We couldn’t have asked for a better day for a drive.  The morning started off a little cool, but the sun warmed us up nicely by midday.  The fall colors had just come out, and we had plenty of opportunities to see them on the many tiny, winding roads we took to get to the covered bridges and the trolley museum.

Things started off at the McDonalds on Washington Ave. in Bridgeville.  On our earlier scouting runs Lenore and I had discovered that all the covered bridges that we knew of were identical, so for the tour we decided to just see a selection of them.  Since the bridges tend to be on very small roads, and not near towns, the tour group got to drive on some very narrow, winding roads through some gorgeous rural areas.  Several people wondered how Lenore and I were able to find these tiny, out-of-the-way roads after having only lived in the state for a year… it was all thanks to the internet.  Much of the planning was done with the help of the Google Maps website, followed by several scouting trips.  You can see our route here.

We drove right through the first covered bridge without stopping, and went on to the stone “S” bridge at the intersection of Hwy 40 and Hwy 221.  It’s an all stone bridge, completed in 1818, that was actually built for wagon and stage traffic headed toward the expanding West.  It was fun to see something designed for a time so long before our cars were around.

Next it was off to our last two bridges, in the vicinity of East Finley.  This was when we had the first break-down of the trip… and unfortunately it was my car that broke down.  On the upside, it was a quickly fixed sticky clutch pedal, and I got to see a “roadside seminar” up close and personal.

Keith Waltower gets us back on the road.  It was very funny that the men couldn’t wait to look under the hood, but most of the ladies stayed in the cars.  Lenore took this fantastic photo.

The line-up behind my disabled car.

We got rolling again, and made it to the rest of the bridges without too much more trouble.  The last bridge on the tour turned out to be a great place for a group shot of everyone with all the cars.  We got some nice shots and we were off to lunch.

The 3 River Region Model A Ford Restorer’s Club

There was a bit of a slow start due to some mechanical trouble, but we were soon on our way.  About halfway to lunch we had our second “roadside seminar”.  The topic this time was the virtues of filling your tank before you leave, and it was hosted by Bill “No Gas” Hamilton, as he was dubbed by Carl Trimber (who is always ready with a joke).  A collection of gas was taken up in a soda can, and we were soon on our way again.  At the lunch spot Chuck Berrington presented Bill with a large empty container for his next gas crisis.  Of course Bill would have to fill it himself though.  Bill took all the ribbing with a laugh, and told us that this was actually the first time he had ever run out of gas.  I figure that if you’re going to make a mistake like that, you might as well do it in front of a bunch of your friends so you can all get a good laugh out of it.

Bill Hamilton with his new “gas can”.

We stopped at the trolley museum after lunch, and got to ride on a trolley from about the same era as our cars.  The afternoon was supposed to include a stop at an antique mall in Cannonsburg, but we unfortunately ran out of time.

This is me in front of a trolly.

We finished up with dinner at King’s Family Restaurant on Washington Rd in Cannonsburg.  All in all, it was a great day, and a fun tour, and I’m already looking forward to the start of next year’s driving season.

The question of which oil to use in my Model A was a difficult one for me from the beginning.  It seemed like there was a lot of conflicting information out there, and I didn’t know what to believe.  This may not be the final word on the subject, but I feel like I now have the answers.

Our guest speaker for the seminar was Ken Pyle from PPC Lubricants.  He gave us some history on oil in general (I didn’t know that oil native to the Pennsylvania area was the best natural lubricant, and that crude oil from different regions was not all the same), and then we got into the info that we really needed for our cars.

Older engines are just different than modern engines, so their oil needs are a little different too.  Older engines (pre 1990s) need oil with higher levels of zinc and phosphorus to act as anti-wear agents that newer cars don’t want, since too much of those additives will mess with modern catalytic converters and emission systems.  Also, modern engines have tighter tolerances, so they are now using oils that are too thin for old cars.  Interestingly, we can also use some diesel oils because Diesel engines have the same additive needs as our Model A engines.

Oils that have been tested by the American Petroleum Institute (API) have a rating “donut” on the back of the bottle.  You can read the codes in the donut to see if the oil is what you want.  The photo below has a donut that reads “API Service SM”, which is higher than the preferred maximum rating of SJ that we want for the Model A.  We can also use some diesel oils because Diesel engines have the same additive needs as our Model A engines.

