kishy's 1984 Town Car

[kishy]

where would it be storing vacuum though? I don't recall a reservoir for that circuit that could be applied to the dashpot.

I suspect its meant to leak otherwise it wouldn't release. I don't think the solenoids are internally vented, so if you shut off the vac supply the dashpot would simply hold unless the vacuum was able to leak out. Yes I know it doesn't really leak out, but you know what I mean.

I thought the owner's manual said to bump the pedal to start it in cold weather? Can't say I've ever read the manual for a CFI car. Its not something I've ever been forced to learn.

The little plastic vacuum reservoir closer to the brake master is my guess. I believe that one is dedicated to emissions controls and therefore is available to the bank of solenoids. Off the top of my head.

Agreed re: unable to release, non-vented solenoids. The EGR is applied and vented by two separate solenoids, yet the dashpot is only controlled by one, so it makes sense to have a calibrated leak amount.

I'll have to review the manual. It's weird. The pedal is definitely moving. Keeping in mind that winter full cold idle speed is about 2000RPM, the dashpot isn't capable of bumping the throttle that far. At full cold idle speed it is possible to cruise out of the driveway onto the road and maintain normal driving speed on city streets, although it takes a bit to reach those speeds (I've tested this and proven it).

The other possibility I forgot would be the cruise servo, but again, vacuum operated.

[Stocker]

I just checked mine and didn't see any pedal movement when turning the key on.

I don't know if this is normal, but in mine the pedal needs to be pushed all the way to the floor to set the cold-idle cam - a little movement like that wouldn't do a thing.

[87GrandMarq]

Stocker is correct, like a carb you need to push the gas to the floor before starting so itll catch the fast idle cam.


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[kishy]

There are multiple steps on the fast idle cam. The amount of throttle travel I'm seeing when the pedal bumps from presumably stored vacuum is almost enough to catch the first step on the cam. I have approximately double the correct amount of spring tension on my throttle return, so what I'm thinking is that if I correct my amount of throttle return spring tension, that might have an interesting effect.

It is not necessary to push the pedal to the floor. That just guarantees you hit the highest step on the cam, but in reality you only need to push the pedal less than an inch to get there, and much less than that to get it on a lower step. In warm weather I start mine without touching the pedal and you should be able to do the same.

Floor the pedal = the cam will always go to the current highest idle step based on the temperature of the thermostat.

I specifically remember reading that our cars have "no touch starting" which means keep your foot off the pedal, but I can't remember what conditions allow it to happen. It is not 24/7/365.

Edit: No, I'm definitely wrong. It's the Ranger I'm thinking of. The carb had electronic idle speed control and it featured no-touch starting. 5.0 CFI does not have it, but I think 3.8 CFI does (it also has electronic idle speed control).

Per the manual, cold starting, push the pedal to the floor (but as I mentioned above, it doesn't actually need to be to the floor)
Per the manual, warm starting, hold the pedal at 1/4 to 1/2 while cranking and slowly release once engine is running (which explains a lot really)
Per the manual, if you fail to start trying the above, crank while holding it wide open.

[87GrandMarq]

Cfi is weird isnt it lol. When I totally disabled the fast idle cam on my 85 I had to hold the pedal to help it warm up even in the hot Florida ambient temps.

As stupid as it sounds I almost want my 85 back just to prove to all the cfi haters they can still be relavent lol. Mine had the classic rolling idle sometimes but let me tell you it never left me stranded. If only it had ac I probably would have kept it. That and no rust.


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[DerekTheGreat]

When I had my '85 it always started in warm weather with the engine cold with no throttle input. I never paid attention enough to see if the throttle moved when flipping the key to run. However, when trying to start it hot, I did indeed have to push the throttle slightly or I could crank it until the battery died. I adjusted my fast cold idle down as low as I could without it surging. Rolling idle was a PITA and my only complaint with the thing. She ran beautifully when warmed up and I think it looked much better under the hood than my SEFI. Although my SEFI '88 runs noticeably smoother than my '85 did. I like CFI, not afraid to admit or ashamed of it. It's much like why I prefer GM TBI over GM Vortec; serviceability.

[87GrandMarq]

Man I forgot about that, mine used to crank for a longer than usual time and I could never figure out why. It would run like a top once started though.


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[Stocker]

It is not necessary to push the pedal to the floor. That just guarantees you hit the highest step on the cam, but in reality you only need to push the pedal less than an inch to get there, and much less than that to get it on a lower step. In warm weather I start mine without touching the pedal and you should be able to do the same.

Something might not be set up correctly with mine then. I usually floor it briskly two or three times, because there's been enough instances of one time not engaging it that it's become a habit. I cleaned everything and re-attached the cam spring that popped off to only minor improvement. Oddly enough, if I work the throttle from under the hood and watch it, the mechanism works exactly like I'd expect it to. (but then, this car also runs worse than any carbureted vehicle I've owned...)

[kishy]

84 Marti report:

[DerekTheGreat]

Cool.

[kishy]

Oil change and chassis lube day for the Lincoln. 199,165km. 3700km change interval; I normally go for 4800 but it was last done in March and the whole short trips thing. Having a take-home company car has significantly reduced the rate at which I put kilometres on my stuff.

Hoping to catch the rollover to 200,000 in a photo. It isn't a traditionally significant number like "100,000 miles" but I'll only ever see it once. Which I guess is also true of all the other numbers when you've got a 6 digit odometer.

[gadget73]

I managed to get mine hitting 200,000 (well, 00000) on video. Mine are in full size miles though, not those fun size ones you guys use.

[kishy]

200,000 fun-size miles!





Purchased at 172,105km in May of 2016, and has been my primary warm weather daily. Since December, I've had a company car so the (short) commute doesn't get rolled onto this one anymore.

[87gtVIC]

Congrats! Still looking good. God bless company vehicles for personal use. Definitely prolonging the life of this townie.

[kishy]

Something occurred to me the other day, while thinking about timing sets, cam gears, fuel pump eccentrics and so on:

My CFI cars have both been equipped with a fuel pump eccentric, of which there is only one piece...but after doing the timing set on my carb '83, I believe it is a 2-piece eccentric just installed without the second piece.

Gadget raised a point in the wagon thread around this time last year:

Its also there to keep the dowel pin in the cam. Later cars have an L shaped thing in there for that purpose, but possibly it didn't exist in '85.

When I replaced the timing set in the wagon, I did include that piece. I do not recall if I did so because of Gadget's remark or just because I felt like putting it back in, but the result was it's inside that timing cover.

However, with the Lincoln which I had done much earlier, I deleted that part.

What is the likelihood of that dowel pin walking out?

Pics from 2016:







I fairly confidently believe that the washer under the cam bolt will not allow the dowel to exit the front of the gear, however, it is not clear to me how long that dowel is, and if the dowel has room within the cam gear to fully exit the camshaft and thus allow the gear to freewheel.

My earlier theory was: the eccentric was installed on all engines because at that stage of assembly it was not known on the line if the engine would be carb or FI.
I am leaning towards believing this is not the case, because the "eccentric" in the CFI cars has only been one of the two pieces of the eccentric that went into the carb cars.
This points to the engineers including the part for the reason gadget pointed out.

I really don't want to open this one up again, but that would certainly be better than having a catastrophic failure on the road should the dowel come out. Some engine building threads I've found out in the wild suggest that as long as the cam bolt has good clamping force on the gear, the dowel plays no role (and, if the bolt were to start walking out, failure is imminent regardless of good dowel engagement...so maybe it's 6 of one, half a dozen of the other?)

Thoughts?