1976 MG Midget

[Loren]

Had a few minutes after work today and looked under the car again for brake fluid. Nothing under the front. But, in the back... nothing around the wheels, but... there's a little puddle under the diff. Hmmm...

Yeah, it's brake fluid. I slid under the car and looked. Sure enough, it's where the rubber hose goes into the junction block for the rear brake lines. It's probably just loose, but I'd rather just replace it. It doesn't look old. I'm pretty sure all of the flex hoses have been replaced at some point. I'm guessing that this is not a hose failure, probably and installation error. Either not tightened, or installed without a copper washer, or maybe they tightened it with a twist in the line and that helped loosen it?

Anyway, it's actually a common part. Could have gotten it locally, but Amazon had it for $10, so I ordered it and a copper washer kit just in case it doesn't come with one. Should have it Friday.

Still don't know what's causing the misfire, but at least I found the brake issue.

[Native]

Well, that's aggravating. Hopefully it's easy to figure out and fix.

[Loren]

The cool thing about old cars is that they're so simple! I'll poke at it Friday. If I don't get anywhere, I've still got all weekend.

[Loren]

Didn't get under the hood today, but my brake hose arrived, so I jacked up the car to replace it.

Removing the old one was easy, and it was readily evident that the hose was NOT as new as I thought it was. Initial inspection, it looked fairly clean with a nifty and very visible white stripe. It simply didn't look 47 years old at a glance, so I assumed improper installation or a missing copper washer. Nope, the diff end that was leaking is obviously swollen, disfigured, and it's leaking from the crimp. And there's a tag on the hose with the date 06/76, it's an original hose!



Since it's not been touched in 47 years, and isn't likely to be touched again in my lifetime, I took a minute to clean the bracket, the sliding nut plate piece that holds the hose, and the lock nut, and shoot them with some paint. Will reassemble tomorrow.



And, yes, I know I'm spoiled being a Floridian working on what is obviously a "Florida car". Unless the car spent its life on a beach, cars pretty much don't rust here.

But, check this out!



That was unexpected. The task for tomorrow is to replace the transmission mounts (and reinstall this brake hose and bleed the brakes, and figure out what's causing the rough running that suddenly started the other day), I'll be sure to tighten the prop shaft bolts while I'm under there!

[Loren]

Got a lot done today, but NOT the transmission mounts, which were a primary thing on the list! Looking closely under the car (I'd only looked at some photos before), I found that it may not actually be possible to replace the transmission mounts without removing the transmission! I did slide a piece of rubber under the trans where it was resting on the frame. At least it will keep that part of the transmission case from wearing/rattling.

But, I got the leaky brake line replaced and the rear brakes bled. That put us back to operational status.

Removed the multi-piece speedo cable and all of the service counters. Then found that my replacement single-piece cable has the wrong end to attach to my speedo. Dang it! So, I put a cover over the transmission hole so I can drive it with no speedo until I get the proper cable.

Check trans and diff oil levels. Both are full and very clean. So, I opted to not change the fluids.

Pulled the spark plugs. They were very sooty from running rich, that was expected. Plugs were nearly new NGK's, and a wire brush made quick work of knocking off the soot.

Put a scope down the plug holes. Things are mostly clean down there, and the '76 flat-top pistons are present. That means that the engine should have the proper 9.1:1 compression rather than the 8.5:1 of every year before and after that. If the head has been shaved, it could have more.

I meant to do a compression check, but forgot!

Inspected plug wires, distributor cap and rotor, all good and nearly new. Points have been replaced with an electronic module, so no wear parts there.

Added about a half-quart of engine oil, first time I've had to add any.

That's about all that was done today.

[Loren]

I'm in driving mode lately. Trying to get out for a drive at least every other day. Running errands, or just going "out for a blat."

What I'm finding is that when I run errands, the car is really, REALLY hard to start when slightly warm. It takes it a LONG time to fully warm up, and I'm not sure about restarts there. But, if I just run to the store... it won't want to start when I get back out to the car. It's flooding, and I'm not sure why. Could be related to the general rich running of the car (someday I'll check/adjust the main mixture adjustment), but it seems that it might be related to the automatic choke. If it's staying on when it shouldn't be, that would also be a factor. One of the things the auto-choke does in addition to choking, is add more fuel. So, one more thing to look at... unless I end up rebuilding a different carb and putting it on before I get to it.

