After three years of working on it on and off, I took my T out for a drive tonight. A friend was in town and wanted to help out so we chipped away at a couple of the last little detail items to be done then ordered a pizza to celebrate. The pizza place is at the end of the block so we decided to take the '26 on its first real outing.
The low speed band slips on anything but level ground but everything else seems okay. I suspect the engine is pretty tired but without another T to benchmark against I can't say for sure. In any case the little truck must have liked being out, when I came out of the pizza place it gave me my first free start before we went back home.
All in all it's good to have it out on the road. Now I just need to tweak the transmission, maybe buy some new tires, then get it safetied.
Fabulous! May you have lots of happy T-ing!
Here's my friend Chris driving it shortly after I showed him how.
Fortunately the low pedal is an easy adjustment on the outside of the hogshead. Just loosen the lock nut, turn the adjuster in until the pedal bottoms out about an inch above the floorboard, and tighten the lock nut. Then go for another drive to celebrate.
A freebie on the first trip out? That pickup does like being out and it likes you!
I don't see a cloud of smoke behind the T like one of mine. It's in good shape! ;-) ;-)
I bet that felt good and thanks for posting for us!
That is a great feeling Tim. Glad to hear your on the road to alot of fun.
Drive safe and often
Thanks Steve, but unfortunately that low pedal adjustment is all out of threads. I popped the transmission cover off to see if there was some hope of maybe shimming it with a washer or something just to float the car along until winter but the low speed spring is compressed so far that it seems to be what's preventing full engagement of the band. No big deal, looks like I'm learning to replace band linings next week...
I got the high speed clutch fingers tightened up while I was in there but I may have overdone it a hair. I'm trying to picture the mechanism from my desk right now but I think I can free up my neutral by lengthening the bolt that rides on the cam, right? Then do I go back through the adjusting for free neutral procedure?