6/15/09

Whew, it was hot at the shop on Saturday. I arrived to find John and the dude about halfway through with the lowering of the ass-end of the dude's 510. I got to work putting the prismatic “Datsun” decal on the plates the DMV screwed up for Ms. Clio. John suggested that we trim the decal so that it doesn’t have to deal with the strengthening embossed rib thingy around the edge of the plate. The concern is that the thing might try to come unstuck there and begin to rise off. I agreed and began the search for the scissors. I can never find the scissors when I need them. I ought to get a dozen sets and leave them around the shop. Anyhoo, I give up and go for a razor blade. I make the cut and attempt to remove the backing material. No luck. I tear a corner and that one gets put on the paint cabinet. “Good thing I bought five of these,” I shout across the shop. I take another decal and strip the backing off. I apply it to the plate and then trim off the border. This worked much better. Oh, it definitely would have risen up and begun to come loose. I watch them work for a bit and then go to move Lil' Wiggly in front of the door. Of course I drive around the building once or twice, just to make sure the car is fine. I park and have a look at installing the plate. I decide that I'll let John do it since he would never be happy with my installation. He might not ever say anything about it, but I'm sure it would have bugged him for some reason. It would be just a bit crooked, or just a bit too far left, or I wouldn’t have used washers under the screws and the decal would have bunched up, or something. You know. Anyhoo, I pop the hood and have a look around. I decide to test a hypothesis. I'm going to see how the car performs without the brake booster connected. I look around for a cap to put on the nipple. No luck. I do find another nipple in another manifold though. I remove it, cut off the nipple, shove a bolt in the hole, and set it up in the vice for zooking. Just before I start the arc, I walk out to Fifi and take Big Millie off my hip. Yeah, I drove Fifi and was carrying. I’ll probably carry all the time, when I can, now that I know how comfortable it is. Ok, so to be more honest, I'll need to use a double negative. I'll probably carry all the time, now that I know how not-uncomfortable it is. That is correcter, because while it isn't nearly as comfortable as not carrying, it isn't so uncomfortable as to not do it. Ok, so I zook the bolt into the pipe-thread thingy and take it to the faucet to cool. I find a wrench and remove the nipple from Lil' Wiggly’s manifold and screw the plug in its place. The car now idles just as smooth with the brakes applied as it does without them. I drive around the building and discover that the booster was not doing a damned thing. I call it a success and move on. John and I talk wheels and tires for a bit. We were both, sort of, correct about the tires on the Z six-spokes. Two of them were 195/70-14s and the other two were 205/70-14s. Yes, that does make John correcter than me, in that there were no 60-series tires in there, but there were two 205s like I said. He went on to point out that the tires on Ultra Violet, the HL-A10 “510” four-door hatch on the trailer, were brand new and the right size. I looked that direction and mentally made a face about the ugly assed wheels. “I guess,” I said aloud, as if there were any other way to say something, “those wheels are just about ugly enough for a B-210.” “I’m not saying,” John said, “use the wheels. Let’s have those tires put on the six-spokes.” This is a good plan. I don’t think I'm going to do it, but it is a good plan. No, I think I'll actually put the ugly assed wheels on Lil' Wiggly, as a bit of course. I would have done it then and there, but it was friggin hot. I did steal a brake line from Ultra Violet for Lil' Wiggly but didn’t install it. They finished up with the rear of the 510 and turned it around to do the front. The dude and I traced the starter problem to a fault in a starter relay. We didn’t fix it right away because John was working on the suspension and we didn’t want to be spinning the engine over while he was under there. Or something. Dude and I watched as John did all the modifications necessary to install 280ZX struts and brakes in this dude’s car, helping as needed. I had the dude haul the plasma cutter back to the welding table area so I could cut off the spring perches from some old 510 struts to act as centering devices in the 280ZX cups. After overheating the plasma cutter a few times, I finally fingered out the secret to using it. I got the perches cut and they installed them in the struts. They got the struts in and the brakes bled then the dude drove the car around the building. It looked a lot better. Since it was getting late, and we were both dying from the heat, we locked up and went to lunch when the dude left. I offered to drive us both in Fifi so we could be in air conditioning but John refused. I shrugged and hopped in Lil' Wiggly. We ate at Chili’s and then went our separate ways. I was going to take Lil' Wiggly home but remembered that Big Millie was behind the seat of Fifi. I wanted to go get my gun. I took Lil' Wiggly back to the shop and hopped in Fifi. I went home and got ready to go to the Ranger’s baseball game. I'll tell y'all that story tomorrow though.