4/8/08

I was going to tell y'all the story of my day at the shop Sunday, today. But instead… no, I am going to tell y'all the story of my day at the shop Sunday after all. Ok, so I head for the shop Sunday morning and pull the nose cone again. I look around for the source of the leak, remember the coolant I discovered when I got back from my hoon on Saturday? It appeared to be the splice in the upper radiator hose. I had used one of those plastic splice thingies when building the car and apparently over tightened it. When I took it apart there was a little divot-like indentation where water could escape. It would be fine until the system made maximum pressure and then, PFFT! I tossed the splice thingy in the trash and found a section of metal pipe the right OD. I decided to weld on a hose retention bead so I fired up the TIG. When I had the beads welded I hit the thing with the wire brush and cooled it with water. I reinstalled the upper hose and refilled the radiator. I think I fired up the engine to check for leaks. Yeah, that sounds like what I would have done. It didn’t leak so I moved on to another project. I reinstalled the tonneau cover and then the Birkini top. I decided to see if I could get in the car with them both in place. I could not. So, I'm not sure what that means other than I have to stow the tonneau if I want to use the Birkini top. Of course another option would be to resurrect the “zipper in the Birkini top” idea. I think a zipper by the top bow, or perhaps two with a second near the windshield frame, would allow for much easier ingress and egress. Ooh, and if I had a snap-in “support” piece for the open flappy end, it would be like a sunroof! Oh, that kind of defeats the purpose of the Bitkini top. Never mind. Ok, so I've tested the top with the tonneau and decided to not do anything about it at this time. I'll fold the tonneau behind the seats for topped driving for the time being. I moved on. I decided that I'm never going to use the choke so I removed the twin cables from my little one-to-two cable adapter thingy. I didn’t feel like removing the scuttle again to pull the knob so I left that end of the cable in place. I had a look at spring-loading the choke mechanisms in their off positions but didn’t like the only spring I found. I decided to just safety-wire them. Of course, safety wire limits the amount of mixture adjustment Juan has because of the way the arms move when adjusting. I cut the safety wire off and had another look-see. I decided that they would probably be fine and left them be, for the time being at least. I took the spring I didn’t like for the choke arms and used it to pull the choke cable and knob closed. Why? Why not? I now have a little silver knob on the dash which does absolutely nothing. Perhaps I'll hook it into a compressed carbon-dioxide bottle to simulate a nitrous purge or something someday. I suppose I could attach it to that flap in the scuttle to open and close as a vent. We’ll see. While I'm sitting next to the zorst, I notice that I never safety-wired the bolts holding the muffler to the header. I did that right quick even though it has been un-wired for at least 18 months now with no ill effect. I sat there and stared at stuff for some time trying to think of other things I could do instead of washing the car to get it ready for the cruise. I decided that a master-kill switch would be better than my current method of disabling the car; pulling the main fuse. I took a measurement of how long the cable would need to be to get the kill switch into the dash where the faux choke cable is, and a measurement of the spring length I'd need for the choke levers on the carburetors. I took off to the auto parts store to buy a kill switch, cables, and springs. O’Reilley’s didn’t have, that I could find, a master-kill switch. I might have settled for one of those “Lucas style” metal switches but they didn’t have them either. I forewent buying the springs and battery cables so I could get them all at once. I rolled to the Boys of Pep, stopping at McDonald’s for a couple Quarter Pounders with Cheese. I ate them in the BoP parking lot. I scoured the isles of the BoP to no avail. I finally asked if they had master-kill switches and was told they usually do, but they were out. I headed back to the shop. I decided to give the O’Reilley’s on McCart a try and lo and behold, they had a master-kill! I bought the switch, a pair of throttle return springs, and a single 9” dual-eye battery cable. I decided to mount the switch under the hood instead of in the dash. Yep, I'm that lazy. Of course that decision is going to come back and bite me one of these days when I “hop in” the car and forget to turn the switch on. I know this and acknowledge it up front. Perhaps I'll change my mind and move the switch one day. We’ll see. Back at the shop, I install the springs on the carburetors and have a look at the master-kill location. I decide against my original, original idea of having the switch poke out of the bodywork and mount it to the frame just over the battery. I make a bracket for the switch and rivet them together. I run the battery’s cable to one post of the switch and the new section of cable to the other. I hunker down on them, at least I think I hunkered down on them, I need to check that, and mount the bracket to the frame. I run the new cable, and the cable to the engine block, to the same bolt holding the bracket to the frame and hunker down on it. I flip the switch on and walk to the other side of the car. I turn on the ignition and hear the fan fire up. I walk back to the other side and flip the master-kill off. The fan stops. I turn it back on and the fan goes again. I walk back around and fire up the engine. I decide to not test whether or not it will kill the engine because I have also killed alternators that way. I shut off the ignition and go back to the other side. I make a safety-wire lanyard for the key and attach that to the switch’s bracket. The beauty of this system and switch location is twofold. First, the stiffness of the safety-wire lanyard forces the switch to want to stay in the “on” position and the location, with the hood in place, prevents the switch from being turned off accidentally. I'm pleased with it. By this time it is getting late so I lock up and go home. I've been forcing myself to “drive” George in my mind as I'm walking around campus so as to get excited about working on him again. I think I'm just about 75% talked out of going this weekend. Therefore, I might be working on George Saturday. I guess the big deciding factor on the trip to the hill country cruise is going to be John. I'll go on the cruise if John tells me one of two things. Thing one: he wants to go. Thing two: he can’t go and can’t make it to the shop on Saturday. So there, the ball is, once again, solidly in his court. He must make my decision for me. So, what’ll it be bub?