Ken’s Top recommendation for the Model A is Brad Penn SAE 40 Racing Oil.  It does not have the rating donut on it, but it does have everything we need in an oil.

One advantage that is particular to this oil, is that since it is made from 100% Pennsylvania Grade oil it has unusually good stickiness. 80% of engine wear comes from dry starts, so you really want that extra stickiness to keep the oil on the parts where it belongs.  The only problem is that Brad Penn is a regional product, so if you can’t find it, here are the guidelines for selecting the right oil:

What you want:
-    Straight 40 weight oil (SAE 40)
-    Rated no higher than SJ (SC is lower, SM is higher)
-    Detergent Oil (to get rid of sludge)
-    Diesel Oils rated no higher than CI-4 (CJ-4 is higher)
-    ZDDP additive (zinc & phosphorous for anti-wear, oils rated higher than SJ or CI-4 do not have enough ZDDP)

What you DON’T want:
-    oil without an API rating donut (like from the dollar store), unless it has all the properties in the above Want List
-    SA or SB rated oil
-    Multi-Viscosity
-    Synthetics
-    Non-detergent
-    Diesel Oil rated CJ-4 and higher

I am not an authority on this subject, and all of this information is new to me, but I think this gives us a pretty good idea of what we need for the Model A Ford.

All lined up and ready to go

We met at a McDonalds south of Pittsburgh, and there were 13 cars: 10 antiques, and 3 modern ones.  As we pulled out and got on the road I had an enormous grin on my face.  It was just so cool to be driving in the middle of a pack of Model A’s.  I was a little giddy.

Elizabeth Bridge

We lost a few cars on the way to our first stop… twice.  Normally the group stays in touch with CB radios, but there were a number of new people on this tour, and the leader’s CB wasn’t working.  Eventually we got everyone together and took a group tour of Nemacolin Castle.

Nemacolin Castle in Brownsville PA

Waiting for some lost cars to catch up

At what was supposed to be a brief lunch stop at McDonalds we lost a couple of cars.  Carl Trimber has a couple of Model A’s and the beautiful one his daughter Sharon was driving lost its transmission.  Fortunately they had AAA 100 mile towing coverage, but we had to leave them behind.

We stopped at a little pottery shop that had some donkeys, including a couple of babies.  I had never thought about it, but I guess I have never seen a baby donkey.

The day finished up with a meal at Kings Family restaurant, which is a Pittsburgh area chain that is similar to Perkins, but with better deserts.

Left to right: Keith Waltower (on phone), Bill Hamilton, Chuck Schneider, Willa and Don Miller

I just love driving my Model A.  It’s so fun, and it’s so much better to drive with a whole group.  I love the connection to the past, both in understanding a little bit of what life was like before my time, but I especially like the connection to my grandfather.  He was the one who maintained this car, and my mother tells me that one of her main memories of her father from childhood was seeing his legs sticking out from under the Model A.  I think about that image a lot when it’s my own legs sticking out.  Very cool.

When I first got the engine running on my 1930 Model A Ford Sport Coupe I noticed that there was an imperfect seal between the engine block and the exhaust manifold. I could see little puffs of smoke coming out. If you’re not a car person, the exhaust manifold is a cast-iron branching tube that funnels the exhaust out of the engine and into the exhaust pipe. I mentioned the leak to my friend Devin, and he was the one who said the famous last words this time, “It’s easy to replace that gasket. You don’t even have to take the manifold all the way off to do it.”

So I bought a new gasket, loosened the nuts on the manifold, slid out the old gasket, and slid in the new one. Easy. Except that it didn’t fix the problem.

I mentioned it to the guys at one of the meetings of the 3 Rivers Region Model A Ford Restorer’s Club and was told that I might have to have my manifold resurfaced. Apparently this is a common problem with Model A Ford manifolds. After a while the flat surfaces that are supposed to be perfectly flush with the side of the engine block get warped and no longer make a good seal. Fortunately Keith Waltower is in our club, and he is a very experienced mechanic of old cars. He told me of a NAPA shop down in Belle Vernon PA that had a giant belt sander that could do the resurfacing more quickly, easily, and cheaper than taking it to a machine shop. Apparently a lot of the cost of getting a part machined is in the set-up, and with a giant belt sander there would be no set-up.

