The first "Hawk-Rod" resurrection, Roadkill style

[Builderguy]

Never a problem, just a situation. You (and friends) will get this figured out. Of that, I am sure!!! My only thought is the differential. Question: After sitting over night, will it do right away, or does it take a few miles before it starts?

 

[HawkRod]

Never a problem, just a situation. You (and friends) will get this figured out. Of that, I am sure!!! My only thought is the differential. Question: After sitting over night, will it do right away, or does it take a few miles before it starts?

Thanks for the thoughts and questions - everything helps!

I am not aware that there is any warm up or delay before the problem shows itself. Having said that, I typically need to drive at least a mile or so to get on a highway. So a mile is about the minimum distance I drive before a highway. That also typically means that the engine will have been running 5-10 minutes before the highway as well.

The differential and rear bearings are about all that is left after the process of elimination, so the differential is certainly one of the next things to check! Many years ago, we did pull the rear and my father-in-law visually checked it out and said it looked OK. So I may check the bearings next, and then go to the rear.

 

[HawkRod]

Took a trip with the old girl down to the Shenendoah valley. Drove through rain and slop yesterday, and camped at a really nice campground.

I'm having trouble uploading pictures - they are probably too big. But here is one at a lookout today. More coming as I can...

 

[HawkRod]

Here is driving in the rain

Better weather: out prowling the highways where it belongs!

Here was last night's camp

 

[rumblefish360]

Total cool dude!

 

[HawkRod]

A couple from our current camp site.

This trip is helping me get a punch list of things to work on and improve so the car is really road worthy - hopefully for a cross country trip spring next year (since I failed to get everything ready for this past September).

Who says you can't have fun testing?!?

 

[Builderguy]

Tent, you don't need a tent!!!! Just open the trunk and sleep in there, plenty of room.

Real world test data, the best you can get. The more miles the better and you are correct, " OUT PROWLING THE HIGHWAYS WHERE IT BELONGS!"

When I finally get my Superbird, that is where it will be, "out prowling the highways where it belongs" not locked up in a garage. Let people see them, remember them, and enjoy watching them run.

 

[HawkRod]

Tent, you don't need a tent!!!! Just open the trunk and sleep in there, plenty of room.

Real world test data, the best you can get. The more miles the better and you are correct, " OUT PROWLING THE HIGHWAYS WHERE IT BELONGS!"

When I finally get my Superbird, that is where it will be, "out prowling the highways where it belongs" not locked up in a garage. Let people see them, remember them, and enjoy watching them run.

I've slept in a car enough times, but no more unless I have to!

A few more from today:

Now to get home!

 

[HawkRod]

Well, we made it home just fine.

We put 840 miles on the car, and "pressure tested" a lot of things. It looks like we have a fuel leak from some old lines near the tank, so that is a priority to fix. There are also a few other things we discovered that just plain bugged me during the trip - so those will go on a punchlist to fix. More on that in my next post, but I am gaining confidence that the original Hawkrod will hold up to more demanding rigors like driving 12,000 miles coast to coast to coast!

Now to get ready to go up and work for my father-in-law. I'll hit it again on Thursday...

Hawk

 

[monroegtx]

looks like you had a very nice and productive trip Hawk. Glad you got to sort some bugs out.

 

[MoparJimT]

Awesome trip HawkRod. I have yet to get my car to that level of roadworthyness. Still fighting with the brakes. Cannot wait to do a trip like that. Winter is approaching fast here in Colorado so may have to weight for spring. Good luck on tracking down the vibration

 

[CoronetDarter]

Took a trip with the old girl down to the Shenendoah valley. Drove through rain and slop yesterday, and camped at a really nice campground.

Is that the infamous (and mysterious) Barry Edgar riding shogun?

 

[HawkRod]

Awesome trip HawkRod. I have yet to get my car to that level of roadworthyness. Still fighting with the brakes. Cannot wait to do a trip like that. Winter is approaching fast here in Colorado so may have to weight for spring. Good luck on tracking down the vibration

Keep at it and you'll get it. Getting a car truly "sorted" can be a time consuming PITA, but it is worth it in the end. I've got my work cut out for me on this car, but hopefully will get it all done over the winter so the cross country trip can happen in the spring. You'll not get rid of me so easy - I'll get to Colorado at some point and share a beer!

Is that the infamous (and mysterious) Barry Edgar riding shogun?

Yes, the infamous Barry, as well as my neighbor went on the trip with me! In the one shot Barry is driving the car - he has the goatee and the glasses.
I'm the good looking one behind the camera!

 

[HawkRod]

I threw in new intake manifold gaskets because I had a very small leak out the front of the manifold (darn it!), but it is still running strong and well (and the leak is fixed!)

