1978 New Yorker, thoughts?

commando1 said:
I told you before. I'm mistaken for Brad Pitt all the time....


I know nobody will believe this but it is true.
I AM an extreme animal lover, member of the ASPCA, make donations, rescue injured animals and wildlife, etc.
My eyes well up when those Humane Society ads show on TV.
See? I do have a softer side to me than I appear to have to most people.
PS: Don't let this get around, OK?

After my wife, the most precious things in my life. I spend more money on them than on my cars and I don't regret one penny of it:

6icyfa.jpg


:eek:fftopic: OK. Enough of this mushy -softy stuff.
Click to expand...

Stan - I believe you!

I'm an animal lover too. I can't even watch those ads with abused animals.

BTW, I'm mistaken for George Clooney all the time. It gets annoying sometimes.

LOL!
 
commando1 said:
I told you before. I'm mistaken for Brad Pitt all the time....


I know nobody will believe this but it is true.
I AM an extreme animal lover, member of the ASPCA, make donations, rescue injured animals and wildlife, etc.
My eyes well up when those Humane Society ads show on TV.
See? I do have a softer side to me than I appear to have to most people.
PS: Don't let this get around, OK?

After my wife, the most precious things in my life. I spend more money on them than on my cars and I don't regret one penny of it:

6icyfa.jpg


:eek:fftopic: OK. Enough of this mushy -softy stuff.
Click to expand...

Kitty Kat's...............NOW I've seen everything.
 
Hey all,

Just wanted to get some thoughts. Car was running a little warm for a while.

I had a coolant flush to hopefully get the heater core flushed, and change the nasty looking coolant.

I then removed thermostat to see if maybe that was sticking.
As of today, I have a brand new radiator, water pump, and temp sending unit installed.
So...
1) New coolant
2) New Radiator
3) No Thermostat
4) New Water Pump
5) New Temp Sending unit

The car ran very cool for a long time (early in the morning and no thermo).

I drove it for longer than normal, which was good. However, it still goes a bit over the half point,(on temp gauge) and just a hair further than that before I parked it.

The other thing I was going to point out was that I turned the heater on full blast. Before, (with old radiator and pump) the air would be very hot when I did this.

Now, with new parts, the heater is blowing out slightly over warm air. (heat gauge reading about 3/4 at this point)

The next 2 parts to change in my mind are the heater core, and/or the temp gauge in the dash.

Do you guys have any different thoughts? Should I fire it up and plug an aftermarket gauge on to the sending unit to see if it truly is overheating or not?

Thanks!
 
The fact that you have no thermostat now is the reason your heater is blowing lukewarm.
You HAVE to have a thermostat.
Guys go to a 160 thermostat thinking it will make the engine run cooler. Bad science.
You need a 180...

That aside...
What's the car? What's the engine? A/C??
Fan clutch working?
Got a shroud on there?
 
Last edited:
I didn't catch how you replaced the lean burn. One thing to check is a "ready to run" distributor on ebay, which they make for your RB engine. About $50 and lets your run a better e-core coil and increase your plug gap.

One continual problem with my 383 is leaking valve covers. That seems to be a common problem. In my case, it appears mainly due to a non-flat gasket surface on the top of the heads.
 
BillGrissom said:
I didn't catch how you replaced the lean burn. One thing to check is a "ready to run" distributor on ebay, which they make for your RB engine. About $50 and lets your run a better e-core coil and increase your plug gap.

One continual problem with my 383 is leaking valve covers. That seems to be a common problem. In my case, it appears mainly due to a non-flat gasket surface on the top of the heads.
Click to expand...

Here's the complete lean burn conversion kit. Same price at Jeg's or Summit. Conversion instructions come with it. Part Number P3690428 $225.99
312-p3690428.jpg
 
Last edited:
Sorry all, guess I should've specified.

This is the same car on page 1-6 of this thread that I started a while back...I have just continued adding to it over time as I make repairs.

I have a 78 new yorker with 31,000 miles. 440 Engine. Lean Burn is already replaced with what 78NYB recommended. Thermostat was taken out to check for thermo sticking, and was going to do "commando's self flush" specified earlier in the thread (which requires thermo out). I've had to change valve cover gaskets also since mine leaked when buying the car.

Fan clutch works great.
A/C is there, but not working.
Shroud is on.

I can put my hands up in front of the grilled and feel alot of air being pulled through, so I know it's not air-flow.

Sorry for the confusion, I originally started this thread back in the winter time and add to it every once in a while.

Thanks
 
This is a very nice car and I don't know how I haven't seen it till now, beautiful!
I say you should have a thermostat and it might as well be a 180 as I don't think a 160 lets your engine get into a proper operating temp range.
 
Thanks for the compliments

I have the thermostat and all gaskets here, it was out to check whether it was sticking or not. I have a 180 and a 160 and 3 gaskets.

The problem is, not only is my engine getting to operating temp without it, it's going beyond that.

And I forgot to answer the question about needing a thermostat or you will have luke-warm heater air.

I had no thermostat last week, and was still running my old plugged up radiator, old water pump, and old temp sending unit. With no thermostat, I was able to get very hot air out of my heater.

I replace all those parts, and still left thermostat out, and get no warm air, even though my coolant temp gauge says it's well beyond normal operating range.

Thanks for all the attention and comments, it's helped me think of other things as well.

And for all thermostat comments, once I can get it to stay at or under operating temp (or around there) I fully intend to put it back in. The thermostat being out is not a permanent thing. It was a troubleshooting step for me last month before ordering a new radiator.

Thanks!
 
And you said previously that your engine oil is black and is not a milky color? If your engine oil is black and you replaced everything except the fan clutch. I would replace the fan clutch. I had a 73 Challenger in Wisconsin in 1973 (it was my daily driver) and I had a problem with the engine overheating when the ambient temperature was 10 degrees F. Everything on the cooling sytem was brand new and all components appeared to be working. I took out the thermostat and no change. Had to be either the water pump or the fan clutch. I changed the fan clutch and it was the problem. Even though that original fan clutch looked ok, seal not leaking, and appearing to work... it wasn't and was overheating the engine.
 
Hey all,

As you know I've been battling an overheating problem on my 1978 New Yorker, 440, that is on page 1 of this thread.
I've changed:
radiator
thermostat (multiple times)
water pump
sending unit
fan clutch

I was still having overheating problems. Even with no thermostat my heat gauge still read that it was getting warm. After many, many radiator drains, parts changes, and lots of frustration, I could only assume that the next step was digging into the heater core, or checking intake and head gaskets. But, before actually getting down to intake and head gaskets, I figured I should probably double check and make sure that my heat gauge in the cluster itself was true. I bought an infrared temp gun to check hoses... top read 210, bottom 150, but I didn't trust the gun.

So I went and ordered a new sending unit and Auto Meter (part # 4337) gauge with the 1/8 NPT that is required for the sending unit.

And Voila...it's magic. This was the reading after I pulled back into my house after driving in stop and go traffic, and up and down hills. Probably about 90 degrees F ambient here. I put in a 180 thermostat, and even after putting a load on the engine (35 MPH up hill, and climbing) it never got over 190!
IMG-20120811-00273.jpg

IMG-20120811-00273.jpg
 
So, I guess I can officially say that my heat gauge went bad in the cluster.

PS Thanks to all who replied on this thread!
 
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