My new Fb

[59wagon]

Before I pulled the motor and gearbox out, I removed the fenders (which are a mess and need heaps of luvin’) and, trying to keep with my method of fixing as I remove, started on the headlight buckets.
It turned out to be a bit more than just a clean, sandblast and paint. On both buckets, 2 of the 3 headlight adjusting screw retainers were cactus



They ranged from not too bad and reusable,



to mostly disintegrated,



and totally disintegrated and gone missing when the screw was removed



One of the springs was also damaged and 2 of the plastic covers were missing



I stuck the spring on some rod and slowly squashed it back into shape with some nose hair pullers





Squashed it in the vice



All good



Next was the retainers. First cut a 5/16” bolt



Did I say I got a new toy? About 18 months ago, I picked up both a lathe and a milling machine from my brother’s mate for $300!! Both need work but I’ve just now managed to get the lathe running so I can do simple turning for now.

Where was I ....... oh yeh, so I put the headless bolt in the lathe, chamfered a 45 on the end and centre drilled it to allow drilling a hole later



Also chucked up a 6mm rivnut and chamfered the inside, also at a 45 degree angle.



Cleaned both bits up for welding on the wire wheel



The reason for the chamfers was twofold - one was to get the bolt and nut to sit straight when pressed together in my elaborate jig,



and the second was to provide a bit more thickness to the nut to prevent burn through while welding as it’s fairly thin-walled. So after a few dobs of snot, it’s back to the lathe



I turned off the snot and drilled through for about 30mm to accept the 10-32 unf headlight adjusting screw.



Next I chucked up the tap and started threading by turning the 3-jaw by hand and applying pressure from the tap by turning on the tail stock. The next pic is of a later one I did, where I started the tap before welding



The beauty of doing it this way is it’s a lot easier to get the tap to run straight. For the first one I did (I’m making six of the little suckers), after starting the thread, I removed it from the lathe and did the rest in the vice



My cheap tap wrench blew it’s guts about half way through, so I hammered a nut on the end and used a 5/16” spanner to finish off



For the other five pieces, I went the whole way in the lathe - heaps quicker. What was also cool about this was that when removing the tap, you could release the tail stock and run the lathe in reverse



Here’s a comparison of original vs repro



I couldn’t thread the rivnut tool all the way as the thread eventually hit the bolt



I added a couple of washers into the gap, cleaned and primed the area on the bucket where the part was going, and installed the part



I then had to remove the 6mm thread in the rivnut with a 7.5mm drill, to a depth of 11mm, to fit the adjusting screw spring



Bob’s your uncle



It was now dinner time, so I’ll have a think about what to do to replace the plastic covers - I assume they’re there to prevent crud getting into the retainers??

Cheers,

John


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[Blacky]

Nice work as usual JB , you really should be more careful working on rotating machinery while wearing rings , that is a pretty nasty degloving you copped there mate

[Errol62]

Hooley Dooley John,
You will need the wee plastic cap only if you drilled right through the bolt. As you have a ready made thread you could possibly use a dome head nut. It s just to keep out mud.


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[59wagon]

I found out why the original retainers were in such poor shape. They’re made of aluminium and, like blue and green, ally and steel should never be seen - at least from a corrosion perspective, unless some sort of barrier is provided to prevent the ol’ galvanic corrosion in dissimilar metals.
The ally had “galled” onto the screws and it took a bit of careful effort to separate them and rethread.



I ended up making the plastic caps by cutting out some plastic discs and gluing them to some 3/8” OD plastic tubing I had.



Then tapped them to screw onto the retainers



One of these screw clips for holding the chrome bezel on was missing





I couldn’t find anything close at Rares or hardware stores so back to the shed. I drilled about a 5/64” hole in a piece of thin sheet metal, then centred the hole on a larger hole in a piece of copper I had, and whacked a drill bit with a hammer until the drill bit edges just pierced the hole




Then neatened up the indent with a quickly made punch ground to shape, and carefully tapped the underside with s small hammer to get a sort of spiral happening, before threading with the screw




Next was to fold the metal over 180 degrees, with a shim in between to keep some gap between the two sides



Drilled through from underneath to locate the upper hole, then drilled the clearance hole on top



I then trimmed it to size. It’s not exactly original looking but will do the job



Cheers,

John


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[59wagon]

The headlight seals were quite perished or hardened,



so got some newbies from Rares. The rear most seal looked identical to original, but the front one is quite a different design



When fitted up though, it looks like it does the same job. The original seal is relatively complicated, so I guess the new design makes it easier to reproduce - that’s progress for ya’.

Headlight buckets are now all done



and I put some Never Sneeze on the adjustment screws so they shouldn’t bind up too easily





Cheers,

John


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[Errol62]

Your patience and resourcefulness John.......
You’re spot on about the ally adjuster threaded tubes. Over the years I’ve collected a few Lucas headlight buckets. The adjusters are stuffed in most. When they started putting inner guard panels in later cars it put paid to a few corrosion issues suffered by we early Holden fanciers.


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[59wagon]

As promised in an earlier post a few weeks ago, here’s a description, with pictures, of how I pulled the motor and gearbox out. Apart from pulling the already disconnected grey (without gearbox) out of my already stripped FC a few years ago, I’d never done it to this extent before.
I followed the manual and all went pretty smoothly. The radiator and grill assembly were removed a while back, so there’s no pic’s of those bits. Maybe someone will find this useful.
Warning - it’s a pretty long post

Here goes...