So the car remains operational, but I am doing my first transmission rebuild. I decided to do a thread dedicated to the 727 rebuild here:
https://www.forbbodiesonly.com/moparforum/threads/hawks-first-727-transmission-rebuild.232272/

I still have quite a few things I want to do to the car mechanically. On hold but soon to come are an attempt to fix my wipers so they park properly, cleaning up the rear brakes, fixing a windshield washer tank leak, left door hinges, and the DAMN EVERPRESENT SMALL HARMONIC VIBRATION

The body will remain "RoadKill" style, but I will, if time allows before the trip, take a shot at fixing some areas.

But first, let's finish the transmission!

 

[MoparJimT]

Keep at it and you'll get it. Getting a car truly "sorted" can be a time consuming PITA, but it is worth it in the end. I've got my work cut out for me on this car, but hopefully will get it all done over the winter so the cross country trip can happen in the spring. You'll not get rid of me so easy - I'll get to Colorado at some point and share a beer!


Yes, the infamous Barry, as well as my neighbor went on the trip with me! In the one shot Barry is driving the car - he has the goatee and the glasses.
I'm the good looking one behind the camera!

I am definitely looking forward to it!!!

 

[HawkRod]

I have started the transmission swap. I'll keep all transmission specific rebuild elements in that thread (link in post 214 above). In this thread I'll cover general items relating to the swap.

The transmission swap is going slowly. First of all, removing some of the bolts out of the bellhousing has been more than difficult. It's easy when the K member is down and the whole assembly can easily be reached! But when the body of the car, headers, torsion bars, etc. are in the way, it gets harder and much slower to get them out.
Additionally, we have had some bad weather here. I don't have enough room for all my cars, so I have to stack my 73 and 70. I don't want to leave the 70 outside in bad weather to work on the 73, so I need to have good weather to continue with the work (no rain or snow).

Hopefully I can finish by the end of this weekend coming up. Pictures and details coming...

 

[Cranky]

I have started the transmission swap. I'll keep all transmission specific rebuild elements in that thread (link in post 214 above). In this thread I'll cover general items relating to the swap.

The transmission swap is going slowly. First of all, removing some of the bolts out of the bellhousing has been more than difficult. It's easy when the K member is down and the whole assembly can easily be reached! But when the body of the car, headers, torsion bars, etc. are in the way, it gets harder and much slower to get them out.
Additionally, we have had some bad weather here. I don't have enough room for all my cars, so I have to stack my 73 and 70. I don't want to leave the 70 outside in bad weather to work on the 73, so I need to have good weather to continue with the work (no rain or snow).

View attachment 1221858

Hopefully I can finish by the end of this weekend coming up. Pictures and details coming...

I know that drill! When I did woodworking, had to move the cars out of the shop and cover the 'mechanical' tool boxes etc. RPITA to say the least. 90% of the woodworking machines/tools are long gone but I still move the cars out depending on what I do...

 

[HawkRod]

Hell, I've removed a few transmissions in my day, and with a lift and transmission jack, it should be simple. Right?
Well, in simple terms, this job is kicking my a$$. This normally happens when I get quite confident in my skills - call it Karma or Murphy's Law.

Basically, the Gear Vendors unit is making this job extremely difficult.

So I got all needed bolts, linkage, etc. loose and/or out. I then removed the GV overdrive unit from the back of the transmission. The problem is that the back of the GV tail shaft is not narrow like the original 727, but rather it has an almost 7" flange on the back. OK, well, I figured it might just make it out if I angle the transmission correctly as I take it out.

So I got my transmission jack under it and started messing around. My buddy and I lowered the front of the transmission hoping we could just sneak the tail shaft out.
NOPE. There is simply not enough room between the body and the torsion bar brace to get it out.
So then I figured: Fine, I'll just remove the tail shaft from the body of the transmission and take the transmission out without the tail shaft.
NOPE. The tail shaft cannot move back far enough to give the output shaft the ability to angle downwards as much as needed.
I'm stuck!

The cross brace for the torsion bars MUST come out to drop the transmission. In the 73 and up cars, this is a separate piece not built in to the body like in my 70. So to get the cross brace out I have to get the torsion bars out. OK, fine, I've done that several times too - no problem.

NOPE. I worked on that for awhile and they are absolutely not budging. I can't understand why. I've done this several times and it has always worked well, especially if the bars have been out recently like these have.

With some bad weather coming, I had to tuck my tail between my legs and get a couple of bolts back into the transmission so I could get my 70 back in.

Finally, as I was looking up at the lower control arms the pivot shaft doesn't look like it is fully engaged in the lower control arm, but for the life of me I can't remember what it looked like after I pressed them on. Does this look OK? Should the gap (see red arrow) be there?

I am frustrated as hell and ready to reenact the scene where Daisy Duke loses her Road Runner off a cliff!

 

[Builderguy]

Hawk,

You are fine, this is how mine look.

 

[HawkRod]

Hawk,

You are fine, this is how mine look.

View attachment 1224177 View attachment 1224178 View attachment 1224179

Ray: A huge THANK YOU for those pictures! That at least takes one worry out of the equation.

Now I just need to figure out why my pesky torsion bars aren't budging. Best that I stepped away so I can be in the right frame of mind (read: not frustrated) when I am working to solve the issue.