I was trying to get the car ready to drive for a 4th of July parade in Cannonsburg with the Model A club in a couple of days, so I was in a bit of a hurry to get the job done. The place that Keith mentioned was about a 45 minute drive from my house, so I made a few calls to see if I could get the resurfacing done somewhere a little closer to home. Most places couldn’t do it soon enough, and they wanted about $80. So off I went to Belle Vernon with my exhaust manifold. In hind-sight I now know that this is where I made a critical mistake. You may even know what it is if you’re a Model A person, and we’ll get back to it later.

By the way, you do have to take the manifold off to replace the gasket. I discovered that you can’t really get the surfaces clean if you don’t. When I took my manifold off there were big gobs of the old gasket still on there that would have messed up the seal even if the surfaces had been flat. Both surfaces really have to be clean and free of rust.

The drive to Belle Vernon was easy, and it literally took about two minutes for my exhaust manifold to be finished. I was shocked. But the surprises kept on coming. It only cost $27.83! That’s about a third of the cost of the machine shops. I was feeling pretty smug on my drive home.

I had already ordered a bunch of parts for putting my car back together. I needed new studs (basically a threaded rod) since the nuts on two of the four of them were permanently rusted on. And believe me, I put some serious effort into trying to get them off. I think the intense heat must make the rusting problem worse in this one spot, because most bolts are fine as long as you grease the threads before you put the nut on. Keith gave me a great tip to solve this problem in the future. If you get brass nuts for both the manifold studs and the clamp that connects the exhaust manifold to the exhaust pipe, they can’t rust together. Genius.

I got back to the garage, and started to put everything back together. I was feeling pretty good about it because I was fairly certain that I had all the parts I needed, and that I knew what I was doing. I was going to be able to make it to the parade. That was when I realized my mistake.

This is going to get a little technical, but stick with me; I’ll try to be as clear as possible. On the Model A, the exhaust manifold and the intake manifold are connected to each other by two bolts. The bolts are there to keep the two parts lined up because they share the same studs in order to attach to the engine block. Each part has a half-moon shape that makes up one half of each hole that goes over the stud. When the intake manifold and the exhaust manifold are mated together their respective half-moon shapes come together to make up the entire hole that goes over the stud and gets clamped down by one washer and nut and held in place on the engine block. Because the only place I had a bad seal on the manifold was on the exhaust manifold, I only took that part with me to get resurfaced. So now when I put the intake manifold back onto the exhaust manifold, the half-moons were different thicknesses (since the exhaust manifold had been ground down), and the flat surfaces were at different levels. Therefore, there was no way to get a good seal to the engine block. I should have left the two manifold parts connected so that they would be ground down to the same thickness, and would meet up properly with the engine block. Arg. Double Arg. When I realized what I had done there was much cussing. Also, I learned later that you are better off leaving the two pieces bolted together since if you take the bolts out, the bolt holes tend to strip, and then you have new problems.

I tried to figure out a solution involving stacking up more than one gasket, or grinding things down myself with hand tools. I mentioned these ideas to Keith and as he implored me to just do it the right way I could hear the pain in his voice from having dealt with half-baked repairs in the past. Of course he was right.

I had a gig in New Jersey in a couple of days, and Belle Vernon was sort of on the way, so I took the entire manifold with me. This time I got to go down into the basement machine shop and see the fabled giant belt sander, and let me tell you, it was GIANT. I handed the guy my manifold, which he actually recognized, and it seriously took him 30 seconds to grind everything flush and erase my anguish. Even better, since they had charged me the minimum labor rate of one hour last time, they didn’t charge me anything this time.

I had about three weeks on the road for gigs in the Midwest right after the NJ trip so I wasn’t able to work on the car again until yesterday. It’s just so much better when you do things right. I got the manifold back on the car, it started right up, and doesn’t seem to be leaking exhaust anymore.

