AMC Eagle

[MadMan]

I had a neighbor who told me a story. He had an old Ford Bronco, not sure how old, he made it seem like the 80s, but probably the 70s, hard to say. He no longer had it when I heard the story. He used to drive 200 miles to work and back every day. He had to stop halfway (both there and back) and clean the points!

I'm sure it's an extreme example, but I would take one or two failures (needing a tow truck) over cleaning my points twice a day, I'll tell you that much.

[MIPS]

Okay well now that I've played with the timing a bit it's apparent that the Eagle isn't liking the diet of 86 and both sea level and high altitude (above 3000 feet) driving. You can tune for above or below and 90% of the time it will be behaved but the variance in air density means somewhere along the line you're gonna get some wicked knock.
This is fixed starting in 1984 with a redesigned (okay, internally it's the same microcontroller) computer that includes a knock sensor, but I'm an 82, so no knock sensor. Of course, there's a fix for that.



They don't normally come up for sale often but it's great for adding a knock sensor to a non-equipped engine and it supports almost every ignition type. Popular Science positively reviewed it in 1984 and yesterday found one for the equivalent of "half price" in 80's dollars...but it's going to a PO box int he states so it's unlikely I'll be able to install it for a while.

[MadMan]

You could probably make one with an ordinary knock sensor and a Raspberry Pi. Old Chevy knock sensors are tapered pipe thread that fit in the block's coolant drain.

[dishdude]

This sucker is clean.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1988-Americ...gAAOSwqmJfVQ4T

[MIPS]

Ran into a small fire. Nothing too serious.

For those who have grown up with cars where the headlamps are contolled by a relay, in the days before that was a thing you had both battery voltage and the full draw of the headlights coming right up to the dash and getting routed by a switch. Doing it this way did work but put a lot more stress on what was otherwise a combination switch. It's a common issue for the switch or the connector or in some cases even the harness to burn up from age related wear.

In my case it appears my switch has been replaced previously, however the housing later cracked and the main headlight output terminal came loose. The resulting resistance burned the wire and spade clean through the connector.
Note the two marks where the spade was just sitting loosely on top of the terminal.



So better now when it's getting colder and there's less daylight to pull the cluster and replace the headlight control and dimmer switches. Thankfully my local parts shop supplies both.

[MadMan]

You know they sell the plug, too, right?

[MIPS]

Yes but I needed the car tonight and the plug would of not come in to my supplier until Tuesday. I just snipped the old crimp off, crimped and soldered in a new one and now it's all good.

[MadMan]

Nice improvisation.

[MIPS]

Dammit, but now the speedometer cable chatters.

That cable was a pain in the ass to separate from the cluster. It's right above the column support and the end is plastic, not metal so it's really easy to snap off and you pretty much have to crawl under the dash and reach in with one arm and one eyeball clearly seeing where your hand is while you hold a flashlight in your mouth. You barely get enough space for a finger and thumb to grab the knurl on the cable, unthread it and pull it two inches back to remove the cable.
Anyways I did get it out and even before I pulled anything the cluster had an annoying habit of developing a "sque.........eek" that came and went, so I took a drop or two of 3 in 1 to the speedometer port and shot some lithium grease down the cable.....yet somehow I made it even worse.

[Titan1a]

Sounds like it needed graphite or molybdenum.

[MadMan]

The cable sleeve may simply be damaged internally, and you made it worse by disturbing it. Just a hypothesis.

[MIPS]

Eugh. I had a suspicion that would be the problem potentially but I really cannot spare any enthusiasm for a job like that. Fun quirk about this car is that because it has dealer installed cruise control and not factory, you have to be careful when selecting a replacement cable and sleeve or you will end up with one too short.

I mean, the cable and sleeve replacement kits are not hard to find and they are cheap but I would rather not deal with that crap now that we're dropping below freezing at night.

[MIPS]

Okay nevermind. Turned out to just want a bit of oil.




*phew!*

[Macdude]

Nice, I have two Eagles on the road. An 86 wagon and an 82 SX/4.

I had knock and temp issues for years with the 86, even with the knock sensor active.

[MIPS]

As anyone might of notices, mechanically the car has been pretty quiet for a while now.
AND THEN THIS MORNING.





Driving home from the night shift on mainly dry roads when the rear passenger axle snaps. After calling BCAA and getting it hitched up (ironically, it was the same person who towed me way the hell back when the transmission failed so he remembered me ) and dropped off at the shop with a jack stand under the axle I didn't get to bed until 3:30 this morning.
So what happened here is I'm pretty sure it's nothing I did that caused this. I'm still hunting down the bulletin but for a short period someone didn't have their torque driver set right and the rear passenger axle nut was overtightened. It's apparently very common for cars that missed the bulletin back in the 80's to snap their axle inside the hub and then strip out the splines. Eagles use the AMC model 35 axle which is derived from the Dana model 35, but they are not the same so in the middle of winter I have to head out into the snow and see if I can dig out another axle shaft in the dead of winter.