4/13/07

The HL A-10 wagon is gone. I mentioned yesterday that John wasn’t going to make it to the shop last night because he had to work late. Well, I got to the shop at about 1730 h to see the dudes waiting for me. John called just as I was turning into the gate and I told him I saw them. They followed me to the back and we had a look around. They were “impressed” that there was another person as sick as them with the collection of crap I had lying around. I told them about all my plans and projects and they just shook their heads and laughed. When the time came to get down to business, I threaded the air hose out the hole in the back of the shop and fired up the compressor. I aired up the one flat on John's orange 510 and we rolled it out of the way. Oh, I moved Mr. Wiggly and they were impressed with the sound of the Leaning Tower of Power. Have I mentioned that I really like that van? Anyhoo, we roll John's car out of the way and I go to fill the tires on the wagon. “Pshhhhhhhh!” Nothing doing. They were so dry-rotted and cracked that all air going in came out just as fast. You know how they’ll sometimes hold a bit and “pshh” down for a second after taking the chuck away? Well, these didn’t. I began looking around for alternatives when suddenly I noticed they had backed the trailer up to the car and started hooking up a wench, no wait, make that a winch. After some initial protest, the car started moving. The steering column was locked but fortunately John had unbolted it from the dash. No, he didn’t unbolt the lock mechanism he unbolted the column. I'm not sure why. So when I turned the steering wheel the ignition switch, turn signal stalk, headlight stalk, and all other assemblies that usually stay still, all turned with the wheel. Fortunately it all moved enough to steer the thing onto the trailer. The dude tied the thing down and handed me the money. We thanked each other and they left. Now I was waiting for Gregg so we could put the Cragar SS wheels and good tires on the brown 210 for the track day. He shows up and we stick the jack under the car. I ‘splain that the spacers behind the rear wheels are cosmetic and he justifies them as widening the rear track thus loosening up the rear of the car. “Mmm, ok,” I reply. He centers them up and tightens down the lug nuts. We’re of the opinion that the spacers being off center might have been part of the shimmying and vibration problem with that car. I forgot to call and see if it was any better on the way home. Oh well. He moved on to the front and changed that wheel. We looked at the brake pads and I remembered that Pat probably put new ones on there recently. With the passenger side done we debated turning the car around or rolling the jack to the other side. Rolling the jack won. He changed the driver’s side and we stood back to see how it looked. It looked good. We washed up and both left. Like I said, I forgot to call and ask how these drove but on the other hand he didn’t call to say the thing was shaking any worse. I'm going to assume it is better until told otherwise. So, with that you are all caught up again. I have to go pee so I think I'm going to call the rant complete. Look for a report on the weekend’s activities Monday.