Nissan Weekend #14

As much as I'd like to pretend that weekend 14 never happened (or at least to not count it as an actual “work day”), I guess I should go ahead and tell the tale.

Mostly, the fourteenth installment in our continuing series largely consisted of me futilely attempting to wipe tar off of where the quarter-windows and tail-light assemblies had been on my car (and removing the pinstripes and adhesive for the trim). I bought a BIG bottle of tar & adhesive remover that probably would have worked fine had it just been a single small blotch or two that a person might get by driving through a road construction area with fresh tar ...not a huge quarter inch bead of the stuff covering a line that perhaps equaled 15-20 feet or so in length ...and this isn't even counting the double stick tape that had held the bumper strips on (another 15 feet or so), or the pinstripes. Back when I was working in the field, we used some stuff in an aerosol can that nearly melted the shit off on contact. I think I was kicking myself most of the time for not making some phone calls to find out what that stuff had been.

My dream had been to do all of the body work and put on the primer coat of paint this weekend. As much as I want to bitch about the complete waste of a day ...the truth is that I probably couldn't have successfully done that anyway: it rained cats and dogs nearly the whole day, and I have doubts that the paint would have even stuck. It also doesn't make me feel any better when the goal for #15 weekend is now going to be the same as this one though.

So I went out first thing in the morning and started wiping the tar out of the quarter window flanges with the solvent I had purchased (keep away from "Goof-off" everyone). Nearly two hours later, I started on the tail-light flanges. I didn't work QUITE as hard on those, and eventually I took a razor to the pinstripes and double stick tape that had a consistency that was somewhat similar to concrete has after having been on the car for 24 years. I guess that on the upside ...at least I did go ahead and mask off the quarter windows and all of the bolt holes where I had taken out parts (rear bumper, lights, etc) while I was working.

...it was well after one before I finally figured out that what I was doing just wasn't cutting it, and that I needed to try something different. I drove into town to see what was available, and had to settle on detergents and some heavy-duty scrubbing utensils. I put all of the “components” back into place inside the car and drove it outside; it was a bit amusing to drive a car without a dashboard in it. None of what I bought turned out to be particularly impressive or overly effective when I made it back with them, but I think the plastic scrubbers and brillo-type zinc pads may have been a bit better than nothing at all.

Ultimately, it came down to wet-sanding the shit out of it, and that mostly did the trick although it went down to the primer in a lot of the heavy areas. Then when the heavens opened up and started dumping what I'm pretty sure was one of the local lakes on me, I pulled the car back inside the shop and started pulling a vacuum on the AC system. I took off the RF fender and did a bit of pounding on the fender with a rubber mallet to get the worst of the dents out, then put three cans of refrigerant in the AC. I either have a pretty big leak, or something else is going on; it cycled rapidly like there wasn't enough refrigerant (R12 capacity was only 34 ounces, so three cans should have been overdoing things a little bit). I guess I'll find out next time; I dumped a shit-load of oil into it, so a leak should be pretty obvious if there is one.

When the monsoon passed over, I pulled the car back out and did a little more sanding before calling it “enough” for the day. Had I done the body-filler work, it's probably almost ready for the primer-coat. As I was finishing up, I set the fender back on it and remembered that I had done absolutely NO sanding on that.

I'm considerably less than thrilled with the progress on this trip, and I guess that I'll just have to hope that next time I won't have the rain variable mixed into things. I got a fair bit done as far as prep-work goes; there's still a fair bit yet to do though. As I've said, I'm less than thrilled, but it could have always been worse I suppose.

Nissan Weekend #13

So number thirteen was a bit of a short weekend as well; we brought my Mom's sister and one of her kids out to the ranch Friday night, but came back home Saturday evening after dinner. I got in about six hours of work time; I think I probably got a lot more done than I had really thought that I would, although I suspect that my BIL thought I set myself back a ways rather than moving forward.

It really was a slow start. Although I brought my toolbox along with me, I never took it out of Mom's car. I used the BIL's quarter inch socket set and a few screwdrivers the whole day; the "mechanical" end of it is mostly done now, so I don't really need very much. Oddly enough (or maybe not), I started out on the front bumper cover. The epoxy I used to fill the damaged area was pretty rough, so I just got a bit of a start on that. I worked on it for maybe 15 minutes or so; I have a cardboard box I carry a lot of the "little stuff" around in, and I forgot to bring some of the items that really would have aided in the sanding. As I worked on it for a few minutes, I got to thinking that perhaps I would be doing myself a favor to simply bring the whole thing home with me. It became somewhat obvious that I was probably going to be looking at hours of work to get the contours on the repaired section right; why not just do all the sanding and maybe even the primer coat here in Dallas?! Food for thought at least; I abandoned that project and got busy on removing the rear bumper cover.

