Toyota O2 Sensors

So, in the midst of last week's Studbakering, I had to take some time to fix the wife's car. This involved replacing the battery and replacing the Oxygen (O2) Sensors. Turns out that this is a much bigger (but not to difficult) deal than one might think.

Read the how-to here: http://www.theymightberacing.com/Maintenance/O2Sensors.aspx

Cheers!
Jody

All Arizona Studebaker Gathering (March Madness) 3/28/2009

It was a great day. I just felt bad that I didn't manage to get the brake restoration and exhaust work done on my Champion so that I could bring it out there. The photos I took (250-ish of them) are available online at the following address:

http://www.theymightberacing.com/Shows/MarchMadness.aspx

Cheers!
Jody

Studebaker March Madness

Today was a good day. Went out to the annual March Madness Studebaker gathering. As hard as I may have tried I just couldn't get the brakes done in time. Even if I could have finished the brakes it wouldn't have mattered much as I still haven't received the muffler for the new exhaust system. I did get new pipes, and as soon as that muffler arrives I'll be able to bolt it all together.

The fun of Studebakers, short of the cars, are the people. Visited with a number of old Studebaker friends, met some new ones and talked to all sorts of members of the public. I also did my requisite photographing. The memory card has been loaded to the laptop, it's a matter of getting them loaded up to the website. I hope to have it done by tomorrow.

Cheers!
Jody

Sitting in the garage

I'm sitting in the garage on a tuesday night. Been pulling apart Studebaker brakes all afternoon/evening and am getting tired of scraping road goo and standing in front of the sandblast cabinet.

Spent the weekend at Disneyland with the family. Got a couple fun pictures that I'll post later. Spent most of Monday recovering from the trip/drive. As much as I may like wandering and driving, my legs don't appreciate it as much as they used to.

Monday evening saw the fuel system go into the Jensen Healey project. Short of one last bolt it's all done and it's time to move on to the rear axle assembly. So, keep your eyes peeled for a new fuel system article on the JH.

I decided to go ahead on the Studebaker brakes while waiting for the new exhaust. Ordered the bits from Chuck over at StudebakerParts.com and they came within the next day (got to love the laziness of having things mailed to me from within my own city). So far most of my time has been spent scraping and sandblasting parts clean, as well as a little painting. I hate cleaning brake drums. It's not the pieces themselves so much as it is the rough surfaces they normally have from the casting process. Makes them so hard to get clean. The good is that the wheel cylinders presently do not look like they need honing, so as dirty as everything was, it was reasonably sound. That being said, the outer rubbers were trashed on both front wheels.

Tomorrow should see at least one wheel mountd back in place, with the possibility of two! The next bit is to bend and flare new front brake lines. Then it's off to the rear end, and finally the master cylinder. So, in theory, should I be diligent, sh should have working brakes (but no exhaust) by the weekend!

Cheers!
Jody

Studebaker Carburetor

I wrote up my work on the carburetor, oil bath air filter, and exhaust manifold. It was a real effort in de-bodging. For more ino on that restoration segment read the article about the carburetor. The old girl is running like a champ now (no pun intended) and is eagerly awaiting her new exhaust system and brake rebuild.

Jensens and Visitors

Spent the last couple nights figuring out what was needed to finish up the trunk portion of the Jensen-Healey. At the same time I've been trying to catch up on my writing for the site. Tonight I published the article on restoring the vibration dampener on my Studebaker Champion.

Additionally, we got to go out with Dan Eiland and his family for supper tonight. They were in town doing orientation for his son to attend ASU next year. It's great to get together with other folks who are into the same cars (and have so many similar stories). Now we've just got to get a car running well enough to take it out El Paso to visit.

Studebaker Follies

One of the greatest sources of frustration when working on other cars is the previous owners. If you are lucky and had good PO's then ther's rarely a problem. If the PO was a bodger, or hired a bodgr mchanic, well, then, it makes later repairs and restorations an royal pain in the butt.

So, if you're a bodger.... Quit it!

Now, you may be asking yourself where this ir is coming from. So, I managed to get all the parts finished up yesterday, the Carburetor, the exhaust/intake manifold and the oil bath air filter. Yesterday evening I happily went out to the Champion to reinstall everything, thinking to myself that there's only 15-ish nuts to tighten and everything will be back together again.

I trid to fit the manifold to the exhaust pipe and noticed that it just didn't want to go together. Further investigation showed that the flange on the exhaust pipe wasn't quite the right size. Confused by this, as the old manifold fit just fine, I took a closer look at the old manifold. Someone, in an attempt to force things to work together in the past had bent outward at 30-40 degrees the studs that protrude from the bottom of the manifold. So, the new manifold, with straight and correct bolts just wouldn't fit.

A sailor-string of commntary later I left the exhaust pipe unattached, mounted the manifold to the engine, and took a break to go help a fellow JH owner with his distributor.

I got up this morning early, finished attaching the carb and air cleaner, and tidied up the job. So, the project is "done" excepting for the fact that I'll be replacing the exhaust a little earlier than I planned. So, now it's off to go find an exhaust for the car.

