kishy's 1984 Town Car

[kishy]

Perhaps the old cats and trashed Y-pipe were more of a restriction that I'd figured.

This car gets up and GOES now, and it does so without sounding like a pile of crap. The mufflers I selected, aiming for "cheap" and "more engine noise than stock replacement" are way quieter than I had imagined (figures - this engine isn't moving a lot of air) but at idle, the exhaust tone is enough to overcome the fuel pump noise which was definitely a goal. My buddy's 87 with all new exhaust, all you hear behind that car is the fuel pump, and it's awful. I like that the exhaust on mine is somewhat drowning it out.

I tightened up the ever-self-loosening nut on the inside driver door handle (the only 9mm fasteners anywhere on these cars) and now it feels just that little bit less like a beater. Good stuff.

And yeah, the finished product of that wiring is way less ugly. The mock-ups with the test leads are laughably bad, though.

[DerekTheGreat]

I sense another race coming on...

Car really does look good with the hideaways. I'd like those + your taillights and panel on my '88 for the ultimate box TC appearance. I'd actually really like to make an '81 2 door that way. Oh well, that'll never happen.

[kishy]

I'm quite irritated that I didn't think to fill the holes for the Continental badge on the left-hand headlamp door. I do not want to install that badge and the holes are annoying to me. Same thing with the fender Town Car emblems I think, I'd rather just not put them back.

But yes...the hideaways look so much better than the quad rectangular lights on the Lincolns. I would never put it back how it was...vacuum and electrical fun aside...and I geek out over hearing the "whoosh-clunk" when they operate.

ATF is still cherry pink, so a stoplight drag race might be in the cards.

[kishy]

Came out to the car after work today, found a parking lot spot roughly aligned with the smog pump, about 4-5" in diameter. Couldn't figure out what aligns with the back of the smog pump so I drove home and put cardboard under it to better pinpoint the issue.

Determined that it is coolant, so my heart sank, thinking I'd have to re-gasket the water pump yet again. Of all the crap I've done to this car and my others, even including the Ranger clutch, I'm pretty sure the 302 water pump is the one thing out of it all that I'm most hateful of.

But, upon closer inspection, found the coolant is pooling on top of the timing cover, and the water pump gasket (which I coated in antifreeze-proof RTV) seems dry all around. The upper rad hose is leaking against the water outlet. Cool, that's easy.

I had purchased some extremely old stock upper rad hoses from RockAuto for a dollar or so each several years ago, of the narrower dimension used on the earlier cars (they do not fit my 91). These hoses were, and still are after use, fairly stiff and unhappy about existing. This seems to translate to a lack of desire to seal up against fittings on both ends...I've had this hose leak at the rad previously (fixed by RTV) and now also at the water outlet, this time fixed by taking half an inch off the hose to bring it down to a narrower section so it seats tighter and further down. It seems OK but we'll see. Bonus is it's further away from the fan blades now too.

Repacked the front bearings yesterday, forgot to mention that. In doing so got rid of a little squeak on the passenger side. Wheel had play, which I thought would be a worn upper ball joint because the boot is trashed, but nope - it was all in the bearings. I'm hoping to run these until the car gets its medium brake upgrade, which it also needs...not "needs" needs, but the rotors could do with replacement, and I'll be damned if the stock crap is getting replaced like-for-like.

There is an exhaust leak, it appears once everything warms up in the form of that crackling sound when you let off after a rev and I believe is between the cat and H-pipe on the driver side. It sounds OK otherwise. I might tweak the angle of that cat a little since it's tilted kind of funny, but I don't know that it can be made any better.

[DerekTheGreat]

I'm quite irritated that I didn't think to fill the holes for the Continental badge on the left-hand headlamp door. I do not want to install that badge and the holes are annoying to me. Same thing with the fender Town Car emblems I think, I'd rather just not put them back.

But yes...the hideaways look so much better than the quad rectangular lights on the Lincolns. I would never put it back how it was...vacuum and electrical fun aside...and I geek out over hearing the "whoosh-clunk" when they operate.

ATF is still cherry pink, so a stoplight drag race might be in the cards.

I think the Continental badge would look right at home on there. If you haven't already, just place it in the holes and do some with and without shots, you might like what you see.

Sweet, I need to bypass my heater core, a trip to the hardware store ought to give me what I need for the time being. I'm afraid if I do that, I'll never have the heater core fixed though.

I wonder if replacing my cats would net similar seat of pants results...

Came out to the car after work today, found a parking lot spot roughly aligned with the smog pump, about 4-5" in diameter. Couldn't figure out what aligns with the back of the smog pump so I drove home and put cardboard under it to better pinpoint the issue...

...But, upon closer inspection, found the coolant is pooling on top of the timing cover, and the water pump gasket (which I coated in antifreeze-proof RTV) seems dry all around. The upper rad hose is leaking against the water outlet. Cool, that's easy...

That feeling you get when something ends up being much easier than expected; Priceless.

[kishy]

For the first time in virtually forever, I seem to be driving a car that doesn't leave puddles behind. The junkyard P/S pump showed evidence of a reservoir seal leak due to how grimey it was, but the leak has not started up yet since I put it on and filled it. Cool.

The water pump seems to have remained sealed, as has the upper rad hose. I'm thinking of changing the thermostat out since I think this one is a little lazy, engine temps pretty consistently hover around 200-205 and that's even with the bleed hole I drilled in the t-stat, so it can technically flow a teeny tiny bit more than its fully-open capacity anyway. The gauge might be junk though, I really should find my infrared thermometer to get a second opinion.