The bumper cover came right off; it's amazing how easily all of that comes off when you have virtually all of the interior mostly laying on the exterior. There were two nuts on either side that were covered (hidden) by insulation, but I saw the top two before I even started so I pulled the insulation back to SEE if they had hidden a couple more. When I had everything loose, I gave the cover a big tug...

...and nothing. It wouldn't budge. I pulled both outer parts loose, but the middle of it was still holding tight. I looked closer and sure enough; I had missed one stud that had a wiring loom going over the top of it. Apparently 12 studs in the interior of the car isn't QUITE enough to hold it on; they need to throw one MORE hidden one in as well.

It was a surprise to me when I took the tail-light assemblies out; I had been reading about how the seals for them were rather notorious about springing leaks. I had a fair amount of rust damage in the rear that I had assumed was from the hatch seal (I'm still not ruling that out); the rust damage in the spare tire well was definitely from a leak in the right tail-light seal though. The standing water in the left side after I washed it is still a bit of a puzzle though. I saw a spot on the left seal that looked like water may well have been passing through, but I didn't see the obvious watermarks like I did on the right side. I'm certain that I'll have a lot of puzzles to figure out once everything is painted and put back together. Since all the water that runs across the entire rear hatch empties right by the light assemblies, it's a pretty good bet that the leaking problem was there all along.

The same sealant used for the tail assemblies is what is used on the rear quarter windows. I had been reading an article about how if you were re-sealing one, you might as well do all of them. The sealant is a really annoyingly sticky black tar-like substance that apparently loses its thickness with age; it had been running a little bit on the side windows for as long as I had the car and was almost impossible to clean off. The more I read about these leak-potentials, the more I liked the thought of just taking them out, painting the trim separately and re-tinting the glass while it's out of the car. One of my "projects" while home is to find a good cleaner for the tar; that stuff is almost impossible to get off with nearly everything I've tried so far.

The quarter windows came out with relatively little fuss; the adhesive-cleaning was (and will continue to be, on the next visit) the most difficult part. I took all of the side moulding off, and I'm not really sure how well those parts are going to go as far as repainting since they are SO flexible. Hopefully not TOO bad is all I can say; only one side had severe damage, but I'll need to paint them all to have them match. I used a razor and cut off the worst of the double stick tape that held them on; hopefully tar remover will take care of that as well.

After I spent goodness knows how much time with a razor blade trying to get the worst of the double-stick tape and the tar on the window and tail lens areas off, I remembered the ground effects, which turned out to be no big deal at all. Once those were off, I took a few steps back and tried to figure where to go now; I still had time on my hands. I guess that the logical next step would have been to have gotten busy on spit cleaning under all the things I took off; only I didn't have anything to take the tar compound off and that was going to be getting in my way no matter what I did.

I was so proud of myself for finding that dashboard cover a while back ...it really makes a world of difference in the looks. The more I thought about how badly the vinyl was peeling up, the more I started thinking about ways to clear off the old rotten stuff before attempting to gue down the cap. ...to the point it was actually starting to literally bother me. I had a thought creep into my head about the possibility of just taking the whole dash out; after all, I had all the lower trim out, the AC control head/stereo assembly, the glovebox ...the instrument panel was really the largest obstacle standing in my way for getting at ALL the bolts for the dash. It isn't exactly FUN to take out, but not that big of a deal after everything else I've done.

I had the time now ...and it might save me some trouble down the line if I was able to do the work on it with it OUT of the car (shit ....everything is easier to work on when it's out of the car). I went ahead and got busy with that. I think the largest problem was just in remembering where all of the bolts were, and what peices had to come off to get at the "hidden" bolts. It was really a "couple of hours" out of my way, not a "couple of minutes" ...it sucks to take it out in any case, but in this case I think I turned out to be doing what may be a huge favor to myself later on. When I pulled it out, it turns out that the reason the vinyl started peeling up in the first place is because it has started rusting out underneath ...BADLY! I'll need to cut away almost all of the affected sections and do some major sanding and rustoleum painting ...then put in some low-rise sandable foam and hopefully that will work well enough. I'd really rather not have to chase down another dash for the silly thing, but I guess I'd rather find out now rather than a year or so down the line when it all starts warping because I cut corners (and I've cut more than a few already).

Once I had the dash out and on the ground, I called it a day. The BIL came out and nearly fell over when he saw the interior ...I think he said something to the effect of how it had LOOKED like I was in the process of putting it all back TOGETHER?!?! Ah well ...it may not be pretty, but I'll be happy I did it later. I chose to only bring home the front bumper cover, the quarter-windows and the tail-lamp assemblies this time; hopefully to get prepped and all of the tar off of before I head out the next time. Time will tell! She's looking pretty scary, but I'm sure hoping this means I'm still on the downhill end of things.

