Fred's Page

Hello one and all,

When I started doing this page, I mentioned I was open to criticism’s and corrections. Well I’ve had our first contributor in that dept., in our good member Gene Hall. He pointed out to me at the last meeting that I had begun my last 2 articles on a negative note, by apologizing and chiding myself for procrastination. He said it takes away from the reader’s enthusiasm to spend their time reading the article. Upon reflection I see that he is right. Thank you Gene for teaching me something about writing.

Lynda and I entered the ’32 in the Joe Bailon custom car and hot rod show at the Auburn Gold country fairgrounds. During the awards ceremony I received an autographed Candy Apple Red clock. Joe Bailon is one of the most famous custom car builder’s and originator of candy apple paint. He retired to Auburn and has put on this free to the public show, for about 10 years. This is the 2nd. year that we have seen Andy and Linda Nance working at the car show.

Last mo. I said I would describe the way to get filtered oil to all bearing surfaces, except the rear main. I am going to show in this month’s article the way the stock system works. When you look at the drawing you are looking at the rear of the block. You have to picture the oil pump being mounted forward of the rear main, in the sump area of the pan. The pump it’s self is not submerged in oil, but it has a pick-up tube that does go down into the oil. The early V-8’s didn’t even have a screen on the pick-up tube, while the later one did. The pump gears are in a cast iron housing that extends upward into a cavity in the block. From this cavity the pressurized oil goes out through a small hole to the rear main bearing and upward through a larger passageway. That is where the drawing takes over marked “from pump”. There is a way to also filter the oil to the rear main, but more complicated to do. As an aside, you may remember having seen ad’s for the pan plugs with magnets on them to attract bits of furious metal that might be traveling in the oil.

As I write this I keep coming up with more things to say. I guess I will just stick to the subject at hand, which is how to protect your engine by filtering the oil, before it reaches the area where an abrasion of a bearing surface can take place. We must remember the distance between metal to metal contact is just a few thousands of an inch. Try taking a piece of paper and marking 1 inch on it and then with the finest pointed pencil you can get your hands on, mark 1000 marks in the one inch space. Get the picture!

Here is another mind bender. At 6000rpm a 4 cycle engine is firing each cylinder 50 times per second. There are 4 cycle engines that run at 12,000 rpm, or 100 times per second. With 8 of those baby’s under your hood at 3000 rpm going 70 mph down the freeway we can see why that 350-400 cubic inch s.u.v. is sucking so much fuel. Think of the amount of oxygen being burned out of the earth’s supply every day. Amazing that there is any left for us to breathe. Ok how about this, the size of each cylinder is approximately the size of a can of beans. The engine in your old Ford V-8 is running at 3000 rpm and you’re flying down the road at 60-70 mph, depending on your gearing. That’s 25 cans of air and fuel going through each of those cylinders per second. 25 per second x 8 =200 cans x 60 seconds = 12,000 cans per minute x60 minutes = 720,000 cans per hour. Let’s say we drive to L.A. in 8 hrs. x 720,000 cans per hr. this will = 5,760,000 cans. Kinda fun playing with this stuff.

Keep it right side up.