Cowl drains, hubcaps, tire info

[kuusamon]

I took some pictures of my wheel wells. I remember reading a thread of part in the technical tips about cowl drains.
In my right wheel well (passenger side) you can see the nice round hole that leads to the cowl vent inside the car. Basically strange if you don't know because the splash water from the tire goes right in the hole and probably causing rust in the heater area.
This hole is not there on the driver side? is that correct, or maybe it might look that there was a new steel plate, replacement part?, covering that hole.
In those places there must be then the rubber cowl drain so you won't get water inside but just air, correct?

What have other members than about this solution? do most of you have the (rubber?) cowl drains or made something different there?
also a picture of my hubcap and tires. I have several books, Williams restoration guide and another parts exchange replacement book. have not found the exact hubcaps, close to it but not exact, are these original or from a galaxi maybe?
also a pic of my tires, not in bad shape, are still looking good, any info on tire where to buy this particular tire brand?

also a picture of my left front inner wheel well seen from the engine bay. You can see the left wheel through the opening was this always like that or did some models/years have a rubber splash guard inside from splashing mud on the side of the engine?

[Coral]

my 60 has the same (open) hole on the pass. side and not on the drivers - yours does look like something was added there....
The hubcap center almost look like LTD's logo, (but its hard to see) thunderbird hubcaps can be viewed on Dennis Carpenter Ford's link in the advertisement or vendor area, page 18 of his catalog, you can click on the small disk to view online.
http://www.cokertire.com is fairly popular for the older look tires.

[kuusamon]

Thank you, here a better pic of the logo.
Could not find anything on that on the net or in the catalog's. the logo seems familiar but have not seen this type of hubcap.

[partsetal]

Ronald,
What you are looking at behind the wheels are the splash shields. Yes, only the right side has a hole, and there is supposed to be a plug in there to prevent splash from getting behind it.
If you were to remove them you would see the structure that makes up the inner rocker panel and the cowl box that forms the lower portion of the windshield and cowl drain. The cowl drain is a large hole at the bottom of the cowl box that is supposed to drain the water that comes in through the ventilator that surrounds the windshield wiper posts. This fragile rubber tube affair is supposed to drain water through the space between the fender and the inner rocker panel. The way the outlet in the cowl box is designed, the water level must reach about a 1/2" before it ever reaches the fragile tube. The reason for rust here?? Also the drains clog up sometimes around the outlet and allow debris to build up between the splash shield and the curved part of the inner rocker. When you see corrosion or rust thru on the splash shield chances are there is damage to the inner rocker piece.
Carl

[DKheld]

Ronald,

That's about a '72 Mercury Montego hubcap - may have also been on the Mercury Cougar that year but I believe those are just for the Montego.

I have 6 original style Tbird hubcaps that are driver quality. Im always picking one or two up at car shows for a few bucks. They all have dings, scratches, will need polishing and the spears or rays will need painting (one is warped and would probably only be good for a spare cover in the trunk although I have fixed some pretty bad ones). The hubcaps are not flattened or terrible and all have their shape they will just need a little work.

Feel bad that your Tbird has to wear Merc. hubcaps over there in Finland so you can have them if you want to pay shipping. (If I make it to Finland someday you can buy me lunch) Checked with FedX and UPS but prices were around $200 which I thought was very high. The US Postal Service has an estimated rate of around $60 US. I guessed at the size and weight so it may be a little more or less. I would be happy to box them up and take them to the Post Office for a better shipping estimate then wait to hear if you want them. I valued them at $25 for customs and didn't see any restrictions on car parts to Finland on the post office customs restrictions.

I'll post some pictures here later today to give you a better idea of what they look like if you are interested.

On the tires - those appear to be polyester or bias ply tires. The car will wander quite a bit in the road even with all new suspension parts. If you can afford it and do not care for original style tires put radial tires on as soon as possible (they are available in wide white wall in the link Coral pointed out). Drive it first with the bias ply tires then put the radials on - you will not believe the difference in handling - I did this with mine 6-7 years ago.

Eric
registry 5347



The worst one around the edge

[kuusamon]

Eric, thank you very much for the offer, sounds great.
after your post I went and checked a site that I checked before but just to much yo go through but now wit the info you gave me I found them and indeed your right on, indeed Mercury and cougar 1972. That site is 'hubcaps.org' but they have hundreds and hundreds of them, just impossible to find if you don't know what you are looking for.

I like to accept you very nice offer and its much simpler than that concerning the sending. Don't have to be send to Finland but to California, from there a friend company container will leave sometime next month to Europe.
I send you a p.m. on that.

Thank you very much, very nice of you.
regards,
Ron

[kuusamon]

if its ok I will make a new thread concerning a small new problem I found today that I have to fix, its concerning cowl drain, or at least related. The problem that was described here about standing water did happen.
Have to look up some info on it with a drawing and ford parts numbers.
regards
Ron

[Coral]

I am glad you got some resolve on this issue!

[kuusamon]

yes thanks on the tires also, they still look nice and not dried out yet with plenty of thread left, actually they look hardly used but I have to look for the DOT info to see how old they are, if older than 10 years they must be changed anyway.
I am planning to get some good radial white walls as soon as the car is ready and drive able then I will get some more modern 14 inch rims first that are disc brake fitting because I will get that done also in the near future.
Hopefully get the car ready this year and the next container from my friends company end of this year of next year may might have rims, new tires and brake conversion parts in it. if...my budget is sufficient...

regards
Ron

[DKheld]

Ron,
There are a few alternatives to purchasing the wide whitewall radial tires. You can purchase a standard set of tires and make them appear to be wide whitewalls in 2 ways.

1) Tire paint - reference ebay item 330425753619 - never used it - don't know much about it or how it would last.

2) Port-a-walls - had them on my car before I changed to radial tires. Worked great, couldn't tell they were not part of the tire unless you examined them closely, flared away from the tire slightly at highway speeds (didn't know untill a friend told me), need to run tubes because the tires don't seal well.

Was changing to radials and would have replaced the port-a-walls because the tires and port-a-walls were 12 years old, polyester and dry rotted but was unable to find any port-a-walls 7 -8 years ago so went with wide white radial tires. May be cheaper this way if one of your tires is ever damaged - just get a new standard tire and put the port-a-wall back on.
reference ebay item 280497920179 - never purchased from this seller. (These may be illegal in Finland ??)

Also try http://www.widewhitewalltires.com These are the brand of tires I purchased for my car and they have been great so far - slightly cheaper than Coker tire.

This is a picture of my car about 12 years ago with the port-a-walls although it was a low resolution picture it was the best my old digital camera back then could do



Eric
registry 5347