Nissan Weekend #12

I think the last line in the previous post was almost an omen of things to come.

This was a very short "weekend" as we drove up Friday night and came home Saturday evening somewhat early. I managed about 5-6 hours of work time, although it seems a good deal of that time was mostly "busy work." I got started a bit after nine Saturday morning and wrapped things up around three or so that afternoon.

After numerous attempts, I was finally able to get the correct part from the dealer for that emission hose that I had fabricated on the last trip. I had also ordered the o-ring for the fuel pump cover and finally decided to order the entire cable assembly for the rear hatch/fuel door release. One small part of the cable was broken (and I'm pretty sure I broke it myself when we picked up the car in Waco); I had been trying to think of ways to "fix" it without buying a whole new cable, but when I noticed that the rather high price was for all three cables as well as the hinge (which caused the failure in the first place), I decided it was probably money well spent just to buy the full assembly. When I removed the fabricated emission hose and placed the new (correct) one in its place, I noticed that the entire fresh air intake assembly had shifted over slightly in order for the old (fabricated) one to fit. I probably would have been looking at one of the plastic sections breaking somewhere down the line from the stress had I simply left it the way it was.

...It's always nice when you realize that not cutting those corners will probably save you unnecessary money and trouble down the line.

Of course, the first order of business was to fix the fuel leak. I had hoped to be able to drop the fuel tank on one side and have the room to simply lift the pump assembly enough to slip the new o-ring into place. Although that hope turned out to be wishful thinking, dropping the entire tank really wasn't such a big deal the second time around. I thought it a bit amusing when my BIL said that as many times as I had had it out, I ought to be able to do it pretty fast! I found that amusing because I had only had the tank out of the car the one time when I first started the whole project. On the last trip, he had been with me when I removed the straps to drop the tank down a little bit, and was also there when I took off the muffler for more clearance/visibility; that isn't even close to removing the whole tank though. The filler hose business is actually the most time consuming part of the whole job since there are so many brackets and covers. I guess you could unhook the filler hose from the tank as long as you are willing to slosh gas all over yourself while you're jostling it. The muffler has one clamp and two hangers to remove; the straps are simply a nut on one side and a bolt for the other, then you turn them on their side to remove them (without an actual lift, that part is easier said than done though). I guess as a former professional, I always just get a kick out of how most people have a tendency to confuse which is the easy part and which is the more difficult (in actual practice).

Once the tank was sitting on the ground, I tightened the lines to the pump itself (just in case) and swapped the o-ring. I felt no need to try to check anything else or attempt starting the engine before putting everything back; since nothing was physically broken, there wasn't anything else TO be wrong. I had one little problem with the reinstall that I'm fairly sure will come back to bite me in the ass at a future date, but some things you just have to take in stride. It will never be a problem as long as the fuel pump is working, and it won't make a bit of difference otherwise. Once it was all back in, I pulled the wheel dollies and set it on the shop floor on it's actual tires for the first time since this whole project began.

Now that it was back on the ground again, I decided to tackle the "problem" with the timing that I had mentioned in the last post. I tried to bump the engine slowly to bring it to TDC (top dead center means number one piston all the way to the top of the block); I'm fairly sure there's a wire that needs to be grounded to disable the timing advance, so the timing light in and of itself wasn't as useful as I had hoped. It didn't take much bumping to figure out that I was indeed a tooth off on the distributor though. I had thought it was pretty odd that it would have been as far off of what it had been originally. Two screws, one bolt; it isn't as though there is anything remotely difficult about resetting it. I did learn one really interesting thing I wished that I had taken note of when I removed it though: where the distributor cap screws down on the distributor, the rotor should point directly at the right screw to be at TDC. It was all of a 15 minute setback, but it was still a "duhhhh" moment when I noticed how obvious it was. The engine still seems to have a very slight misfire after warming up to operating temp; I'm guessing it to be a vacuum leak somewhere, but it should be fine until I finish the paint and body work (I might hook up a vacuum gauge next time just to confirm). I really can't do any diagnostics until I actually take it on the road; the computer can't do a legitimate relearn cycle until it's actually been driven. I can tell that there is something (however slight) off; I doubt it would be enough to even affect the inspection though. JUST enough to annoy the hell out of me once I start driving it again though.

Once that part was out of the way, I basically just drove it outside for a wash job. I'm going to be having a few problems down the line a bit; I found that there are some pretty major leaks in the weather-stipping (or adjustment) of the rear hatch. Water actually began to pool up in the rear after washing it. Once again, I suppose that'll wait until the paint work is complete. I have a lot of reasonably inexpensive leads on that front; I'm simply choosing not to worry about them just yet. I'm still toying with a few ideas about the window seals (I know the drivers side is leaking); my heart nearly stopped when I found out that the rubber for the t-tops cost more than a freaking engine though! I have found some good forums, but forum posters tend to work in extremes. Overly simplistic vs overly anal with little middle ground; there are always alternatives that lie in between "spend a grand on new seals" and "rub brake fluid on it to expand the rubber" (also deteriorating the rubber).