I gave the radiator and motor a clean and flush prior to removal.



Yep, but as I don’t intend to touch the motor, I didn’t drain the oil.





I left the ground cable on the motor











A split nose screwdriver comes in handy sometimes.







I removed the bonnet on my own, but would recommend getting help - I almost dropped the b&s@rd before I got the final bolt out.





Both of the steps above were done months ago



I ground an old spanner down to get it thin enough to fit under the generator terminal











As my coil is mounted on the firewall, I disconnected the HT lead at the coil, and the other two wires at the distributor.





Water temperature sensor



and oil pressure switch















Two different nuts and just one washer .....



It took a bit of banging and bashing to separate the pipe from the manifold

































The speedo cable needed a bit of finessing to get it all out into the engine bay area once disconnected

















I didn’t have tool no. 7A1-1, so I just let the oil naturally gravitate to somewhere below.











































This assumes you have tool no. 6A 16



I butchered one up when I did the FC’s motor removal previously, at the same time trying to brush up on my stick welding skills. Of course, you don’t have to have one of these (you can use ropes, chain, your wife’s trackie pants, etc.), but it works well and gets the angle of the dangle spot on, using the front ring when removing.









At first attempt, we hit the rear of the gearbox on the hump support



I then realised it was because the front of the car was jacked up from previous work on the kingpins, etc. After lowering to normal ride height, it came out Mickey Mouse.



Before removing the motor and gearbox, I had to find a place to put it - not so easy in my shed. After a bit of reorganisation, I turned this



into this



That’s about it. Perhaps someone will find this useful one day. If anyone’s got any useful tips that might help make it even simpler or easier, please chime in.

Cheers,

John

[ardiesse]

John,

Well done. After having done a few engine-outs, I would amend things very slightly -

?. Remove crankcase breather tube.
7. Add: remove generator.
9. The washer on the exhaust flange is a "ring-in". It's for the manifolds.
10. Add: remove throttle return spring and unbolt linkages from the throttle cross-arm.
12. Oops. You unbolted the lower selector lever from the gearbox. It's supposed to stay on.
12a. You'll need to weld up the shifter rod and the hole in the lower shifter lever.
12b. Oops. The speedo driven gear is supposed to stay in the gearbox.
13. Leave the trunnions on the rear uni-joint to prevent entry of dirt. Tape them in place on the driveshaft after removing from the pinion flange.
15. When removing the handbrake return spring, it's much easier to unhook the lever from its pivot with the return spring attached, then let the tension out of the return spring with the handbrake lever.
16. The clutch fork return spring is supposed to sit between the slave cylinder and gearbox case, if you can believe such a thing. You can just see the boss where the return spring attaches. It's much easier to make a long loop of wire and hook it around the back of the slave cylinder, so it can attach on the outside of the slave cylinder. There is a rare-as-rocking-horse-poo slave cylinder casting with an extra boss on the outside of the casting for the return spring.
17. After lifting the engine up to take the weight off the rear engine mounts, unbolt the rear engine mount brackets from the gearbox.

Amended paras 7 and 17 are to make the engine and gearbox narrow enough to fit through the radiator opening.

Rob

[59wagon]

Cheers Rob, that’s very useful feedback.
Yes, I was going to ask about the shifter rod, etc. as it looked worn but I didn’t know any better. Is it supposed to be the same diameter as the rest of the rod?
It’s good you picked up on my “bloopers” too

Thanks mate,

John


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[Errol62]

Outstanding job documenting and editing this process John and Rob. The space you made for the removed driveline John, cardboard and random flammable fluids. I smell a bonfire!


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[ardiesse]

John,

The gearshift rod isn't the same diameter everywhere. The diameter where the split pin goes through will be a good guide. I'm guessing 3/8". And 5/16" for the other selector rod, I think. The EK shifter lever was revised to include a rubber trunnion. If you can scrounge one up, it'd be way better (or drill your FB lever out to take the trunnion).

You've had the engine running previously, haven't you? Anyway, now that the engine and gearbox are out, you'd be nuts not to take the gearbox and flywheel off and replace the rear welch plug in the block.

Rob

[Jonty]

Thanks for the pics of motor removal - will make up for my lack of documenting the process when I come to put my motor back in!


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[Patrick_R]

John,

That is an amazing blow by blow procedure you have documented.
Top effort mate.
Fantastic pictures I might add, especially as some would have been quite difficult to take.

What did you use to highlight each individual step in the workshop manual?
Was it photo editing software?

Ric.

[59wagon]

Thanks Ric.

I have an iPhone 6S and use the edit feature that comes with the phone’s “Photos” app. It’s pretty basic but you can do things such as crop photos, add text, arrows and draw free hand with your finger as I’ve done with the highlights in the manual. It probably does more than I’m aware of.

Cheers,

John


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[59wagon]

Outstanding job documenting and editing this process John and Rob. The space you made for the removed driveline John, cardboard and random flammable fluids. I smell a bonfire!


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Thanks Clay and fair call about the liquid fuel sources. It’s not their normal place of residence, but I’d just plonked them there after a session of ride-on mowing and chainsawing - slack, I know.

Cheers,

John


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