1/3/07

So now I'll finish telling y'all about my long weekend. Monday morning I got up and watched a few minutes of the Rose Parade with mom since she wanted it on on my big TV. I made sure she didn’t have anything she needed me to do and headed to the shop. Saturday John had suggested that rather than lower the front of Mr. Wiggly to get the desired rake, we raise the rear. “Brilliant!” I declared in that Guiness Stout commercial sort of way. I stopped at the Boys of Pep and looked for a 1” lowering block kit. I finally found it and started for the register. For some reason I turned around and went back to the end cap where the air-horns were displayed. I grabbed a set of “low tone” horns and proceeded to the register. With my newly acquired booty (tee hee, I said booty), I headed to the shop. The zorst was getting louder but I didn’t really realize it. I got to the shop and parked in such a way as to be able to install the blocks. I chickened out. I moved on to the gaskets. The gaskets I had were those “dead soft” aluminum reusable guys but the holes didn’t quite line up, that was why they weren’t installed before now. I drilled the holes bigger and took them under the van. Of the six bolts holding the two collectors together, one was gone, one was about to lose its nut, two were finger tight, and two were actually tight! No wonder it leaked. Oh, this was what I meant by it getting louder earlier. I found another nut and bolt to replace the missing guy and installed the gaskets. I went for a spin. Much better! I came back and had another look at the lowering blocks. I guess I should be calling them lifting blocks shouldn’t I? Anyhoo, I chickened out again. I opened the horn kit and started looking at the stuff in there. I took the horns to the van and found a spot where they could mount. I mounted them there. I removed the stock horn and used its bracket to mount the compressor. I mounted it. I made a ground wire and hooked up the hot wire from the button. I gave it a test honk and heard the compressor spin. I hadn’t hooked up the air lines so I knew it wouldn’t honk. I hooked up said lines and gave it a try. It wasn’t nearly as impressive as I'd hoped but it was better than before. I decided that I really should install a relay so I did that. It wasn’t much louder, if any, so I moved on. I had one last look at the lifting blocks, and chickened out again. I decided to go for a hoon. I spent the next few hours just driving around in Mr. Wiggly burning gas. It was glorious! There is trouble afoot however. With all the hot-rodding I've done, the engine now makes enough torque that the clutch is starting to slip ever so slightly in third gear. Not all the time, just when trying to accelerate through the torque peak. It is kind of weird actually. First gear pulls nice and strong all the way to my arbitrary 4,000 RPM rev limit. Second does the same. Third, however, pulls for a bit and then the revs increase as the engine comes “on the pipe” and the clutch slips a little. If I lift the throttle just a tad it hooks up again and continues to accelerate. If I'm cruising at the right speed in third, which is top or high gear in case you had forgotten that the thing only has a three-on-the-tree, I can drop the hammer and get it to slip as well. No, I don’t do it often but I have forgotten once or twice. It does kind of sound like a slush box dropping down a gear for a pass, but I know it isn’t. I really need to get under there and adjust a little more slack into the top of the clutch pedal travel. That might help some. Not to mention get the thing to catch closer to the floor. I hate how it grabs way up at the top of the pedal. We’ll see. Oh, the armrest for Matilda arrived yesterday. I think I'm going to go to the shop by myself this evening and install it. John has to work on his wife’s car and probably won’t make it. Then again, I might just go straight home after work. I ordered a fuel pressure regulator and some other bits from Summit earlier. I'm thinking that I can mount the pump in the engine bay of George since it is a vane/rotor design and should have enough “head” to draw fuel from the rear to the front. I may go in and replace the existing line with a bigger one just to make sure there is plenty of volume. Of course we’re not talking about a huge power engine. I'll be happy with around 130 or so horsepower. Hell, that’ll be almost twice the stock power anyway. I think we’ll be fine. Well, I have passed the page break so I think I'm going to call it a day. Toodles.