So, I'm sitting here at work on a rainy Saturday evening, killing time until 7pm, going over what's left to do in my head. We've only spent parts of 4 days on the car in the week and a half since we bought it, what with work, and most of our team being too far away. The only local guy besides me is too busy half the time, so we have a lot left to do.
The cage is in, which is HUGE. It looks great, but all that 1.75x.120 DOM steel weighs like 200+ pounds. What do we care? The car weighs 2 1/2 TONS!
I rebuilt the carb, and drained the tank (gotta love old cars, it had a drain plug!). Not much of anything came out of the fuel tank in the way of trash, so we'll just add a big inline filter, and hope for the best. I had to weld the front bumper and lower radiator support on. Somebody had jerry-rigged it with two axle U-bolts, and when you stopped, the bumper dropped way down in front. When you took off, it picked back up. Those threaded steel rods that go through the detached lower radiator support? Yeah, they kinda need to be rigid if you want the front wheels to track, especially while braking.
-The starter is out, and I have it partially disassembled. It needed new brushes badly, and I'm hoping that's all, because that's all I ordered. The solenoid seems to be okay, it just cranks too slowly to start the car when it gets hot.
-The old VERY rotten exhaust is off. I gotta fab up a pipe and a muffler after the Y pipe, and I'll probably do a driver's side exit in front of the rear wheel.
-The wheels and drums are removed, and we need to rebuild the wheel cylinders, and possibly the master cylinder. The new rear shoes need to go on, as the newish ones on the right rear are soaked in old brake fluid, and will probably break apart while racing. We might also replace the lines, depending on how they look, and if they loosen for us. We also have all new hoses, to avoid a fire (coughTunachuckerslessonlearnedcough).
-The safety gear (seat/harness/cutoff switch/extinguisher/etc.) needs to be installed.
-The tires all need replacement. We need wheels for spares.
-The car needs to be painted. It's raining.
-The rear air shocks need installation, and the 2x4's a previous owner wedged in the rear coil springs need to be removed, before they shift and rip out a brake line.
-The lights need work. We have one headlight, no brake lights, and no dash lights.
-The wipers need a motor. It's missing. If not, the windshield needs a good coat of rain-x.
-We need to buy front shocks, and install them.
-We need to repack all the wheel bearings.
-We need to clean the previous owner's coat of primer off of all the pretty chrome.
-We need to put the new radiator hoses on, and flush the radiator.
-We need to tune it up, and change the oil. Lucas additive is a must, this thing has 48 years worth of oil leakage caked on underneath.
-It needs the new valve cover gaskets to slow said leakage, at least from one point of origin.
It probably needs a bunch of other things I'm forgetting at the moment. Some of you have built a car in a week and a half. You know how difficult it can be. It's worse with a 48 year-old car that hasn't been really used in the last decade or two. We're gonna get it all done, Lord willing, but it aint gonna be easy. Any MD/DC/VA area peeps with free time on their hands and some basic knowledge of crap cans can come on out and lend a hand! Your payment willl be seeing the car make it out onto the track at NL. That, and frosty beverages while you work, of course. My cell is 301-675-8006 if you're interested!
Captain: Speedycop & The Gang Of Outlaws -'94 Mark VIII (Least Horrible Yank Tank Stafford '09, NOLA '10) '61 Caddy (Org Choice-NL '09) '63 Tbird (EPIC Repair Failure-Gingerman '10, I Got Screwed-Summit Pt '10, I.O.E. WINNER Stafford '10!) '77 Lancia Scorpion (I.O.E. WINNER Joliet 2010!) '67 Galaxie 500 (Judges Choice-CMP '11)
Future Fleet: 1957 Ford Prefect 1942 Buick 1959 Bugeye Project GLCOAT