Mrmerlin

nice detail work, the amount of parts it takes to put one of these cars together is amazing.

I noticed this and thought I would pass it on ,
the early cam towers have the removable lifter liners.

They also have micro thin gaskets where the liners seat into the tower.

Most important is that you remove all of the old gasket, its hard to tell if its in place,

make sure to install new gaskets they look like figure 8s,

Otherwise the tower will be levered off the head and leaks will ensue.

It will usually leak along the top edge of the tower / head if this is happening


I have a few damaged rear carpets that need fresh jute backing ,
I would be interested to see what you find,
this could also expand to repair of the floor mats with the damaged jute backing.

Please Carry on with the most excellent restoration

Rob Edwards

Hi Stan-

Got it on the lifter sleeve gaskets, I stared at them for a long time wondering how I was going to get them out, until I ran a finger along the inner edge and the figure 8 just popped out intact. Couldn't have been easier, I was expecting them to be fused to the cam tower... Have new ones here, ready to go.

More stripping, yesterday:

1993GTS

Wow! I just binge read this thread. Not sure how I missed it. Like the best season of wheeler dealer all at once. Thanks for keeping us up to date on everything. I feel like I'm right there with you. Minus all the hard work of course

Such a sweet car to do it with. Amazing color combo!

William and Rob congrats on such a cool project. It takes a lot more patience than I have to do this as well as you guys are. I just hope one day I get to see it in person.

I know first hand how well William takes care of his cars, and this one looks to raise the bar even further. Love it!

Now finish it already



Chris

Rob Edwards

More blasting today- eventually we're going to run out of things to clean- almost there.

Have gone through about 30 lbs of baking soda this weekend. But it does make for clean engine bits:



Hubs, September 1977 date code:

The Deputy

Pretty sneaky setting those two cam towers next to one another like that...this not-yet-awake-brain looked at it for a minute thinking "hey, how come they have a double overhead cam engine in this car"...lol.

That baking powder sure does a nice job, and you say you had to put an attachment on your blasting cabinet for its use. A blasting cabinet is on my "want list"...but must renovate the garage first this summer.

Brian.

AO

Rob and William,

Outstanding work. Been loosely following this. Can't wait to see the finished product. Great project for the archives.

Rob Edwards

Wanted to share a bad decision, so no one repeats it- I have washed carpets before in our front loading washer, cold water, gentle cycle. Well, the (barely 2 year old) Whirlpool washer (that's WFW96HEAW0, for Google...) went TU just before Christmas, so after two failed trips from the 'repair' man, and a MIL who also needs a new washer, I bought a toploader to temporarily clean out the backlog of laundry here before installing it for her. I'd already done William's carpets in the front-loader, leaving only the rear cargo carpet to do.[foreshadowing]....

Cut the old trashed jute off the original cargo area carpet yesterday- in my haste to get it Napisaned and in the washer, I didn't really look at the back of the carpet- looks a little weak, in retrospect- note the linear defect in the carpet:



Horrified when I pulled the carpet out of the toploader- Coupla new holes that weren't there:



So- at the risk of overgeneralizing, even on gentle cycle, I'm not sure that a washer with an agitator is a good idea for old, fragile carpeting. Front loader, gentle cycle, low spin, no dry, FTW....


Will pull the vinyl binding off and incorporate it into the replacement, as a memorial to the original.....

Mark Anderson

Maybe some digging upstairs might find a replacement

AO

Looks like it would still make a good bed for a dog. Just sayin'

Rob Edwards

Camo bed for a golden retriever.

Rob Edwards

Next dumb question-

Gauge cluster- cleaned all contacts, checked all bulbs. WTF are the little white spots on the black cluster surround/frame? I'm afraid to touch that surface for fear of ruining the surface. Anyone BTDT on cleaning it (whatever 'it' is) off?

The clear plastic cluster lens seems to be glued on intermittently around its periphery, I suppose it could be carefully separated and the black frame cleaned/painted/whatever, but I'm hesitant to touch any of it.

the flyin' scotsman

deleted.......reread question

SwedeInSiam

That's mushrooms (fungus).

My 2 clusters looks the same. Plan to try to separate the lens on the spare one to clean and paint it.

Jadz928

The paint used on the gauge cluster is strange. It's almost greasy. Long story short remove it with laquer thinner. Repaint flat black.
Lens comes off fairly easily. A straight blade and putty knife will get it done. Polish the outside of the lens while you have it apart.

William A

Truth is, Rob's "mistake" with the rear carpet was a merciful coup d'grace on an irretrievable fabric. What is interesting is the carpet was totally cooked, yet the vinyl remains in mostly great shape!

Jim and Swede, thanks for the advice on the instrument cluster, who would have thought spores could get in there!?

Brian, Rob's media blasting cabinet has been a revelation for me. To think I have been "cleaning" in such a tedious and time consuming way all this time.