Otherwise, the car is a joy to drive. I'm bonding with it.

Need to order my replacement speedo cable. I found the correct part number. Just need to get the new one ordered and the old one returned.

[Loren]

Got the replacement speedo cable, it looks correct. Need to get motivated and return the wrong one. Oh, and install the new one.

Buuuut, that's low priority now, as the car is back to inop status. I mean, I could "probably" drive it. But, it ain't right.

The carb has gotten worse. Last time I drove it, it started okay, and I drove it right away. It was stumbly for a few minutes, but decent once it warmed up. The last time I TRIED to drive it a day or two after that, it started up fine, and I opted to let it warm up a little before driving it. I didn't dutifully babysit it while it was warming up, so it stalled in the driveway. And, it went into that "won't start when slightly warm" mode.

I actually popped the hood to look at the carb for the first time (been trying to ignore it), and found that the choke assembly on the side of the carb is physically loose! I don't even know how the thing is assembled. Hard to troubleshoot something when you don't even know how it's put together. So, Iet it rest.

Now, I'm back to gathering parts to rebuild/replace the carb. Y'all know me, I like to do at least a little bit of an upgrade, when appropriate, anytime I'm taking something apart.

The "thing to do" with these cars is to ditch the single Stromberg carb and replace it with dual SU carbs from an earlier (or European) car. It's a bolt-on swap, but it's a little pricey these days because so many people have done it that the parts are getting scarce. It takes a dual carb manifold, a pair of carbs, all the linkages and all that. If you can get it all in one kit, it's not that bad. But, by the time I bought the parts, rebuilt TWO carbs, and got it all together, I'd probably be into it for $5-600 or more.

Add to that, while I like a little added performance where I can get it, I also like simplicity. I'd rather not get into dual carbs and having to keep them synchronized and all that shit. Meh.

I did some research, and found that:
1. The original carb is a 1.5" Stromberg carb.
2. The Stromberg carbs are nearly the same as the SU carbs, but "old school British hot-rodders" have a strong affinity for the SU's. Thus, they are more expensive, and parts are more expensive. But, knowledge is more plentiful.
3. The dual carb setup uses 1.25" SU carbs.
4. The throttled area of the dual SU carbs is almost exactly the same as a single 1.75" carb, and 1.75" SU and Stromberg carbs are readily available. (used on bigger-engined British cars)
5. I'ts not super-popular, but a handful of folks have documented a single 1.75" carb swap onto the 1500 engine, and report that it rips about as well as the dual SU swap... which is reported to be a significant increase in power and response.

So, I started looking at 1.75" Stromberg carbs, thinking about doing that swap.

That's when I came across the "trick" and hard to find Triumph Herald 13/60 intake manifold that's mo' betta than the 1500 Spitfire/Midget manifolds. Lucked into one on eBay in the UK with the older (manual choke 1.5") Stromberg carb on it. Figured that improved manifold was a good enough "improvement" for now, and ordered it.

A couple weeks later, my carb/manifold shipment reaches the US and gets STOPPED by customs. No reason given. But, eBay says that it will neither be delivered to me nor shipped back to the seller, and I'll be refunded my money. Ooookay. Back to looking for a Stromberg 175CD carb!

I now have on order:
A pair of Stromberg 175CD carbs from a Triumph TR250 (2.5 liter 6-cylinder... I'm hoping that the needles will be sufficient for my purposes and I won't have to fart around with sourcing different needles, if anything these needles will be too large... and sanding them down to make them smaller will richen the mixture. I might try that, if there's not enough adjustment available to get my mixture right.)
An extra single carb manifold, should be same as the one I have
A Stromberg rebuild kit

The plan:
Rebuild one of the 175CD carbs
Enlarge the intake port on the intake manifold from 1.5 to 1.75", maybe also enlarge the ports on the head side.
Oh, and I have to redrill the manifold to fit the 4-bolt 175 carb rather than the 2-bolt 150 carb.
Fit a choke cable
Win

Still need to round up a choke cable, probably some bracketry for that. And probably the gasket/insulator to go between the carb and the manifold. Very likely some studs and nuts for the carb.

