7/9/08

So this douche bag on a Hardly… no, just kidding. I'm not going off on them again, not yet at least. Here’s what I really have to talk about: Barbara. We met at the shop again last night so they could attempt to patch the zorst leaks which would probably have failed the car’s inspection. Jesse, which is the name of the kid buying the car but I'm not sure of the spelling, showed up first. Well, I showed up first but he was first between him and Kevin. Anyhoo, he showed up and we drug out Gil’s old zorst which has been standing in the corner since being removed so many years ago. It is a decent enough 2 ¼” system with a Flowmaster and a chrome slash-cut tip. I think it would sound pretty good on there. When Kevin did arrive, Jesse pulled Barbara around front. Oh, it was raining. When the rain quit Kevin pulled the car up onto the porch thingy so we could see under better. That stock system has got to go! It is teeny-tiny, except for the gigantic Cadillac Convertible right under the driver's legs. There are also about seventy-five pounds of heat shields under there as well. We scratched our heads about it for a while and just about decided on removing the flange after the cat, ditching everything behind it, zooking on the Flowmaster, and making a 90° bend to dump out in front of the rear tire. We put the kibosh on that when we realized the bolts on the cat probably wouldn’t come off. They crawled under and put the patches on the holes since they were all after the muffler anyway. We’ll do a “real” zorst in the near future when the car is legal and stuff. Once they had the patches on, they fired up the engine to bake them into submission. The leaks sounded less severe than before and pretty soon got even better. I think the stuff melted into the holes and sealed it all up with heat. Before long it sounded pretty good. Well, as good as a 1 ½” choked up smog zorst can sound on a B-210. Jesse took it for a spin around the building. He asked some questions about the brakes and we told him that without the booster the pedal is going to be really hard. I hopped in and went around the building. I'm jealous as hell! The thing pulls well enough, and runs straight and true, the brakes worked well, and the clutch felt pretty good. I wouldn’t have a problem driving it. The shifter bushings are totally shot though so we’ll need to drill it for a ½” bolt and the shocks & struts are virtually nonexistent. Of course I'd replace the shocks & struts while lowering it, which we’ll probably do soon as well. All in all, I'm having ever so slight “seller’s remorse” right about now. Of course it is totally because they did all the work and got it going. I don’t have a problem admitting that. Gregg finally showed up with the 14” six spoke ZX wheels and we unloaded them into the paint booth. He, Gregg, took Darth Versa’s stock wheels and tires so he can get Matilda inspected as well. While we were rolling them out, I noticed a stack of 14” six spoke ZX wheels sitting right inside the door. I wonder how long those have been there. Well, Gregg’s is a set of five wheels so Jesse will have a spare and it came with 16 lug nuts. Unfortunately, the tires on the wheels are gigantic so he’ll have to buy a set of 185/60-14, a formula which yields a value of -10.916667 if you are a geek like me who has to calculate every formula he sees, tires before he can use them. I told him that the ones for George cost $23.00 each so he ought to be able to get rubber on it pretty cheap. Maybe not that cheap, but still. So, that’s that. John and I were discussing the possibility of installing Gil’s engine in Shi-Chi. For those of you who haven’t been me or John, Gil’s engine is an A-14 with a Nissan Motorsports Race Cam #1 in it. Or is it a Race Cam #2? It is the milder of the two Nissan Race Cams. Anyhoo, it is a pretty strong engine, until it bends the number one pushrod, which it is wont to do. We’d finger that out before using it in Shi-Chi, probably. Right, so John and I were discussing that engine for Shi-Chi. Well, I decided to take a look in the intake ports to see if it had shrouded valves like the A-15 or open valves like, well, a good head. Good news: it has unshrouded valves. Bad news: it is a round port head. My intake manifold is an oval port. D’oh! I did a test fit of the round port single side draft manifold I have and it fit perfectly, even with the header. That made me smile. I don’t think I'm going to go back to a single side draft on Shi-Chi though. This, I think, puts the kibosh on using Gil’s engine as is in Shi-Chi. Now I know I've already used “kibosh” today but it is such a powerful word I felt it was acceptable to use twice. If you don’t like it, well, you can just put the kibosh on reading this from now on. See if I care. So, while discussing this new turn of events with John this morning, he asked what will become of Gil’s engine. I said, off the cuff, that I'd probably use it with the single side draft and header in the Louisiana Purchase. After giving that some more thought though, I put the… ok, I won’t say it again. After further consideration though, I think I'm going to offer the manifold and header, since I have two, to Jesse for Barbara. I promised John I would not sell Gil’s engine so I think I'm going to wait until I get my head back from the machine shop and possibly put it on there for Shi-Chi. I like the thought of having the big cam and short stroke in Shi-Chi, but I also like the “torque” of the long stroke A-15. An A-14 should rev better, especially if I shave the hell out of the flywheel while we’re out. Ok, I think I might have another idea festering here. I think if I have the machine shop mill the head and install different valve springs while they are in there, ones which won’t coil-bind, I'll be set for using that cam in whatever bottom end I decide to run. So now I just need to decide if I'm going to go to run a higher revving A-14 bottom end or swap the cam over to the longer stroke A-15. Either way I'm going to have to pull the A-15 from Shi-Chi, at which point I might as well have the flywheel shaved. Yes, I think we may be on to something. Unless John comes up with an idea which puts the kibosh on it. Ha!