Progress Thread Exorcising a '76 Coupe

Maybe once a couple of these are sold. Although... she did say "no more than 10." It may have been said sarcastically accompanied by an eye roll. I may have had a handprint her exact size on my back following said statement. I have fortunately forgotten that part and will concentrate on the number 10 instead. Seems like a solid plan! Right?

Back with the rebuilt transmission! She was burnt up. Filter clogged with material. Wrong filter. Bushings fried. Nothing left of friction material on the places its supposed to be. Had him install a stage 1 shift kit. The instruction say kickdown should never happen unless at wide open throttle. Claimed premature kickdown is primary cause of wear in a C4. Said to bend kickdown linkage so it only happens at full throttle. Sounds excessive for a daily driver. Any Input from you guys?
 
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Nope, can't help with that one. WAY back when, when I had an auto car, I installed a "Shift Improvement" kit or something like that. Seems I pulled the kickdown linkage and would just downshift manually. That lasted a couple years before I pulled that car apart and swapped a 4 speed into it.
 
Maybe once a couple of these are sold. Although... she did say "no more than 10." It may have been said sarcastically accompanied by an eye roll. I may have had a handprint her exact size on my back following said statement. I have fortunately forgotten that part and will concentrate on the number 10 instead. Seems like a solid plan! Right?

Back with the rebuilt transmission! She was burnt up. Filter clogged with material. Wrong filter. Bushings fried. Nothing left of friction material on the places its supposed to be. Had him install a stage 1 shift kit. The instruction say kickdown should never happen unless at wide open throttle. Claimed premature kickdown is primary cause of wear in a C4. Said to bend kickdown linkage so it only happens at full throttle. Sounds excessive for a daily driver. Any Input from you guys?
I usually don't run a kickdown on my C4 at all. I slap the shifter back to 2nd when I need to pass and back to 3rd when I'm done.

Of course, I have a Hurst V-Matic shifter in the car.
 
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Finished up cleaning and prep work. New p/s rack, pump and lines. Changed kick down lever on trans to a shorter one as the rod/lever were hitting the header. Swapped timing cover to a front sump dipstick and mechanical fuel pump. About to reinstall the cleaned up engine and rebuilt trans.

Since I replaced the timing cover my last step was to change the oil. It's full of metal. The magnetic drain plug had 1/4 " of shavings. The filter is full of metal flakes and shavings. There was no metal when I started with this engine. I did replace the oil pump and dizzy. Both new. It drove maybe 2 miles. I pulled dizzy and the gear looks fine. This gear was on the old dizzy that came installed on this engine. I was pissed and quit for the day. I am hoping the new oil pump is bad. Otherwise I will need to rebuild this engine and that's gonna take a while.

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This oil pan was cleaned and painted before installing a couple weeks ago. A new oil pump, pickup tube and drive shaft were used. Yesterday I pulled the oil pan. Found grey oiley film on oil pickup tube. A fair amount of metal sludge and several what can best be described as small bb's of metal in the pan. The oil dripping off cylinder walls is clean though. No metal. The oil in the heads shows no metal. Yet the little bit of oil in the pan is full of metal. Pulled oil pump apart, found score marks but no missing metal. Pulled one rod cap and bearing has some wear but nothing concerning. The engine and trans assembly is hanging on the hoist so I didn't want to stick my head underneath to see cam gear. I will attempt that later today when I have someone available to call 911 if things go south. At this point I ass-u-me the cam gear is wiped out or the new dizzy is at fault. I just cannot locate where the metal came from.
 
Neither gear looks wiped out but there is metal all over the cam just behind the gear. I guess the gear wasn't meshing just right and I did not run the engine long enough to destroy the gears yet. Should have ordered a new gear and used the duraspark dizzy. The points dizzy looks fine. It does have a lot of upward play. Maybe bad bushing? Idk.

Can try a new dizzy and keep fingers crossed but there is metal on the first cam lobe. Since dizzy gear does not look bad the cam gear must be worn and I just cannot tell without teardown. I don't want to put a dizzy in and destroy the engine. My financing is dried up until after christmas. Sooo......

I have what is supposed to be a non roller engine with a new crank and cam. I am leaning towards trowing it together and seeing what happens.
 
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Been a while for an update. Not much to add but have been tinkering again.

The older 302 that came with the primered coupe has new lifters but removing the timing cover shows a very worn timing chain with sludge behind the cam gear. It was not rebuilt. Looks like they removed the heads and reinstalled them with new lifters and head studs. No way was this cam or crank replaced.

Since it's just sitting around and I don't know the true history it's going into Doc as my grandson calls it to see what happens. Hoping to have an update in a couple weeks.
 
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Ran into some health obstacles again and am banned from doing anything in the barn for now. Hoping to be back to work on the coupe in a couple weeks.

I have a new oem style dizzy from an 85 manual mustang. I am going to get as much metal as I can out of the roller engine and put it back in. I know it ran good and did not smoke. I only drove it for a couple miles with the bad dizzy. Looking at the cam gear is difficult since I didnt remove the cam but I don't see major damage to it. The roller either needs rebuilt or will be fine. So what better way to find out!
 
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Thank you. My spine is afu. I thought I was invincible for way longer then my genetics allowed. I have a couple fused discs already and they want to fuse some in my neck and thoracic area which I do not want to happen as long as I can still get around.

I have been having pain between my shoulder blades for a few years and it's been dismissed as my degenerative disc disease. They did a stress test after me bitching I am having a hard time getting around and pain is getting worse. I told docs I had lung cancer or long covid and wanted to know which to buy. An urn or a/c parts.

I got the results last week and now the thinking is my heart is acting up again. I had a cabg in 2014 then stents in 2015 when the cabg failed. I go in on the 13th for another angio gram so they can do whatever they do to patch me up again.

Until then I am on strict orders to take it easy.

The moral of this story is don't let the wife talk to your doc. It may extend your life but certainly interferes in playing cars in the barn.

No no. The moral is if something doesnt feel right keep pushing. Some doctors are dismissive and want to assume the easiset answer is the right one.
 
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