Re: [Amc-list] Brief road trip...

[Matt Haas <mhaas@xxxxxxx>]

Tom,

The factory A/C shrouds (at least the late 60's ones) are nothing 
special. They're just a big hoop with four tabs for mounting bolts 
(mount with the radiator bolts). They did get a 7 blade flex fan. I 
would think it would be pretty easy to come up with a better shroud 
design without much effort.

I also took a look at radiators in my parts book and six cylinder 1967 
Rebels did not get a three core radiator with A/C. In 1968, the Rebels 
did get a three core radiator with A/C.

Newer vehicles are generally better for engine/tranny cooling. I was in 
that area last July (I think it only got to 110 heading into Vegas at 
night) and the coolant temp gauge in my 07 Ram moved one needle width 
closer to hot than normal (the only other time it did that was crossing 
the Rockies on I-70 -- I also had to turn the overdrive off for part of 
that [it's a 5 speed and having it locked out of 5th worked the rest of 
the time]). I had the A/C going and was towing my wagon at the time. I 
was pretty impressed since my 96 would run hotter towing around here 
(not nearly as hot and no steep hills). Also, the tranny cooler on my 
new truck is about half the size of the radiator on the Americans so 
there is a bunch of cooling capacity there.

As far as timing goes, my 67 American with 199/auto (water cooled) likes 
10 BTDC and my 68 with a 232/stick likes 5 BTDC for best power. Both 
will ping like crazy if the timing is off. Did the 70 232 have EGR? If 
so, hooking that back up will help with pinging but you need to put a 
temperature controlled vacuum switch on it since the EGR valve opening 
on a cold motor is bad for performance.

What rear gear do you have in your car? A fairly low rear end gear (mid 
3's) will help when towing and not be too hateful on the highway.

Matt

On 6/22/2008 3:25 PM, Tom Jennings spouted this sage advice:
> Just last night got back from a 3-day (was gonna be 4-day) trip camping 
> to the northwest corner of Arizona (near Meadview), a burning-man-like 
> regional event. About 400 miles each way.
> 
> Took the newly-gasoline-converted Classic wagon, four people (two 
> large), 20 gallons of water, trailer, 10 x 16 PVC quonset hut, big tent, 
> and all the usual camping crap.
> 
> Man was it hot!! Car was very pingy, I need to re-curve the distributor, 
> too much advance, though I adjusted it on the road finally more or less 
> OK. Pinging increased with coolant temperature, but also air inlet temp 
> (read on). This is a '70 232 with cast iron intake with a Carter YF.
> 
> Averaged just under 45ph (that's door-to-door trip speed) including all 
> stops (there were (too) many) so not bad considering I never exceeded 
> 60mph, partly due to the trailer, but mostly due to heat. I was taking 
> it VERY easy on the air-cooled Flash-O-Matic. I really gotta put a guage 
> on that thing so I don't have to guess.
> 
> I've got a two-row radiator, a big flexfan, but no shroud. Cooling is 
> adequate for desert driving. I've also got a big VintageAir A/C system 
> that we ran pretty much the entire time. Turned it off for the big 
> grades, which there were a few.
> 
> It was well over 100 on the way out (lucky us, a heat wave in LA, and 
> large-scale weather seems to rotate eastward, from So. Cal.). I just 
> kept it in D1 and drove according to temperature.
> 
> Got there OK, but the event wasn't to our liking; really fine people, 
> but not for us, but combined with 105+ temps during the day made it 
> unbearable. We left Sat AM.
> 
> The ride home was hot. By hot, I mean, the air at times was coolant-hot. 
> It was 115 in Needles CA (route I40, at the CA/AZ border). 115 in the 
> shade. It was so hot, we had to close the floor vents because it HURT 
> YOUR LEGS hot, no exaggeration.
> 
> The A/C worked great, but up the loooong steep grade west of Needles, 
> though only about 4000 feet altitude and I'm just guessing 5% grade, at 
> 115 degrees, in an ancient Rambler with a full load, and an air-cooled 
> transmission, was a big nerve wracking.
> 
> Basically the way I handle those is run at the motor's sweet spot; 45 
> mph in second, or 28 mph in low, steady, steady, steady, varying with 
> heat and ping. The temperature gauge indicates the cooling systems "low 
> normal" and "high normal"; the two extremes of thermostat mostly closed 
> (it hunts around closed) and mostly open (it hunts around rated thermo 
> temp, about 190 - 200 degrees. I worked all that out with an external 
> thermometer long ago. A/C goes on when the temp is below high-normal.
> 
> All these shiny blacked out cars zooming by us up the grades; we must 
> have looked like Amish people in a buggy, in a dusty old Rambler in flat 
> paint with a trailer full of junk!
> 
> I'm sure newer cars have better default trans cooling systems, but I 
> know most of them were eating up transmission life.
> 
> 
> On the one accurate fill up I did before the trip, I got 19.8mpg, but I 
> think that's high; for the whole trip itself it got 16.5mpg, not too 
> terrible under the circumstances. I think I can get 20 out of it 
> regularly, I just got the carb sort-of dialed in before I left. Timing 
> is wacked.
> 
> I hope I didn't cook the transmission. It was one of the hardest trips 
> I've ever made on it. Ran fine, no crazy leaks, no bad smells, rebuilt 
> in the last year. I'll get a tune up this summer.
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> 
> 

-- 
mhaas@xxxxxxx
Cincinnati, OH
http://www.mattsoldcars.com
1967 Rambler American wagon
1968 Rambler American sedan
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