Golden Lion Grrrages
1957 Chrysler 300C
Page 6

We have the power window motor project completed so I thought I would take a quick minute and wash the windows. How big of a job can that be? Well, it turns out there was black over-spray paint on most of the outside surfaces from a careless painter. The job grew 4X. Mineral spirits was needed to remove the over spray, alcohol needed to remove the mineral spirits, Windex to remove the alcohol. But the glass was still not clean. I remembered the hint to use a micro fiber cloth and dang to daisies that did the deep cleaning. I hope I remember micro fiber for the future.

Back to these doggone wheel covers and painting the red center disc. I tried the usual masking and was not satisfied with the result on the outer edge. With the taper of the wheelcover in that area, the masking tape must wrinkle and you don't get a crisp edge. So I started fresh and had the idea, why not get a red decal disc made? That would have a nice crisp edge. But right off the bat I noticed the disc surface is not flat and expected the decal would have to wrinkle on installation. I got out my ancient mechanical drawing tools (1940 era) and cut paper samples. Sure enough, they wrinkle. The decal idea is out.

I'd like to see an original wheel cover with original paint to see the crispness of the outer edge. It might tell me how the factory did it. In any case, I made a mask out of tag stock which covered from the outer edge of the painted section to the rim with another circular piece cut to meet the disc edge. I was surprised when the force of the paint spray from the rattle can was enough to move the mask. The edge was terrible. Forget that one.

I went back to masking the disc area with painters masking tape. I used short sections with overlap. The edge was OK and the OD was reasonably uniform. Then I tried vinyl masking tape, the kind they use for pin striping. This is stretchable and conforms to irregular shapes. The results are better than painters tape. Getting the OD perfect requires practice and talent when applying the tape. I spent 30 minutes on each masking and reached the "Pretty Darn Good" level. I will leave this project there. By the way, there is this ad from 1957 and the wheel centers are not red. I have to say, it looks good that way too. A fella could leave them unpainted and forget all this masking. Here is the video on the wheelcovers.


Moved on to getting the coating off of the white wall tires. Bleche white still has no effect. Someone suggested using a pressure washer. I did. It didn't do a thing. I worked with increasingly aggressive Scotch Brite. Progress was slow and not the best. It is unbelievable how difficult it is to get these new white walls clean! More to do.

I had a minute so I replace the power steering return hose. Someone had installed heater hose. That won't hold up to the temperature and pressure of power steering oil. You can easily tell the wrong hose, it sweats and becomes soft. Power steering fluid is flammable and the hoses are not far from hot exhaust manifolds. Use the correct hose such as NAPA 7-1207.

The package shelf arrived from Quirey. At first I thought it was too wide. The trick is to remove both the right and left interior quarter panels. Even though they look like they don't take up much space, they do. Arc the package shelf at the center and you can install the edges under the rear window gasket. This car also had the rear speaker and rear window defog option. I installed the shelf and located the cutouts from below for best alignment. By the way, I hear SMS also makes rear package shelves, and they will make them to a custom width if need be.
I don't know what it is about interior work, it always take two or three times longer that I expect. Click here for a video.

The defogger is unique to 57 (maybe 58 & 59). Notice how it sits down from the mounting plate and has a "chimney". After 1960, the motor is attached right to the mounting plate. This means you can't swap in a newer (and more common) defog. A previous owner had removed this so he could fit the rear AC ducts (since removed) and a new mounting plate had to be made, repairs made to the plastic duct. This little thing took much more work than anticipated.

Let's jump into the new wiring. I have the rear harness installed. It came from YnZ. The front harness came from Rhode Island Wiring. YnZ has the front harness but their price is much higher than RI. Still, the YnZ harness is much better than Rhode Island (correct size terminals and fixtures, all wires labeled).
It is easy to wire the engine bay. There aren't that many things and access is great. I found problems with the old wires -- the generator regulator was wired wrong, one wire to the starter vacuum switch was broken, and so on. Between the service manual schematic and supplied diagrams, this is a breeze.
Under the dash, access is limited and there are many many connections to be made. Do not under estimate the time and effort involved here. Here is the part 1 video of wiring.


Some of the original Bakelite connectors too brittle to use. The light socket for the steering wheel map light supplied by RI is too small and I had to reuse the original. I also found a broken wire on the starter switch on the back of the pushbutton assembly. This repair required removal of the transmission push button assembly. After removing some dash chrome and the lower housing, the assembly can be coaxed out of the front far enough to access the two 5/32"(?) bolts holding the cable retainer. With the assembly free, I could see the switch is not removable; it is riveted to the case. I was able to solder a new wire and tested the switch for operation. Might as well paint the push buttons. I used Testors again and this time I had some super fine tip brushes. The assembly went back in and tested fine.

