Quote:
Originally Posted by Xeen
It's a good thing you have some time to spare before the power tour to work out the bugs, lets just hope there are no other problems so you have time to put some miles on her before it's go time.
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I hope so too, Brian.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Low Elco
Call Boppa- He or I may have that manifold paint that we used on yeller. Yours if you want it, works pretty good so far. Scotchbrite it and slap it on there, it may hold the rust back. Congrats on the fire up!
Yeller got wet, hee hee. Wash some of the giant Lab slobber off it!
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Thanks for the offer, Chip. Not sure if I'll have time for that or not. Punch list is still pretty long.
Update...
The water pump arrived late Tuesday and I spent all day yesterday working on it. The quality of these units has gone downhill since I bought the original that was on the car. Porous casting, sloppy machine work and a few holes that wouldn't line up with the timing cover without re-drilling them. Very frustrating. Then to top it all off, I discovered the height of the hub is 1/8" less than the original. So without a spacer, the pulleys won't line up. Buried in the box was a tiny little slip of paper warning not to try to alter the hub. Doing so would void the warranty and possibly lead to "catastrophic failure". They offered to sell you a spacer kit as a fix. Not sure who the bean counter and/or marketing genius is at Holley that decided it's a good idea to throw in a slip of paper instead of a $2 part and piss off a customer. Having a lathe and mill meant I was able to make the needed part, but it wasn't in my time budget.
After all the trials and tribulations, the engine is back together and upon startup... the new water pump leaked out the weep hole just like the other one did. However, after running it for about 10 minutes at operating temp, the leak disappeared - thankfully! The engine sounds better after tightening the valve lash by another quarter turn. Starts instantly and doesn't run on when you click it off. Timing was dead nuts where I set it the other day and the vacuum is a steady 10 in. at idle.
I discovered the passenger side tie rod was hitting one of the rack and pinion lines, so I remade the line and now I have a small leak. When I first installed the rack, I had to splice both hard lines with AN fittings so I was able to re-do just that section. I think the rack is off like an '87 Cavalier (and a whole host of other models / years) and the fittings in the housing are metric bubble flares which I can't reproduce. I can't source the lines anywhere and hate to buy a rebuilt rack just for that reason. Not to mention the PITA it is to work on it. Plus the lines probably wouldn't be new anyway. I'll jack it up tomorrow and hopefully get an eighth of a turn on it before the wrench rounds it off.
The punch list is now written on the bench. I'd planned to have the car at the shop today to have the a/c charged, front end aligned and the state safety inspection done. Did not work out... and it's supposed to be raining the next four days, so I set it up for next Tuesday. If it's dry at all tomorrow, I'm going to take if for a short test drive. Will let you know how it goes.