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Since both my 26 year old craftsman’s wouldn’t stay locked and started skipping I just happened to walk on the evil white/red candy van that my friend has. Dang him. I went to Lowe’s to swap the craftsman’s out since they do their tools now. The girl looked up the number in their book and said they came from a 200 pc set and I had to return the whole set to get a new one. I don’t know what was in the original set and didn’t know what was in the new set. I know I bought a “new” set of craftsman bigger wrenches and they feel and look like crap. Definitely not what I bought in the late 80’s early 90’s.
You have done such a great job with what was already a beautiful Corvette. There is so much information and details, I have been forced to read the thread several times to find the sectIon I really needed. I hope to see it in person before you head away from Tidewater.
Your time and enjoyment have real value. I think this was a wise investment towards both. Plus, eww, who wants old rusty crap on their Pristine Corvette?!
Yea, my original Craftsman stuff that I bought in high school in the late '90s has held up well, but as I need new stuff, I've tried to replace it with good quality bits that will outlive me.
You have done such a great job with what was already a beautiful Corvette. There is so much information and details, I have been forced to read the thread several times to find the sectIon I really needed. I hope to see it in person before you head away from Tidewater.
We definitely need to meet up....I'm plotting a road trip up 10 on the western bank and back down 5 on the eastern bank of the river with a stop for lunch at Rocketts Landing for lunch. I also need to check out Stone Brewing right across the street.
Plus, eww, who wants old rusty crap on their Pristine Corvette?!
Just yucky!....its pristine outside of 10 feet, if you get closer than that, and the sun's out, you can see the spiderwebbing over the entire car. Its nice though, because I'm less inclined to worry about washing it
Friday was turn signal day...what a PITA!!! I realized my brake lights weren't working last monday when my wife followed me to what turned out to be a failed attempt at a dyno tune. I traced the issue back to the turn signal switch and ordered a new switch and canceling cam from Lectric Limited....allegedly made in the USA and will last longer....allegedly.
I started by pulling the steering wheel and shaft out, hoping that I could leave the column itself in the car. On inspection, the original canceling cam looked fine, so I decided not to mess with it and tossed the new one in my parts bin.
As I started to attack the switch itself, and got the 3 screws removed, it became readily apparent I was going to need to pull the column in order to get the old big tail out, and the new pig tail routed correctly.
Even with the full column on the bench, it was a massive pain getting the hangar bracket off the column....until I realized that you need to pull the retaining clip and rubber gasket, then it slid right off.
The switch was so old and brittle, it broke in my hands as I was pulling it.
Installing the new one took a bit of fiddling, but was pretty much the reverse order of how it came apart. It did take 3 tries to get the position of the hangar bracket on the column correct so that everything mated correctly once the shaft was installed and seating in the steering coupler.
Fortunately, it all functions as advertised and I now have functional brake lights and turn signals.
These arrived from Zip on Friday evening, which gave me the opportunity to give them two coats of Rustoleum satin clean in an attempt to keep them from rusting...we'll see how that goes.
Installation was straight forward, but some of you keen eyed individuals might note I messed something up in my rush....
I initially installed the passenger side first, and the tabs on the french locks were interfering with my ability to get a socket completely seated on the bolt, so I had to do the final torque with a box wrench. I figured I was fine, since I had a dab of blue lock-tite on the threads, I have a pretty good idea of approximately 65 ft/lbs feels like, and the french locks were there to keep the bolts from backing out. I assumed the slight interference was due to the new french locks being stainless steel over the flimsy originals. When I went to install the driver side, it quickly became apparant what I had messed up. The orientation of the french locks on the passenger side were 90 degrees off of where they should have been. I had them bracketing the shaft side when they should be bracketing the flange side. There was no interference as far as the lock and the shaft went, so I finished up the drivers side and called it a day. Later in the evening, my OCD kicked in, so I got up early Sunday morning, went down to the garage, and pulled the bolts out of the passenger side, moved the french locks, reinstalled everything, and torqued the 4 bolts to 65 ft/lbs. It probably didn't make any difference, but I feel better about it now. We then took a lovely Sunday morning drive to grab some take out breakfast and coffee before it got too hot to be driving around in a non-air conditioned car.
Passenger side.....incorrect!
Driver side.....Correct!!!
I also finally remembered to order and install a proper battery hold down bracket. Whoever designed this set up where you need to remove the puke tank to access the battery clearly didn't have serviceability in mind!
Looks good. I’m glad you posted that as I forgot to order new locks. Hopefully they will get here quicker than summit. Ordered some things last Sunday and usually have it in two days. It’s been sitting 20 minutes away since the 5th at the postal facility.
