Cold weather & Hudsons

KTRON
KTRON Member
in HUDSON
How does the extreme cold of winter (-10F - 30*F) effect your Hudson. Most of you guys probably store your Hudsons indoors and do not use them in the winter, but what if you left your car sit outside for a week in freezing temperatures, how would it react?    Is the 6volt starter strong enough to crank the engine over, would you swap your SAE30 for a 10W30 oil before winter sets in? Does it need a sniff of ether when cold? Does the cold make you wish you had a manual choke cable? How does the transmission react, water crystallization on the cork clutch? Hard shifting until warm? 

Some of my diesel engines regardless of condition, simply will not start below 40*F without starting aids (high speed air starters, webasto coolant heaters, Lucas thermostarters, etc etc). I do not believe in ether, and am curious how the Hudson would react to the cold. 

Chris

Comments

  • Park_W
    Park_W Senior Contributor
    edited February 2015

    Based on experience with "Mom's and my" '37 Terraplane in Northern Indiana in the early fifties:  Two cold weather issues . . . thick engine oil made it difficult for the starter to turn the engine, and thick oil in the transmission made it difficult to change gears, especially for the first mile or two.  Snapped the gearshift lever off at the base one very cold morning.

    The good news is that the T always started on the cold mornings, while Dad's '41 Chevy didn't!  I loved it when he had to ask Mom if she'd drop him off at work.

  • lostmind
    lostmind Expert Adviser

    My wife and I drove Hudsons year round, hers was a 54 hornet , mine was a 46 Commodore.

    Both sat outside in northern Ohio winters. Never missed a day of work , or shopping.

    Maintain them , with good battery , not a problem.

  • terraplane8
    terraplane8 Senior Contributor
    I posted this here in July 2007:

    "It's deep winter here in the South Island of NZ with day after day of
    hard frosts (-6 to -12 celcius) and snow on the mountains, and my '36
    Terraplane had been parked in an open carport for the last two months
    untouched.

    I suddenly panicked about whether it had
    enough antifreeze as well as the battery going flat, so I took a walk
    down the hill to the stables where it lurked. After getting in, turning
    the key and hitting the starter button, with a fair bit of that
    distinctive Hudson
    "GGGGGRRRR....RRRRRRR......RRRRR....RRRRRR......RRRRR" at a respectable
    rotation rate considering the temperature (about -1 C) it fired up
    beautifully as if to say "what's the problem, don't you trust my 1936
    technology in the middle of winter even if I have been sitting unused
    for two months?

    OK, so one problem had evaporated, but
    what about the radiator water? Well, it looked like pretty solid ice in
    there when I looked, but on dipping a finger in it was just half-solid
    slushy ice. After warming up for a few minutes, it turned back into
    water with no leaks apparent. A nice drive later followed by a longish
    drink of anti-freeze plus a battery charge top-up it was back into
    hibernation until spring".

    The oil was just the normal Castrol GTX20-50 and the choke was manual. There is an encore to this, it later sat in the same carport for 17 months untouched, and started up fine with no battery charge, fuel bowl prime or anything, and this on high-compression too. It has a good conventional Hella Endurance battery and the big 6v cables.
  • 51Hudson
    51Hudson Senior Contributor
    My 51 super 6 sits under a tent all winter in the nice cold northern Ohio weather. We have been having below 0 temperatures lately and just this past weekend I went out and started it after it has been sitting for a month. Even with the straight 30 oil in it, it turned over after just a few cranks.
  • BillUSN1
    BillUSN1 Member

    I fuel injected mine so it starts just like any other car in my driveway!

    ;-)

  • Browniepetersen
    Browniepetersen Senior Contributor

    My Hudson's rest under a cover in my shop.  I go out on a regular basis, uncover them and with the heat in the shop at 70, I start them up and go for a drive.  That is what old and retired is all about?


  • railknight
    railknight Expert Adviser
    edited February 2015

    I thought, "what the heck," despite it being around 20F outside today (February 22), "let's see how well the Super Wasp starts in this cold weather."  Upon sitting in the front seat I noticed that the left rear tire was completely flat.   No problem, I'll just back the car out of the garage a bit and air it up.

    Car started in the cold much better than I figured.  Pretty much as if it had been a warm day out.  After letting it warm up for a few minutes I slowly backed it out and as I did this I heard something straining from the front of the car.  Realizing what it was, the little Battery Tender, I immediately stopped the car to see if was still intact.

    Nope, the poor thing had the wires completely pulled out of the charging unit itself leaving the long wires and clamps still attached to the battery.  Lesson learned.  Leave the darn car sitting through the winter without starting it up 'till it's warm out like in April.  Who cares if it starts in the winter, I'm not going to drive it anywhere anyway! 

    Dan

     

     



  • Geoff
    Geoff Senior Contributor
    You actually do more harm than good  by cold running an engine for short periods, because the acids and moisture do not get a chance to burn off, and you can damage the cylinder bores, valve seats, and bearings.  A simple procedure can be done before storing a car, either pour some oil into the carburetor throat until the exhaust smokes, then turn off, or else if the engine is hot,  hold your foot on the clutch,  rev the motor and then switch off, and release the clutch.   This will  distribute oil through the motor and the clutch facings.  Even better - wedge the clutch pedal down.  This does not seem to have any detrimental effect on the clutch springs. I have installed electric pumps on my Hornet and Jet, in parallel with  with the mechanical pump, so I can prime the carby before starting.  Also as a back-up if the mechanical pump should fail.  A small toggel switch under the dash actuates this.  
  • railknight
    railknight Expert Adviser
    Good advice, Geoff.  I was one for pouring oil down the throat of the carburetor of my 1950 Pacemaker for winter layup.   However, seeing that my Super Wasp's engine is due for a rebuild in the not too distant future, I'm not that worried about one winter startup just to see how well the car performs.   
  • KTRON
    KTRON Member
    Great information guys! I was hoping I wouldnt need to install a Webasto diesel fired coolant heater on my future Hudson if I wanted to take it down the road. Perhaps I can just get away with an inline 750 watt coolant heater if the need arised,

    How do these cars handle in the ice and snow? 

    Chris
  • Per
    Per Member
    Chris,

    An easy solution if things get really, really cold is to put a space heater under your hood, a blanket over the grille, and let it run overnight. Heat will then come out of the car's heater very soon after you start the car!

    Per
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