To be clear, there is no flow-related reason why one cannot swap the cast iron pump out in favour of an aluminum one right? Because that's what I did, way back when I first got the car.

The impeller is smaller, of course, and the water passage is basically not defined at all, so I can see it being a much poorer flowing pump...but poorer enough to make it actually have a cooling deficiency?



Called my guy at the parts place here (since shipping on that cast iron pump is looking pretty brutal) and $35+tax isn't awful. It's at least competitive with what I'd pay ordering from RockAuto. The question is, do I really want to do that mess of a job just to see if it might improve things? Thermostat is a much lower effort investment to start with.

I do believe I need to do more with the exhaust hangers. I have a plan for it, and it involves galvanized plumbing strapping...not to act as a hanger, but to help hold the hangers in position to resist gravity and suspension bounce forces.

I'm pretty sure this is all hanging a little low back around the fuel tank, but welcome your opinions.

[gadget73]

No reason you can't go iron to aluminum, it just gets one less bolt, which does make it slightly more prone to blowing the gasket between the pump and timing cover.

[Kodachrome Wolf]

Tailpipes look pretty normal to me. Maybe the Aeros tuck up a bit more, but beyond that your system seems to hang pretty normally compared to other dual exhaust cars.

[kishy]

Racing against the incoming rain, I tweaked the hangers behind the mufflers a bit. Got both sides to go a bit higher...there's nowhere else for them to go, so this is it, either like this, or like they were in the prior pics above. The hangers have a fair bit of tension on them so I'm not sure if this is ideal or not.

My main concern is that, when the suspension is loaded, I don't want any chance of dragging the pipes going over uneven ground.





Note the height of the opposite side pipe vs the tire:

[DerekTheGreat]

Mine are tucked up pretty good, can't even see the tail pipes. Check my TC's thread for pics if interested. I think they're on the 3rd page.

[kishy]

Swapped out the CC817 Ford/Mercury sedan cargo coils in the back for 8805 Town Car constant rate springs.

It sits quite a bit higher with typical load, and after loading the car down with various bottled liquids, it does not sag easily either. The ride seems to be more like what it should but now I feel like I need to replace the front as well, because I'm not liking the front feeling so much lower.

Before reference (not great but you can get the idea):







Moog CC817 left, Moog 8805 right:

[gadget73]

Looks fairly level. How does the ride height compare to book spec?

[kishy]

Looks fairly level. How does the ride height compare to book spec?

I'll have to look into that. I have the "book" (I imagine it's in the Body/Chassis/Electrical one) but I also expect I'd need to swap to stock size wheels/tires for that evaluation. Unless it's measured from axle to body?

It is pretty level. With some settling it will be perfect, I believe. I had just gotten used to the nose being a smidge higher which makes the car feel quite a bit longer.

[kishy]

I decided to "poke the bear" and tinker with the idle adjustment. I had both the fast idle and curb idle set a touch high to provide a more consistently reliable experience, and it's finally gotten to the point where it bugs me enough to do something about it.

Successfully lowered the fast idle from 2590 to 1870, where correct specification is either 1900 or 2100, I forget. The difference in engine noise from 2000-2500 is really significant, so it doesn't sound like it's racing now. A proper cold start will be required to verify this isn't too low, but since I'm not planning to run this car in the winter anymore, that may never be necessary.

Curb idle was a little more troublesome, as I thought it would be. There's this convoluted process you have to go through to put the computer into a learning mode to set the idle, and you don't really have a good indication of whether you succeeded or not. Anyway, brought it down from 700 fully warmed, in gear against chocks and brakes, to 550, where spec is 550. I was unable to restart the engine with it set like this without giving it a tiny bit of throttle, so I bumped it up a bit and arrived at 570 ish. I verified the TPS closed throttle voltage is 1.00V on the nose; given that fast idle is achieved by holding the throttle open on CFI, I am quite reasonably certain that the exact idle voltage is not as picky as people make it out to be for SEFI.

More tinkering to be done. When it fails to start, it will start with a tiny bit of open throttle. What I'm trying to figure out is if this is because it doesn't like the TPS value against the actual amount of throttle opening (sloppy TPS), or if the TPS is fine but it's just not sucking enough air (in which case, why is it not enough air when the throttle blade is set per specs).

The TPS is such an incredible pain to change on these that I hesitate to just swap it to see what happens.

Reviewing the process again now that I'm back in the house, I skipped part of the fast idle adjustment (EGR and evap capped off). I think I've overlooked those every time I've tried to play with that adjustment.

TV could do with a check/re-adjust but I had it pretty high before, so it may just be "normal" now. Drives the same, give or take a little.

[gadget73]

I'll have to look into that. I have the "book" (I imagine it's in the Body/Chassis/Electrical one) but I also expect I'd need to swap to stock size wheels/tires for that evaluation. Unless it's measured from axle to body?

It is pretty level. With some settling it will be perfect, I believe. I had just gotten used to the nose being a smidge higher which makes the car feel quite a bit longer.

I think its bumper to ground, but you can extrapolate any difference from stock if you know the tire size difference from stock. If yours are an inch diameter larger, just add half that to the value in the BCE manual.

I did all that with the Continental when I was fixing the rear height sensor. It looks like the back end is down, but it measures right in spec. Its just how the body is shaped.