Awakening a long-sleeping car

Discussion in 'The Bench' started by WQ59B, Jul 5, 2020.

  1. WQ59B

    WQ59B Well-Known Member

    Let’s say a car has been parked in an enclosed garage for... oh ... 25 years. Moderate climate, but garage was unheated. Mice were in the garage to varying minor degrees over the years (nothing epidemic- but there’s signs underhood they’ve been bunking there).

    How would you advise trying to restart the car (which “ran when parked”). Is potential chewed wires a legitimate worry? Would an engine that turns by hand but with some reluctancy be better opened up first (original engine)?
     
  2. TrunkMonkey

    TrunkMonkey Well-Known Member

    I would start with all "basics" and work "up" from there.

    Only use fresh gas to prime and start.
    Make sure there is oil, and it is not contaminated with coolant or gas.
    Make sure you have coolant.
    Check all wiring for frayed, corroded, broken, (chewed) evidence.
    Make sure the engine can be turned by hand.
    Inspect plugs, wires, rotor, and cap to be sure they are at lease in serviceable condition.

    Have a battery with 14.x charge state, or a good booster/charger if an older battery.

    The exhaust is not plugged or obstructed (from rust or varmints setting up the house)

    Pull all plugs and rotate the engine with no fuel, and either using an oil pressure gauge to verify pressure is building, or watching the light going out.

    Reconnect all ignition components, then I use a little acetone (it does not take much. wetting the filter or about a teaspoon in the carb bores), and see if it will light off.

    I usually run the fuel supply line after the fuel pump into a catch can, and use fresh gas from a temp container to feed the carb during the "waking" of the engine, especially for one that has sat that long.

    (I have found acetone is better than "starting fluid", a very small amount and it will fire. If timing, fuel delivery is correct.)

    Once you get it running, let it get warm, with mild variation in RPM, then drain oil, inspect the oil, and cut the filter and check for debris.

    Drain the coolant, fill with water, add new oil and filter, then run again and set/check timing, vacuum, charging system, look for fluid and vacuum leaks, "smoke" from the tailpipe, and any unusual noise.

    After, a good flush of the cooling system, checking all other systems, lights, brakes, transmission, and such, then a short, shifting, and gentle back and forth drive to verify transmission and brakes, then take it for a short drive.

    Other folks will likely have more to add, but good eyes on everything and proper effort will make the "raising from the slumber" much easier and less worrisome, then just jumping in and giving her a kick in the butt. (I know how and what to do, but sometimes miss explaining a step, from nearly 50 years of "muscle memory". If I walked out and started doing all of this, I would see many things that I failed to note, because they are just "habit". So if I missed something, hopefully, others will fill in and or correct as required.)

    Things you need to be mindful of, are seals and gaskets being dry and resulting vacuum and fluid leaks. And carbs being varnished, sticking float/needle/seats, bad power valve, or accelerator pump. Fuel/coolant contaminated oil and wiring issues.

    I would not open the engine unless I found evidence of problems from going through a good "pre-run" check and service/maintenance/inspection as noted above.

    YMMV.

    :)
     
    Last edited: Jul 5, 2020
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  3. Houmark

    Houmark Well-Known Member

    You can watch a couple of episodes of "Vice Grip Garage" on YouTube.. He picks up a lot of abonned cars..
     
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  4. TrunkMonkey

    TrunkMonkey Well-Known Member

    But a guy will need some cold snacks, and a good bat-ree. Great....
     
  5. Golden Oldie 65

    Golden Oldie 65 Well-Known Member

    I've known of a couple cars that have been stored for many years that, with a new battery, started right up and ran well only to have the camshaft fail within a short time of driving them. With this in mind, before you start it I would change the oil using a break-in oil or an alternative of oil and a ZDDPlus additive. And when you first fire it up, run the rpm up to 2,000 for a least 10 seconds so that fresh oil can get circulated, particularly onto the cam. Oil, even gear lube, when it sits for many years will drain off of surfaces leaving them dry so you need to get those surfaced coated as quickly as possible, like breaking in a new flat tappet cam. I've seen many rearends that have sat for years that, after pulling the cover, have seen rust on the gears that we not submerged in gear lube. I've also seen it in manual transmissions.
     