Once this is all back together with the 175 carb, I probably won't see much performance improvement until I do some work on the exhaust side. But, at least I'll have the car running more reliably and not be at the mercy of a finicky automatic choke.

[Loren]

Oh, and once I have a carb in-hand (so I don't have to pull the one off the car just to look at it), I can figure out if it's a simple matter to either remove the choke assembly, or tighten whatever is loose, to get the car back to running condition while I work out the rest of this carb swap!

[Native]

Customs stopped a carburetor. There's your tax dollars at work.

[Loren]

Word is that there have been some changes in regulations, and if the paperwork isn't just right, it's done. I'm betting that was the problem here, the sender didn't do something right with the paperwork. But, I'll never know.

[Loren]

Okay, new carbs have arrived. I'm only using one of them, but I have a pair of 175CD carbs. They're from a dual carb setup, so they're slightly different from each other. I could use either one, but will probably use the one that has the throttle lever on the correct side.

The carbs are in great shape. Not corroded, and they look and smell like they just came off of a running car. Still have oil in the dashpots, and smell like fresh gas. In fact, after closer inspection, I might just slap one on the car without rebuilding it just to see how it goes.

These carbs are same as the one on the car, but bigger, and with manual choke. So, I'll have to do some fiddling to get it to fit.

The replacement manifold that I got is also from an earlier car, so it doesn't have the fitting for the EGR. Guess I'll do an EGR delete, oh darn.

When I started looking at things and laying out how I'm going to enlarge the manifold port to fit the 1.75" carb, I realized that I'm not really equipped for manifold porting. Once upon a time, I had a Dremel, which would work in a pinch. But, what I really need is a die grinder with a proper aluminum cutting burr. Me being on a "just buy the damned tool" kick for the past few years, I went ahead and ordered a cheap electric die grinder, and appropriate 1/2" diameter bit.

I shouldn't need to do much in the way of porting. It's mostly just enlarging the mounting plate where the carb goes. Behind that is the "log" part of the manifold, and I can do it without requiring much, if any blending. I could enlarge the head side ports, but I'm not sure there's any benefit to it. Pretty sure they already match the head ports more or less. And being smaller there is actually better for low-end torque. Maybe someday when I fit a header and larger exhaust, I'll take a look at that.

Actually, I just ran some rough calculations (using an online calculator), and it appears that the intake manifold runners are sized exactly as they should be for 1500cc and peak torque at 4250 rpm. That's not bad. It's almost like the engineers knew what they were doing. The engine is capable. The carb choice and all of the emission controls choked it.

So, the manifold work will be:
- Filling the existing two mounting stud holes with JB Weld
- Enlarging the carb port
- Drilling/tapping four new mounting stud holes (the bigger carb has 4)
- maybe cleaning up some casting imperfections as much as I can reach.

Once that is done, I should be able to start fitting the carb. Figure out what needs to be reworked on the engine as far as EGR delete, managing PCV, etc.

Oh, and I need to run a choke cable at some point.

[Native]

Guess I'll do an EGR delete, oh darn.

I lol'd.

Sounds like you've got another project to work on...good times!

[Loren]

Figured this carb upgrade was getting involved enough to warrant it's own thread:
viewtopic.php?p=69733

[Loren]

Okay, I'm calling the carb swap done! Modified manifold. Larger 175CD carb. Manual choke. All is working well enough. I have a few more items to add to "the list", like fabricating an air cleaner assembly, and so on. But, she's running, and quite well. Even got the Steve Frank "seems adequate" stamp of approval.

As if I don't have enough to do on this car... today, I had Steve try to help me remove the steering wheel. All I wanted to do was reposition it one tooth to the left to center up the wheel. But, it's been stuck to the steering column. And it still is. But, now we've broken the steering wheel. Probably just as well... apparently, each spoke is attached to the rim of the wheel with a single rivet.