Here’s another great tip from Keith Waltower: when attaching the clamp that holds the exhaust pipe to the manifold, put a jack under the muffler and jack it up so that it is held in place against the manifold while you get the clamp in place. I’m not sure that I would have thought of doing it this way, and it makes it really easy. Also, make sure that you have the taller half of the clamp facing down. I used a little high-temp sealant from the auto parts store inside the clamp too.

The last thing I did was put a heat shield on the top of the muffler. It should help keep the cabin a lot cooler. I got it from Snyder’s and it was pretty cheap. It would’ve been a little easier to put on if a) I had done it before reattaching the muffler, and b) I had not tired so hard to put it on backwards first.

I’m off to do a test drive.

My buddy Devin gave me a great tip on getting the head off the block. After draining the water out of the radiator, and disconnecting the water outlet pipe (but before removing the distributor or spark plugs), loosen up all the bolts an 1/8 inch or so, and leave them on the studs. Now start the engine. The pressure from the first cylinder igniting should pop the head loose, and as soon as it’s loose, the engine will die. Now you can remove the spark plugs and the distributor, along with the rest of the nuts. I still had to use some persuasion in the form of a dead-blow mallet to get the head all the way loosened up so I could lift it off.

Also, I don’t have a engine lifting bracket or a winch, so I just put some cloths down (so I wouldn’t scratch the paint), and stood on the frame, straddling the engine. It seemed to work fine, but you have to make sure you have a place to put the head once you get it off. I put down a thick towel in front of the windshield and set the head on it until I could get over to the side of the car and move the head over to my work table for cleaning. It’s pretty heavy, so be careful and don’t hurt your back.

I cleaned off the carbon from the underside of the head and from the tops of the pistons, then used a shop-vac to make sure I had gotten all the funk out of there. One thing you don’t want hanging around in your engine is funk. Make sure that the surface of the head, and the top of the block are perfectly clean and smooth before you put your new gasket on. It is imperative that you do everything you can to get a good seal with the gasket. I used the new premium head gasket from Snyder’s that doesn’t require the spray-on sealant. It looks cool, and I’ve heard good things about it.

Also, be extra careful when tightening the nuts on the water outlet pipe. I’ve been told that they break easily, so I only tightened mine to 45 ft/lbs instead of the recommended 55.

After all my work, I was ready to go out for a drive. I put the key in the ignition… and the car wouldn’t start. You can relieve yourself of the disappointment I felt by setting your timing before you try to start the car. Once I did that, things seemed to work fine. Also, don’t forget to re-torque the head nuts after 500 miles of driving.

The meeting took place in Keith Waltower’s garage, Main St. motors, and it is an awesome place. He was working on 4 or 5 cars upstairs, and the basement had another 20 or so cars in storage. Some of them were Keith’s, but I think most belonged to other people who rent space.

I was the youngest guy there by far, but I was not the newest. I was one of 3 new members today. I am going to learn SO MUCH from these guys. I can’t wait. Sometime next week I will drive my Model A down there so that Keith can take a look at a few things, and help me get the car running properly.

After the presentations, pizza, and the singing of Happy Birthday to Don (he’s 75 today, and actually I missed it because I was in the bathroom), a few of us went down the block to help Larry (the out-of-focus guy in the middle of the above pic) drag a Coca-Cola cooler out of a basement. The place with the cooler was incredible. I think it is a print shop/antique store. Carl and his assistant Ed showed us around a bit. There is more stuff in this building than you can believe, and it’s fantastic.

Since I was helping with the arduous task of shoving the giant Coke cooler up the stairs, my tour of the building started in the basement. Most of the space is full of hundreds and hundreds of type drawers (some are Civil War era) filled with lead and wood type blocks for letterpress, and jammed way in the darkest corner are two giant presses similar to this one.

photo: The Excelsior Press

I cannot even imagine the pain in the butt it must’ve been to get those two presses down into the basement. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they literally weighed a ton (that’d be 2000 pounds). Upstairs was a real-life maze of awesome stuff stacked up above your head that lead to a storefront that was set up like an antique shop, and under the table were 3 table top letterpresses. Amazing. I don’t have a need for the presses, but some of my art pals might.

All in all it was a pretty great day, and I can’t wait ’til the next meeting.