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  6. 436'd Skylark

    436'd Skylark Sweet Fancy Moses!!!!!

    I had a similar experience with a 70 LeSabre I bought in 03. It had been sitting since 83. I changed the oil and fed it some gas. Turns out it had a couple stuck valves. Ruined a couple lifters and bent a few pushrods. That was pretty sweet.
     
  7. 12lives

    12lives Control the controllable, let the rest go

    Pull the dizzy and prime the pump? Bring the pressure up?
     
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  8. weim55

    weim55 Well-Known Member

    The Internet is full of these will it run videos. Most on more or less junk vehicles that if something does go wrong in the engine go south right there no big deal. But suppose the engine in question is a numbers matching stage one GSX all of this is Tom foolery, pull the engine out and do it right, period. Even if you cover every base there is a chance you could damage some thing ( or something was already damaged when the car was parked ) and now the car is really devalued. But if you do want to give this a try I’ve done the below routine a good dozen times. Yes this takes a good couple hours longer but very worth it if the engine lives and you have a good runner that you can move on and use.

    Trunk Monkey has it pretty well covered but I would add a couple things that I always do:

    I pull all of the spark plugs and put in a couple solid squirts of Marvel mystery oil and let that sit for a few days. Do this before you attempt to turn the engine over in anyway.

    Pull the valve covers remove all the rocker arms and pushrods.

    NOW try to rotate the engine a full 360° a couple times by hand. With the valve train disabled you can be certain not to damage it AND you can isolate the bottom end for any rotational interference. The most common problems are rust in one of the cylinders or a mouse nest in one of the cylinders. With rust sometimes you can carefully rotate the engine clockwise and counterclockwise with some WD-40 in the culprit cylinder and finally get it to turn 360°. The engine will likely run but that cylinder will probably be wounded and not compression well overtime. If it’s a mouse nest it will usually start to squeeze itself through the spark plug hole and you’ll know right away what’s going on there.

    If the engine pass is the above rotation test, onto the valvetrain: squirt fresh motor oil inside the valve springs to the valve stems and guides. Using the tool of your choice or just your hand and arm if you’re good and strong compress each valve several times until you are certain they are lubricated and move freely. You will almost certainly find a couple that are very sticky or get stuck in the guide partially open. Spraying some WD-40 inside the spring to the valve stem and guide and carefully working the valve against the spring pressure until eventually it will free up completely. Then fresh motor oil on each valve stem and go.

    Now drain the old motor oil from the pan. When I go to pour new oil into the engine or use a large container that will hold all 5 quarts and allow me to completely flood The valley/camshaft area with oil through whatever access holes are available with the valvetrain off the engine. Left and right, Front to back.This gets all of the exposed cam shaft and tops of lifters a good coat of oil all over them. Now reinstall the valve train lubricating everything as you go.

    Prelube The engine with the distributor out using a tool and a drill. It’s nice to have two people to do this, one to run the drill and the other to carefully turn the engine by hand of full 360° as the oil pump is turning. Watch to see that oil gets through the pushrods to each rocker arm as you watch with the valve covers off.

    Reinstall the valve covers prime the carburetor with fresh fuel and a supply from a clean fresh container. Ideally you want the engine to fire immediately and run it at high rpm idle just like you would break in a new engine. That camshaft needs a solid supply of splash oil so we can live after sitting dry for so long.

    Good luck on bringing her back to life!

    Steve weim55 Colorado
     
    Last edited: Jul 5, 2020
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  9. bw1339

    bw1339 Well-Known Member

    It's what I would do.
     
  10. WQ59B

    WQ59B Well-Known Member

    Great advice, greatly appreciated.
    Vice Grip Garage is also a good confidence booster.

