Coffee, June 29, 2013

SMITTY wrote:Wish me luck boys! I'm goin' in!!

Captain kirk would be proud of you to go where no man has gone before.

Well played sir! Well played!

Sorry to hear that news Steamup - talk about a one-two punch. May she rest in peace.

Welp, I pulled off a successful mission inside the magic box! My soldering iron almost didn't make it though. I refused to pay what Radio Shack wanted for the replacement tip, so I stuffed a Weller tip in there after some bending and tweaking. The damn thing got so hot the plastic housing almost slid off it like molasses! Anyway ... I'll update my thread on the subject with all the step by step details and pics. Fixed and works PERFECT!! Cost to me: $0.00 - my favorite number!

I just got in from changing the front rotors and brake shoes on my wifes car. Among all of the other problems with the brakes (the rotors were wobbling badly under braking, and the car smelled massively of burning brake shoes each time she pulled it into the garage) I found 3 well stuck slide pins . What was supposed to be a one hour job just took me four hours, mainly due to the frozen slide pins. That's how it is for me. Just test drove it and there is no wobble plus there was no brake shoe stink when we pulled it into the garage.

One of the pitfalls of having a garage Larry.

Oh yeah ... speaking of brakes, I just did that too! 5th time on the Silverado. This time I did it because my last replacement pads SUCKED from day one. Dealt with it for over 2 years & 12k miles. Finally just bought a set of EBC yellows with their premium rotors. So sick of doing brakes on this thing. They pulsated right off the showroom floor with 47 miles on the clock. How the hell can something leave the factory that way??? Anyway - dealer did it 3x, I did the 4th and now the 5th. These EBC's are supposed to stop better than anything ... but I'm not liking the PILE of brake dust on the chrome after just 100 miles of driving. Trade off, I suppose - everything's a compromise ...

I had a rear caliper lock up on my Ford truck this week...slide pins were corroded and sticking. Rather than try and salvage the rusty parts I put a set of reman calipers on it today. E brake is still screwed up, but at least the calipers release properly.

The Focus, which has been sold for 3 weeks now .... yet is STILL here ... now has a dragging front caliper from sitting. Glad it's no longer my problem. I was reminded in a way I will certainly learn from why I always steered clear of front wheel drive econoboxes. Never again! It served us well through the winter, and I made money on it, so I can't complain.

Had a very busy week and a VERY busy day yesterday.
During the week, the Packard Club had their national Meet near here, about 20 miles down the freeway. I had friends come in for the meet from Commiefornia. So I went to a few events with them..
At the car show in a nearby city park, I was wandering around, and bumped into Pierce Arrow friends who were here, visiting a Packard-owning friend.. so we got together for dinner, and a tour of my cars and projects.

My friend Jeff from Commiefornia got me a ticket for the friday tour to a huge car collection in a nearby city, it was quite an experience.. 'only 8 Pierce Arrows, and 'only' 16 Packards.. but uncounted Cadilacs , Lincolns and many other older exotics as well a a healty collection of later cars. Totaling 175 cars !!!

While at the swap meet on Wednesday, Jeff got a lead on a Packard V12 engine, complete with all accessories over west of Lansing, about a 2:15 minute drive. He checked on it and got an appointment to see the engine and other Packard parts as early on Saturday [yesterday] as possible, the appointment was for 1pm.. we had to leave no later than 1:30 to get Jeff back to Detroit's airport [DTW] to catch his flight back to Commiefornia.

So Jeff also wanted to go the the CCCA classic car museum , the Gilmore museum in Hickory Corners. the museum is about 45 minutes south of the V12 engine.

