My '85 MGM, "Maisa"

[Mainemantom]

While I personally love the "baroque" styling of the 70's Mercuries and Lincolns, wire covers are always kinda meh, and seem busy a bit cheap. They're ornamental without elegance. Many 60's and 70's turbine wheel covers are incredibly conical, which looks like ass IMO. These more understated wheel covers with contrast and depth are just the ticket.



I put up a buy-listing to our Ford club buy/sell group, but no bites yet.
I'm guessing you wouldn't be exactly enthusiastic about boxing up a set and sending it to Finland?

I have sent parts and cars overseas many times. I don't mind as I pack parts very well. Last set of hubcaps (57 Ford) I sent to the Netherlands. Buyer was extremely pleased. I know the shipping cost is really EXPENSIVE. I would list them on Ebay on a Buy it now. Shipping would be via the Global shipping service that Ebay has. If you pm me, we can discuss a plan.

[Arquemann]

I have sent parts and cars overseas many times. I don't mind as I pack parts very well. Last set of hubcaps (57 Ford) I sent to the Netherlands. Buyer was extremely pleased. I know the shipping cost is really EXPENSIVE. I would list them on Ebay on a Buy it now. Shipping would be via the Global shipping service that Ebay has. If you pm me, we can discuss a plan.

Good to hear. Currently I'm not swimming in disposable income, but if I can't get the wheel covers locally (and for cheaper) I'll turn to ebay or you. I should be getting my interest reimbursement and tax return later this summer.
Can you give a ballpark answer on how much the wheel covers and shipping would be? There's a nice condition set on ebay currently for $150 + $100 shipping estimate, which is a bit high for my taste.

[Mainemantom]

The price of the wheel covers is $125. The shipping cost is determined by Ebay. The global system deals with quoting shipping cost and doing the customs paperwork. I pay the cost for shipping to the global terminal in the US plus 14% commission.. From there you pay whatever cost Ebay determines.
I could do the deal outside Ebay however the shipping cost generally is much more and without insurance.
When you are ready, let me know.

[Arquemann]

I've still been tinkering with the carb tune, a stupid seesaw of adjusting the balance between transition circuit and main circuit. 80/20 rule for sure. Tiny adjustments, ambiguous results, my own tomfoolery and large temperature changes make things hard and confusing. Though I've fixed the choke issues and hot starts are quite crisp now so atleast I don't want EFI as bad anymore. Also the price hikes got the Sniper 2s at around 2200€. Cheapest FiTech kits are around 1200€. If I'm going EFI, I'd probably go Modular + 4R70W aswell.

Had a rear turn signal go out, switched out bulb, no help. Got voltage, got ground, got no light. Scraped the ground prong a bit, still nothing. Ended up being a bad new bulb, tried two others that did work. I have thought about getting diffused LEDs for the rears, as they are really hotspotted especially in daylight. Dunno if the cruise problems are a thing in boxes without the CHMSL, and how screwed up the blinker speed gets.

Yesterday I filled up the tank and parked leaning left. Pissed out gas. What the heck, it hasn't done that since I replace the filler neck seal a couple years ago.

[kishy]

I have thought about getting diffused LEDs for the rears, as they are really hotspotted especially in daylight. Dunno if the cruise problems are a thing in boxes without the CHMSL, and how screwed up the blinker speed gets.

If Sylvania Zevo LEDs are available to you at a cost you find acceptable, I highly recommend trying those. They do not hotspot because the diodes face back towards the reflector. I did a little video in my '83 thread recently that demonstrates their appearance. https://www.grandmarq.net/vb/forum/t...18#post1398618

The "cruise problem" is absolutely a thing in boxes without the CHMSL and you will need to mitigate it if using LEDs. A simple "fix your turn signal flashing too fast with LEDs" resistor wired somewhere in between the brake light switch and any brake light socket, going to ground, should take care of it (but note, if you install only one, and put it "after" the turn signal switch, operating that turn signal for the side you wire it into may cancel cruise). I used one to fix this problem on my Ranger. A number of years back I bought a bag of 10 or 15 of the things for a couple bucks on AliExpress and still have a bunch kicking around.