The mere act of driving the car outside for the first time was cause for a lot of celebration though. I was washing it down when the sister and BIL came up the drive from town; the BIL started shooting one of his guns out the truck window when he saw the car outside (a Colt replica loaded with blanks, but still). Like I said the last time ...it was an impressive moment for the layman, but there wasn't a thing in the world (except maybe for the temperature) stopping me from driving it out last time had I really wanted to do it. There wasn't really THAT much stopping me from starting it on the Christmas trip either; I'd rather have have had it running reasonably well with ALL the parts connected rather than run like crap with only most of them. ...I'm just anal that way.

After the wash job, I thoroughly swept the shop floor where the car had been before pulling it back in (and took sarcastic advantage of the photo-op). I went to the house and got some Windex and went to town on all of the windows (inside and out), and even some of the body. After this was over with, it was mostly just busy work for the next hour or two. I took off both of the door panels and pulled the radio assembly out of the car, took off some of the rear body stuff (third brake light, reflectors; I started to remove the tail-lights but they were glued in a bit too tightly). Then I made a stack of things that I needed to take home with me, and put all my tools away.

...I think this was the first time that I hadn't thought far enough ahead that I really didn't have anything else planned to do if/when I ran out of time. I was really amazed at how clean the body was though; the only real damage is to the passenger side, and even that part is pretty minimal. I still have a bit of trepidation given my utter lack of experience in body work, but it was amazing how a mere washing could make such a huge difference in both the looks and how I'm viewing the "challenge" of fixing it.

I'm hoping that this will mean a downhill run from here out, but only time will tell. It's just nice to see a light at the end of a tunnel at long last.

Nissan Weekend #11

So it would appear that I'm finally into the double digits on my weekend(s) project; I'm of two minds about how this one went over though. As a former professional auto technician of 20 years, I don't personally feel as though I got a whole lot accomplished. From a layperson (and a disabled one at that) standpoint ...I suppose it was at least a mediocre accomplishment. The BIL seemed to think it was a VERY substantial weekend, but then he isn't as anal as I am about determining what qualifies as "progress."

I guess that the first notable thing to keep in mind is that I really wasn't all that up to working in the first place (I have doubts that I'm ever really all that up to it); since the death of my dad, I just haven't quite been all that "with it" for all the understandable reasons anyway. Although working is a good stress relief for me, I also have a body and mind that just won't quite keep up with my ambitions most of the time.

We made the trip up Friday evening, and I got to work Saturday morning. I spent a great deal of time simply puttering around; I didn't tell anyone there, but I'm fairly certain that BIL's best friend had used his shop since X-mas and cleaned up a little bit. Very nice thing to do, only none of the nuts and bolts for some of the parts that I had disassembled on his workbench were anywhere to be found. I wasted a fair bit of time searching, but didn't go too all out on it. I had been looking for bolts for the new catalytic converter at the parts house when it occurred to me that my Daewoo trunk was chock full of metric nuts and bolts; I had brought enough of a mix along that it seemed a bit futile to spend too much time looking for the original ones. I installed all of the exhaust, that headlamp motor I had burned out on the last trip, the rear wiper motor and I removed the rear spoiler while I was at it. I also cleaned out the glovebox (no mean feat) and removed it to bring home with me and see what I can do with its mysteriously malfunctioning latch.

Even on the Christmas weekend, I had two "mystery" vacuum lines (I wasn't quite sure where they went); I found where one of the two went at least. One of the things that I had forgotten to do was get vacuum hose and come up with a reasonable facsimile for that one oddball emission hose that the dealer had told me was no longer available (more on that later on). Basically I started out the morning with "little stuff" and even the execution of that was punctuated by another little problem. The BIL has had the shop for about three years, and he had yet to clean out the rain gutters ...and I believe he figured out they were totally clogged.

You have to sort of know me and my condition, but I have a problem with certain acoustical settings ...large places that echo give me a LOT of trouble (meaning my "dizziness" gets a lot more severe). Wal-Mart and Home Depot's are NOT friendly to my condition ...quite a few Target's do the "ceiling" rather than leaving the upper section with the "warehouse" feel ...and they seldom treat me as poorly. You kind of have to use your imagination with that in mind when you consider me in a large metal shop with somebody beating around on top cleaning out rain gutters. It was just after lunchtime when I realized that I was getting bad enough that I probably couldn't even have told you my own name; I also had enough done that about the only thing left was to either get busy on (finally) starting up the engine, or pull out the carpeting from the front section of the car.

