Reproduction Parts for 1916-1964 Chevrolet Passenger Cars & 1918-1987 Chevrolet & GMC Trucks


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Clement, Dave39MD, David_S
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
I have been making a document of ongoing progress since we started this project. I will start posting the progress in a single thread to avoid having to many individual ones.

June 2018
1941 Chevrolet Master Deluxe delivered. Goal of this is to be a father son project. I have done basic mechanic work and minor paint work prior to this but nothing to this extent or scale. This is not planned to be a restoration to a show car or to ‘of the assembly line’ condition. It is designed to go to local drive ins and get ice cream. It is going to be a for fun car. Many of the choices will be left to my sons, they may not be period correct. This is a combined experience.

One of the first things done after a good car wash, was buying reprints of all the literature and service manuals for the car. Also lots of You Tube videos have been and continue to be watched as needed. Also joined the VCCA as a great source of information. Before purchasing this car I was already a member on gbodyforum.com. That is a great source of information that I have used for my Monte Carlo. This site also has several members willing to help on any topic they can.

The car came with lots of parts and was mostly complete. Good condition for the age. Last known registration based on the sticker on the window was 1969 in Missouri. Did not run when purchased. New battery, changed fluids cleaned points and it started.

Drove it about 2 miles to verify all the gears and clutch worked. Ran well considering it was sitting for at least the last seven years, if not more. Brakes worked well too. Was not safe to drive to far since the dry rot in the tires was extensive. One tire the inner tube can be seen through the sidewall. The brands on the tires are manufactures that have not been around since the sixties. The test drive was made to help assess what we were going to need to do.
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
Time to update this thread. A few parts I may have placed elsewhere on the forum but I thought I should make this thread complete.

Fixed the sticking throttle and brake. put the floor plate back in and it should be ready for a test run shortly.

Took the 41 on the road for a 5 mile trip. It starts, stops, and shifts without issue. Temps stayed around 180 for the trip per the gauge. All the gauges (not counting the gas gauge as it was running off a jug) appear to work correctly. Headlights are working (tail lights not yet connected). Suspension was smooth and the engine sounded good. Started after about 30 seconds without anything sprayed down the carb. Did smoke a bit for the first 1/8 mile but that cleared up. Hills did not seem to affect it. Stayed at 30 MPH without an issue, did not try anything faster. The body panels were not even making noises.

Pleased for a first true test of three years' work. We were expecting bigger issues or some problems. Did have some coolant coming out the overflow but we suspect that was due to us overfilling it and not knowing how much to add.
Biggest issue was we ran out of gas 6 feet from our garage door when putting it away. :)

The mirrors arrived and we have them mounted. Mounted them to the top of the door frame just over the vent window. The driver's side is ok (not great) for driving use. The passenger side is useless for driving use. The passenger side is great for aiming at the back corner of the car. It will be a great help for backing and parking. They did not fit in front of the vent window due to the door gap being too small. I do like the look of them and the boys are happy too.

Also mounted the wipers. They are not functional yet but they do look better than having the big holes in the body.

Tail lights wired and working. Sons fixed the brake light switch on their own. Currently the wires are run to add blinkers in the future but at this point we are aiming to get it on the road. Will probably finish the blinkers when it is off the road for the winter.
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
Winter break is over and we have completed rewiring the car. All of the new items function properly. The dimmer for the dash lights now works. Car now has blinkers and a horn. All of the dash lights were replaced with new bulbs. Started the car and drove it out into the driveway to test everything. The headlights, dash lights and especially the tail lights all appeared brighter after the rewiring. After this was completed we documented all of the new wire colors in the back of the 41 service manual. Also recorded the part numbers for the blinker kit and the flasher.

The chassis was lubricated today. First time they have used a grease gun. Found a diagram in the 41 maintenance manual showing all of the lubrication points. While they were working down there they adjusted the hangar for the tailpipe. It was too high in the rear and the pipe did not allow for much movement. Loosening the mount a little and lengthening it gave the pipe some give and allowed it to hang closer to the correct position.

