New 320 owner, 62?

[thisismatt]

Welp, consider me disturbed

[wayno]

All I can say is Ouch.

 

Don't be wiggling it around trying to figure out if it is broken, if it is straight let it be and let it heal, if your having issues with breathing in and out of one side then you need to go see a doctor, maybe you should anyway, as they may have to put stuff inside your nose to open it up evenly on both nostrils and let it heal that way, I had to have that done once as my face bent the steering wheel when a kid hit me head on(destroyed the Dodge van), and I will give you some advice, if they do fill up your nostrils, when they take it out do not breath in, take a big breath thru your mouth and then blow out your nose, it is a terrible smell that first breath.

[datzenmike]

When I say how to thump the back of the wheel towards you I always add 'turn your head'.

 

You could have smashed out your front teeth which is way worse. Chicks dig a bent nose.... make you look dangerous.

[difrangia]

Leave the nut on the steering column shaft a couple of threads next time. Hope you don't wear glasses or that boo-boo will keep on giving for a while.

 

I got TKO'd by my brother's mid-late 70's Olds Cutlass once. The family used to meet at our parent's house for Sunday dinner back in the 80's. After dinner one Sunday brother was gonna check the oil or do something in the Cutlass engine room. The cable operated hood release wouldn't work and brother and our dad were finagling with it trying to get it open. Mechanical wizard, me, pushed everyone aside and says "Let me show you how to do that". Squatted down a little and squinted my eyes and looked down through the crack between the front of the hood and the front fascia panel to look for the cable going to the release. I could see it and wormed my hand in a gap below the grille till I could barely hook a couple of fingers around the cable housing. Raised head up 6-8 inches from hood gap and gave it a couple of good healthy tugs and; nothing. Couple of more tugs; more nothing. Took another close up look down the hood crack to see if I could adjust the method and gave it a little tug. POW !! That sucker went off like an Improvised Explosive Device and the cute little hood center trim nailed me right at the inner edge of the right eyebrow. When someone says that they saw stars from a blow to the noggin, believe them. I staggered backward a couple of steps, still squatted down, and landed square on my azz. A nice little calliope of colorful stars were circling my visual field, a healthy rivulet of fresh blood was dripping off my chin, and brothers and dad were laughing up a hoot !! Guess it was pretty comical from where they stood, but I kinda missed the humor. Ya live & ya learn !!

[320 Newb]

I've got an electrical mystery on my hands. The turn signal lights on the gauge bezel are getting power when the turn signals are engaged but the light bulbs don't light up. The terminal in the light socket lights up the tester light but doesn't light the bulbs. I tried a few new bulbs, and pushed the terminal out of the housing and made direct terminal to bulb contact. And it lights up the tester light nice and bright. Any ideas?

[wayno]

Do the front and rear turn signals work?

 Test the bulbs themselves before putting them in the sockets, I just use a wire with large alligator clips on both ends, I put one end on the ground on the bulb, the other end goes to the ground on the battery, then I carefully touch the center of the bottom of the bulb to the positive post on the battery, if it don't light up then clean the bulb metal pieces and try again, if it lights up then I put it in the socket and clip the wires on the socket leads and if it don't light up I clean the socket and try again, if it lights up then I install it in the instrument cluster and give it power thru the cluster leads, if it don't light up then I clean the cluster connections including the ground areas around where the bulbs insert into the cluster, all this stuff is old and needs to be cleaned, I cleaned my 521 instrument cluster in the work truck and everything works great now, need to do the 520 now as the right blinker in the cluster doesn't work anymore unless I fiddle with the bulb housing, and then it only works a couple times, then I have to fiddle with it again, it needs cleaned really bad.

 

[320 Newb]

I searched around behind the bezel with a flashlight and found an unsecured ground with a ring terminal. I'll attach it to one of the gauge screws and I bet it does the trick. 

 

In steering wheel to nose news, my 5 year old jumped on me in bed this morning when I was sleeping and busted it back open. I was awoken to pain and blood everywhere.

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

My 7 year old son hit me right in the face with a snowball the other day. Actually drew blood.

 

I feel your pain.

[320 Newb]

Oh man your son's got quite the arm.

 

Still struggling getting the turn signals and gauge bezel lights working. I secured the loose ground from behind the gauges but it didn't fix my probs. 

 

 

[wayno]

OK, I have 2 clusters in front of me, one is an early one and one is a 1965, they appear to be the same turn signal wise.

