I worked like a fiend, probably skipping things I shouldn't have but
Sunday afternoon I managed to move the snake out of the garage under its
own power. That's the first time in, well, longer than I care to say,
that the engine has has been fired up. Amazingly the battery, which
hasn't been touched in about two years, cranked the engine over pretty
strongly. But I did have to connect jumper cables to an extra battery I
had in the garage to get the engine running. The idea was to move the
car out onto the front lawn where I could hose off several years
accumulation of dust, cobwebs rabbit fuzz and God knows what else without
making a huge mess. But the weather was perfect, and everything
seemed to be working so well. How could I resist, liability insurance
or no; so, off for a few turns around the block to circulate the fluids
and to warm the innards up a bit. Mine and the car's. I'd really
forgotten how good it is to drive a roadster and how really wimpy my
other cars are. The hopelessly warn out stock 289 currently in the car
still supplies neck-snapping acceleration. In fact, the engine is so
bad and the tires are so warn I really shouldn't have been driving that
way but it felt SO GOOD. It made my day. No, it made my week!
Finally, it was back to the front lawn and a good hosing.
The ride made up for most of the days set backs but I do have a few
concerns. Before starting the car I removed the valve covers to oil up
the vale train. I was pretty well sickened by the God awful mess I
found there. There was about an inch of waxy sludge on everything. It
was so bad that I decided not to waste my new $11 set of valve cover
gaskets, so after oiling things I just smeared Form-a-gasket on what was
left of the old cork fragments and torqued down the covers nice and
tight. A few words about this engine. 10 or 12 years ago I pulled the
original HiPo engine out after the bearings seized. To get me by for "a
short while" I bought an old Fairlane for $75, pulled the engine put it
in the snake. The speedometer on the Fairlane hadn't worked for some
undetermined amount of time before I bought the car. The odometer was
stopped somewhere in the 20k vicinity on who knows what time around.
The guy who owned the car before me didn't strike me as someone much
into car maintenance and I assumed I'd only need the engine for a short
period. Needless to say, I didn't pay much attention to changing the
oil and filter or plugs, et cetera. Most likely this engine will stay
in the car a bit longer so I may try to clean things up a bit. 289s are
notorious for sucking oil through the valve guides because the rubber
seals used in these engines tend to harden and disintegrate. The engine
smokes a lot. I suspect the valve cover gaskets will get used yet. The
other thing I did before starting up was drain the old gas and change
the fuel filter. There was lots of crud in the filter and I noted
telltale red staining around the tank seams. That'll have to be taken
care of when I take the radiator in for rebuilding.
Immediately after the engine started, the garage filled with smoke so I
was hot to back the car out. My first scare: I just couldn't get into
reverse. Everything looked okay when I bled the system but it was a new
slave cylinder for a Sunbeam Tiger and though it had the same Girling
part number, it looked a bit different. Finally I tried for first gear.
It slipped right in without so much as a groan. After pulling forward a
foot or so I tried reverse again and it slip right in, no muss no fuss.
I didn't have another problem with reverse after that. The next thing
was the brakes. But not to worry. They may feel spongy but they work
just fine. I never felt the least uncomfortable with the way the car
stopped. I'm sure I could lock up all four wheels if I wanted to. The
brakes have no assist or any servo action and respond very linearly to
pedal pressure so locking the wheels up is not something done without
conscious effort. I still plan to work on the sponginess but I'll wait
until the pads wear in a bit.
Well, not everything worked perfectly. In fact, the turn signals didn't
work at all. Most likely that is because I didn't get something back
together right when I reinstalled the turn-signal switch. Or my rabbit
gnawed a wire through that I haven't found yet. I did have to fix a few
gnawed wires. Also the oil pressure gauge read zero. I'm pretty sure
that has always been the case with this engine but I want to verify that
it's the sender unit and not the oil pump before I plan any long trips.
And I would swear that at some point in the distant pass I had put a
switch somewhere in the cockpit that bypasses the thermally activated
switch for the electric radiator fan. I looked and looked but never
found it. The thermal switch has been dead for years so I must have
installed another switch somewhere. Just have to keep looking.
When I was screwing the license plate on I notice that the registration
sticker said 86. It hasn't been that long since the car was driven but
I guess that's the last year I drove it on a regular basis.
Registration stickers have been accumulating in the glove box for a
number of years. I decided to put the '92 sticker on.
I spent some time reading through the section of the manual that covers
regular maintenance. The fitting on the steering rack and pinion really
is a grease fitting. It's to grease the pinion bearing. 140 Hypoid
gear oil is put in by undoing the clamps at the ends of the rubber
boot-seal and squinting it in form there. Sounds like a joy.
Roland Dudley
cobra@hpcdcsn.cdc.hp.com
CSX2282
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