-arch springs on a '64 Comet we had once, with great results. But they can't do coils. Guess we need to replace both springs with a matched set, or put a block under the weak one, or shorten the stronger one.
• The heater is bypassed. Fans work, but it's likely the heater core needs to be replaced. Controls need an overhaul too -- very sticky, with limited travel.
• Wipers are missing parts and the motor doesn't run.

When these are sorted out, we can give some attention to appearance and finish details. Missing or damaged trim, interior floors, headliner, seats, window rubber, door rubber, sill plates. The body rust, paint, and chrome. I'm sure there's more. It's still TBD how much of this we want to do. Progress continues to be satisfying; we've met some interesting people and got some sage advice as we learn how this car was supposed to work and how to make it better. The estate wagon body style and the car's age are enough to get noticed.