Story and photos by Mark Wing

The work party at Larry’s Garage was very busy on this late summer’s day with projects by Dave Ferro, Frank Lewark, Jeff Richards, Kirk Peterson, and Paul Duncan.

Dave Ferro had occasionally experienced a shimmy on his 1918 Model T depot hack.  He had already replaced the kingpins, so he knew that wasn’t the problem.  After inspection, Dave found that his Pitman Arm was a little loose, the tie rod ends had worn oval and the threads stripped.  Larry suggested drilling out the damaged threads, tapping, and then inserting a Helicoil at each of the ends.  The Helicoil repair and Pitman Arm tightening should solve the shimmy problem.

Frank Lewark of Lemitar, NM was at the work party to have Larry rebabbitt a 1924 engine block and rod caps. The old babbitt was melted out, the surfaces cleaned, tinned, and recast.  On a follow-up work party the following Monday, the block was line-bored.

Jeff Richards brought his 1926 Model T touring car for repairs in preparation for the tour to Las Cruces, NM later in the month.  Repairs included tracking down a hard starting problem, tightening the steering components, and checking wheel alignment.

Mark Wing had brought his newly rebuilt 1925 touring engine with the idea of replacing the new ball bearing 4th main with a newly babbitted one from Gene French.  Several of our club members had experienced the common problem of oil leakage from the ball bearing 4th mains, and many of them switched out for the tried and true conventional 4th mains when the opportunity arose.  In this case, Larry checked the serialization on the ball bearing 4th main already installed in Mark’s engine and found it to be different than the type that Larry had recently had leakage problems with.  The decision was made to just try this one out and see if it leaks.  If necessary, the engine can be removed at a later date and the problem corrected if oil leakage becomes a chronic problem.

Paul and Marilyn Duncan were installing Rocky Mountain Brakes to their 1927 pickup truck.  With assistance from Al Schwanke, Eddie Paquette, and other club members, great progress was made on the installation.  At a work party the following Monday, the final installation and adjustment was completed.  The work party that day concluded with Larry and Paul taking the pickup out for a test drive.

Thank you Larry for very productive and enjoyable work parties!