So, I'd been thinking about buying a new steering wheel, anyway. The one on the car is not stock. It's a commonly available wood-rimmed replacement, slightly smaller diameter. It very effectively hides the turn signal indicators directly behind the rim of the wheel, and the spokes obscure most of the gauges. That's why I was thinking about a new wheel. Something with spokes that angle lower so that I can see the tach and speedo.

Just ordered a nice Lecarro two-spoke leather-wrapped wheel. It's a "Corvette" piece, and a well-known name. And the hub adapter for that wheel should fit my car. Conveniently, the later Midget uses the same spline as 60's-90's GM. Of course, the place I ordered from only has "one in stock" of both the wheel and the hub... what are the odds of them suddenly being "backordered"?

[Loren]

Got the new steering wheel installed. Also reinstalled the speedo that I'd removed to gain access to install the choke cable. And replaced the speedo cable with the one-piece unit that I bought way back when. That's all good. Nice to be able to see all of the gauges and the turn signal indicators on the dash! And the wheel is centered now, so the turn signals cancel properly. Yay.

The car has been running quite happily since I put the new carb on and fixed the vacuum advance. But, the last time I drove it, didn't seem to have any pull over 3500 rpm. (which is really no bueno in a car that really doesn't like to rev past 5500, anyway... it needs that 3500-5500 range!) Once you got up to speed, it cruised fine, but just wasn't accelerating properly.

I've been fiddling with the mixture adjustment occasionally, and of course I don't take notes or remember what I've done. So, I may have gone too lean with it. It also could be related to the choke... the choke cable is being sticky. But, if the choke stuck on, it would run rich rather than lean. So, maybe not. (the choke on this car isn't REALLY a choke at all, it's just a "fuel adder" to make the mixture richer)

So, that's happening.

But, I got her fired up and drove out to get dinner yesterday. And, the clutch... which has been finicky since day one, you have to push the pedal ALL the way down to get the clutch to disengage, it will complain every time you shift if you don't... it got worse.

First, shifts got difficult. More difficult than usual. By the time I got to where I was going (10 minutes away), turning into the parking lot, it was clear that the clutch wasn't properly disengaging... in fact, barely disengaging at all. It stalled trying to back into a parking space because the clutch wasn't disengaging.

I went ahead and limped it home with no clutch. That's always fun. Especially in rush-hour traffic on a Friday afternoon. Thankfully, the engine at least fired up easily on the 3 "start in gear from a stop light" maneuvers I had to make.

Now, the clutch not disengaging is probably hydraulics... but, COULD be something mechanical.

Fortunately, when I checked it today, I found that the clutch fluid is empty. That's good, very obvious problem.

I was going to just replace the slave cylinder, as it's the most obvious/common failure. But, when I shopped for parts, I found a "clutch hydraulics kit" that had the slave, master and the rubber hose all for about $68. Yeah, I like that idea. As sure as I replace the slave cylinder, that rubber hose will leak. Or the master will fail. Might as well replace all of those 48-year-old parts.

Ordered parts today. Of course, as soon as I put that kit in my cart, I get the pop-up telling me that if I spend another $82, I qualify for free shipping. So, I also ordered motor mounts, a proper choke cable (to replace the cheap generic one I used that's all sticky and awkward), and a couple other odds and ends.

Oh, and I changed the engine oil last weekend when I was under the car doing the speedo cable. Went with 0W40 Mobil 1, some Euro car variant with high zinc content.

[Loren]

Damn, I thought it had only been like 3 weeks. It's been almost 6!

My clutch parts came in within a few days, but I didn't even open the box until this morning. Combination of it's hot, I'm lazy, and I spent some weekend time working on other projects.

This was one of my other projects that I was finishing (still not quite done), but I digress.



Clutch master and slave plus the hose. You'd think that would be a job that could be done in about 45 minutes. Not so, my friends!

First, I was gonna put the car up on ramps. I knew that might not be easy with the clutch not working properly (if at all). Figured I could use the starter and crank it up the ramps. Alas, the car hasn't been started in almost 6 weeks... and the last time I drove it was at night (lights on), and I had start it in gear at every traffic light... so, of course it didn't have enough juice to even turn over. (thankfully, I put it on charge while I was working, and it recovered)

So, I ended up jacking up the car and putting it on stands. One of the jackstands ended up being in my way the whole time I was working under the car. Of course.

