Frerbruraryr 6, 2012

Well, as they are wont to do, plans have changed yet again. After doing stuff at the shop, which I will outline in a bit, I had a look at the single side-draft carburetor A-series manifold we have and decided to go ahead and build an A-14 for the Spit’. I found a round-port A-14 head and bolted the manifold to it. Then I began looking for the header we’d removed from The Seven. John eventually found it, in the first place he looked, in plain sight, on top of Pat's KA-24, right where I had walked four times while looking myself. I bolted it up to make sure both manifolds would work together… they do. Huzzah! I also think I'm going to plan on using that weird right angle air filter adapter thingy I bought on e-Bay… just for grins. Ok, so here’s how the day went down. I woke up late, again, and headed to the shop around 0830 h. When I arrived, John was already in the process of building his 1200’s suspension bits. I hooked up the trailer and we discussed how we wanted to arrange stuff. We shoved Super Karate-Monkey Death-Car over where the BMW IX had been and dropped John's B-310 in that spot. We rolled Nadine back where she had been and John's B-210 in behind that. We parked the trailer and went back in to work on John's suspension bits. While he was drilling holes for shocks and mocking up the parts to be welded, I was playing with the A-14 head and manifolds I mentioned before. While I was zooking his bits together, he found the header for me. I watched as he painted the suspension arms. No, I did not get any work done on Lil' Wiggly. No, I did not round up parts for, or change wheels on Nadine. I stood there and watched John work. My shop, my blog; sit on it if you don’t like it. After his parts had dried, he “installed” one and we had a look at the spring compression and suspension travel. It might just work this crazy idea of his. We cleaned up and went back to the same Italian place for another batch of calamari and split a Stromboli. From there I followed him home and we loaded his Goldwing in the bed of Fifi. We took it, and a bunch of parts, over to John Ullom’s house then. After I dropped him back home, I went home to find a text on the work phone from the dude wanting to buy Nadine. He thought they might try to come Sunday. I realized the wheels never got changed! Oh, while I was zooking his parts, after he found the header for me, John cut out the cross member we’d welded into Nadine. So at least I was that far ahead of the game. The wheels were going to be a problem though. I decided I'd go “first thing” in the morning and change them. I also decided to take Monty and use some valve lapping compound to really smooth up the interface twixt the barrel and compensator/bushing. I got to the shop and decided it was friggin’ cold. I sat in the relative warmth of the shop (at least I was out of the wind) and lapped the barrel and bushing. Oh yeah, she’s as smooth as a baby’s butt now. The gun doesn’t “stutter” when racking the slide like it used to. It is smoove! I cleaned and oiled the gun real good and popped it back in the holster. Yeah, I sometimes conceal carry a full sized .45 ACP 1911 WITH a one inch long compensator on the end of the barrel. I'm that badass. I looked around for other things to keep me inside and finally gave up. I had to change those wheels. I fired up the compressor and ran a hose to the back wall of the shop. “Hmm,” thought I, “There used to be a hole in this back wall for getting electricity or air outside.” I walked around back and saw that the facilities folk had patched it up. I went in and got a socket and ratchet and took out two of the screws then bent the metal patch out of the way. I fed the hose through and got to work. I aired up the four tires I was going to install on Nadine and drug the jack, impact wrench, wheels, and whatever else I thought I'd need out to the car. I jacked up the driver’s side and replaced the front wheel with a Toyota rim we had laying around. It went nicely. The rear, not so much. A 13” Datsun rim will not fit over the Triumph brake drum. I stole the wheels from the 200SX axle and put them on the rear, airing them up as I went. When I was through, my ass was thoroughly kicked. I put up the hoses and screwed the cover back over the hole in the back of the building. I hung out for a while waiting to hear from the dude. Finally I decided I was going to grab some lunch so I sent him a text asking his status. Halfway to Chicken Excess I realized that I was broke-ass and if I ate out I wouldn’t be able to eat lunch during the week here at work. As it stands I'm probably still going hungry the last half of the week. Oh well, I've got a badass car to drive. Anyhoo, I finally got a text back saying he wasn’t going to make it but could I send him some pictures. “Dude!” I screamed at the phone, “I'm already home!” I just replied, “Ok.” Later on, after I'd had a nap, I went back to the shop and took some really shitty pictures of the car to send to him. When I got home, mom wanted to go to El Fenix for their new brisket nachos. We did. They sucked. Back at home I watched the last few seconds of the second half of Puppy Bowl VIII then caught the Kitten Halftime Show. I just about peed myself when the “Popular Middle School Girls” GEICO commercial ran. “Eww.” “Seriously?” “So gross.” I'm still laughing at that… I'm not sure why. And I guess that gets y'all caught up to my weekend. Oops, just had to run across the street for something. While passing through the cafeteria I thought, “I’d like a diet ‘Tard Fuel.” I rounded up the requisite $1.25, plunked it in the machine, and pressed the button. Out popped a regular ‘Tard Fuel. I'd forgotten just how tasty a regular ‘Tard Fuel is. Mmmmmm. High fructose corn syrup and caffeine! I’LL BE BOUNCING OFF THE WALLS PRETTY SOO… OH, LOOKS LIKE RIGHT NOW‼‼‼‼ Bing, bing, BING! Ricochet Rabbit!