    Here’s the ‘hypothetical’ vehicle in question; will update when progress is made.
    D9E85CCC-1652-480C-9CE2-3B38AB0BCC23.jpeg
     
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  11. WQ59B

    WQ59B Well-Known Member

    No; I like the above list just fine.
    It’s VGG’s attitude I need to embrace; just do it.
     
  12. philbquick

    philbquick Founders Club Member

    Since you're changing the oil anyway, it doesn't hurt to dump a gallon of diesel fuel into the crankcase and let it soak for a few days. Drain it into a clean pan and dump another half gallon through with the plug out as a rinse. Chase that with a quart cheap motor oil to get rid of any residual diesel fuel. Take what is in your formerly clean drain pan and dump it into a container while straining it through a paper towel in a funnel, this way you will see how much junk was in the pan. If just muck came out and no engine parts, put your plug in and fill it with clean oil. Also, replace everything made of rubber in the brake and fuel system. I had 2 crashes due to stuck wheel cylinders on cars that sat for a long period of time.
     
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  13. pbr400

    pbr400 68GS400

    Good luck! Cool Grand Prix.
    Patrick
     
  14. 12lives

    12lives Control the controllable, let the rest go

    Nice car! We had a 63 GP growing up. Although it had a stupid shifter that went PND12R or something close. The R was not for "race" either! When you hit R while driving things stopped very quickly!
     
  15. John Codman

    John Codman Platinum Level Contributor

    TrunkMonkey has it pretty much nailed. I would check the coolant both for anti-freeze content and cleanliness. If the coolant is dirty, I'd drain it - including the block drains (yup, I know that it's a messy job but someone has to do it). If the coolant is only a little dirty I would run the thing to see how it goes - If the engine is running terrible, you will just have to drain the coolant again as you proceed. The other thing that I would mention is that Pontiacs are notorious for bad timing chains. Check for slop in the chain by aligning the timing marks on zero then wrench the crank back and forth - if you get five degrees of crank motion before you pick up the valvetrain load, it needs a chain; use a good set with steel gears on the camshaft sprocket.
     
    Last edited: Jul 6, 2020
  16. WQ59B

    WQ59B Well-Known Member

    • Car has an original 56K on it; maybe chain isn’t that worn.
    • Coolant is clear & green.
    • I’ve already assumed a complete brake job (inc lines/MC) is necc.
    • Will def pull plugs / Marvel Oil the bores, then turn it. Turned it manually about 2 yrs ago; it turned, but I didn’t consider it was 10.25:1 when it turned kinda stiffly. Only other motor I’ve manually turned recently was a running-condition 6.5 CR flathead- that turned easily.
     
  17. Nailhead in a 1967

    Nailhead in a 1967 Kell-Mnown Wember

    the timing gear will fail because of age, not high mileage
    theres nylon on the sprockets
     
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  18. telriv

    telriv Founders Club Member

    I've replaced T/C on Pontiac 350's MANY times. One was a '68 Lemans. Pulled up to the pumps for fuel & wouldn't re-start. Now this particular car was mostly around town driven & ONLY had 28K on the clock. Not only was the chain gone, BUT the cam was wiped also.
    A couple years later, I told them about this, the engine needed to be replaced because the oil pick-up was blocked with the nylon teeth from the cam gear. Person said the oil light never came on. Of course it didn't because it HAD oil pressure, BUT not enough volume to help lubricate & cool.

    Tom T.
     
  19. Dr. Roger

    Dr. Roger Stock enthusiast

    Made the mistake of trying to put an old car that hadn't run in over 10 years on a trailer. Pushed it up and when it got to the top... no brakes whatsoever! It tried to chase us all back down the street. Brake fluid had all been replaced by rust.
     
  20. 70staged

    70staged Well-Known Member

    I was going to suggest Vice Grip Garage also. Entertaining as well as being helpful starting cars that have been parked. Even admits if he can’t getting running, can’t win them all. Good luck on getting it going. Let us know how it turns out.
     

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