I opted to start on the top side. Broke loose the hydraulic hose (I've learned! Forgetting to loosen things like that FIRST always comes back to bite me!), no problem. Loosened the upper slave mounting nut, no problem. The bottom one? Well, the slave cylinder is in a metal box, the side of which is about 1/2" from the side of the master cylinder. Can't put a wrench on that lower nut from the top. The MC is an old-school British design with a "can" style reservoir. The bottom of the can hangs below the outer tube part of the cylinder such that you can't get a socket on it from behind!!! I guess the factory installed it on the pedal box frame before installing it on the car. I "could" remove that assembly, it's 8 bolts. But, to do so, I'd have to also undo the brake hydraulics, and I'd rather not mess with that system. What to do?





Consult the MG forum! There are folks who say that they've manage to get it done with a particular 1/4" drive swivel head 1/2" socket. I thought about ordering one. But, the more I looked at it... it just doesn't look like anything should be able to get around that can. Another solution that someone used was to use a chisel and hammer to loosen the nut and then spin it off by hand. I liked that idea, so I gave it a shot.

Of course, the stud that the nut is on was painted over when the car was painted red. To my surprise, it knocked loose easily enough. (the car isn't rusty) But, it wouldn't turn by hand. I had to use the chisel to keep knocking notches into the nut and turning it a little at a time. But, I got it off!





Before I started this process, I looked at the replacement MC. It's a different design (I'm betting it's something off of a 70's era Mitsubishi or Honda... not uncommon for such parts to fit these cars, I was finding the same sort of things when I was researching what to use for a brake light switch), has a plastic reservoir that doesn't hang below the cylinder, and the outside of the cylinder is smaller. So, no interference with the nut. Once I got the old one off, putting a (new) nut onto the new MC from behind was cake.



That all got done, and I got the new hose routed through it's hole behind the battery and connected to the MC. I didn't start this job until just after noon... and I did take a little lunch break... but, now it's after 3pm. Geez!

Time to get under the car. Looks simple enough. It's got one of those pinch-collar type mountings. If you've ever done front struts on something like a Ford Focus (or very related Volvos, or something like an older Civic, you've seen this arrangement holding the bottom of the strut). One bolt. Easy, right? Not fucking so, my friends!

I first removed the nut. Think it was just pinching the slave cylinder, I very briefly tried to twist and pull the MC out. Wasn't happening. Decided to research on it. (yeah, I could have done all that before I started, but that wouldn't be very manly, now would it?)

This time, I grabbed the manual first. It has some photos, but the instructions weren't all that great. Looks like the bolt has to come all the way out. A quick check of the MG forum verified that. (I love working on this car... it's just like working on a Miata... there's NO problem you can have that someone else hasn't already asked about on a forum) The bolt has to come out because it fits into a slot in the SC that locates it. And the whole thing can be fidgety to remove. Cool.

Back to it. Got the bolt out, no problem. There's even room above it to work with. Nice. This sucker doesn't want to come out! It's a tight fit in its hole. Used a pair of channel locks to twist it back and forth whilst pulling on it. Took a few minutes, but it came out.

I was smart again and remembered to thread the hose onto the SC before mounting it. Those things can be a pain to get lined up and started after the SC is mounted to the transmission!

Fitting the new SC turned out to be a royal pain, and seemed like it took over an hour. Maybe it was 45 minutes. It was too long.

It's a tight fit, and I'm working around both a jackstand (eventually, I put the car on a jack and moved that jackstand... I still had two stands under the car for safety, but the jack was holding up the car) and the exhaust a little bit, so mostly working one-handed. Eventually, I ended up taking a screwdriver (tight fit for that, but just enough room) and prying the "pinch collar" part apart where the bolt clamps it. That opened up the hole enough to more easily slide the SC into place.

The next hurdle, because things are still tight, and it will only move with the screwdriver actively prying the collar open, was getting the stupid pinch bolt back in! I could position myself to where I could see into the hole with a light, so I knew it was "close" but not quite lined up. Stuck a round punch up into the hole, but the punch was too small of a diameter to help anything, plus things are tight enough that it wasn't going to just "pry" into place.

