Rambler Father/Daughter/Son Build

[rustyroger]

Great work you and your kids are doing.
AMC engines are incredibly tough, I fired up a friends Rebel SST ragtop last weekend after rebuilding it. He didn't think anything was wrong with it until the rear engine oil seal let go, then we found 2 cracked pistons, 3 others had broken rings, the crankshaft was so worn it had grooves in it and the bearings were completely shot, the bores were so worn it needed a .060" rebore, several camshaft lobes had disappeared and the timing gears were worn to spikes. Incredibly the heads were in good shape needing only a decoke and relapped valves.
Lets hope your engine is in better shape.

Looking forward to reading more of your progress - good luck!.

Roger.

 

[DRIVEN]

AMC engines are incredibly tough

I think that, technically, the flathead in their car was Nash in origin. Still, they have a reputation for reliability and were the economy option. I know that when I got mine (the OHV version) everyone kept telling me how great they were on gas. It never really did much better than 20mpg but I beat it mercilessly and it would not die :lol: . I'm sure that if I had driven it the way they were intended to be driven and had an overdrive behind it it might have gotten high 20s or better. My parts car had the overdrive but I never drove it on the road. I sold the complete running and driving car to a guy for $600 at a swapmeet. The next year I saw the guy at the same swapmeet and he had transmission/overdrive on a table with a $1000 price tag on it. Too bad that car got parted out. It could have easily been put back into service.

 

[viperedvette]

Awesome bike chops on the cheap! That's making me want to try something like that 8) .

Thanks!....they were a lot of fun and real easy to work with!....just get an idea and start chopping :wink:

Looks like some fun times with the kids bro . Cant believe u got the car free what a deal .Cant wait to see the progress ill be check-en in on this build thread for sure .

Ya it's fun to see them working on their own car and taking ownership of it with their own sweat and elbow grease!......and free is the best part about it, cuz if it doesn't run or turns out to be a big lawn ornament it isn't as big of deal!....but if they do get it running and driving someday it will be a good story to tell about how they got it for free!! :wink:

Thanks everyone for the encouragement. I will let the kids read this thread today when they get home from school and show them how much support they are getting on there project! So if you want to say something to them here go right ahead, and I will encourage them to write here themselves like I said before. I see it as one more thing they can take ownership of and be proud of what they are doing. 😀

 

[DRIVEN]

Hey kids, keep up the good work! Ask lots of questions and don't be afraid to get dirty.

 

[ramblerkids]

Hi! thanks for the good advice 😀 😀 😀 😀 😀 i really like our rambler i just hope we can get it to start 🙁

 

[viperedvette]

I signed the kids up to the forum so that they have their own account. They are ramblerkids. They are a little shy about what to say but I am sure they'll get used to it. They are pretty excited about how many people have commented on the work they are doing 😀 so thanks to everyone's comments and encouragement.

I downloaded the pictures from the other day, so here they are.

Here is the plunger from the starter all cleaned up

I showed my son how to put the proper air pressure in the tires and how to read the tire gauge and had him check all of his tires

He enjoyed it so much that he had to check the pressure in my car too! lol :wink:

and a shot of Mom and daughter and dogs all running away from Dad and his camera!! lol 😀

 

[DRIVEN]

Man, I thought it was a flathead? And what's the scoop on the red car behind it?

 

[viperedvette]

What does the flathead look like? Sorry I am not the most technically savvy guy with motors and their names 😳

The red car is a neighbors 65 440 2 door with the same engine but an autoomatic. Rebuilt engine but transmission not very good and pretty rusty. He brought it over so I can reference things on the motor, and convincing me to buy it off him for $500.00 😀 It's nice of him to leave it so the kids can see and hear a running Rambler. I'm pretty certain I am going to buy the car and have my own Rambler to work on! 😀 .....I'm getting jealous of the kids and their car!!! 😢

....no work on the car today, too busy with family things and mothers day tomorrow as well.

 

[viperedvette]

Here are some pics of the red 440

There is a nasty amount of bondo and rust on the car. You can see a big chunk of bondo that came off the rear passenger side up beside the top of the trunk and rear window. 🙁

 

[rustyroger]

What does the flathead look like? Sorry I am not the most technically savvy guy with motors and their names 😳

The red car is a neighbors 65 440 2 door with the same engine but an autoomatic. Rebuilt engine but transmission not very good and pretty rusty.

A flathead (commonly called sidevalve in the UK) has the valves in the block, ohv means the valves are in the cylinder head operated by pushrods from the camshaft in the block (pushrod engine over here), ohc means the camshaft is in the head directly operating the valves.
Your neighbours car should have a Borg-Warner 65 transmission, most British automatics of the same era had Borg-Warner transmissions, the 35 model in our small cars, the 65 in larger cars such as Jaguars. I understand these transmissions are tough and durable, and reasonably cheap to repair.
Perhaps your kids will be able to fix your neighbours transmissions soon at their current rate of progress. 🙂

Roger.