It was a bit of a relief that I hadn't gotten the emission hose. I also needed vacuum line, but in a pinch I could have simply used the windshield washer hose for what I needed; actually ...I DID use it for two things until I found out a third needed a section large enough that cutting would have been required. It was a good excuse to get myself out of the large tin can that somebody was beating on the outside with a stick in any case though. I washed up and drove into town only to find that in itty-bitty towns like Winnsboro, the only parts house closes at noon on Saturdays. My first thought was that I might as well just drive to Sulpher Springs ...well over an hour out of my way, but when you need it, you need it.

The second thought that hit me was that I could probably find stuff that would work at a plain old hardware store. I actually went as far as to call the house to ask where the local hardware store was, but then it sort of occurred to me that a thorough search of the town proper would take approximately 5 minutes since it only consists of about eight blocks. I also seemed to recall having seen it in the downtown area during one of the parades somewhere down the line, and sure enough ...it took all of three minutes of driving to find it. I went in and was immediately surprised that in a town the size of Winnsboro, that the man who came over to assist set my "gaydar" off like a fire alarm; I had (sort of) joked that during the '08 elections about all of the McCain/Palin signs and a couple of curiously Obama/Biden shaped charcoal briquettes in a yard or two.

He kinda stood out in other words; the veritable "pink sheep" if you will.

He was a great deal of help in any case. I got some 1/2" rubber tubing for the emission hose and 1/8" for vacuum ...it wasn't really made for auto application, and I have a bit of doubt that it will handle the heat, but with a couple 90 degree angle elbows for the emission hose I was good to go; and for less than four bucks to boot. When I got back to the shop, the BIL had just finished with cleaning the shop gutters, so I counted myself fortunate in timing.

I got back to work and installed the vacuum lines (and restored the washer hoses to their rightful places), then fashioned the emission hose. The hose ...uhhhm ...worked. It was just a touch too long, but I still managed to cram it into place; I had to use clamps to hold the center section together, but not much could make it even attempt to budge the side hookups even un-clamped. I'm thinking I'll be trying to find the CORRECT one again at the dealer; why in the world the dealer has three part numbers for the identical part on the three "types" I have no idea (types= turbo, non-turbo, 2+2). I tried to order once before and they simply ordered the wrong part; they've discontinued two of the three part numbers that are the same part (if that sounds a bit confusing, it's only because it is), so they gave up when the non-turbo showed discontinued. The clear rubber tubes I got at the hardware store look like they might be affected by the heat, so I may go ahead and spring for some "real" vacuum hose while I'm at it. The main thing at this point was that the engine was at last ready to try to fire up.

The good news is that I was able to tell by the pitch of the noise from the fuel pump exactly when it was primed and ready. With my foot all the way on the gas, the engine actually fired up very quickly; only problem was that it DIED just as quickly as it started. I hadn't really expected that it would be easy to start ...one of the bad things about the Nissan's in those early days of computers was the computer relearn procedure. When I left it sitting for long enough for the battery to go totally dead, it would never run right until it ran through the relearn process ...and that always meant babying it until it started idling on its own. Now with a freshly rebuilt engine, I wasn't really able to tell the difference between an essentially new engine not wanting to start, and what/where the problem was. AND I developed another problem in the process: a fuel leak at the gas tank.

The BIL came out after a while ...I had already taken the muffler back off and dropped one side of the tank down, but it took his coming out to actually find where the leak was: on the seal for the fuel pump cover. We tried a few things, and I still don't know WHY it's leaking instead of just stinking (it's at the exact top of the tank ...with only 5 gallons of gas, it shouldn't be leaking at all, though "smelling of gas" is a common complaint when that particular seal goes bad); end result is the same though ...it needs a new o-ring that conveniently didn't come with the new (two hundred and fifty fucking dollar) pump. We eventually made it stop leaking by taking off the gas cap and relieving the pressure, but it'll still need to be fixed unless I want to drive it with the gas-cap off (which is pretty much illegal everywhere).

Between all the cranking and the trying to fix the fuel leak, it literally took hours to get the car to finally idle on it's own ...even though it did sound as though it was only running on about three cylinders when it finally did. I suspected from all the backfiring that it was a timing issue, but it was running so poorly that it died every time I just looked at it wrong until it finally made it to operating temperature. I finally got it stable enough that I was able to start adjusting the distributor ...and after around three hours just getting it to idle at ALL, it took about three minutes to get it idling WELL. The main problem at this point is that the distributor is way off what it was before rebuilding the engine, which leaves me with a few questions. BIL nor I had a timing light that would work, so I wasn't able to check it any way but by ear. The distributor is all the way at the opposite end of its range of adjustment, so I may have to remove it and see if I can move it across one tooth if the light shows it to still be out of time. Problem there is that it may throw it out the OTHER direction; it may just be that way until the engine wears in a little bit too though. My gut feeling is that I'm going to need to try to move the distributor back one tooth, but for the present purposes it's running ...and running pretty WELL at that!

