OT Did people only use bumper jacks?

Chuckle. That is how you transition from Young and Immortal, to Wise Old Fart- one scary or expensive lesson at a time. Glad you had no permanent damage. I remember changing an engine mount once, and only felt stupid afterward when my brother pointed out to me that if the jack I was juggling the engine on (Back when oil pans were strong, and a piece of plywood underneath was plenty to lift the engine) had leaked down, I could easily have lost a hand. He was right, of course- I should have stared at the setup long enough to figure out how to wedge the engine with the timbers and planks that were sitting right there.

I'm too fat to fit under modern cars, and (for now) have enough cashflow so I don't have to, so it really isn't an issue for me any more. But if I ever do get crazy like that again, I'll buy decent jackstands, along with the floor jack to replace the one from long ago that seems to have grown legs somehow. No idea when or how that happened....

In the Maryland area, ION TV has Patty Duke, the Original Outer Limits, Highway Patrol, Sea Hunt and loads of old stuff. It's free, off-the-air HD TV. They also show all sorts of old movies from the 60's and 70's that aren't available from Netflix (never made it to DVD). Better looking HD than Comcast's hyper-compressed cable service.

-- Bobby G.

I used to carry 2 or 3 of those ballast resistors around in the car, and didn't even own a Chrysler product. Made a lot of brownie points with them.

Erik

Including the ones from Detroit, Kansas City, etc.

Well, I started as an apprentice mechanic in 1968 and I wouldn't have deampt of crawling under a car without jack stands (or a reasonable facsimle there-of). I'd never trust a bumper jack, with the possible exception of a "tripod" - or the garage type bumper jack or "end lift" that had safety stops and a tip-proof frame.

Even with the bumper end lift I USUALLY used stands if I was going underneath..

Did a lot of work under axle end-lifts too - but ONLY with the safety catches engaged.

On 5/21/2011 4:45 PM, mm wrote: ...

In about the year after the invention...a "pro" wouldn't be one for long else't...

--

Mine always ran when wet - I'd hose it down with the carwash to show people that a slant six mopar COULD run when wet.

Always had a spare resistor in the glove-box untill I "got smart" and mounted a spare on the fire-wall.

I'd jack the car up and put a couple of concrete blocks under for safety, jacking the car down to rest firmly on the blocks before scooting under. I prefer the bumper jacks to the current system but I guess bumpers aren't strong enough to take the weight anymore. These days I use ramps or a hydraulic jack.

Don't even let me get started about the finicky nature of AMC models and their cobbeled together parts from any and all manufacturers. The things they would do when it rained/got hot/got cold/dried out/you name it!

.......

"I need a starter for a 66 Ambassador."

"What month was it built?"

"What *month*? I don't know..."

"Go take the starter off and we'll see if we can match the bolt pattern. They used 3 different starters that year."

.......

"The wipers on my 68 Javelin stop working."

"Check the fuel pump."

"The car runs fine...I said the wipers don't work."

"Check the fuel pump. There's a vacuum booster pump bolted to the top of the fuel pump that powers the wipers. They can leak."

.....

BTDT

On 5/21/2011 9:29 PM, DerbyDad03 wrote: (snip)

Okay, so Javelins were really 1959 Ramblers under the skin. But you gotta admit, that first year Javelin sure was pretty. I did a real double take going through a 73? or so Hornet hatch at a dealership- the load floor cover over the spare tire was painted plywood- the company was so broke by then they couldn't even afford tooling for a simple almost-flat ridged metal panel.

Concrete blocks are "dicey" and cinder blocks a no-no. If using concrete blocks, put a board on top so no edge of the frame or suspension nicks the blosk. A cinder block can disintegrate with little provocation and no warning.

Hey, it was NOT that bad. They either used prestolite or delco - and they were extremely reliable.

.... And that was a heck of a lot better than general motors' use of manifold vacuum only up untill 1957. If it was raining and you were pulling a long uphill grade --- Good Luck!!!!

And that plywood deck did NOT rattle, and was very stout - you never saw one dented or damaged. Why use steel???? It was protected from the elements and was not required to be air-tight like floor-boards, or to stand up to exhaust heat etc.

And the Javelin was MUCH different than a '57 Rambler. It was a '68, more or less. The 232 and 258 sixes were pretty good little engines - and the 290, 304,360 engines were better than the 287, 290, and 327 Nash engines of previous generations -- and they were not BAD engines.

No argument there- my family owned several of the AMC straight sixes with the seven main bearings- it was about the only part on the car that held up well, aside from the perennial leaky valve cover. I think Jeep only recently stopped using a descendant of the same engine. Wiki sez 64 through 06. That is a production lifespan up there with the ford and gm small-block v8s.

But vacuum-operated wipers by the late 60's? Almost Made a Car, indeed.

Actually, when the vacuum assist pump started leaking, the common "fix" was to simply bypass the pump and hook the two hoses together.

As long as you didn't accelerate onto the highway *too* fast, the wipers would just hesitate, but never actually stop. :-)

Alright, I'll admit it, my ringtone is based on the '66 Ambassador I owned up until 1980.

Pull the front seat forward, recline both sides of the split front seat until they were level with the back seat and the whole inside of the car was a bed.

If you call me I'll hear the Blues Brothers...

Next I caught a ride with a gambler's wife She had a brand new lay down Rambler She parked inside of town, layed the Rambler down She said she sure could dig if I'd knew her

Back in the 70's, a friend and I drove a beat up Javelin from Cleveland to NYC. It was pouring rain and halfway home the wipers stopped working. They would go up when you slid the lever to On, but wouldn't come back down unless you slid the lever to Off.

I was riding shotgun and had to keep turning the wipers on and off with the lever. This went on for hours until the lever came off in my hand. Luckily, they stopped in the up position and when we pulled over we found that if we manually pulled the wipers down, they would go back up by themselves.

We rummaged through the trunk and found a length of wire just long enough reach the wiper from the passenger window. It was pouring and cold and we ended up putting our socks on our hand so it didn't freeze as we operated the wiper with the wire.

By the time we pulled into NYC, we were wet and dirty and had a memory that we still laugh about to this day. That friend turned out to be my best man many years later.

The trick was to get the high quality aftermarket resister that was sealed. The resistors I had trouble with were open in the back exposing the resistor elements to the air. The open units would corrode and burn out. I never had a problem with one of the sealed resistors.

TDD

Thanks.

I also had a cast metal jack stand cave in. It was rated at 3000 pounds I think, and the whole car weighed only 3000 pounds. No one was under it when it collapsed. I told the store I bought it at, but I doubt they cared.