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I wouldn't go there with the idea of repairing the rust in the doors. If you want to drive a decent, un-rusty car, the first step would be to move out of the upper midwest.
Not what you want to hear, but it's the unvarnished truth.
You really have to limit your expectations on this car. You can and should tune it up so it gets better MPG and power, but a partial restoration of the body is just not worth it. Long story short, you can replace metal here, and then it will rust through over there.
It is quite possible to completely restore this car of course, if it was a barn-find Hemi Cuda for example you could consider full disassembly and immersion strip the body, weld in new metal, while another shop rebuilds the running gear. Even if you acted as the "general contractor" for such a project, you would need over 100K to do it. Obviously beyond insane for the car you have. Particularly since you could go to the South or West and buy the best remaining example of this car for probably $5000 or less, and it would be original, not resotored.
Has anybody ever tried applying cold to a bleeder screw, hold a chunk of dry ice against it, to try to make it contract and break free?
I have applied a little judicious heat near the screw as well, probably anybody who has been wrenching as a serious shade tree or a pro for more than a couple of years has done it.
It is a pushrod engine but I think it has a timing chain setup similar to Chevy V8s - I think anyway. If that's what it has, the chain and sprockets are pretty robust and don't generally give trouble, and if it does break, this is a non-interference engine so you will need a tow and to replace the chain, but no valve-piston close encounters of the expensive kind.
I wouldn't go there with the idea of repairing the rust in the doors. If you want to drive a decent, un-rusty car, the first step would be to move out of the upper midwest.
Not what you want to hear, but it's the unvarnished truth.
You really have to limit your expectations on this car. You can and should tune it up so it gets better MPG and power, but a partial restoration of the body is just not worth it. Long story short, you can replace metal here, and then it will rust through over there.
It is quite possible to completely restore this car of course, if it was a barn-find Hemi Cuda for example you could consider full disassembly and immersion strip the body, weld in new metal, while another shop rebuilds the running gear. Even if you acted as the "general contractor" for such a project, you would need over 100K to do it. Obviously beyond insane for the car you have. Particularly since you could go to the South or West and buy the best remaining example of this car for probably $5000 or less, and it would be original, not resotored.
Well moving out of the Midwest isn't an option at this time unfortunately. Any other place other than this area of the country would be better for driving a rust-free car.
I've seen many people restore cars much older than mine is so I definitely know its possible. Of course then there's the $$ factor too.
Ok now for a new question and thoughts....I pretty much have an idea on what I need to do with the motor. I will probably do an oil change, and fill it with 4qts of the dino oil and add a qt of the MMO (Marvel Mystery Oil) to help clean it up a bit, then I will do another OC in about 1,000 miles or so.
Now as for the tranny, it shifts smooth as it should. I was thinking of just doing the pan drop and changing the filter and fluid. No flush. I did take some pics of the fluid condition as it stands, its light brown (about the consistency of light engine oil) and has no burnt smell whatsoever. So here are the pics for analysis:
The paper towel blot test:
With the car having 182K miles, the fluid condition is not bad at all, no grit or shavings on the fluid. However if its best to simply leave it alone, then I will just let it be. I don't drive hard anyway so I take good care of my vehicles. As my late grandfather always used to say, "take care of your car and it will take care of you."
Some pics of the car, and the motor. The engine compartment is pretty clean, which is nice.
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