As for flashers, you have some options:

• If you only want to run LEDs in the rear and will keep incandescent up front, there are some thermal flashers which are tolerant of only having one bulb attached. Off the top of my head I believe it's the factory-installed hazard light flasher (acquire an additional one and place in the turn signal flasher socket) that works for this, while the factory-installed turn signal flasher does not.
  This retains the soft metallic click-ping sound, which you may find desirable.
• If you want to run LEDs up front as well, you must go electromechanical for the flasher - e.g. a flasher which contains a relay and a tiny circuit board with a timer circuit, which flashes at a consistent rate. As long as you keep incandescent bulbs in the instrument cluster, a simple 2-prong one should work fine. The electronics of the flasher require a path to ground through one of the light bulbs so one of them, somewhere, has to still be incandescent.
• If you want to run exclusively LEDs including in the gauge cluster, you must go with an electromechanical flasher that has a dedicated separate ground wire, which eliminates the requirement of an incandescent bulb to provide a path to ground.

This was touched on here: https://www.grandmarq.net/vb/forum/t...6745-led-bulbs

[Arquemann]

If Sylvania Zevo LEDs are available to you at a cost you find acceptable, I highly recommend trying those. They do not hotspot because the diodes face back towards the reflector. I did a little video in my '83 thread recently that demonstrates their appearance. https://www.grandmarq.net/vb/forum/t...18#post1398618

The "cruise problem" is absolutely a thing in boxes without the CHMSL and you will need to mitigate it if using LEDs. A simple "fix your turn signal flashing too fast with LEDs" resistor wired somewhere in between the brake light switch and any brake light socket, going to ground, should take care of it (but note, if you install only one, and put it "after" the turn signal switch, operating that turn signal for the side you wire it into may cancel cruise). I used one to fix this problem on my Ranger. A number of years back I bought a bag of 10 or 15 of the things for a couple bucks on AliExpress and still have a bunch kicking around.

As for flashers, you have some options:

• If you only want to run LEDs in the rear and will keep incandescent up front, there are some thermal flashers which are tolerant of only having one bulb attached. Off the top of my head I believe it's the factory-installed hazard light flasher (acquire an additional one and place in the turn signal flasher socket) that works for this, while the factory-installed turn signal flasher does not.
  This retains the soft metallic click-ping sound, which you may find desirable.
• If you want to run LEDs up front as well, you must go electromechanical for the flasher - e.g. a flasher which contains a relay and a tiny circuit board with a timer circuit, which flashes at a consistent rate. As long as you keep incandescent bulbs in the instrument cluster, a simple 2-prong one should work fine. The electronics of the flasher require a path to ground through one of the light bulbs so one of them, somewhere, has to still be incandescent.
• If you want to run exclusively LEDs including in the gauge cluster, you must go with an electromechanical flasher that has a dedicated separate ground wire, which eliminates the requirement of an incandescent bulb to provide a path to ground.

This was touched on here: https://www.grandmarq.net/vb/forum/t...6745-led-bulbs

Thanks, the leds you put in look alright, but to my eye they're insanely bright on brake/blinker. If I'll go led, I'll probably just simply get resistors on both sides. LEDs aside, at some point I definitely intend to make the innermost bulbs to be park & turn/brake aswell.

And yes, I very much enjoy the soft flasher relay clicking. The slow speed and real noise is perfect.

[kishy]

Thanks, the leds you put in look alright, but to my eye they're insanely bright on brake/blinker. If I'll go led, I'll probably just simply get resistors on both sides. LEDs aside, at some point I definitely intend to make the innermost bulbs to be park & turn/brake aswell.

And yes, I very much enjoy the soft flasher relay clicking. The slow speed and real noise is perfect.

Videos can be weird for lighting, and that was recorded in low light. The Zevos are already dimmer than many other LED options (I favour them for their relative change in brightness between tail and brake). I assure you, in daylight, you wouldn't want anything dimmer. With sunlight on the lenses you still want the car behind you to see that you're on the brakes. The CHMSL helps a lot with that on cars so-equipped.

I also like the soft clicking but for various (mostly consistency) reasons I've gone to electromechanical flashers on most of the vehicles.

[Arquemann]

I think I've finally done the best I can with this carburettor. I have 0.52mm wire in the idle air bleeds, which fattens up the transition circuit pretty nicely.
- With 59 main jets the afr was a bit rich at cruising speeds, around 13.5-14, otherwise good with crisp acceleration.
- Now with 58 main jets, the cruising speeds are pretty close to stoich, bouncing around 14.5-15 ± 0.3 or so. Not quite problematic, but light acceleration suffered as it got leaner and near to stoich. It's not as smooth and lost a bit of power.