I didn't want to beat up the bolt that I was re-using, so I found one on the shelf that was the same diameter and longer. Used it as a drift. Hammered it into place. That made sure things were lined up. Of course, I couldn't get that bolt back out. But, prying with the screwdriver loosened things enough that it pretty much fell out without losing alignment (much).

The proper bolt goes in from the top (I guess it "could" go the other way, but that's the way it was), and it didn't fall into place like I wished that it would. There was prying involved. There was hammering the longer bolt partly in from the bottom to be sure things were still lined up. And eventually, I did use a hammer (in a very weird way, because I couldn't properly hammer it from the top... so, it certainly wasn't "hard" hammering) to tap it down to where I could fit the nut to draw it the rest of the way down. That all worked, just took time.

Okay! Now, I all I have to do is bleed it! Easy! Well, no, my dear friends, it is not. It is well-known that bleeding the clutch on these cars, for whatever reason, is notoriously difficult. But, the last time I did it, it seemed pretty normal and easy. Maybe I'll get lucky? I DID take the time to bench bleed the MC, surely that will help?

Called in the wife to work the pedal. And it really didn't take long to get fluid to flow. (fun fact, the only brake fluid I had in the garage was half a small bottle of RBF-600, that's 600-degree brake fluid for track driving... serious overkill for clutch hydraulics... and not enough of it) Got a couple reservoirs of fluid through the system, and didn't seem to be bubbling. Let's check it out...

Nothing. No pedal at all. WTF?

I pondered for a moment. It was pumping fluid when I bench-bled it. It pumped fluid enough to get through the system. Then I looked things over. The new clutch hose is conveniently clear (old one was bright red), and the problem was obvious. Big ol' air bubble at the high-point of the hose. Gonna have to work that thing out somehow, and I don't have a pressure bleeder.



Consulted the internet for ideas. Somebody's had luck using the sprayer off of a spray bottle as a sort of vacuum pump. I gave that a shot. It did initially work, though it wasn't moving the volume of fluid that I needed it to. Then it quit. I wonder if the innards of that sprayer reacted with the brake fluid? I could still see the bubble, though. I need to move a LOT of fluid quickly to get that out, otherwise the bubble just continually rises to the top.

What I ended up doing was just using VERY quick, sharp pedal strokes to clear the bubble. Part of it was moving the bubble more quickly... part of it was moving the bubble back and forth quickly enough to sort of aerate the bubble to help it move. I was able to get 7-8 quick full-strokes of the pedal before emptying the tiny MC reservoir. With that, I got most of the bubble out before I ran out of fluid. I even recycled some of my bled-out brake fluid (fresh fluid that's been through a new system, aside from the fact that I was using a water bottle that may have had some water in it as a catch vessel... why not?) so that I could keep working.

In the end, I got MOST of the air out, enough that the pedal came to life and I was able to drive the car. And drive the car, I did! And it was good! A little finicky getting into gear from a stop, especially reverse. But, it shifted well, and it was a nice drive. Ended up running over to Wal-Mart to get some brake fluid. I'll re-bleed again sometime soon, and it should all be good to go!

7+ hours to do a 45-minute project. Par for the course, I suppose.

[Loren]

Oh, and since I've installed the new steering wheel, and centered it in the process, the turn signals now cancel properly. Plus, I can SEE the turn signal indicators on the dashboard, as they are no longer hidden behind the rim of the wheel. With all that, I might not need to add my turn signal noise maker.

[Native]

Old car. Old house. Old anything... Any "simple" project won't be. Nope.
Great you got it back together, for sure!

[Loren]

Spent some time with friends in the garage yesterday.

Got the choke cable replaced. I'd tried to cheap out and use a generic cable from eBay. It was way too stiff, like a lawn mower throttle cable. Didn't work well at all. So, I spent the money, got the proper OE-style cable. Had to remove the speedo from the dashboard again to access the nut on the back side of it. But, it didn't take long to do it. Now it works!

