Since it has been so cold I decided that I should redo this valve. I was lucky to get the valve from another 'Bolter in town. Thanks "No1300". So I have been thinking that I should leave it alone as it appears to not leak air anyway. But after fixing the cowl area and getting ready to put the firewall mat in I thought if this leaks it will make a mess. After looking up a lot of info from this site I found "Denny Graham" and "Czechman" had some good info and pictures. Just before I got going I found another valve on Facebook marketplace and ordered it from Denver Colorado. My thinking was I did not want to mess it up, so I had nothing to use. The valve arrived and checking it revealed it leaked air so I decided to take it apart and use the other as reference. The valve came apart fairly easy to get the plate off. To get the copper tube off, use a crisp bladed small screwdriver. It was easy to get under the tab and using the blade of the screwdriver and going under the slot of the plate to help pry the tube that is crimped. The tube is round and this so far was the most difficult part to get the crimped edge straight but still curved to fit through the metal plate. Once I got this off the rubber was deteriorated but did not look like it was leaking. After a few tests with air it looked like the valve was leaking from the inner seal. To get at the inner seal you have to unsolder the opposite end of the tube to get at the plunger. The plunger looked to have a chunk out of it allowing it to leak. I did not know if this part was available as most of what I read did not mention having to replace it. After some more reading I did find some posts within Stovebolt that mentioned that some kits came with the plunger. I eventually found a site for Mopars that had a kit that included two plungers and the bigger seal. I read the reviews and there were a few that said it worked on other vehicles as well and that the Ranco valve used mostly the same size of seals for there applications. The price was right and I ordered a few hopping they were correct. Another alternative was that a rubber seal for a faucet may work but since my Mopar rubbers arrived and they look to be the same, other than maybe made out of a more silicone type of rubber. So far so good. We will see how it goes back together.
I gave up on trying to make mine work before I even started on it for the same concerns of it leaking some time down the road. What I did instead was take the guts out of the tube and soldered it all back together without any way for it to leak. It is now just a fancy looking non-functional Rancho valve that will never leak and no one will ever know. (Well, except for the 10s of thousands of y'all now that I spilt the beans.)
1952 5-window - return to "as built" condition | 1950 3100 with a 235 and a T-5 transmission
