3/6/13

Well I've been thinking again.  We know how that can cause problems.  Thing is, I'm almost sure I'm not going to like driving Lil' Wiggly with the V8.  Sure, it is going to be stupid fast, but I'm getting to a point in my life where I'm like, “Meh, so what?”  I think… no, I'm know I like “momentum” cars better than “brute force” cars.  Take Fiona for instance.  Yes, it can accelerate like a scalded ape, but most of the time it spends puttering around barely ticking over.  Ok, I do let the revs flow pretty freely, but I'm still just barely cracking the throttle and rarely does it ever come “on the cam” before I'm shifting to the next higher gear.  It might sound like I drive it like a pussy, but I think it is more a case of the car is capable of so much more than I ask of it.  Ah!  I just realized something!  It is like my “needs” for a motorcycle… you know, before I decided I wasn’t a bike guy.  I wanted a bike which was nearly topped-out when cruising on the freeway.  One with the throttle ¾ open, not one with ¾ throttle left to twist.  I think I'm the same with cars.  I think that was why I was so… I want to say “happy with” but I'm not sure that is quite right… meh, happy with the Versæ when they were just marginally adequate for hooning.  They got me up on the freeway and around slower cars well enough, and even managed a few speeding tickets, but I did have to really “open the taps” to do so.  I think that is why I'm so happy with The Seven only having around 100 horsepower.  It does what I want it to spiritedly enough for me.  Hells bells, one of the most fun cars I've ever owned was George with a clapped out 68 horse A-12!  You could “race” anyone on the road… and they’d never know it.  But damn that was a fun car!  For that matter, the brown 210 and Lil' Wiggly were a hoot to drive with anemic little A-series engines.  Of course the Chickenhawk is an anomaly now.  I did really like having a shit-ton of torque (relatively) available in that car.  Perhaps the low-revving “grunt motor” Z-20 I had in there was part of the draw.  Having said that, it should follow that I'll like the mountainous torque off idle of the V8 in Lil' Wiggly.  Hmm, perhaps.  We’ll see.  It also follows that a KA-24 should be a pretty good fit with me.  Since that is the plan, right now, I think, for George, it is another “we’ll see” situation.  Anyhoo, I think, the long and the short of it is, I'll probably be willing to, if not actively seeking to sell Lil' Wiggly soon after it is back on the road.  That does not meant the car is “dead to me” by any means.  But I'm not getting my hopes up that it will be the be all and end all of driving nirvana for me.  So, what does all this mean?  I don’t know so I'll move on to discussing what will be next after Lil' Wiggly leaves the shop.  I think the current plan is to shuffle the Spit into the main bay, probably where John's car "Timmy!" currently resides, so we can basically do what we did to "Timmy!" in reverse.  See, "Timmy!" now has the independent rear suspension from a Datsun 510 rather than the live axle a 1200 normally runs.  John, if that is secret knowledge, feel free to delete back to the word “resides.”  We’ll remove the independent rear suspension from the Spit and replace it with a live axle.  Then we will get cracking on deciding what engine is going in that car.  Right now I'm thinking the A-14 that came out of Lil' Wiggly, minus the radical cam, and rebuilt with the “exotic” parts from the turbo engine in George (ceramic coated pistons and cylinder head), and perhaps the turbo bits themselves as well.  Oh, I guess the actual first thing would be to roll George in and remove that engine and transmission.  Also, we’d move John's car, "Timmy!" over to the bay occupied by Lil' Wiggly now so we can “finish” it.  Ok, here is a “dog with a puffy tail” situation.  I just had a thought about storing Lil' Wiggly at the house.  I wonder if I could surreptitiously build a little “garage” on that lower patio for it.  The city doesn’t want me building back there but I wonder if a small “storage shed” like the one currently back there, but large enough to roll Lil' Wiggly in and out, could be built on the sly.  I was thinking that I'd put the canopy over Lil' Wiggly when parked back there but that doesn’t seem like a good solution.  See, the problem is Lil' Wiggly is not going to be weather-tight by any stretch of the imagination.  More so than The Seven or the Spit, but still not what Juan would call “outdoor parking friendly.”  Ideally I'd boot mom’s car out of the garage and park there… but I'd have to have much bigger balls than what I'm currently swinging to do that.  No, ideally I'd have my own garage next/attached to a smaller house… or the big-assed shop in Boyd, but I'm not holding my breath for that to ever happen.  Hmm, I think I'm going to call this a rant and go look at storage sheds on line.  I'll report findings tomorrow.