kishy's 1984 Town Car

[kishy]

I did knock out a few additional steps on this over the last couple days.
Right side disassembled to match left. Lower arm bushings are in usable condition on both sides so are being left alone.
Wire wheeled a lot of the exposed frame surface and painted more than photos above show. 2 coats on most of it now.
Pressed out right side ball joint, have not yet pressed in the new one.

I would like to clarify my position on the ball joint discussion here:
Buying replacement boots makes sense for a low, or no-mileage ball joint. In my case, a brand new, freshly installed part (and not an extremely cheap iteration of that part) was damaged by my own carelessness. New boot availability saved a fair bit of headache here.
I don't know that I would knock the suspension apart just to change the boots, on existing joints of unknown (or known to be old) age. I'd probably just throw entire new ball joints at it in that scenario.
When I big brake swapped my 91, I also put it on the Speedway springs at the same time and quickly determined that I hated them. Lack of desire to mess up ball joint boots was the reason that the springs stayed in the car as long as they did (I believe about a year). That's a scenario where, especially if the force required to separate them didn't seem super excessive, I may have used new boots rather than replacing the joints as well. In reality what ended up causing me to take it apart again was the failure of the cheap ball joints included in the fully loaded control arms, and took the opportunity to swap the springs at that time.

I'm pleased that the info about the newer master cylinder has helped someone. I'm surprised that never came up as a sort of popular thing to do, alongside the newer brake swaps. It hits a whole bunch of checkboxes for being a good idea:

• simplifies brake line routing
• cleans up the engine bay cosmetically
• makes brake fluid level be checkable at a glance without fighting to open the reservoir
• makes brake fluid be easily addable without fighting to open the reservoir
• changes the function of the brake warning light in a manner that, in my opinion, provides more advance notice of a broader range of problems
  • The stock earlier setup does not engage the warning light unless the shuttle valve trips, which won't happen unless there is either a very large leak or one system has become functionally empty, at the same time as when brake performance suddenly degrades.
  • The newer setup will engage the light as soon as the fluid level is low, but while there is still plenty in the reservoir to continue using the brakes successfully. An example scenario that could turn the light on with the newer setup but not the older would be a slowly leaking rear wheel cylinder which still operates but gradually drops the fluid level over time.

I did get my required items in Detroit today and will make mention of that in my junkyard thread.

[kishy]

69/20.5 degrees today! On-and-off rain, but 69 degrees!

I chipped away at some of this today.

• Another coat of paint on the exposed frame sections. The painted areas, which got larger over time, vary from 1 to 4 coats, and I'm content this will keep things adequately non-rusty.
• Removed the frame-mounted brake combination valve.
• Removed the stock-design brake master cylinder. Mounted the 1991-spec brake master cylinder. Still need to modify the warning light wiring, and of course do lines. Front lines will be replaced entirely, rear are pending closer inspection before I make a decision.
• Pressed in the right side lower ball joint. Installed boot. A piece of 2" ABS pipe makes a perfect boot installer on the Moog lowers.
• Installed coil springs on both sides, using new upper isolators on both sides. The originals didn't look hopelessly awful but I have new ones so might as well use them. The lower control arms are being held up (constraining the springs) with the shocks at the moment. This is hard on the shock bushings but I'm not able to put the knuckles in yet.
• Bolted the upper control arms to the frame rails. Have not torqued the shaft nuts, waiting for it to be at ride height for that. Have not installed ball joints yet, will talk about that a bit below. I am missing one of the upper arm bump stops, but I am absolutely positive that I have it somewhere, so I'll have a look around for it.
• Located my upper ball joints to put them on the arms but ran into a problem.

Anyone remember this thread?

https://www.grandmarq.net/vb/forum/swap-meet/internet-rare-finds-and-good-deals/48965-moog-k8600-upper-ball-joints-92-94-on-wholesaler-close-out-at-rock-auto

Well, years of additional shelf-aging hasn't helped those boots stay in one piece. All 4 of my uppers waiting on the shelf have trashed boots now.



Dimensionally, trying to match these up with the multitude of universal boots on eBay is proving difficult.







I should probably check on the boots of those same joints that are already installed, on the wagon.

[87gtVIC]

Bummer on the parts hoard boots. Its a shame.

Once completed can you elaborate more on the brake lamp/reservoir warning wiring you mentioned above....or direct me to where you spoke about it previously?

[kishy]

Bummer on the parts hoard boots. Its a shame.

Once completed can you elaborate more on the brake lamp/reservoir warning wiring you mentioned above....or direct me to where you spoke about it previously?

Since the boots on the ball joints might make "once completed" a moving target:

I mentioned that in the wagon thread. See this reply: https://www.grandmarq.net/vb/forum/t...18#post1168901

Relevant snippet:

Reviewing my 91 EVTM the 3 wires to the brake fluid level switch are...
P/W from brake indicator bulb in cluster (hot with key in start or run)(also tees in with parking brake switch)
P/W from ignition switch (grounded in start; internally connects to above P/W inside switch, used for bulb check)
BK to ground

Thus the switch grounds the bulb circuit when the magnetic float inside the reservoir drops below the required threshold.

The two P/W wires are virtually identical in the 85 EVTM. The only difference in wiring is that the dual system switch grounds via its bolt into the frame rather than by a wire connection. So my wiring connections to convert this are super easy. The two existing wires will go to the two P/W wires on the new switch, and the ground wire just needs to find a ground nearby, and that's that.

[gadget73]

I think I have a set of those ball joints on the shelf too. If you figure out a boot, please let us know because I probably need a set to fix mine.