The other task I opted to check off of the list today was engine mounts. They're so saggy that, combined with the also-saggy transmission mounts, the transmission case was resting on a cross-member and making all sorts of noises.

Looked at the driver's side mount. It looked difficult to reach, and the mount itself didn't look too bad. Maybe I'll just do the other side and leave this one?

Looked at the passenger's side mount. Yeah, it's sagged by over 1/4", looks all warped and disfigured, and the rubber is hard and cracking. But, geez, this one is even harder to reach!

Had to remove a radiator hose and the coolant overflow tank to get down there. Then, the biggest issue was because the mount was so sagged, the access hole for the center bolt of the mount had shifted such that it was blocking the way of getting a socket on the bolt! After much monkeying around with two jacks (one under the oil pan, one at the tail of the transmission), I was able to get the socket on there. Thankfully, years of classic British oil film meant that nothing was rusted and it all came apart easily enough.

To get the mount physically out of its position, however... that required either the engine to be raised further, or tilted significantly to the other side. Tilting wasn't happening. Gotta undo the driver's side mount to raise it up further. Okay.

That's when I realized that the DS mount didn't have the center bolt in it. At all. Wasn't there! That made it easy to jack up the engine and get the PS mount out. A bit of leverage to tilt the engine was also required. Thankfully, Ben was there to lend a hand.

From there, removing the two frame bolts on the DS mount wasn't hard, and after taking a lunch break, getting the two mounts back into position went pretty quickly.

Found a suitable replacement for the missing bolt, and opted to use the same bolt on the other side. It's metric, but it'll do. Getting all the bolts in place wasn't difficult, but it was nearly impossible to tighten that center bolt on the left side! That's probably why it was missing.

Ended up creating a custom wrench. I cut a cheap 13mm wrench in half, and enlarged the opening to fit the bolt. (totally forgot that it was a 14mm bolt... I was thinking that it was a 1/2"... thus I started with a 13mm) That gave me a wrench that was short enough to get in the available space and turn the nut. Thankfully, the lock washers bit on the head of the bolt and I got by without having to find a way to hold the head! Got it hand tight. Then used a cheater bar and a hammer to tap the end of the wrench (again, extra hands were required!) to get it good and tight. Hopefully, it will stay put.

The only side-effect of this whole process is that now that the engine is up higher, the radiator fan was making contact with the fan shroud. Made a horrendous noise the first time I starrted it! A couple of adjustments to that sheet-metal fan shroud took care of it.

The car now drives much quieter!

And, of course, a new item added to the list: I noticed that the radiator is not properly secured. It's missing a couple bolts, which allows it to rattle around a bit. I'll have to look into that. Always something.

[Loren]

Totally forgot about that radiator problem. Did I even add it to the list?

Anyway, I've been driving the car regularly. The evap system is still crap that I need to address. If I overfill the gas it smells, and if I hang a left turn too hard when full or near full, it'll smell. But, otherwise, it's driving nicely. And I checked MPG at the last fill-up. (which is questionable, as I never fill up at the same place, and you have to put the nozzle in upside down to get it to fill at because there's a 90-degree bend in the filler neck that will cause it to shut off instantly otherwise) 13.5 mpg. So, that's either inaccurate, or I'm running really rich. I should probably tweak around with the carb some more. I was more focused on getting it running well initially, which it now is.

The seatbelts bumped themselves up on the priority list. Passenger side got to where it wouldn't retract, seems like it broke a spring or something. Then... I was getting in the car to drive home from somewhere and the receiver stalk on the driver's side came up from between the seats. Guess that bolt wasn't tight, eh? I already had a new seatbelt kit. So, I finally got both of the new seatbelts installed today. Yay!

While I was off for 5 days last week, I did next to nothing. But, I did start working on adapting the air cleaner that I bought to fit the carb. It's designed to fit the smaller carb, I couldn't find one that wasn't stupid expensive to fit a CD175. Figured it would be easy to adapt. And it was... but, time consuming. I've got the fabrication part done. Now, I just need some bolts to attach it. Then I'll not be ingesting dust into the engine.

I need to sift through my to-do list, re-prioritize it, and try to start getting some things done.