kishy's 1984 Town Car

[kishy]

This past Wednesday, I lost my grandmother at 87. She was a truly incredible woman, and I miss her dearly. Although she never related to the passion I have for all things mechanical (what grandmother does?), she adored the fact I had interests and hobbies that kept me engaged in a positive way. It's important to me to carry on with that because I knew it made her happy.

As mentioned above, I had purchased a new alternator (96 T-bird 3.8 application - 130A 3G clocked the good way). This arrived on Wednesday, after I had already discovered the battery terminal concern on Monday. Given the expense of returning a heavy item such as this and the inevitability of needing another 3G sooner or later, it made the most sense to install it and run it for the duration of its warranty. I did that last night.

I think I finally figured out how I got the 3G original pulley (the big one) to work on my 91 with the 6K507 belt - I put the belt on the pulley before I put the lower mounting bolt through the alternator. The belt cannot actually clear the pulley raised edge as long as the alternator is on the lower bolt, but the extra freedom afforded by its removal makes it work. This doesn't really bother me for a roadside belt change because the lower bolt is not that big of a deal to get out. So, the new 3G will spin quite a bit slower, and the larger pulley also means no more squeal due to undersized pulley (more contact area for the belt - an issue that has been brought up here before when running the small pulleys). Car seems a little more free to rev, too, which is interesting. Essentially underdriving the alternator from what it was before would account for freeing up some power.

I did notice that the new regulator on the new alt looks to be "slow". That is, it begins charging at just above battery voltage, and gradually climbs in .2V (or so) increments over the next 2 minutes or so, before arriving at about 14.4V where I expect to see it. This is not consistent with Motorcraft original regulators which shoot right up to 14.4 instantly on start, so I may choose to swap on a known-good regulator. On the other hand it might not represent any sort of problem.

My car's insomnia (headlights opening prematurely due to vacuum loss) has been worsening, so I had purchased a 50 foot roll of vacuum line in the appropriate size (7/32" ID, Gates 27043) in preparation. Today, I tested the major end components (the motors, and the reservoir), found they tested out OK, and replaced all of the 1981-vintage lines for the headlight doors. If leakage persists, I will examine the check valve (90s Taurus take-off) and the door control solenoid (1981 vintage) and proceed from there.

I did find that, when testing the vacuum motors from the other end of the lines rather than directly hooked to the motors individually, I had vacuum loss. Likely the lines just weren't airtight anymore.

Check valve is an easy fix: put another one one.
Solenoid is less-so. The valve inside is constructed the same as the parking brake release valves, so if the rubber block inside degrades beyond a certain point, that's it, it's done. I do have spares but I'm hoping it's not that.

[87gtVIC]

What an amazing grandma you had. Sorry for your loss Kevin.

[gadget73]

Sorry to hear about you grandmom. I lost mine a few weeks ago at 96, so I understand what you're going through.

[sly]

+1 sad time. I lost my mom's mom just a couple of weeks after my daughter was born. We never got to get the picture of the family gingers together. They both have the same hair too... type and color and thickness and pretty much every way, the same. It's like they're family or something. Was definitely a sad time.

[kishy]

Thanks guys.
In her declining health, I thought I'd made peace with what was coming, and that I'd somehow be able to 'take it like a man' and soldier on. How wrong I was. There's something undoubtedly 'final' about death, if you don't subscribe to a belief system to the contrary. I don't actively believe there's something waiting for us, but I hope there is. She certainly earned a reward with her life of public service.

As for the car:
It appears I need to polish the commutators in both front window motors, as they're being stupid and finding dead spots at the least convenient position (fully down) necessitating the ol' door-slam-while-holding-switch to put the windows up. Oh joy.

In replacing the alternator, I opted not to reconnect my newly added ground (aiming to figure out if radio noise will return due to insufficient grounding via alternator mount points - though the loose battery negative was almost certainly at fault). Radio noise has not returned. However the chime module made a weird little glitchy sound and I'm not sure what to make of that. Old car problems.

What do we think about the 'laggy' voltage regulator? I'm not sure exactly what goes on inside those things, electronics-wise, but it seems unlikely to me that it's a good thing for it to behave that way.

Caught a glimpse of the front sway bar while poking around with vacuum lines. I guess I never realized exactly how much smaller the stock one is vs the cop car one. Kinda tempted to throw the new fat bars on this car as-is and just see what happens. Not exactly a huge effort investment but I did want to get them cleaned up and coated with something first.

[gadget73]

Sounds like a crappy regulator. I've never seen one that had to "wind up" like that before. I'd be concerned that it wouldn't maintain voltage reasonably under changing loads.

There isn't a whole bunch in a regulator really. Voltage divider and a couple of transistors really make up the whole works. If one of those transistors was flaky it might act like this I suppose, or if they went with an overly large value cap and large value resistors in the divider it would take a while to charge up the filter cap if there isn't enough current flow through the divider to not make it act stupid.

[Giraffe]

Condolences for your grandmother, man. Just got done reading the obituary. What an accomplished life.

[kishy]

She was really something else. Her accomplishments were significant by any metric, but when you consider that she pursued them as a woman emerging from a time in history when women simply didn't do such things, and that she did most of them as a single mom...she was nothing short of a superhero in the women's movement, and graceful about it at every turn. I have original election posters for her run for alderman and mayor, as well as a button pin for the latter, which have always been valued items but even moreso now with her passing.

There are so many things I wanted to do with and for her in her old age...some light traveling to places we'd always intended to go...but as her health failed it quickly became apparent we couldn't do those things. I will see those sights some day, and I'll have her in my heart when I do.

