| jamesmundstock | -- 05-17-2017 @ 6:17 PM |
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Ok I have a question for the old timers. I am 62 and did not know this. I was removing the intake on my '47 and saw some sludge in some of the dips in the casting next to the lifters but the sides of the valley were clean. I decided to drain the oil and more residue came out and when I put my finger up in the drain hole there was about 1/8" of sludge. A mechanic friend of mine said that was build-up from years of the original oil. I worked on cars in the 60's and 70's and never have seen this. Is there any truth to this or could it be from condensation from starting and letting it run a few minutes and shutting it off? This engine runs good but my current inclination is to yank the motor and rebuild it. Thanks for any feed-back.
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| len47merc | -- 05-18-2017 @ 7:15 AM |
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Your mechanic friend was very likely on the mark regarding the build-up from years of the 'original' oil. 'Original' meaning original 'type' oil of regular 30 wt non-HD oil. This does not warrant pulling the engine and rebuilding it - for this reason only - unless for your personal peace of mind you feel it necessary. Were it me and I knew the engine was sound (compression, etc.) and the overall mileage on it is reasonable then at most I'd do - and the emphasis is on 'at most' - is pull the pan, oil pick-up screen and oil pump, clean them, re-install and keep on gettin' it. At Most. This can be done from under the car/with the engine still in the car with a bit of patience and creativity and will require a few iterations of jacking up the frame and lowering it, turning of the wheels right and left, to accomplish it on the '46-'48s. Have now done it 3 times myself on these models. My '47 59AB was the same way upon receipt after sitting for 40 or so years with 37K original miles. After flushing and replacing all the fluids, some if not all of which did little more than drain my wallet, the car was driven without problem with the 1/8" or so of sludge still in the bottom of the pan for many thousands of miles. Ultimately I pulled the pan in a then novice (and unsuccessful) attempt to change the rear main seal with the engine still in the car and while it was out I did clean it, the pick-up screen and oil pump and have run a modern name brand 10W-30 HD oil ever since without problem. Many will tell you not to run a modern HD oil in an engine like this for fear of breaking something free and clogging up an oil pathway, etc. My personal experience with now multiple '40 - '48 models with this same condition supports this not to be a concern and that converting to an HD oil simply works over time to very, very slowly dissolve the sludge which is slowly picked-up by the by-pass oil filter. I have never seen the sludge completely eliminated from a pan prior to the owner deciding to pull the engine for say clutch replacement or other and while out deciding to go through the engine to clean residual mold sand from the block/clean the cooling system/or just for the experience and grins ultimately rebuild. Have never seen in my admittedly limited time frame with these Fords (<10 years) and numbers of cars with this condition (~8 now) even one have any sort of engine failure from running the car with the sludge left in the pan - with HD oil or not. Fwiw. Just my $0.02 - this topic always generates a lot of input so I'll lay this out there and let everyone peck away at it! Steve This message was edited by len47merc on 5-18-17 @ 7:23 AM
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| Stroker | -- 05-18-2017 @ 12:54 PM |
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len47merc: Nothing to "peck-at" in my opinion. Excellent advice! The "only thing" I'd add, is to attempt to "dispel" the oft-repeated urban-legend, regarding the need for oils with high-pressure additives to prevent cam lobe destruction. Our un-modified "underhead-valve" vintage Ford V8's do NOT have high-unit loads at the tappet/cam lobe interface like modern overhead valve, or overhead cam engines do. Therefor we don't need to pay extra for "reproduction" vintage oil. I'll probably get some "hate mail" for having said that, but unless you are running an aftermarket high-lift racing cam with racing valve springs, you simply don't need anything other than a good quality off-the-shelf oil. Personally, I use Mobil Delvac 15W-40 diesel oil, as it has plenty of detergent, and excellent film-strength. Even Wal Mart carries this stuff. I also like Mobil One Lucas, and some of the other quality 100% synthetics, but NOT in my old Ford. These are excellent oils, but some have reported that they tend to encourage oil leaks in older engines that don't have modern sealing surfaces. This message was edited by Stroker on 5-18-17 @ 1:00 PM
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| trjford8 | -- 05-19-2017 @ 5:30 PM |
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Stroker is correct. Just buy a good grade of modern oil(usually 20/40)and be done with it. It's a 100 times better than the oils of yesteryear and will not harm your engine. The same can be said for unleaded fuel. It can't hurt a flathead. Lead in fuel did not become in vogue until the late 40's. Flatheads were built long before the lead additive and seemed to survive just fine.
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