BIL was ecstatic ...I was feeling a little bit let down. Back in my "prime" I probably could have had it running in less than an hour; with a fully equipped shop (and maybe my old toolbox), the whole days work might have taken three hours. I felt like I hadn't gotten much accomplished, but it was still pretty nice just to hear the thing running again after all this time. There was no big rush on leaving the next morning, so we just called it quits for the night then.

The next morning was a mixed thing as well. As it turns out, the carpeting is likely to be a lot more "involved" than what I had hoped it would be ...there was a pretty good deal of stuff that had to be taken off to get the old out ...the driver's side was completely saturated with brake fluid from the previously leaking clutch master cylinder, the drivers seat track was rusted beyond belief. The seat anchor stud's nut was so rusted that the nut was literally peeling apart; if I had been a betting man, I never would have thought it would have come off without cutting. I soaked it with penetrating oil and beat an impact socket onto it; sure enough, it ripped the sides off the second I zapped it with the impact. I went down two sizes and beat THAT socket on and zapped it with the impact: honestly ..my initial thought was that the stud broke, but what was left of the nut actually came right off! When the carpet finally came up and out, there wasn't a bit of rust damage on the actual floorboard. Of course, when the carpet actually came out ...I also found that I couldn't have been much further off on the color of the carpet. I really need to take the swatches and compare again now that it's out, but I think I'll be okay regardless.


We got the carpet out and side-by-side, and BIL talked me into what I had honestly thought all along ...that I needed to wait until LAST thing to put the carpeting in. My main reason for changing my mind was that since the self-destruction of my Daewoo ...I probably need to have the Z READY to drive just in case. Now that it's actually running again, I'm thinking that I'm not really in a different "boat" with the carpet in or out ...if I HAD to drive it, I still could. When the body work is done is the time to put the carpeting in though; I guess I just needed someone else to state what I already knew. I did go ahead and remove the seat tracks, sanded them and gave them a good coat of rustoleum. I'll need to be sure to check the passenger seat, but I think I would have remembered if it would have been anywhere near as bad. It also had no reason to have the paint peel off since it wasn't saturated in brake fluid.

So the numero eleven weekend was mostly just getting some minor accessories put in, the carpet taken out, and now it's running again. On one hand it doesn't sound like a lot, but on another ...I can't complain about the results. I figure the next trip will be simply fixing the fuel leak, and then DRIVING it out (for the first time in nearly 4 years!) and giving it one of the most thorough exterior wash jobs ever; it's all mostly cosmetic from here out. It will probably seem like taking steps backward when I start pounding out dents and adding bondo and primer; I guess if one were to go by looks ...the next trip will probably LOOK the most productive of all of them to date though.

...even if it really is just going to amount to a car wash. *snicker*

Nissan Weekend #10

It's difficult to even know where to start beginning my online monologue about week 10 on the Nissan. The fact that I've waited over a month to even begin writing about it doesn't exactly help things a lot; not only has a ton of crap happened in the meantime ...my memory really isn't all that great in the first place. It was Christmas weekend, so it was cold as fuck ...my hopes that the weather would be "cooperative" were kind of shot to hell by the Dallas area getting it's first "White Christmas" in 70 years; wouldn't you know we didn't get a BIT of it in Winnsboro though. It was my first month-long break since starting this entire project, and my health has honestly been pretty shaky since the Thanksgiving trip.

It hasn't improved improved in the meantime either.

The last post could have aptly been named Nissan weekend #9/Daewoo weekend #1. All of the reasons I initially described for telling people that I would never recommend a person attempt to change transmission fluid in a malfunctioning tranny turned out to be exactly the case on mine; it got much worse (shock, fucking shock). I'm thinking that may need to be a story for another blog though. The bad news and the good news is that I may be writing more frequent "Nissan Weekend" posts in the nearer future if my health will let me.

I didn't waste a lot of time when I got back to the metroplex in finding a radiator shop to have a look at the radiator I had removed on the last trip. I had already looked around a bit at prices for a re-manufactured radiator, and found the prices to be a bit high ...and oddly enough, it was higher than I recalled when I visited the radiator shop even. I told him I had got a much lower quote than what the price really was, but it was purely unintentional on my part. The least expensive price was $159 at O'Reilley's and I thought it was $129. The radiator shop said it was $60 to clean up and rod out the radiator, so I was fine with paying that although I could remember when it was $30 (...and walking barefoot in the snow to school ...uphill ...both directions); when I took it out of the trunk ...I wasn't surprised by what the guy said, although I was hoping it would be otherwise.

