
Lots of antique tractors, their carburetor seals were cardboard! You would think with the oil exposure and fuel they would just dissolve away, but they evidently didnt!Roper got their name by virtue of how they used a piece of rope as a seal in water pumps. The modern viton lip seals we take for granted are a recent thing. I'm old enough to have rebuilt a car engine where the only seals available were leather. That's why cars leaked so bad 40 -50 years ago. Chryslers used these strange "Ball and Trunion" universal joints that had a big leather bag around them to keep the grease in and the dirt out. So seeing a wooden bearing seal is not surprising. They didn't have the material science to make a modern oil seal. Old vacuum motors had shield bearings for the same reason.
You had to use a bunch of gasket sealant when you installed anything on these old cars. That made what should be a simple chore like a valve adjustment on an old Plymouth, or a carb clean an all day ordeal. You had to scrape all that gasket sealer and old torn up gasket material stuck to the engine block and whatever cover you removed and remember to buy new gaskets to use when you button everything up. Today with modern gaskets you just wipe everything down and replace the gasket. About the only place I ever have to use any kind of sealant is over the camshaft cut outs. On my old BMW K100s they were built with a paper gasket under the timing cover. Now, when you put them back together you just squeeze a thin bead of high temp RTV sealant and good to go. No gasket. Sealants have come a long way too.Lots of antique tractors, their carburetor seals were cardboard! You would think with the oil exposure and fuel they would just dissolve away, but they evidently didnt!
lol yeah the tolerances were just eyeballed "good enough" and then seals and gaskets carried the team.You had to use a bunch of gasket sealant when you installed anything on these old cars. That made what should be a simple chore like a valve adjustment on an old Plymouth, or a carb clean an all day ordeal. You had to scrape all that gasket sealer and old torn up gasket material stuck to the engine block and whatever cover you removed and remember to buy new gaskets to use when you button everything up. Today with modern gaskets you just wipe everything down and replace the gasket. About the only place I ever have to use any kind of sealant is over the camshaft cut outs. On my old BMW K100s they were built with a paper gasket under the timing cover. Now, when you put them back together you just squeeze a thin bead of high temp RTV sealant and good to go. No gasket. Sealants have come a long way too.
The gasket surfaces were as well finished as you find on modern engines. They just didn't have modern Viton gaskets and seals nor did they have the good sealants we have now. On old cars you had a paper valve cover gasket that required you to paint some sealant on the two mating surfaces. Today you have a really nice molded Viton gasket and no sealant is needed. The cover screws will also have rubber grommets so the cover basically floats on rubber but is oil tight. A lot of engine components that are not removed for routine service that used to require a gasket and sealer are now joined only by advanced sealants. And those sealants do not leak like those old gasket did. No oil weeps. When I get around to resealing the fan housing on my Kirby I will use Three Bond 1102 or 1184.lol yeah the tolerances were just eyeballed "good enough" and then seals and gaskets carried the team.