I had a great 62 that I bought last year, and my Dad insisted on buying it from me. So, I had been on the hunt for a good straight axle. I have kept an eye on this car since seeing it at Bloomington Gold last year. To know me is to know how I like my original cars. I was pretty smitten with the car, but the price tag was not quite to my liking. I saw the car again at MCACN where it was awarded it's Triple Diamond Award. I was busy judging through the weekend, and never had a chance to catch up with the owner. I still had an interest in the car. Then to my surprise, it popped up on BaT a bit later. I was a bidder on the car, but not the winning bidder. Oh well. I thought it was a neat car and a very authentic one at that. The car struck me as a great original car, but not as pure of a "survivor" as others I have had.

A few weeks later, I got an email from BaT asking if I was still interested in the car. So after a couple of phone calls, I was the proud new owner of this 60. I was comfortable stepping up for the car, as I had seen the car in person, as well as knowing some of the people who had judged it. It was my thought I could turn this into a better car than what I had seen, added to the fact a great car I could drive. The car has had a few "notable" owners, so this is not necessarily an unknown car. Like any of them, they all have needs. This car is no exception as you will see.





The car retains it's born with drivetrain, all original dated secondary components, a wonderful unhit body, and chassis that still retains original inspection marks and frame stencil (albeit very faint).





Delivered to VV Cooke in Louisville, KY and sold on April 2nd, 1960. It original owner Mr. Marvin Henderson maintained ownership from 1960 through 1995. At the time of sale, the car was documented to have 89,601 miles. All subsequent ownership is documented with title copies, as well as cataloging all dates, codes, and stampings in the car.





This car is well equipped with the following options......
-4 speed transmission
-Deluxe heater
-Signal seeking radio
-6.70x15 4 ply W/W tires
-Windshield washer
-Courtesy lights
-Parking brake alarm
-283 / 290hp fuel injection
-Positraction axle 4.11 ratio
-Metallic brake equipment
-Sunvisors
-Hardtop

The car was campaigned through 2025. Awards for the car include.....
-1997 Bloomington Gold Survivor Award
-2025 Blooming Gold / Gold Certification
-2025 NCRS Chapter Top Flight
-2025 MCACN Gold Concours
-2025 MCACN Triple Diamond

Not much left from a judging perspective

As one can discern, this car has been a very static piece since 1995 accumulating 994 miles in 36 years. Much of the heavy lifting had been completed by the prior owner to get the car running, driving and stopping. When I picked the car up, I knew it certainly could run better. I no sooner got it out of the trailer and went to work.

The car sounded and acted like the timing was retarded. For those who do not know these F.I. cars, the distributor housing is 2pc. The lower portion is fixed, as there is an oil supply line that feeds the gear box that drives the injection unit. The top portion which contains the breaker plate and distributor cap then rotates to set ignition timing. The upper and lower portions were seized together. I was so focused on fiddling with the car, I never bothered to take some pics. Anyways, I pulled the distributor, and soaked the joint between the two with penetrant, and got that loosened up. I then loaded it up on the distributor machine to check / adjust the dwell on the both sets of points. Reinstalled, that and set the timing. Good outcome there.

Then I diagnosed the F.I. unit was not getting a vacuum signal to the enrichment diaphragm. The unit was against the rich stop (which the oil in the engine confirmed)

The vacuum signal comes from the air meter side of the unit



Then that runs under the plenum in a steel line to the enrichment diaphragm on the fuel meter.


The stop on the right is the rich stop. It's engine vacuum that determines engine load and pulls it against the lean stop (on the left). It is those two stops that determine the "tune". This is one of the reasons big camshafts and low vacuum are a hurdle in F.I. engines.


The steel line that runs under the plenum was plugged with some kind of gunk. So I sprayed some carb cleaner in the tube, let it sit overnight, and blew it out with compressed air in the morning. I am impressed with how good the car runs.

A fresh set of plugs, wires, and tires were next on the docket

 

After a fresh set of tires, a new set of wires, and some detailed work on the injection unit....and this old girl is starting to really come around. Too bad driving season is 60 days away. I have to give a shout out to both Jim Lockwood and Jerry Bramlett. Each of your detailed posts, coaching people through time, have proven to be a tremendous asset. The F.I. unit was far out of calibration. With the preliminary settings on the enrichment diaphragm to spec, the car runs just that much better. Another win!