Before the under dash area becomes any more populated, we should install the new firewall insulation pad. You might think installation would be no big thing. You would be wrong. You can't install the pad as one piece unless you are working with a bare firewall. There are too many things in the way such as the steering column and brake pedal. You have to cut it and piece it on. This is still a wrestle, during which the pad wants to shed itchy insulation. Install the push pin retainers. The old ones are brittle and break, the new ones are too flexible and you can't push or pound them in; all they do is flex. You have to get to the nose of the push pin on the other side of the firewall, grab it with pliers and pull through. There are some pins you can't get at, the outer ones are blocked by fenders and pieces. You don't need all of them to get a good mount.

We should also now install the wiper motor and arms thinking we need to know where they are so we can route the new wires to safe locations. The wiper feed wire runs from a circuit breaker located on the top mount stud of the gauge cluster. I expect that breaker will be difficult to install. I hot wired the wiper and checked the arms for clearance with the new wires. All set there.
The wiring for the wiper switch isn't complicated. It is the wiring from the washer pedal that complicates things. Chrysler had this option where pushing the wiper washer pedal activated the wipers as it blasted out washer fluid. I don't know if it had been working, we'll find out once we get reassembled.
I got the wipers to work by putting an aux battery cable ground direct to wiper body. Wipers cycle but don't park. Checked the switch connections, all OK. I grounded the switch body and wipers cycle but stop 3/4 up and wiggle back and forth. Strange. Found nothing helpful in the manual. I ran another ground so the wiper plate is grounded to the body. Tested, all works fine. Wipers do strange things if you don't have grounds.

The headlight wiring is a bit of a snake pit. If you replace old wires with new wires one by one, it isn't too bad. I found a previous owner had connected the black wire to the yellow. The black wire is power to the tail lights, the yellow is power to the parking lights. I guess it would work but I am not sure why he did it. By the way, the wiring diagram on page 400 from the 1957 service manual is wrong on the headlight switch. The red feed wire is shown to the circuit breaker when it should go to the B post on the headlight switch body. This error is corrected in the 1958 service manual.

The parking brake light switch is a small rod at the base of the switch pod. As the handle is pulled, the rod moves and completes the circuit, much like a door light switch. I am missing a metal piece at the switch to receive the wire. I had a spare pod with the switch and swapped. I don't think you can install the wire to the switch unless you have the pod off of the brake lever shaft -- I don't see the access.

Before the dash wires get congested, I tested power antenna switch and up is up, down is down. Installed the dash gauge assy next. Because the wires are not long enough, you have to install gauge in the dash then run wires. The temperature gauge sender wire is tough to connect because of access.

It is easier to install the left pod while the speedometer is not there. You can reach in and easily get the nuts on the screws. Installed the wiper switch and was first try able to install the outer nut (over the D threads) and then noted I had the switch in upside down. Out, back in and again with the nut. Installed the headlight switch, right side up, 7/8" retain nut, a bit of work, got it. Tested low beams, parks, tails, license plate and panel lights and panel light dimmer. All work but the high beams don't light although the dash panel light comes on. It took a while to find that someone had low beam lamps in the high beam pockets. With high beam lamps where they should be, everything works.
Park brake dash light works, door switches work, transmission button panel lights with panel lights, glove box light and switch work, turn signals work including dash lights. Installed defog switch, tested, works. There was a clock in the parts box with a tag from "Clock Works" with a date of July 18, 2023. Installed, it works. This may be the only old car I have with a working clock.

Installed the new positive battery terminal and solenoid wire. The engine cranks with the N button. Moved on to heater wiring and discovered the heater switch, the blower motor, and the wiring are different AC to nonAC cars. AC cars have a 3 position blower switch (non AC have 2). AC cars have 4 wires to the motor, nonAC have 3 and the shape of the connector at the motor is different.

The distribution box had to be installed and it wasn't much of a wrestle. So I through I would continue along with heater pieces and decided to install the blower motor. Since the heater box and core are not in the way, access should be OK. The inboard screw was a different thread than the outer 2 and wouldn't bite so I drilled and tapped so all 3 bolts will be the same. All found a good bite on the firewall and the blower (which is heavy) is now nicely mounted. The heater core went in and I installed the fooler holder although there is no fooler for this car. I hooked up heater hoses which required removing the blower to get to the lower heater outlet connection. I am getting good at removing and installing that blower motor.

On a roll I reinstalled the heater box. This required taking off the distributor cap and the rear air cleaner. The driver side valve cover is still off, so the heater box went right in. The driver side valve cover has the coil mount on it and won't let the heater box be removed or installed, so it has to be off. Heater box in, we reinstalled the driver side valve cover. We had to remove the master cylinder brake light switch for it to wiggle into place; still not an easy job. Reinstalled spark plug tubes and wires. Reinstalled lower rear seat cushion and rear carpet. Time for a test fire. A bit of prime to the rear carb and she fired. These adventures are here.

To page 7

Back