8/25/09

Well, I stopped by Automotive Machine yesterday out of my way home from work to ask if they could machine the spacers for the “pretty” manifold. The machinist said it shouldn't be a problem. Of course he’ll need better measurements than what I had on the crude little Paint drawing I did on the work computer. I think what I'm going to do is this: I'll bring both manifolds, the hunk of aluminum, and possibly some gaskets to him and we’ll disgust it some more. If it looks to him like tarting up the “ugly” manifold would be less time consuming, and therefore cheaper, we may go that route. There is a simple way to get the spacers made, I think. If I just had him match the shape of the head surface of the “pretty” manifold, port it straight through, drill and tap for a new bottom stud twixt manifold and spacer, and run a longer center stud on top, I'd be done. I probably won't go that route since it won't be that tough to make the little ears on top for the dual top studs. Now, the big question is: do I go long center stud through to the head or shorter stud just between the manifold and spacer? Probably the latter, since I already have that stud. We shall see. On my way home from AM, I stopped in at Steve’s Foreign Auto and ordered a master cylinder for Lil' Wiggly. I'm going to go ahead and imply the blame on John because, well, to be honest, just because it is my blog. So there. John was supposed to send me an e-mail with “instructions” about what to buy with regards to that master cylinder. Since I never got those instructions, I bought the new one Steve had listed. It was $175.00 though. I was going to pass until he, Steve, said the prices were about to double for items like that. So, now I need to cut out early again today and run by Steve’s to get it. Perhaps we’ll install that tomorrow if we go to the shop. We shall see. In other news, mom had a cataract removed today. I'm not sure what the procedure involves but she was in and out by 1030 h or so. My sister took her back for a follow up visit at 1330 h and I haven’t heard anything from them. I'm assuming everything went well. I'll know when I get home, I guess. Well, I'm not thinking of more to tell y'all so I guess I'm going to shut up now. Don't be surprised if you don't get a rant tomorrow since we are supposed to go to the shop. We’ll see if it happens this week.