There is a special tool that you can buy to remove the ratchet nut, but I figured that I could get it without the tool once the radiator was off. It turns out that I was wrong. The ratchet nut is nestled into the concave center of the pulley, and you can’t reach it with a normal crescent wrench. Besides that, the old nut on my car is actually a different size, so the special tool wouldn’t have worked anyway. My two options as I saw them were to go out and buy an expensive tool that I would probably never use again, or go over to the garage across the street and see if one of their guys might come over and pop the nut off for me.

I went over, talked to Ernie, and told him I was having trouble trying to get a part off of my old car. Initially he wasn’t all that friendly, he told me that they don’t do any mobile service, and it seemed that I might be out of luck. The ratchet nut is a really odd-looking little item, it’s kind of like a regular bolt, but it has four shark-fin shaped teeth in a circle sticking out of the top. I had brought it along on purpose just in case I needed it to help me out in my task. I pulled it out of my pocket and showed Ernie when he asked me what I was trying to take off the car. He looked at it, very puzzled, and said, “What the hell are you working on?”

“A 1930 Model A Ford.”

There was a long pause. “Well… let’s see what I’ve got in here.”

I didn’t actually know what he was getting at since he had already told me that they weren’t going to come over. He started digging through some filthy, grease-covered tool drawers that no longer opened very well, and pulled out some enormous sockets. It took quite a while for me to fully get across to Ernie what I needed since the new ratchet nut was 1 3/8″ and the one I had to remove was 1 5/16″, and it took even longer for him to find them, but eventually he had the tools I needed. I suspected at this point that he was going to let me borrow the tools, but I still wasn’t really sure because mechanics NEVER let anyone borrow their tools. As he handed them to me he said, “I gotta respect anyone who will work on a car that is that f***ing old.” I offered to leave my license as collateral, but as long as I was quick about it, he wasn’t worried. But he did ask me not to tell anyone that he loaned me tools.

I went back to my garage, and found that I had to take even more stuff off the car just to get the socket to fit into the pulley, but it was the right tool for the job. I had hoped that I would just be able to pop the old nut off right away, and be back with Ernie’s tools in a matter of minutes, but of course, I couldn’t get the stupid thing off. To make it worse, the ratchet nut is on the end of the crankshaft, so that when I would torque the wrench the car would start to back out of the garage. It was very frustrating, and since this wasn’t working, I truly didn’t know what else I could do. I was sweaty, tired, and my hands hurt from cranking on the wrench so hard. The only other option was something that Devin had suggested. He thought that it might take the sudden force of an impact wrench to get the nut loose, but I didn’t have one, and there was no way I was going to go and drop that much cash. It was extra frustrating because I was under the gun to get the car running again before the upcoming car show that weekend.

I finally decided that improper use of tools and violence was my only option… don’t tell Ernie. I put the socket and wrench in place on the ratchet nut, got out my 2.5 pound Deadblow mallet, and gave the wrench handle a few good whacks. That did it. In fact, it worked so well, and so immediately, that it seemed like maybe this was what I should’ve done from the get go.

I wanted to thank Ernie for his help. Of course I could offer to pay him, but I didn’t have much cash, and that didn’t feel like the right way to repay the favor anyway. Instead I went into the fridge and got out a couple of ice-cold Spotted Cow micro-brews that I brought down from Wisconsin (for someone else… heh) and brought them with me back over to the garage. Ernie was very pleased with the arrangement.

When I told Devin the story, he was amazed that Ernie actually let me borrow tools, but he said, “It’s the car man! It just makes people want to help you out!”

“I know!” I said, “If I were a hot girl, with that car I’d be unstoppable.”

From right to left: My family’s Model A, Devin’s A, a hot rod A, a badly done hot rod firetruck.

Today Devin came up from Bedford and we had our own little 2-car Model A parade over to the rockabilly car show on the west side of town. It was awesome. There were an incredible number of amazing cars. It was almost all hot rods and custom cars, but I did manage to achieve my goal of talking Model A’s with some old car guys. It was really great, and I even learned a little about my unusual water pump… which is now leaking. But that’s ok, sort of, since one of the old car guys told me what kind it was, so I may be able to order parts for it now.

This was the farthest I have ever driven the Model A and that felt really good.

The reflection of my car in the hub caps of the car next to mine.

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