[kishy]

I think I have a set of those ball joints on the shelf too. If you figure out a boot, please let us know because I probably need a set to fix mine.

I certainly will. So far, none of the universal boots seem to be the right dimensions. It also sort of sucks that they mostly seem to come in assortments and then I'll have a bunch of useless ones as surplus.

There's definitely an ethically ambiguous way to address this.
The parts would be lifetime warranty if either of the following were true: either it had been sold at a CarQuest, or if the part had been sold by RockAuto in a Moog box e.g. not closeout.
Since the parts were closeouts, they had only a 30 day return window to RockAuto.
Since a part like this is supposed to have a very long service life, I would argue that boot failure (even if the part had been on a shelf for a decade) justifies warranty replacement.
Of course, the terms of RockAuto acquiring the parts mean the warranty is dead.
But the warranty isn't dead because of the age of the part (e.g. intrinsically linked to why the boot failed; we shouldn't be reasonably expected to accept this as OK because we "knew what we were buying into").

One could, then, on that reasoning buy a new pair of the same joints at a retail parts place, then return the failed boot parts in their place.
The parts store should be out nothing as it goes directly back to the manufacturer via the distribution network. The manufacturer gets the part back, says "oh, I guess there were still some of those defective boots floating around in the network", and eats the cost of doing whatever with the part - as it rightfully should be.

I am going to bring a couple of the parts to a store that I know some staff at and see if they have any suggestions for boots. By doing so, I'll be ruling out the possibility of doing the above sneakily, but also opening the door to the possibility they might just suggest it outright. Guess we'll see what happens.

[kishy]

Unrelated to this car:
All three of the 91 Grand Marquis, 85 Country Squire, and 83 Grand Marquis have been "woken up" for the year and have seen some mileage (even if only around the block for the 83).
Any specific findings or updates will go in their respective threads.

On the boot issue:
I brought the ball joints, in their boxes, to a local CarQuest. I explained that they had not been purchased at a local store but that I was hoping they might be able to help connect me with some boots, even if for a price. The guy took one look at the boxes and said they were from the 90s - but regardless of that, he had no options at his disposal and recommended I call the Moog tech line.

https://www.moogparts.com/en-ca/contact.html

Presently, Moog is a brand/line of Tenneco, a gigantic auto parts company that includes a whole bunch of other familiar brands. I left a voicemail as nobody answered at the tech line, and a couple days later I got a call back. The gentleman who reviewed my voicemail told me that occasionally, but not as a matter of routine, they do end up with some surplus boots and he'd do some investigating to see if he could put his hands on some. A few days after that, I had an email from him letting me know that he'd dropped 5 - all of the ones he could round up - in the mail and I'd have them in a few days (to my US address). He had been trying for 6 (to account for the ones I have already installed) but 5 is all there was.



I do apologize that this probably doesn't help anyone else. He did mention on the phone call that the boots don't come along often, and mentioned in the email that it would likely be several months before any more turned up.


Old torn boot on left, new on right. They are literally identical.

Quick note about the lower ball joint boots which were their own headache recently in the thread: 2" ABS plumbing pipe makes a great installer tool.



Anyway, wrestled the spring retainer thing and got two upper ball joints put together with new boots.



Accordingly, the knuckles have now been installed.





Next up is probably brake lines. I also want to sandblast the junkyard caliper brackets but there's no real reason why that actually has to happen.

[kishy]

Today was brake line day.

The line to the rear looked to be in good shape, so I just trimmed it back to a spot where I could easily fit the flaring tool and used a union to get from there up to the master cylinder.
I would have just unioned off the original tube nut except it's a weird size - maybe 7/16" thread size despite being on a 3/16" line where a 3/8" nut would be more expected.



Both of the front lines had, similarly, been in great condition but had to be replaced as the tube nuts didn't spin and twisted off the lines, as well as the original problem of not reaching the new master cylinder. Made those up nicely.



I assembled the front brakes. These are 95-97 brakes. I am reusing the rotors and pads which had been on the wagon but were removed from it when I upgraded to performance parts. Since it isn't clear performance parts will go on this car, I'm happy to get more mileage out of the take-off parts.



I have bled the brakes at all four corners. I've got a nice firm pedal and no apparent leaks, so I think the brakes are ready to see some drive time.

Outstanding still are tie rods, hooking up the brake warning light, reassembling the sway bar end links, tightening up the control arm shaft nuts (at ride height).
The tie rod ends on the car are tight but I really doubt the threads are going to want to turn on the adjusting sleeves so new ones may be the answer. Naturally, I have a set on the shelf.
I do need to put my hands on a pair of axle nut dust caps, which I think I own but can't currently locate. But I don't think the lack of them should prevent getting some mileage on this in the meantime.

The rear-of-car problems (Air Lift bag that doesn't hold air, drum brakes that behave badly) will come a little later.

[kishy]

Continuing...

Tie rod ends and sleeves replaced. Greased everything. Made a mess but that's fine.
Noticed the idler arm bushing appeared to be completely destroyed. Replaced the idler arm. It put up a minor fight.
While putting on the front wheels, found the centre caps loose. Had to sorta rebuild one, the other one will need some glue another day.
Tightened up the sway bar end links.
Planning to tighten up the control arms after it sits for a bit and hopefully sinks a little. I think the ride height is about correct but it's maybe a smidge higher than I care for. Weighing the option of cutting a partial coil off each spring but I may just leave it alone.

[DerekTheGreat]

It's comin' together! Would be nice to see that car again. Not a fan of the higher ride height either, but drive it around awhile & see what happens. Maybe they'll settle some.