Looks good. I’m glad you posted that as I forgot to order new locks. Hopefully they will get here quicker than summit. Ordered some things last Sunday and usually have it in two days. It’s been sitting 20 minutes away since the 5th at the postal facility.
Just make sure they locks you use are the stainless ones....Ive read accounts of the mild steel tabs breaking off.
Beginning to think this car really did prefer life as a trailer queen/ NCRS specimen as opposed to a driver....
Posted another thread about my dyno results, but essentially the timing starts to break up above 4K RPM. The shop couldn't get the timing to hold steady within +/- 10 degrees so they didn't bother making any fuel adjustments until I can get the timing issue sorted out. So far the overwhelming consensus on the other thread is points/distributor rebuild. Anyone know a guy?
On top of that, I got the car back and found high velocity, orange, rusty water splatter all over the engine bay. Best I can tell from the direction and location, at high RPM its coming from the water pump shaft, hitting the pulley, and being flung in all directions. I assume there is a seal on that shaft that can go bad? I looked into rebuilding the original....I'll probably just put it on the shelf for now with the rest of the "numbers" parts.
Does anyone know what the right dimensions are to order a replacement pump? I dont trust web sites any more that just list every part for every SBC.
I swear....some day this thing will be reliable. I suppose this is to be expected when the car accumulated less than 400 miles since 1982.
Thanks Glenn, what did you end up doing? Paying 25% of a 6.0L LS motor to have a factory distributor rebuilt just seems silly to me if you're not doing the NCRS judging thing.
Thanks Glenn, what did you end up doing? Paying 25% of a 6.0L LS motor to have a factory distributor rebuilt just seems silly to me if you're not doing the NCRS judging thing.
I ended up spending the money to convert my tach to be electronic driven instead of cable driven
to open up a variety of distributor options in the future.
For now, I went cheap with this
Pertronix Flame -Thrower "STOCK-LOOK" Cast Distributor With Original Ignitor Electronics For Chevy SB/BB Engines. Vacuum Advance With Black Female Style Cap
and a Petronix Flame Thrower coil. This way I have gotten rid of the points
Beginning to think this car really did prefer life as a trailer queen/ NCRS specimen as opposed to a driver....
Posted another thread about my dyno results, but essentially the timing starts to break up above 4K RPM. The shop couldn't get the timing to hold steady within +/- 10 degrees so they didn't bother making any fuel adjustments until I can get the timing issue sorted out. So far the overwhelming consensus on the other thread is points/distributor rebuild. Anyone know a guy?
On top of that, I got the car back and found high velocity, orange, rusty water splatter all over the engine bay. Best I can tell from the direction and location, at high RPM its coming from the water pump shaft, hitting the pulley, and being flung in all directions. I assume there is a seal on that shaft that can go bad? I looked into rebuilding the original....I'll probably just put it on the shelf for now with the rest of the "numbers" parts.
Does anyone know what the right dimensions are to order a replacement pump? I dont trust web sites any more that just list every part for every SBC.
I swear....some day this thing will be reliable. I suppose this is to be expected when the car accumulated less than 400 miles since 1982.
Look at it this way, your car is finally being sorted out to be a reliable fun driving car, you did not expect to twist the key and go on your way carefree, not just yet anyway, and you are sorting it out the way you want it, im a bit envious of what you have done in a what amounts to a short period of time.. This thread should be a series of how to stickys.
And down the rabbit hole we go. I had hoped to avoid this for multiple reasons... I want to get a couple thousand miles on the car this year to thoroughly evaluate the engine as that is a big unknown at this point as far as longevity goes (remember, 400 miles since 1982 with an unknown rebuild). If the engine proves to be solid after some milage and a dialed in tune, I intend to keep it in the car and simply go with a Holley Sniper set up when I rewire the entire car....again, a few years down the road. In that process of rewiring, I would send the cluster out for restoration, and conversion to an electric tach input, volt meter, etc. I was trying to avoid doing any of that now in order to minimize down time and outlay of cash.
Given that most of the options for a distributor rebuild have 2-3 month wait times at this point, I'll probably throw a water pump at the car and drive it for the next few months the way it sits. the AFR gets rich up top, so its safe, even if its not dialed in completely. With a baby due mid-November, I may look to pull that distributor the last week in October and send it out for rebuild as I'm going to be VERY occupied this winter/spring. Hopefully by the time it gets back to me, we'll at least be settled into a routine, and I'll be able to sneak in enough garage time to drop it back in, and get back over to Abacus to finish the tune....that or I may look at going the direction Glenn went. It is funny the very strong opinions on the forum with regard to factory points vs. aftermarket distributors.....has one political party started rebuilding distributors and I was unaware?!?
(Glenn if you get a chance, can you post the part numbers you're using, just so I can do some more research, thanks!!)
08-06-2020, 04:34 PM
