it runs. i never thought it would happen. it seemed like just a
dream. the tattered shell and sad boxes of miscellany that came
into my life on a trailer three long years ago have been transmogrified
through the application of sweat, pulled hair, frayed nerves, and enormous
buckets of cash into what is beginning to resemble an automobile.
flash and i started the bugeye saturday. i borrowed an oil-filled
fire extinguisher from a friend, primed the oil system through the
oil gauge fitting, reconnected the gauge, pulled the plugs to
get pressure, hit the starter, and.. nothing. well, not nothing
exactly, but a sort of approximately nothing resembling a dull click.
jumped the solenoid, still nothing (except a lovely shower of sparks).
pulled the starter and tested it on the floor with jumper cables,
and got approximately the same sort of nothing. hopped in the
reliabeast to swap the defective starter for another at the auto
parts club (no reciept, thanks guys!). slap in the new starter,
crank it over. fear and joy. 80+ psi. cool. put the plugs in,
check the ingition connections, turn the key, listen to the cheap
fuel pump buzz its obnoxious buzz (i'm going to swap it for an SU. i
love the dumdumdumdum badum badum badum badum badum),
move the choke lever on that big hungry-looking 45DCOE, pull the
solenoid, give it a little gas, and she fires into life for the first
time, choking great gasping clouds of smoke from her oil-drenched bores.
set the idle to about 2400 to bed the cam in, and grin alot.
the nasty rattly noises turn out to be the defective newly rebuilt
(unipart gold seal) alternator, the oil pouring out of the datsun
5 speed turns out to be because i left the cap on the vent tube,
the rebuilt dual gauge doesn't do temp (but the $20 sunpro water
gauge works nicely, and looks great duct taped to the bare tunnel).
i actually drove it sunday. just a couple quick runs up the road
and back, but i have brakes, clutch, trans, rearend, etc. it actually
works. wow. feels pretty brutal with the weber, the cam, the high
compression pistons, etc. can't wait to get the carb & timing dialed in
on the rolling road by Charlie Rockwell. this puppy's gonna hum.
killer dogs.
she tends to run about 100psi off idle, down to about 80 at idle. i wonder
if i've got too much tension in the relief valve. i'm running
distilled water and redline water wetter, and it won't go above about
190 (so far). the datsun clutch is like a switch - i smoked a little
rubber off the p6s getting it out of the garage - i think i'll end up
going to a smaller bore disk brake master cylinder. she's dripping
a little oil - i need to track down the source and correct it (not
expecting perfection :-).. ahhh.
next week she's back to the paint shop for some minor cleanup, then
it's interior, trim, and details. then we're road bound and mobile.
if you see a shiny little black bugeye with minilites and a big
guy with an enormous grin on his face, it's probably me..
hans "no, really, i *meant* the summer of '94" huber
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