[V8] Black car ramble

[toml99 at todomundo.com]

Well, I finished up everything on that Black car I got a few months  
ago for $200.  The previous owners had purchased the car @ the dealer  
in '94 and had obviously kept it up, but when I got it, it had been  
sitting under a fruit tree for 3 yrs with rats living under the  
hood.  They seem to be partial to those knock sensor wires.  The  
seats/steering wheel were so mint, I swapped them over to my 5- 
speed....looks like nobody ever sat in them in the 200K it had on  
it.  Since it was going to a friend's son,  I did a bunch of things  
to get it running/happy which I think I already posted.  I installed  
my only set of nice used UFO's w/ new pads.  The UFO's came from a  
crate of stuff I got from Bruce when he closed his shop, and while  
they had literally no measurable wear, I did get a bit of a shimmy  
driving it.  I replaced the cracked brake hoses w/ stainless used  
hoses and bled it all.  Cleaned/regreased/rebooted both front axles.   
Checked the belt, and while it looked newish, the tensioner was way  
long(160mm) and figured I should do the belt before letting it go.   
When I removed everything, it looked like someone was in there pretty  
recent, and was happy to see a shiny new oil pump bearing.  It was so  
clean in fact, that I didn't mess with the crank/cam seals, as it was  
pretty apparent that someone did it probably just before it sat.  The  
car had green coolant in it, and I cleaned up the waterpump and  
installed the new Italian one Blau sent.  Went to install tensioner  
stop A, and the bolt wouldn't thread in.....Checked, and the threads  
were barely threads......found the appropriate tap(couldn't believe I  
actually had it and it was Sunday), and it threaded in, but really  
loose.  Appears that the hole that was drilled was bigger than the  
tap......Anyway, the proper bolt wouldn't thread in, and after the  
fact, no normal bolt would thread in(1/2 size off)......so I  
installed the seemingly newish waterpump back in.......If it starts  
leaking before the next belt interval, I'm gonna be pissed.  I had to  
get the car out of the driveway, and while I considered tapping it a  
size bigger, it was Sunday after a crazy long Saturday doing this on  
my gravel driveway in a "heatwave" for the PNW, and I reused the  
pump.  My #1 piece of advice for anyone doing a belt is to put a  
piece of plywood/something over the radiator while that whole front  
core support is sitting on the ground since the crank locker fell and  
whacked the pristine radiator, forcing me to remove it and bring it  
to radiator guy.......Luckily also my local hardware store rented a  
huge 3/4 breaker bar with a 27mm socket as I busted my 1/2" breaker,  
and the 600ft/lb impact I used last time didn't move that crank  
bolt.   Got it all buttoned up, and drove it out to the coast where  
it's gonna live.  I left the skid plate off to check for leaks 
(none.....yeah), and when I went to put it on out there, noticed my  
flarenut wrench still on the bleeder screw on the passenger  
caliper....had skid marks on it from hitting the tire, and that was  
after about 300 miles of driving.....HA.   Really glad it didn't hang  
up and either unscrew the bleeder, or snap it off.....Anyway, it's  
gone, and was a joy to drive on the windy/cliffy/north coast route to  
Neah Bay.  Friend's son is super happy and while we all know what can  
happen, it just got a new belt/brakes and previously had the rack/ 
hydraulic system/instrument cluster/heater core-fan done, and has  
literally no real scratches in it and needs nothing @ this point  
except for some rebuilding of the speaker amps....Tom

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