My experience with Diamondback Tires has been favorable. I've used these in scenarios where a car will not get judged, but I still want somewhat of an authentic look. I realize a tire like this (wide whites) is not for everyone.

Time and time again, I am so impressed with how concentric the tire is, along with the minimal amount of weight they require. I've gotten in the habit of spinning my wheels on the balancer before mounting a tire. That was I know what the wheel is asking for in terms of weight along with how straight they are. On these here, I do a static balance, as I do not want the weights on the outside (like original). None of these tires required anymore the 1.5 oz. for the tire. This is a radial, yet has the squared off tread like a bias ply. Overall, this is another win!


One item I was working on was the chassis on the 60. So after a couple rounds of degreasing, scrubbing with scuff pads, steam, and preserving......this is what I have come up with. To say I am pleased is a fair statement, especially when one considers the mileage of the car!



Yes, that is the ignition shielding for the right side laying there in-between the frame rails



These two marks I did not know existed (nor do I know what they represent)



The faint remains of the A.O. Smith stencil









The engine crayon marks. "CS" is the engine suffix for the 290hp F.I. engine


Then a reality check sets in. I wanted to tune on the engine / injection unit to see how it responded. That would determine if I would work on the injection unit in house, or send it out. I was happy with how it responded. I was going to remove the unit, check everything over, and install an anti siphon solenoid here.........

Later that day, I was going to pull the car outside shoot a few glamour shots of it, as the weather was pretty good. I go to fire the car up, and the engine turns a quarter turn and met with a "clunk". WTF???? I've been here before..........I know the lyrics to this song

So I start pulling spark plugs to check for fuel. Sure enough on the #6 cylinder, it sprays like geyser. HYDROLOCK! I got the cylinder cleaned out, and fired the engine. It's not right. The vacuum reading is not the same and the engine idle is rougher. It must have distorted the connecting rod a bit. A call to my engine builder to see what his schedule is, and start pulling this apart. He has a full schedule, but he will get me in.

The irony is, the last thing I was going to do after photographing the car, was to sit down and order parts, including the anti siphon valve for the F.I. unit that prevents these instances. A good lesson to not procrastinate (intentional or non-intentional)

 

I started to pull the car down. As you will see, the chain of events was for the best, as the coolant was NOT impressive at all. I had to chisel the thermostat out of it!



On the bright side, all sign point to the intake has never been off of the engine





I continued the tear down this week, to find another little surprise........this car had a fire. Admittedly, these F.I. units are known to have the welch plug on the fuel side of the unit leak (or just come out). As you can imagine, that does not work well with a hot exhaust manifold. There was dry chemical all over, including inside the air filter housing. Another good thing I am diving into the car as far as I am.







Here is the trans before.......


After a couple rounds of cleaning.....

 

DANG!!!!!!!
I think you did good, and it's getting even better.
Good score, and just right in my book.

 

Nice, and you are making it even nicer. What a time capsule. If only these old cars could talk!

 

Tim,
I always enjoy your posts and the detailed pictorial documentation of your "finds". This appears to be another fantastic find for you

 

Another winner! Nice going Tim!

 

Wow. Impressive all around. Thanks for sharing!

 

Beautiful time capsule . My first car was a 270 HP 60 . Although not even close to yours in originality, it brings back many fond memories .

 

FWIW, my opinion is that the car has fallen into the hands of someone who appreciates the history of the car and will preserve it. Thank you for sharing, it is a time capsule. Thankfully someone along the line had enough sense to keep a fire extinguisher handy. What a beautiful car.

Drive em safe
Leo

 

That's awesome work thus far! Thanks so much for sharing with us and look forward to seeing more!

Take care and happy cruising!

 

Tim,
Nice car, great pictures, and good work all the way around!
My 62 Gulf Oil car hydrolocked on me early in its career with me. Great fun!
Mike

 

You "may" have just popped the head gasket with the fuel hydrolock. It's hard (but possible) to bend a rod just from cranking.

In any case, its a good reason to do everything to get it back to as new

Nice car, BTW. I enjoy seeing all original cars, and prefer actual original as compared to made to look as original from collected parts.