He said that when they took it out of the cleaning vat, all those green corroded spots would most likely become itty-bitty holes if the car had been sitting for as long as I had said. The real pisser is that I actually had good anti-freeze in it while it was sitting up and everything, but I knew he was probably right. I told him what I had THOUGHT the price was at O'Reilley's, and he had to call around a bit to find someone to match the price, but I told him "thanks but no thanks" ...if all we were doing was price matching, he was an awfully long way off my beaten path to have to come back later. I felt a bit silly when I got back home and saw the real price, but I found the same brand and everything online at Rock Auto for $109, so I was cool with that since I wasn't exactly in any big hurries anyway.

Mom and I drove up to Winnsboro together in her car on the evening of the 23rd; it was loaded with Christmas cheer, lots of bags and the mutt & I; most of the car stuff had gone up with my sister. When we had finished loading the stuff in her truck, I remarked that she should wait a few ...I was pretty sure I might be able to wedge a toothpick or two in there. BOTH of our vehicles had pretty tight fits with all of our stuff; we would have made Santa proud. When Mom & I arrived, after getting everything unloaded I went ahead and got busy with throwing what I'm fairly sure will end up being an utterly futile coat of paint on all the exhaust shielding. I imagine all that paint will peel off from the heat within a hundred miles or so; at least it looks pretty NOW though! I think the real highlight was my dashboard cover though; on the last trip I had closely inspected the vinyl on the dash and found it to be pretty messed up with no real hope of a "pretty" repair, so I had ordered a fitted plastic "shell" cover.

Although I was a bit aggravated that it had holes for a nonexistent speaker, it really looked great once I put it into place. I'd need to disassemble part of the drivers side for a "snug" fit, and then it will take a bit of work to glue it down at a later time, but I was very impressed with how good it looked!

I called it a night after doing only that little bit; I had quite a few days to work with ahead of me. The next morning (Christmas Eve), the BIL couldn't wait to try out his Christmas present from me; we had drawn names and had a separate Christmas for my father at his nursing home the week before, and I had been lucky enough to have drawn the BIL's name. It was a very self-serving present, but still one that he'll get a lot of mileage out of in the coming years I'm sure. I bought an industrial forced-air heater for him (well, for his shop) that cost a pretty penny; given my own tolerances to the cold (and it was in the 20's and 30's the whole time), it was money well spent and HE certainly got a kick out of it!

I began by comparing the old & new exhaust sections, and that seemed like as good of a place to get started as any. I looked high and I looked low, but there was a little something missing in all those gasket sets ...the gasket that goes between the pipe and the engine manifold. I had all this pretty new exhaust "stuff" but no gasket to attach it to the engine. To make the mood even worse ...I had this pile of all the OLD gaskets, and even the old one was nowhere to be found (this particular exhaust gasket would be no great tragedy to re-use, which may be why it wasn't included in the set; I'm guessing that JC Whitney probably just employs a bunch of frickin' asshats though); it seems that I had saved every old gasket EXCEPT the one I needed! I was at least able to compare and make sure all the exhaust parts were correct, but I have a slight bone to pick with the parts company. There were 4 sections to the exhaust: Engine manifold to catalytic converter, catalytic converter, catalytic converter to muffler, and then the muffler section. Was it really necessary to affix no less than 4 extremely large labels to each section using an adhesive that makes super glue look mild?! I started out with a razor trying to scrape it off, but ended up just using the drill and wire wheel attachment. We never got the snow up in Winnsboro, but after grinding off all those labels, it sure looked like we had in the shop.

After I attached the sheilding, one can truly appreciate how much I wish I could put a bullet into whomever stole the catalytic converter when it was parked in Waco ...undoing two little nuts rather than cutting off that three inches or so could have saved me $150 and a LOT of fucking grief. The good news was that all my foresight of dousing the PAIR (an obsolete emmisions part that attaches to the pipe to manifold section) output hose in penetrating oil the last umpteen trips paid off; I clamped it in the vice, and it broke loose on the first yank. I had tried numerous times to detach it after pulling the engine and on the "week 3" trip with no success; I elected to go the "slow and steady wins the race" approach, and simply gave it a nice shot of oil every time I remembered it.

Day one of work was mostly just odds and ends aside from the fruitless exhaust endeavor; I was unwilling to attempt to bolt the engine to cat section without having the gasket ...the PAIR emissions line is just a bit too much of a pain to get at. I had replaced the muffler a few years ago, but it wasn't the actual muffler for the 300ZX, it was just extremely similar. The hookups apparently had to be improvised a bit, as I quickly discovered when I put the new muffler section into place; although I had ordered new hangers ...some of the brackets to attach them to were missing. I fashioned some new ones by guesswork mostly, but was at least able to get most of the rear two sections into place (although not tightened just yet). When I get the front gasket, I may have more troubles still depending on how much damage the theives did by cutting through the brackets for the cat. Although the new one is a "direct-fit replacement" ...it has no brackets for the hangers. There may still be some improvising to be done yet.