The turn signal light wires are left green/red line, right green/black line, the wires go to a 4 wire plug and from there the wires go to the turn signal switch on the column and to the turn signals front and back, the ground(LOL) for the lights is the cluster, the gauge cluster itself is grounded(LOL) by one black wire secured to the right gauge cluster mount screw, that black wire is in the 6 wire plug.

If both them plugs are not plugged in it might not work properly, but you need to keep on mind that except for the 1965(Maybe) the black wires are the positive and all the rest of the wires are some sort of ground, these are positive ground trucks, you have to wrap your brain around that, POSITIVE GROUND!!!

If you have it set up for negative ground, I do not know, make sure the light housings for the turn signal indicators are clean so they make the connection.

Edited January 9, 2020 by wayno

[320 Newb]

Thanks Wayno that's super helpful. I'm running neg ground. My truck is early and all the ground wires are solid black. 

 

The strangest thing is all the bezel lights light up the tester light like they should. The high beam socket lights the tester light when I click on the high beams, the turn signal lights make the tester light flash on/off when the turn signals are engaged. But they don't light the bulbs. They're new bulbs and contact in the sockets is good. I'm stumped. 

[wayno]

I would disconnect that black wire you mounted to the gauge cluster as a ground until you know what it is for, as originally it was a positive wire, black wires were not grounds when the truck was built, the truck body and any black wire was a positive feed line, if you look at the wiring diagram that black wire connected to the instrument cluster thru that 6 wire plug comes from the fuse block.

Maybe that black wire is messing things up as it is now positive power going to ground now, going from positive ground to negative ground can mess with ones head, everything has to work backwards, the guy before you might have had it figured out but when you took everything apart you may not be putting it back together the way it was wired because your thinking negative ground, have you blown any fuses?

[stevecar]

Don't get sidetracked on whether the ground is positive or negative. It doesn't matter to the lights. LEDs care, but not incandescent bulbs.

It sounds like your cluster is not connected to ground good enough. Maybe you painted the area where it gets connected.

[320 Newb]

6 hours ago, stevecar said:

Don't get sidetracked on whether the ground is positive or negative. It doesn't matter to the lights. LEDs care, but not incandescent bulbs.

It sounds like your cluster is not connected to ground good enough. Maybe you painted the area where it gets connected.

 

Great idea to troubleshoot. Most of the ground spots have new paint.

[320 Newb]

Was driving yesterday and smelt electrical smoke. Pulled over and the headlight fuse was smoking a little bit. I'm going to start going through all the wires on that leg of the harness. 

 

On the upside I got my bumpers back from chrome.

 

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

Don't let the smoke out! It never goes back in.

[320 Newb]

22 hours ago, Stoffregen Motorsports said:

Don't let the smoke out! It never goes back in.

Haha I don't want that smoke!

 

I went through my wiring and couldn't find anything but discovered my flasher relay was arcing inside and flashing at an erratic pace. Also when I found the smoke it was after I was at an intersection with my turn signals on for a long time. I'm a little doubtful but I hope that was it. I put in a new flasher and everything seems good. 

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

That sounds like a smoking gun (no pun intended).

[320 Newb]

Stuck on some shiny stuff today

 

[difrangia]

Whuuu...uuh !! , Moses !! That's an ethereal pic !!

 

Those hubcaps could trigger orgasms round here  !!

 

Nice work !!!

[320 Newb]

Thanks for the kind words! I'm going to start polishing the stainless body trim tonight.

[320 Newb]

I'm looking for a grey vinyl perforated, foam backed headliner I can cut and install myself. Does anyone have any leads? I haven't had any luck scouring eBay and the googles. 

 

Or could I get an adhesive noise dampener then use a spray adhesive to secure grey perf vinyl? Any tips or pitfalls to avoid?

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

Try your local upholstery shop. They will have the info you need, and maybe even have the material. They could probably install it for a couple hundred bucks.

 

I found this online, but it's white - https://actionup.com/shop/perforated-marine-headliner/

 

This too - https://www.ebay.com/itm/Black-Headliner-Material-Perforated-Vinyl-Foam-Back-By-the-Yard-54-Wide-/261993774731

[320 Newb]

42 minutes ago, Stoffregen Motorsports said:

Try your local upholstery shop. They will have the info you need, and maybe even have the material. They could probably install it for a couple hundred bucks.

 

I'm going to try and do it myself but this is my fallback plan. 

[Conner]

Here's one option: