Stocker's 1985 LTD Crown Victoria

[gadget73]

yeah the intake end seals are a regular issue on these. The cork ones are trash, get the rubber/silicone ones. The distributor O ring should come in the intake gasket set. Valve cover leaks are also extremely common.


with that much cylinder leakage, the only reason for it is excessively rich fuel mix that washes down the cylinder walls. I'd expect to smell gas in the oil if that were the situation.

or their leakdown tester is full of it. Not impossible. A compression test would back that up, 40% leakage should show up as low compression that comes up significantly with oil in the cylinder and probably low manifold vacuum when running as well.

[Stocker]

with that much cylinder leakage, the only reason for it is excessively rich fuel mix that washes down the cylinder walls. I'd expect to smell gas in the oil if that were the situation.

The shop indicated gas in the oil, I've long smelled gas in the oil at each change, and the fact that it's run pig rich for the past few years makes that unsurprising. In fact, I wouldn't doubt that fuel washing oil off the cylinder walls is what destroyed them.

140 psi compression is within what Ford appears to consider "normal", but it's on the very low end of normal.

[DerekTheGreat]

Get it to stop running rich and then throw a can of Restore in it. Short of mechanical failure, that chit will increase compression.

[Giraffe]

It doesn't really sound like it's all that bad off based on what I'm reading here. Figure out how gas is getting into the oil and fix that, replace top end and oil pan gaskets, throw a can of restore in it as mentioned above. As long as it isn't burning oil, experiencing a lot of blow by, has good oil pressure, and has no knocks, it sounds like daily driver material to me.

[Stocker]

Get it to stop running rich and then throw a can of Restore in it. Short of mechanical failure, that chit will increase compression.

I wondered if Restore was still a thing - I haven't heard about it in a long time. But... I've been trying to get it to stop running rich for years. I can't figure it out and no shop can figure it out. My last option would be to re-cap the computer just in case. I assume there's at least a couple electrolytic caps in there.

It doesn't really sound like it's all that bad off based on what I'm reading here. Figure out how gas is getting into the oil and fix that, replace top end and oil pan gaskets, throw a can of restore in it as mentioned above. As long as it isn't burning oil, experiencing a lot of blow by, has good oil pressure, and has no knocks, it sounds like daily driver material to me.

It isn't burning oil, but it does have a lot of blowby. It used to take about a week to saturate the breather filter (now that it's blown the intake seal out it doesn't get much oil up there). Oil pressure... seems okay, never had the light on. Valvetrain noise on startup, but no bottom end noise. UOAs have all come back mediocre at best, worse the past couple years.

[Stocker]

Brief update - one of the rear wheel cylinders seems to have crapped out over the winter (not that it matters that much). I've done nothing to it in the past 10-11 months besides start it once. It's clear the car needs both an engine rebuild and a carb swap, but I know if I try to pull that off on my own I'll run out of talent before I'd get even close to finished, to say nothing of the fact that I don't have the space to do it. Been too exhausted and demoralized this year to even think about it, and I don't even want to imagine what else on the car is going to end up destroyed from a year-plus of disuse.