To whomever might be interested,
I think I shall call this litte epistle "Connections"...with apologies to
Mr. James Burke.
Well...it all began innocently enough last August. The handbrake on the
recently purchased rust-bucket, euphamistically known as "her" 69 Sprite,
never worked. Ratcheted, sorta, but would not hold the car.
No problem, take apart the handle, see what's goin' on, adjust the brakes,
and down the road...Right? Ha-ha-ha!
Seems the drums would not come off. PO had installed EVERYTHING either
backwards, upside down or any which way he could...except the right way. OK!
We'll do a brake job while we are here. Hmmmm....axles are leaking and the
bearings sound pretty nasty...and Wow...I would not have believed you could
get that much rust into those teeny little wheel cylinders. Wonder what the
master cylinder looks like? Gee... if I'm gonna go through all this work to
take the brake master cylinder down for a rebuild, might as well do the
clutch master at the same time. Can't just do the master and not the
slave...right? Damn! What demented engineer designed this clutch slave
cylinder placement? Get him on the phone. He designed it...he should damn
well have to bleed it! While waiting for my new friend, the UPS guy, to
deliver the latest round of parts, let's pull the battery and see what's
goin' on with all that rust beneath it. Oops! Same engineer responsible for
the clutch slave musta designed this too...off comes the hood just to remove
a battery!
Remove heater, in the way and the core is obviously leaking...holy s----!!!
Where did the the battery tray go? Looks like the bottom of the mighty
Mississippi in my heater channels. Clean out all the gook, drag the Mig
over, get a good friend at work to form a new tray, grind, sand, weld and
paint...new tray. Not exactly concours, but functional.
Let's see now. Hood is already off...she's always had a misfire that bugged
me...why not do a shotgun tune-up? Set valve clearances and check dwell.
Timing? Bah...humbug? That enginner was here again. My arms ain't long
enough to reach from down under the front of the car to the dizzy while
hangin' on to the timing light. We'll just do the old advance it 'til it
pings trip.
Oh Honey! Remember when I started to fix your handbrake? Well...it is now
November, I'm broke but the handbrake does work fine now. I'm going for a
test drive.
Now people...please...picture this...it's raining, I've got the wiper motor
out and on the bench for a quick peek and clean-up, the heater is right next
to it awaiting funds for a core transplant, there are no seats in the car,
I'm waiting for the UPS guy to deliver a set purchased from a new friend met
on the list...but damn-it...I'm going for a ride!
Drive to the gas station, about two miles from the house, and BOY!!!! It's
like I'm sixteen again, and toolin' in my first car. Big smile on my face as
I check out how she runs after spending the last three months on jack-stands.
I feel sorry for all those people in their Hondas and such, so isolated from
the pure joy of driving a car that is so much fun fun fun!
Thanks for listening to my rant. Stay tuned...this car will never be done,
and I'm sure at some point in time in the near future it will once again
cause me to vent at your expense.
Later,
Bill
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