Back to the car again...

The alternator. It's doing some gentle chirping at first start which goes away after 30 seconds or so. I thought maybe the belt was loose...tightened it and it got worse. Angry bearings? Angry brand new bearings? Angry me! Further investigation required. It might be too tight, but there seems to be a very fine line when using the 3G on this belt routing where it's in between "slips a lot and wakes the neighbours" and "makes angry bearing death sounds" so I need to tread carefully.

I found that the insomnia continued to occur approximately as it did before replacing all the 7/32" lines, so I tested further and verified the check valve is OK, and that the autolamp solenoid (in my application, used as the sole control for the doors) is not.

My testing, by the way, consists of putting each component under 20 inHg of vacuum and monitoring it periodically over a half hour or more. Any loss of vacuum at all is deemed a fail. The motors checked out, the original lines did not, the reservoir checked out, the check valve does, leaving only the autolamp box outstanding.

I made a video which you'll find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sggpi7DCObM



According to the gauge it should hold for quite a while...surely not "forever" as that's just not realistic, but it should do at least as well as when the parts donor Mark VI was new in 1981. Not using the headlight switch does eliminate an additional failure point so the potential reliability is better.

[gadget73]

The problem with belts on these cars is there just isn't enough belt wrap on the alternator. To make the belt not slip, its usually so tight that its abusing the bearings. Not a whole lot you can do for it honestly. If there were some practical means of inserting an idler between the alt and PS pump to let the belt contact a larger portion of the alternator pulley it would probably fix it quite nicely. I just don't know that there is enough room in there to put one.

of course if the belt and pulleys aren't all clean and in good condition any slippage gets worse. I was having some issues on my car for a while, then the power steering pump started leaking more obviously. Initially it was a fine mist that was getting on the belt enough to cause problems. Once I replaced the pump, the saturated belt, and wiped the pulleys down with acetone to get all the residue off the slippage went away.

[87gtVIC]

Great video. Enjoyed watching it.

[kishy]

Great video. Enjoyed watching it.

Thanks. That means it wasn't wasted effort!

Here we are, 15 hours since the engine last ran, and the doors are still shut. Not the longest record it's held so far, but at least we're back to over 10 hours

[87gtVIC]

I mean I doubt I will ever use the information that was put forth, but it was entertaining.

Sorry if I missed it within the video but I did not catch what actuates the two vacuum solenoid things that tell the brain box to shut or open the eyes? Is it as simple as an input from the headlight switch?

[kishy]

I mean I doubt I will ever use the information that was put forth, but it was entertaining.

Sorry if I missed it within the video but I did not catch what actuates the two vacuum solenoid things that tell the brain box to shut or open the eyes? Is it as simple as an input from the headlight switch?

That little module has 3 wires: ground, battery positive (constant), and "lights on".
Since the "lights on" needs to cover both high and low beams (so the doors don't shut when you switch to high beams...I dealt with that a while ago), you take the hot from in between the headlight switch and high beam switch. That seems to be how it's done from the factory in a Mark VI.

The headlight switch normally grounds the lamp end of the circuit when off, which was something I struggled with for a while because I relay modded my headlights (thus, the lamp end of the circuit was isolated from the switch when off).

Basically, the "lights on" gets 12V when lights are on. This commands one solenoid to slide the valve inside, which flips the lights open. They will stay open forever, until...

When the "lights on" wire gets grounded (not just disconnected, but actually grounded), the other solenoid slides the valve the other way, flipping the lights closed. They will stay closed forever until vacuum is lost, as they are spring-loaded to open as a failsafe.

[87gtVIC]

Copy. Fun stuff. I used to dabble with fun electronics and bits for the cars years back. Nothing "stuck" so I have to re-research how I have done things when I have questions about my own work. lol

[kishy]

Minor updates:

This car has major rain leak issues which I've somehow been unaware of. Having the car parked, and not under cover, has revealed their severity.

There is a leak at the top of the windshield where water will drip from one exact spot on the trim at the front of the headliner, down onto the centre of the trans tunnel. This is a slow leak. I'm assuming it's the windshield seal, or a rusted through spot adjacent to the seal. The headliner shows no moisture damage.

There is a massive amount of water accumulation on my driver floor mat (which is rubber and has raised edges, so it traps it) after a couple rain storms. Due to positioning, this seems to be dripping down through the dash itself. It will be somewhat challenging to locate, but the windshield is again the most likely source, is my guess.

Those are in addition to the well established leaks on both sides somewhere under the vinyl top at the bottom of the rear window.

There are also persistent moisture specks on the passenger floor mat positioned such that they support my suspicions about the heater core. The car does have very slow coolant loss and no apparent leaks in the engine bay anymore, so heater core is the likely culprit.

I found an '85 TC with a steel hood in a yard recently and found its hood was staying up on its own, and lifted from closed as easily as my 91 MGM with the aluminum hood! I took its hood struts and put them on my Town Car. I left the hood up for about an hour, with the wind coming from the back of the car, and it stayed up perfectly. No more broom handle hood prop.

I've relocated the TC to under my leaky, structurally questionable carport to minimize how much water is getting onto it, and therefore into it. Depending on wagon readyness next year, I may take the Lincoln out of service for an extensive tear-down. Being aware as I am about how ugly these are minus their vinyl tops, I hesitate to go that route, but the vinyl is junk and it needs to come off to figure out the water entry. The car is totally not worth the investment to replace the top, either, unless something pre-cut can be bought to DIY which I'd gladly do.

Insurance is still on it but it's very likely parked for the season now.