[TPR] Monday August 20 (later)

Asa Jay Laughton asajay at asajay.com
Mon Aug 20 21:02:44 PDT 2012 

I think we had a really good day today.  :)

I'm taking vacation from work this week so Shelley, Sam and I can take 
some time as a family.  We reserved a cabin at a local lake for a couple 
of days.  It will be nice to get away and just be with family.  That's 
one of the reasons it was so important for me to get this fired early as 
opposed to later.

Here is how the day went:
- Pressure tested the cooling system, found the fancy thermostat gasket 
wasn't going to work, replaced with standard paper gasket and sealing 
compound.  (that story was in the earlier email below)
- Found oil drips under the car, inspected, found the front bung on the 
pan was loose (I thought for certain I tightened it before).  Tightened 
it over one turn, so I hope it's good now, will continue to monitor.
- Primed the oil system with my drill and the shaft from an old 
distributor.  Read oil pressure on the stock gauge in the car.
- Stuck the dizzy and fired her up.
- Set the idle to about 1,750 or thereabouts and let her warm up to 
about 196 where the thermostat should open and shut her down.  Allowed 
to cool a short while.
- Burped the system at the radiator and swirl tank (I have petcock at 
the top drivers corner of the radiator; makes it easy to burp air out).
- Repeat the running/shutdown/burp scenario about four times over a few 
hours, making sure the thermostat opens, the radiator is circulating, 
the fans come on.
- Used some Engine Brite and a scrub brush on the engine compartment 
(now with the car outside), hosed it off, let it dry and then 
Armor-All'ed the heck out of it.  Looks nice and clean now.
- Installed the hatch loosely (to prevent accidental entanglement while 
driving)
- Installed the drivers seat loosely (lap harness kept me firmly in place)
- Took her for a drive, ran her moderately hard between 45 and 80 MPH in 
third gear, up and down, up and down for a few miles.  Monitored temps 
and oil pressure, all seem good.
- brought her home hot, parked, shut down... no boil overs.  Wrapped it 
up for the night.

HOLY CATS!  Does this thing accelerate now, and that's without getting 
into the secondaries!  Jimminey, do they go even faster once they break 
in?  I didn't take it above 5,000 RPM, though I got close at one point 
and it seemed to fade.  I later remembered the Pertronix I have in there 
has a built-in rev-limiter and I think it's factory set to 5,000.  I 
hadn't bothered to change it earlier with the stock engine, but now with 
this magnificent soul powering her, I had better change it to 6,500 or a 
little less.

About the only thing left to do now is put the deck lid back on.
Time to make reservations.  :)
Asa Jay

Asa Jay Laughton, MSgt, USAFR, Retired
&  Shelley Marie
Spokane, WA
******************************
http://www.racingagainstautism.com
http://www.teampanteraracing.com
http://facebook.com/racingagainstautism


On 8/20/2012 5:25 PM, Asa Jay Laughton wrote:
> Yes, it's ALIVE!
>
> Mad Dawg wrote me earlier asking about that (possibly) leaking 
> thermostat gasket.
>
> I had purchased a brand new reusable gasket from Summit.  It's 
> actually a really cool piece.  It consists of a hard material (kind of 
> like Bakelite) about an eighth inch think with a rubber sealing 
> surface bonded into it on both sides.  The objective is for the rubber 
> to act like an o-ring and seal both the top and the bottom.
>
> I have no doubt this probably works very well for two -very- flat 
> surfaces.  However, in my case, the housing "tube" that connects the 
> top of the thermostat to the swirl tank is the original welded 
> assembly.  It turns out the diameter of the embedded o-ring in this 
> fancy gasket is just inside the flat part of the flange welded to the 
> tube.  Therefore, it doesn't seal well in my application.  I checked 
> it this morning with a pressure tester and sure enough it was weeping 
> coolant.
>
> Soooooo.....  Out it came this morning and was replaced with a 
> standard paper gasket with some Hondabond on both sides.  It now does 
> not leak.
>
> I have a brand new stainless version of this pipe with a nice large 
> sealing area flange on it that I'm sure would work fine.  However, due 
> to other modifications I'm currently using, I can't use that pipe 
> unless I want to cut it down several inches.  I don't really want to 
> do that yet.  I cut down the original pipe for the current 
> configuration which includes a TEFBA filter.  In the future I'll 
> probably mode the cooling system again and will use the new pipe and 
> will then be able to test that fancy gasket again.
>
> Here's a cool note for today: I installed two drain petcocks in the 
> engine, with a hose connection on them, this part from Napa:
> http://napaonline.com/Catalog/CatalogItemDetail.aspx?R=WH_6660_0367751284
>
> This was huge help today as it allowed me to drain enough fluid to 
> remove the thermostat housing without getting coolant all over the 
> front of the engine.  I have one of these installed on each side of 
> the engine and in the radiator.  It's very nice being able to attach a 
> hose and route it directly into a container.  Helps save on really 
> messy floors.  :)
>
> The engine is running so rich it's making my eyes water.  All I did 
> was crank the mixture screws to full rich (remember it's an 
> "emissions" carb and has limited travel of a little over 3/4 turn.)  
> We'll run it this way for just a bit longer and then lean it out.
>
> One bad news part.  The heat riser didn't fit this manifold, so I'm 
> running -without- it.  Which means.... no choke. <sigh>  I'll have to 
> fix that up some other way maybe.
>
> Asa Jay
> Asa Jay Laughton, MSgt, USAFR, Retired
> &  Shelley Marie
> Spokane, WA
> ******************************
> http://www.racingagainstautism.com
> http://www.teampanteraracing.com
> http://facebook.com/racingagainstautism
>
> On 8/20/2012 3:59 PM, Mad Dog Antenucci wrote:
>> Teaser Alert - Yea, that is what he looks like when he's in the 
>> garage doctor. ;-)
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> *From:* Charles Engles <cengles at cox.net>
>> *To:* 'Asa Jay Laughton' <asajay at asajay.com>; tpr at teampanteraracing.com
>> *Sent:* Monday, August 20, 2012 3:50 PM
>> *Subject:* Re: [TPR] Monday August 20
>>
>> “IT’S ALIVE!!!”
>> Dear Asa: I would expect that things are going well in your 
>> garage…..      Chuck Engles
>> *From:*tpr-bounces at teampanteraracing.com 
>> [mailto:tpr-bounces at teampanteraracing.com] *On Behalf Of *Asa Jay 
>> Laughton
>> *Sent:* Monday, August 20, 2012 5:35 PM
>> *To:* tpr at teampanteraracing.com
>> *Subject:* [TPR] Monday August 20
>> Asa Jay Laughton, MSgt, USAFR, Retired
>> &  Shelley Marie
>> Spokane, WA
>> ******************************
>> http://www.racingagainstautism.com
>> http://www.teampanteraracing.com
>> http://facebook.com/racingagainstautism
>>
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>
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