Black Beauty a 66 Satellite E-bay find

[Don Frelier]

Chapter 6 - Running and Driving

Sorry I haven't added anything in a while.
So our story left off with a massive smoke cloud which at the time I attributed to new paint and the header wrap.
It got worse. The next time I ran it the lifter quieted down, but after about 5 minutes it again began spewing out smoke and even caught fire.
Luckily I got it doused with the hose pretty quickly.
After trying cork gaskets on the valve covers (which have always worked for me, just don't last very well) I bought the big bucks moroso blue reusable gaskets.
But what I found was upon close inspection of the M/T cast covers was that the sealing ridge in the corners is crappy almost non-existent.
So I added some RTV in those areas and gradually tightened them up. Finally got the leak fixed.

After some barn testing I decided to drive it a few houses down and back. It went well except the right front brake didn't work at first then would nearly lock up.
So the next drive was a bit further to the end of the road and back (probably 3 miles total).
Running great gave it a few shots of throttle and it was happy.
About 1/2 way back started to lose power, let off a bit continued to act like oh crap ran out of gas.
3 gallons won't get you very far.
Before stashing it away for the winter my brother helped me get the hood installed.
Video of it idling one evening sometimes I will play it when I get the Winter blues.

 

[Don Frelier]

November 2017 Pictures:

 

[Don Frelier]

I've never bought a new set of wheels until last week. But I finally decided that since I had a decent pair of Ford 15" x 7" magnums, I would buy a pair of Wheel Vintiques Magnums from Summit. Friday evening I took the rear steel wheels and new Magnums to a friend nearby who does quite a few wheels in his shop at home.
Saturday after dinner I put them on. I kinda freaked out when I set the first wheel on and it looked like it would hit the inside lip of the fender.
But after lowering it I can pretty easily fit a thumb between the tire and inside edge of the fender lip. I like the look of the wheels, but I would prefer the rear sit a bit higher. They are 15 X 8" with 4-1/2" backspare with 245-60 tires. (Still need to clean the letters on the front tires)
I've only driven the car one day this year, another cold wet spring here in Western NY it's only 46 degrees here today with rain and drizzle all day.
But at least we aren't flooding like the central and southeast portion of the country.

 

[gtx6970]

You get this one running and driving yet.

 

[Don Frelier]

2020 Update: Front End Rebuild
Last summer was not a good one for car projects.
I travelled and worked in factories almost continuously through July before things improved.
After that I didn't want to start any big projects, just drove the cars a few times to local cruise nights.
I actually started getting parts together well over a year ago and this spring felt more motivated.
I started late winter by converting the turn signals to LED's then finally put in a radio I had bought and installed the glovebox liner.
Almost forgot I put new red carpet in it as well.
I started removing the old bushings from a set of lower control arms and a sway bar from a 67 Charger that I'd bought and my son blasted them for me. I ground off the rust on the swaybar and painted it last year.
Finally I cleaned up my garage (carriage house) and backed it in tearing off the front end.
The big screw up was the sway bar mounts, my son helped weld them for me but I tried to go from memory on the orientation and ended up installing them backwards.

 

[Don Frelier]

I wasn't really rushing on this job but all the cleaning and painting took a while.
I did spend an entire weekend towards the beginning before I installed anything.
Part of the plan was to put new wheel cylinders and replace the hose to the differential as well.
But when I pulled the first rear drum everything looked really good including riveted shoes that were pretty thick.
The wheel cylinders say "Made in USA" and look fine so I changed my mind and flushed it out with silicone fluid after installing the new rear hose.

I cleaned off part of the differential and found a "B" marking from the factory looked like new.
Another project will be to clean and paint the rear end.

 

[Don Frelier]

I also changed out the steering box for a Steer and Gear extra firm unit.
The old one had quite a bit of lash to it but the coupler was quite tight.
Another 3 hours of removing the drivers side header, starter, jacking up the motor etc..
Next time I'm buying a new exhaust system to go with the HP manifolds I've got upstairs.
Unfortunately I found a problem with the reproduction upper control arms they looked like they would hit the upper support so I had to cut off the rear overhang.
(After they were already installed).
I also found I had a squeek when hitting bumps almost positive one of the cheap bushings is spinning in the arm.
I already had to press in a Moog bushing to replace one that was loose.
Should have known better than to use aftermarket uppers...
But it drives nicely still need to get the sway bar on it but I intend to.

 

[gtx6970]

heres a little motivation for you. I just put a deposit on this one .

 

[YY1]

I love that car.

 

[Don Frelier]

I had some time off between Christmas and New Year.
There was a thread here about the correct color for the rear trim panel on the trunklid.
Sounded like a fun little project so I found some paint masked it off and shot it in my basement.
Today I got home a little early from work and it was fairly warm so I installed it back on the car.
I'm pretty happy with the finished product.

 

[Fran Blacker]

Good color match.

 

[eldubb440]

I somehow missed this thread.....love the 66s, awesome car

 

[Don Frelier]

Google photos gave me the "4 years ago today" thing.
2017 we moved the Satellite from my friends garage over to my carriage house (small barn).
It didn't run but the brakes worked.
A really fun day for sure.

 

[Nxcoupe]

Wow, nice car! How about some current pics of the car?

 

[Don Frelier]

 

[Nxcoupe]

Just beautiful. Great find and buy!

 

[gtx6970]

I heard there were a few black with red interior 66s at Carlisle this year.

Glad to see you got this one done.

 

[Don Frelier]

The Plymouth was used for transport at my daughter's wedding this summer.
I have some good looking kids as well (but I'm biased of course)

 

[eldubb440]

that back seat....... oh, nevermind

 

[Don Frelier]

2022: Transmission removal, rebuild and install

This project seemed to take forever.

The front seal leaked almost from day 1. A small amount after the 1st winter, a bigger puddle after the 2nd and a pool of fluid after the 3rd.
Coming back from Carlisle it seemed to slip going into 3rd when it was cold so I was pretty sure it was low on fluid.
Just outside of Williamsport we made a gas stop and I was thinking I'd put a half quart in but I changed my mind just dumped the whole thing in.
Within a couple minutes my son pulled up next to me and motioned to pull over.
He said you're leaking fluid bad.
Oh boy... we've got a long way to get home.
I decided to drive it slow for a while and see what happened.
After about 10 miles I pulled over we checked the fluid and it seemed okay.
We made it the rest of the way home without incident.

I think the next time we drove it there was no second gear. 1st seemed fine and you could manually hold it in 1st then peddle it a bit put it back in drive and find 3rd.
It seemed fine in 3rd no slipping or anything but I knew it would have to come apart for a rebuild.
I drove it sparingly until mid September when the Charger drivetrain project was completed.

I started around mid-May this year to jack it up and start taking removing the transmission.
Earlier this spring I bought a NOS Hurst shotgun torque converter from @Big bill.

My friend Dave who built the transmission in my Charger gladly agreed to rebuild the transmission in the Plymouth.