Most of my family is almost awestruck by my ability to remember how to put an engine together after all that time, but the mechanical stuff is actually the easiest part for me. The wiring, although my specialty, is the REAL pain in the ass; hooking it all up is actually very simple ...hooking it up in the right ORDER however, is not. I installed the fuel injection first, and what I later considered to be a huge mistake ...the wiring for it. I believe there are about three levels of wiring for the upper section of the engine, and they have to be installed in a certain order (not to mention a layer of vacuum lines in between). The probem with the fuel injection is that once you attach the electrical sockets ...it is a pain in the ass to take them back off (I seem to recall saying some stuff about how the lack of an impact driver to remove the plenum caused me a lot of undue problems with the injection when removing the engine during "week 2"). I installed the injection rails and a good deal of the vacuum routing (I only had to back up and start over 2-3 times due to getting the order wrong), and actually gave a somewhat early night. I had no intentions of doing a thing on Christmas day.

Christmas Day came and went, and I got back to work on the 26th: Saturday. Compared to the first day ...I got a LOT done this time. The wiring fought me on many occasions, but I slowly worked my way through everything and think that I was able to get nearly everything accomplished that I was willing to. I put the radiator back in, hooked all the wiring, belts and hoses, air intakes, shrouds, covers and heat shields. There were a few emmision hoses and vacuum lines that I was not able to re-use as I had hoped, but I wasn't really all that let down. I suppose that I could have plugged off those lines and started what would have been an extremely loud car without the exhaust attached, but I elected to wait on that score; it's waited this long ...when I do start it, I'd rather it start and run well if at all possible. Or at least without all the mitigating external factors that I KNOW are wrong. I also managed to get a bit of work done with the Jeep ...that was STILL squeaking!

Sunday was a fruitful day to an extent; I took apart the necessary dash sections for gluing down the cover, pulled the steering wheel off and took the steering column apart to find the short in my horn (which hadn't worked for a few years ..ssshhhhhh). I pulled a vacuum on the actual A/C system, and was also able to repair the damage to my climate control box ...I knew there were some loose screws, I just didn't know WHY they had loosened (I'm still only guessing that it was mechanic error, but fixed it with little problem). When I had parked the car, my defrost had been stuck partially open all the time. I replaced all the covers for my fuel tank filler hose and corrected some problems I had suspected I created when I re-installed the tank. I finally began knocking on some of the dents behind the passenger door and applied the first layer of filler on the "hole" in my front bumper cover. I took a few more pictures of course.

I had taken home an inoperative headlamp motor quite some time before. I had taken it apart and cleaned it, but found nothing glaringly wrong ...there had been a bunch of leaves crammed into where it opened and closed ...I suspected that may have been the only problem and that a cleaning might have been all that was necessary. After I had taken it apart and put it back together, I found what looked a lot like a BB on the table. I had no clue where it had come from ...I had done quite a bit of stuff on lots of different things (and my table wasn't the cleanest thing in the world to begin with). It took me re-installing the motor and initiating it to figure out what that tiny BB had been; it worked as a bearing on the shaft that wound the servo back and forth. I found a regular BB that was a bit too large, and started trying to modify the shaft to accept it.

There is a pretty good reason why I've preferred to only work a couple of days at a time since I started this project. I know I'm a very intelligent person and that I was a damned good mechanic. I also know that one of the issues with my disability is that it often impairs my ability to think clearly, and I'll probably be kicking myself over this for quite some time. I took it apart and reinstalled it numerous times to test what I was doing as I was shortening the shaft. I accidently broke the spring that pulled the brushes together in the electric motor on Monday morning. I knew my rear wiper motor had to be replaced, and it used the same motor assembly, so I took it out and removed the spring from it. Brilliant thinking on my part except that I forgot to put the insulator on the spring ...the second I tried to initiate the servo ...it melted the spring in two and cooked the circuit board for the motor.

That was a $150 mistake that I never would have made had I been thinking a bit more clearly. I did a bit more "busy work" with the dent, but mostly just did a thorough clean-up of the shop and called it quits shortly after lunch. Three days of work had been pushing my luck ...four days was now costing money via perfectly avoidable botches.

Yeah ...I get those damned checks every month for a reason. Doesn't mean I like being reminded of why.

Weekend 11 is coming up soon, so it'll be interesting to see what gets done then ...hopefully no smoke will be involved, and definitely no ambulances! At least she's looking pretty good so far!