2/12/07

I really hate it when I waste a whole Sunday at the house doing nothing. That is what I did yesterday, nothing. I started out with the intention of going to the shop but then goofed off until mom got home from church and by then I had lost all motivation. Saturday, on the other hand, was somewhat productive. John and I met at the shop and rolled George out to make room for Gigi. Gigi had four flats. John ran the hose out while I fired up the compressor. When I turned on the air it all started leaking out past the “O” ring in the moisture trap. I had removed the trap a few weeks ago to clean it and apparently pinched the “O” ring when reinstalling it. It was toast. We locked up and went to O’Reilley’s. I found a ring I thought would work and bought two. John bought something and we headed back to the shop. Well, the ring I bought was too thick and wouldn’t go in. I took the whole moisture trap out and bypassed it. It isn’t all that humid around here anyway, not next to the lake. With air in the hoses, we went to Gigi and aired up the tires. The one I was most afeared would go flat almost immediately lasted as long as any other, except the one that did go flat again within a few minutes of course. We did have enough time to roll the nose in and get to work. Gregg had done a lot of the disconnecting and dismantling for us so all we had were a few wires to unplug. John jacked the nose up and I crawled under to take the transmission mount loose and remove the clutch slave cylinder. I also disconnected the speedometer cable but left the reverse light, neutral safety switch, and drive shaft in place. I figured the drive shaft would see to itself and we could get to those wires, if necessary, when they presented themselves as the engine came out. Looking back on it, I guess they disconnected themselves because I didn’t ever do anything about them. Interesting. We hooked up the chain and started lifting. Well, it hung up something fierce. We scratched our heads about it for a bit until John asked if I had removed the shifter. I hadn’t. We dropped the engine and jacked the back of the transmission up again. I fought with the clip and finally got it off but the pin was stuck in pretty good with schmutz and schmort. We finally got it out and dropped the jack again. This time the engine came right out, more or less. Like I said, I didn’t ever remove the transmission wiring so either John did, it disconnected itself, or it was not connected in the first place. I don’t know nor do I care. Oh, at some point, actually it was right before removing the cross member and slave cylinder, I took the Sawzall to the zorst. Letting the blade do the work really pays off! I set it on the pipe and just held the trigger. John commented that it took half the time it ever takes him and I was still cussing it. I had no comeback for that. We discussed tying off the drive shaft and zorst but I decided to go ahead and remove them. We jacked up the rear and I crawled under again. Four nuts on the shaft and another bout with the Sawzall and we were done. John looked at his watch and announced that it had only taken 49 minutes. If I'd remembered the shifter it might have only been 30! We rolled it back to its spot, after airing up at least one tire, and then re-parked George. Marty Smith showed up at some point and asked if we’d eaten. We replied in the negative and agreed to get him on our way out. We did and went to Lotus for some Chinese buffet. There was a fairly hot girl sitting right across from me so I watched her while we all ate. Yum. Oh, and the food was pretty good too. When we had eaten all we could, John went home and I took Marty back to his place. I debated staying to work or going home to have a Shaq Attack. I decided to work. It was a mistake. About five minutes later, one of the farts I had let turned out to be slightly more solid than expected. As Marty Mary would say, “My air-shit separator was breaking down.” I hopped in Mr. Wiggly and ran home. I pooed and took a shower then loaded the receiver hitch in the back. The clutch is really beginning to worry me now. I made it back but I don’t think I should try it again. I had a look at the hitch but decided to work on my turbo manifold instead. I “installed” the Hardly SU part I had just gotten and had a look compared to the DCOE manifold. I took a Shar-Pei and marked the circumference where I wanted it cut then removed it from the car. The line wasn’t perpendicular and I didn’t want it to be. I made the cut and fitted the thing back on the car. I aligned how I wanted the DCOE to sit level and made some reference marks. I took the two bits back to the vice and fired up the welder. The first attempt sucked. They were stuck together but ugly and very iffy. The second attempt was friggin’ beautiful if I do say so myself. I made a pretty long run of really nice weld and had to stop when I got to the ugly part. I turned the piece and the rest of the welds weren’t quite as pretty. It is totally zooked together and won’t leak, but artwork the welds are not. I reinstalled it all on the car and had a look at the alignment. My crooked cut to make the DCOE sit straight perpendicular to the valve cover was close. It is still at a slight angle but I can live with it. The reference marks to make the DCOE sit level to the ground were spot on. I left the spirit level sitting on the studs just so anyone walking in will have to notice it. With that done I decided to call it a day. I might have done something else but I don’t remember. Well, I've filled a page and a half so I think I'll call this rant complete. Have a day.