Doug

 

It was my intention to pull the passenger side head, just in order to document the authenticity of the engine stamp. Seeing as CCAS does not affirm C1's, it's an extra step I'll go through to address any objections come the day I decide to move the car on. So that affords me the opportunity to inspect the head gasket, deck, and cylinder head as well. All looks good




The engine stamp and deck look beautiful IMO. I used a combination of hand cleaner, carb cleaner, and navel jelly to clean this as it appears.

 

We started to get into a couple of items last week. One being the injection unit. Here is a pic of the enrichment diaphragm, with plenty of dry chem in it. The inside of the plenum was covered as well. Once again, it's probably for the better this all occurred.


The injection nozzle blocks were a bit distorted from the fire, so those will get replaced among all of the seals and gaskets.

The inside of the fuel meter was a bit fugly too. I expected worse though....


On a different note, there was a set back with the water pump. When I was disassembling the engine, the pump slipped from my hands and fell to the floor. With all of the rust in the cooling system, that was enough to send the pump over the edge. This pic came from AG Rebuilders.


Fortunately, this casting number is not near as tough to source nor expensive as some of the others I have needed historically. AG's inventory list indicates they have a couple of these in stock to rebuild. I'll reach back out the them today to confirm.

 

The other item that was "horrendous" was the inside of the transmission. When I drained the lube, I was a bit taken back as to how black it was. I thought, "90k mile car.........maybe original fluid?" Nope..........

Someone has been in the trans before as evidenced by the gaskets. The good news is, the gears are in excellent condition, and the shafts are straight with no twist. The bad news, the inside is like the asphalt in your driveway. Every snap ring required quite a bit of coaxing. Once the rings were removed, the gears still required force to be removed from their respective shafts, and the teeth on the speedo driven gear were completely sheared off. In other words, the speedo has not worked in quite some time. The shaft of the driven gear was stuck in the "torpedo" and required a good amount of coaxing to remove.


This of course gives concern about the rear diff. While changing all the fluids is part of my normal routine, I have to wonder what lurks in there. I'll be draining that this week to see how that looks.

Little by little, I'm going to make a good car out of this one!

 

I will be following your posts .

 

Boy oh boy.....talk about service. I just got a call from the engine builder. They knocked the engine apart last week, and got everything inspected, measured, cleaned, and parts ordered. I dropped it off mid-day last Tuesday the 17th.

The bores were .010-.012 out, so the new pistons will be at .030 over. The crank just needs a polish! The flywheel needed hardly anything in terms of resurfacing. The new pistons will yield a 10.5:1 compression ratio, new Eagle rods, timing set, and new valves / springs. I sourced an NOS 097 Duntov camshaft and I am sending that out to them today.

This could be on the dyno in a couple of weeks!

 

If I may make some observations and suggestions.....

The Main Diaphragm is not usable due to the wrinkles in the material. Best case those wrinkles could result in erratic fuel metering. Worst case, they make the diaphragm so stiff the engine won't start. Either way, I suggest replacing it.

Unless you plan to do a complete rebuild of the Fuel Meter.... meaning you completely disassemble it, clean and refurbish everything.... I suggest leaving that tan fuel residue alone. It's been there a long while and is stable.

Some one decided to safety wire two of the four bolts which hold the high pressure pump together. Interesting.....

Remove the gasket for the Fuel Meter lid and check the internal anti-siphon check valve. If the check ball is stuck in the up position, like in the photo below, the check valve has failed. At a minimum, it needs to be supplanted by an external electric solenoid valve. Even better, with the electric valve protecting against fuel siphoning, replace the check valve with a .1875 brass plug.




Check the Ratio Roller for cracks, breakage, or for the roller pin walking out:




As with the Ratio Roller, check the Axle/Link for a roller pin walking out and for wear at the pivot pin holes. Any wear is unacceptable. This is an extreme case:



There is sooo much more to check and do if you want the Fuel Meter to work properly. What I've outlined are only a few show stoppers for you to watch out for.

Good luck!

 

Thanks for chiming in on this Jim. The unit is getting a complete rebuild, including an electric anti siphon valve, as well as plugging the check valve. That included with one of Frank's balanced axle links among other things. I thought the safety wire on the high pressure pump was interesting myself.