So since I have too much time on my hands, I know that to correct the light acceleration lean condition, I should be adjusting the low speed emulsion bleeds. But again, my entry-level carb doesn't support that, even with jerryrigging this time.
Most likely I'll end up putting back the 59 main jets, considering its super hot weather currently, and the cooler weather will make it run leaner.

For my own purposes: m̶a̶i̶n̶ 5̶8̶ -̶ s̶e̶c̶o̶n̶d̶a̶r̶y̶ 5̶9̶ -̶ I̶A̶B̶ 0̶.5̶2̶m̶m̶
Scratch that, even the temp drop from ~28°C to around 20°C got me seeing way too much 16.x afr just cruising. I'm putting the 59s in tomorrow, see where that gets me.

[Tiggie]

I need to play jets games in the 68. Got recommendations on a wideband?

[Arquemann]

I need to play jets games in the 68. Got recommendations on a wideband?

I got my AEM X-series on discount a couple years back. I'm told AEM is the best and while discounted it was cheaper than other name brand units.

If and when you get your carb tune pretty close, just stop there and take out the gauge
The stupid little numbers dancing around on the screen will drive you insane. I'm nuts and trying to tune a carb like damn efi. Tinkering with air bleeds and feed restrictors, those are only adjustable on race-spec Holleys for a reason me thinks.

[gadget73]

or leave it in

https://thecarbcheater.com/

[Arquemann]

or leave it in

https://thecarbcheater.com/

Meh, I have the patience to tune a carb all the way. The carb cheater is basically an electronic carburettor but inversed. It adds more or less air instead of fuel. It'll help optimize AFRs, but it's not going to do much about fuel mileage nor will it fix a lean spot in your carb tune for you. K&N had a similar add-on type system called ECI, which went tits up eventually.
Not hating on the carb cheater or trying to gatekeep carbs, but it's kinda just spending money instead of using patience. Luke aka Thunderhead289 seems like a cool guy, I've been watching his videos for years, learned most of my carb tuning from him and his videos turned me to Holleys over Edel/Rochester.

[Arquemann]

Seems like I have a new issue, surging idle when the AC compressor is engaged. Intermittent, of course.
I don't think it's a vacuum leak since it only does it when the compressor kicks on.

Dumb thing is that I have a carb now, which is too dumb to have a rolling idle. It'd seem that the load caused by the ac compressor is fluctuating alot.
I'll probably get a new ac belt and make sure its tight first, make sure there's no nonsense going on there.

Also the 59 main jets seem good, need to more driving to see if I'm staying with those or going back to 60s.
Then next up is recurving the distributor.

[Arquemann]

Got around to changing the oil, its got around 350 miles on it. For the first time in my life I got an oil filter off with my bare hands. Oil looked pretty good, stuff settling on the bottom of the drain pan was a bit shiny, but no glitter or chunks of anything. So atleast its not eating itself to death.

In went Motorcraft A5 5W30, mainly because my fav Mobil1 was out of stock and the Motorcraft was the same price for 5 liters. 5 liter oil jugs are slowly disappearing and getting replaced with 4l jugs, while the prices stay relatively same. Also having to buy another small bottle is annoying.
Even with 5W30 vs 20W50 previously, on a cold start the oil pressure jumps right to 60psi. The engine rattle might be a bit louder with the 5W30, could be placebo honestly.

A few notes under the car:
- Front main seal is seeping, had a droplet on the front cover, but the surroundings aren't filthy, but still disappointing to see from a freshly resealed engine.
- The cheap pos mechanical oil pressure gauge is indeed a cheap pos and has started seeping by the block side compression fitting.
- Trans pan is dry suddenly?

Also the fucking wire covers keep creaking and driving me nuts!

[DerekTheGreat]

Seems like I have a new issue, surging idle when the AC compressor is engaged. Intermittent, of course.
I don't think it's a vacuum leak since it only does it when the compressor kicks on.

Dumb thing is that I have a carb now, which is too dumb to have a rolling idle. It'd seem that the load caused by the ac compressor is fluctuating alot.
I'll probably get a new ac belt and make sure its tight first, make sure there's no nonsense going on there.

Also the 59 main jets seem good, need to more driving to see if I'm staying with those or going back to 60s.
Then next up is recurving the distributor.

Food for thought: What's the vacuum gauge showing while it's surging? Is it by chance switching between the idle circuit and venturis? Might need to fatten the idle mixture.