We made an effort to get the radio working for the car. Using jumper wires with alligator clips on them we connected them to the car. Also connected an antenna. With the power on to the car we turned the dial on the radio to see what would happen. Then we waited hoping it just needed to warm up. Then we tuned it hoping something would happen. Finally we decided that since only one tube had a slight glow to it that the radio was not going to work without requiring repairs. We had already decided if it worked currently then we would put it in. If it did not then we were going to let it be. There are only a few talk radio AM channels left in the area and of these only two are powerful enough to receive regularly so there is not much benefit to us from an AM only radio unless it already worked. Going to go with a hidden Bluetooth speaker when we get to that point. Might still clean up the old radio and place it in the dash for looks. That is a decision for another time.
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
Headlights are in and finished the harnesses for them. Unfortunately the old wires cannot be removed from the dimmer switch. The screws are just to rusted. Removed it from the car and waiting for a new one to come from the Filling Station. Also ordered a headlight switch while I was at it. The dimmer for the gauges only works in one spot. When I initially tested it I thought the gauge must be on or off for the light, then I thought why would it turn so far past on if it was not a dimmer.

Currently we are only removing a few wires at a time so we do not forget something. I know it will take longer this way but it is working so far.
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by ruscar
ruscar
Thank you for the well described updates. In my opinion too many ask for advice or recommendation and we never hear of the outcome. Again, thanks.
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by Rusty 37 Master
Rusty 37 Master
Glad that you got that past inspection.

I remember working at Firestone in Richmond, VA in the 60's. We had 2 mechanics authorized to perform the twice a year state safety inspection. One day there was quite a commotion in the shop. A customer was extremely mad that he could not use a dash mounted switch to activate the horn.
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
April 2023

Carburetor has been leaking for some time. It needed a rebuild. Luckily I was able to find an already rebuilt one being sold for my car. We installed it today. At first was a little concerned when the one that we removed did not exactly match the one we had received. Found a web site that detailed the changes to the Carter W1 carburetor used by Chevrolet over the years. Turns out that my 41 had a carburetor for a 39 or 40 on it. The one I received was for a 41. We installed it and the car fired right up and idles smoothly. Unfortunately the gas line is leaking slightly where it connects to the carb. We will have to get a new fitting for it before we can really test drive it with the new to us carb. I do not want to have a leaking line over a hot engine, even with a very small leak.
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
Started making door cards. We had bought the canvas last year thinking we would do this over the winter. Other items took priority. Now that we do not want to do anything to take the car off the road we are working on the interior. Used duck canvas, hard board and for a little padding we used my wife's old yoga mat, she now has a new one. Installing the rear panel a few wrinkles appeared when the panel was bent to fit but we thought it still looked good.

Door handles and window cranks are back on. As well as the window trim on the doors. Since we left the dash with the original paint we decided to do the same with the trim pieces for the windows. There are scratches and marks but it somehow adds to the character of the car. For the escutcheons around the door handles and window cranks we found chair sliders that were the same color as the handles knobs and modified them to work. We only had a handful for the car. Completed the kick panels also. They were mounted with industrial Velcro. The driver's side is hiding the fuse block we installed. Having minivan bench seats installed has been nice for working on the car. They fold down and out of the way when you need more room to work on the interior. Since we made brackets to mount them with if we ever do get the original seats done we can swap them out without any issues. A goal has been to make it that anything we do can be undone down the road.
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by Mr87Monty
Mr87Monty
Took the valve cover off to fix a leaking valve cover gasket and found that the oil line to the rocker oiler was cut and that the return line was held on with a piece of wire. The old gasket was cracked at each corner and extremely hard. Thanks to the community at VCCA we were able to replace the part. My oldest took off the front set of rockers so we could slide the new oiler on. Using a compression fitting the old line could be attached to the new oiler. Once the rockers were all back in place we checked the spacing and verified that oil was going everywhere it was supposed to. Next we put a valve cover gasket on and gave it a test drive. No leaks appeared from the valve cover gasket and the engine sounds better since setting the spacing on the valves. Since we were doing all this work we changed the spark plugs also. They did not look bad but we had it apart.
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