What is this thing? Marvel Mystery Inversion Oiler

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REZARF

REZARF

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Sep 8, 2003
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Bozeman, MT
I have a 72 FJ55 that I’m working on with some high school boys in a local auto shop class.

I can’t figure out what this thing is. Any ideas?

It’s got a cap, sight glass looks like a pressure tank of some kind. Gonna’ pull it tomorrow and look for markings.
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Looks to be part of an Air conditioning system. When the AC was running you would see bubbles in the window. Looks arcariac. Or it could be some sort of like chassis oiler system. Maybe oil injection system for fuel like on the old SU carbs on a 53 MGTD.

You have found the legendary :Widget on the Maniform: very rare!
 
I have zero history on this cruiser. I’m going to pull it today and look for markings and clues. I’ll keep you posted if we discover anything.
 
it appears to be a marvel mystery oil-er for the top aide of the cylinders. Pretty rad.

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Thanks @Pighead dor the ad below.
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This is wild! Never seen anything like that before! Thanks for posting.
 
My dad told me back in like 1935 his brother bought brand new Willes Overland station wagon. It had a speed plate to limit the speed to 35 mph for break in. After a couple hundred miles he was tired of crawling around. He put a can of Gulf Valve Top Oil in the gas, within 2 blocks it would do 55 mph with no other changes. Later when the dealer removed the speed plate he put on "an over head oiler" that I think they used Marvel's Mystery Oil. When you let off the gas it would shoot a thin stream of MMO right down the center of the carb. It might have been that unit - I never saw it.

They took a road trip from Michigan to California, over to Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and back home. He said they got like 35 mpg on the trip. They really like the "well head gasoline" they got in parts of Texas - that was natural gasolene collected at the well head - not the distilled stuff from the refinery.
 
Ad from 1953, my Dad was 3 years old. My 1972 FJ55 would be built nearly 20 years later. This ad is over 75 years old. Cool old booger.

Gotta' slowly figure out how to get the grime off without removing any more of the decal. It is CAKED on there solid. Maybe a heat gun and some simple green and a lot of elbow grease. Might try to get it functioning again when we get this thing back together.

This is a class project for high schoolers if you want to follow along... This years Homework FJ55 Build

Marvels Mystery Oiler .webp
 
30 something years ago there was a guy in the Beach N Toys TLCA club that was selling kits to put GM AC compressors onto FJ40s for onboard air. As I recall, he had to develop something like this to lubricate the compressor, because the standard lubrication method (mixed with the refrigerant in a closed system) wasn't applicable in an OBA situation.
 
charliemeyer007 said:
My dad told me back in like 1935 his brother bought brand new Willes Overland station wagon. It had a speed plate to limit the speed to 35 mph for break in. After a couple hundred miles he was tired of crawling around. He put a can of Gulf Valve Top Oil in the gas, within 2 blocks it would do 55 mph with no other changes. Later when the dealer removed the speed plate he put on "an over head oiler" that I think they used Marvel's Mystery Oil. When you let off the gas it would shoot a thin stream of MMO right down the center of the carb. It might have been that unit - I never saw it.

They took a road trip from Michigan to California, over to Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and back home. He said they got like 35 mpg on the trip. They really like the "well head gasoline" they got in parts of Texas - that was natural gasolene collected at the well head - not the distilled stuff from the refinery.
Click to expand...

In flathead engines, there was no top-end oiling, just oil blow-by past the rings or valve guides. Early OHV engines were not much better. Motorcycle owner's manuals used to specify adding upper cylinder lubricant to every tank of gas. When I had bikes like that, I used MMO for that purpose.

The "well-head gasoline" you mention is liquid condensate from natural gas wells. Some (but not all) of it is light enough fractions to burn in a gasoline engine. I knew a few guys to try it in my day, but it's kind of a crap shoot. I have known drillers and company men who stretched their diesel fuel by adding crude oil in their fuel tank.
 
Just the other day I watched a vid on the military Jeep Go Devil engine. Big bearing, low compression, long stroke. Pound sticks in the bullet holes in the radiator, block and pan, top off the fluids and keep driving.
 
1911 said:
In flathead engines, there was no top-end oiling, just oil blow-by past the rings or valve guides. Early OHV engines were not much better. Motorcycle owner's manuals used to specify adding upper cylinder lubricant to every tank of gas. When I had bikes like that, I used MMO for that purpose.

The "well-head gasoline" you mention is liquid condensate from natural gas wells. Some (but not all) of it is light enough fractions to burn in a gasoline engine. I knew a few guys to try it in my day, but it's kind of a crap shoot. I have known drillers and company men who stretched their diesel fuel by adding crude oil in their fuel tank.
Click to expand...
I was just sharing with my wife last week a story that @calico kid told me twenty years ago about tapping wellheads for gas while running around the refinery properties in El Segundo in a Baja bug back in the day.
 
Found a guy selling rebuild kits (George at gbfolchi@yahoo.com) so I’m going to go through it and see if it is already running and if not get it to run again. It’s a dead simple device.

You fill the reservoir with 1 gallon (my tank size) of MMO attach a hose into the PCV line to the carb, adjust the flow rate to 6-8 drops per minute as observed through the sight glass and refill it as needed. Should lose 1 quart every 1,000 miles. It’s vacuum activated so it is a set it and forget it type thing.

MMO is still one of the go to engine un-freeze fixes that I know of so we’ll see how it goes.

Cool piece of history. We’re gonna clean it up, go through it and try to run it.
 
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