So at 0630 I picked Jeff up at the hotel we drove to the Gilmore, arrived at 0900, I decided the night before to use the opportunity to visit the Pierce Arrow Musuem at Gilmore and remove the worn out and leaking waterpump from the museum's 1930 Club sedan, so I could rebuild it. So we removed the pump, got in trouble with the Museum management, for doing maintenance work on a 'show weekend'.. but hey, the tractor, hit an miss, lawn tractor, and antique lawn mowing clubs hardly paid a visit to the car museums anyway,, maybe 20-30 visitors during the hour or so I was removing the waterpump.. and I was off in a corner, not a safely problem or anything.. some people just like to 'feel and act important'' This was NOT a Pierce Arrow guy, I'd been asked by the Pierce folks to get the pump off at my convenience.. it was convenient on Saturday..

So after the Gilmore, we drove north to see the Packard parts.. got there about 20 minutes early, met the 85-ish gentleman and started digging through the piles of parts and Packard pieces.. And while I helped I kept an eye open for any Pierce Arrow pieces.. but found none..

The pile was assembled, most of it anyway, a deal was struck, then Jeff suggested that we get the last pieces out of the corner from behind some other stuff so it was all in one spot for me to pick up later this week.. he said it would only take another 5-10 minutes.. NOTHING takes only 5-10 minutes..
And it was almost 2pm already, we were behind by 30 minutes..
So 25 minutes later the pile was complete and we took off for the airport.. a normally 2: 20 or more drive.. and we were almost an hour late.. to have a comfortable time cushion for Jeff to clear TSA and catch his flight..
As luck would have it,, we wer not the only people in a hurry, I found several very fast moving cars and trucks to follow, so I didn't get a ticket and we made record time to DTW.. 1:50 !! I dropped Jeff at the curb at 4:10 for a 5:25 flight.. plenty of time..

After I dropped off Jeff, I headed south almost to Toledo to look at a Pierce Arrow that I had a 'lead' on.. I looked the car over, and visited with the owners and got a tour of their restored 1880's home, then headed back north to home,, about 2 more hours..

I got home at 830 PM,, it was a very long day..
the VW TDI Jetta did amazingly well, inspite of the high speeds, often over 95mph, the tank calculated out at 48mpg, and I filled the tank to the top of the filler neck.. Amazing how frugal the TDI diesels are..

Last night I slept for a full 9 hours.. been a long time since I slept that long !!

Gotta run..
Greg L

LsFarm wrote:I got home at 830 PM,, it was a very long day..

I guess da heck it was! Wow.... you squeezed two days of doin' into one fat day! I'm glad all ended well. It could have been "Jeff missed his flight because of the two speeding tickets."

Management gave you a hard time for doing charity work? Mom would have said "Beggars can't be choosers." LOL Sheesh!

Impressive mileage numbers there .... I've never been a VW fan, but I think I might have to find one of those.

You definitely have more patience on the road than I do, Greg! Just 2 hours of driving and I HAVE to sleep 9 hours to keep from ramming someone into the median!

Hey Smitty, my wife and I are on our 4th VW and won't look back. Sure they have some problems as any car may have, but we havn't found it yet.
For our part, we are really busy as the shop I work at is swamped with work, and we bought a house, finally. Kinda funny, I havnt been in a house yet worth less then $750,000 and I go to work on mine after. Oh well, someone has to have the money or I wouldn't be working.

Kevin

Just catching up from a busy week/end...
Baby Grace decided the time was right...
Another prime baby, as are the twins and myself...
Not so for the wife...
00:30 6/29...

Nice CC--looks like lil Grace is sayin "COAL"

Happy birthday Grace! Welcome to the Forum.

Steamup.... sorry to hear of your mother in law's passing. May she rest in peace.

anthony7812 wrote: Hey whats an amtrol? Never heard of this contraption...

An Amtrol is the brand name of an indirect water heater. They are called indirect because they heat the water indirectly from some other source. Some other source...like an oil boiler, a coal boiler, solar panels... heats water and pumps it through a coil that's inside the indirect heater. That coil heats the water in the tank. I'm not sure if Amtrol came up with the idea, but they were an early one and certainly one of the better ones.... they have a plastic tank and a life time warranty for the original owner.