So, I finish my post with this.....Use the RIGHT parts for repairs... don't just force stuff to work. Yes it might work for today, but it'll cause much grief down the road!

Jody

Studebaker Carburetor and other items

Finished up the rebuild of the Carter WE carb for my Studebaker Champion tonight. Thes single carbs are generally pretty easy to rebuild, and this one was no real exception. In addition the exhaust manifold was pulled and sandblasted and repainted with high temperature black paint. Finally I pulled, blasted and repainted the air cleaner assembly as well.

As these sort of projects go, it was slow going completely tearing down the carburetor. I'm far too anal retentive for my own good and I literally take every single piece apart for cleaning. Even single barrel carbs have lots of little bits on them.

Now, as per standard procedure, there were a few oddities on this one. The rebuild kit comes with gaskets for a number of different carburetors. After sortng through the entire pile of gaskets I had in my hand the one that appeared to fit correctly. I attempted to force it into place until it broke (apparently I wasn't using the right hammer :). So it goes. A little tracing and trimming and I've built a brand new gasket. Now, mind you, I'm still a little baffled as to why the original didn't fit correctly. Gaskets are somtimes just "off" and so I attributed it to that.

Once I was all done, I started putting things away. At this point I tipped up the box that the carb rebuild kit had come in. I was in the process of crushing it when the correct gasket fell out of the box. Well, dang! Then, I was setting away my "spare" carb that I use as a reference and for the occasional missing bit. I paused for a moment to test the play in the carb, it was much heavier than the rebuilt one. A few moments study showed me that the carb I'd pulled off the car had been missing a pretty important spring. D'oh. No wonder why it flooded itself. So, lord knows how long the car had been like that. I don't remember ever messing much with the carb before.

So, because I had a now found gasket and a spring to add in, it was time to tear it all back apart again, put the items in the right place, and put it all back together. I'm always amazed at how slowly the taking apart/reassembly goes the first time, but every time after that it moves at light speed.

With this all done, tomorrow's job is to bolt everything back into Annabelle and get her running. Then I can finish sorting the garage a bit and get back to finishing the Jensen Healey.

Goodnight!
Jody

Pictures from Wheels of Britain 2009

I sat up till 3 or 4 in the morning uploading and sorting photos. They're finally up online and ready for viewing:

http://www.theymightberacing.com/Shows/WheelsOfBritain2009.aspx

Wheels of Britain 2009

Today's Wheels of Britain was great! Anyone who lives in the area and did not attend crtainly missed out. The gems of the show were the Aston Martin DB6, the Ausin Atlantic, a Triumph TR5PI, and an Allard. Now, really that's just scratching the surface of the cool cars in attendance. This year I sat with my video camera at the exit to film the progression out of the show. I've got that uploaded and edited already. I'm still working on the copious photo collection.

Here's the video!

Tucson British Car Roundup Photos

I finally got through the photos, ironically, it was only a 120 of them to work with. It was a good show, and while not hug, the car quality was amazing. To see the photos check out the Tucson British Car Roundup page.

Garage consternation

So, I'm at one of those points that most restorers hit during their restorations. It's when you realize that at the rate you are presently moving, your grandchildren may be finishing your project... or in my case projects. I've got Edith Grove rocking on the ipod (if you've never heard of her, look her up online, local musician in Albequerque, and the music's great, plus, she drives an Edsel! A friend - Hey Shelley! - played a gig with her one night while I was out visiting. It's good stuff!)

Anyways, and in some fashion, it's indicative of the present state of the garage. The Austin Healey had the lights removed, but still sits there. The green Jensen Healey is waiting on fuel plumbing and me to figure out how to rebuild the sender. Finally, Annabelle, the Studebaker sits out in the driveway minus an exhaust manifold, carburetor and air filter. This doesn't even account for my blue Jensen Healey. I tried to chang the oil on it today only to realize the last person who changed the oil bunged up the bolt so badly I can't get it out of the car to drain the oil.

So in other words, I wish I was doing this stuff full time instad of working, being a husband, and being a father. Don't get me wrong. A smiling, giggling son beats a rear end rebuild any day of the week, and I guess this is why most of the active folks in the car hobby are either family hobbyists, young, or retired. Families take precendence, and If I want him to be into cars, I need to be with him first, and the cars second. The same goes for my daughter.

At any rate, back to the state of my garage. My trip down to Tucson this weeknd past shamed me. And only in a way that meant anything to me. There was only one Jensen Healey in attendance. There should have been two. Now, it was great to see one there, and I'll not diminish the fact that Dale drove out from New Mexico to attend. This is all annoyance at myself for not getting things done.

So, the end state of this, is that come hell or high-water I'm going to Jensen Nationals west in a Jensen Healey this year. I don't car if I have to hobble the old blue girl in, we'll be there. Now, my target is to get the green JH finished. So, watch for more Jensen related posts/articles in the near future... and if I slow down, then bug me, I've got to get her done!

Jody