40 days and counting
So far I have spent every spare minute at the shop fretting over the task at hand.. there is plenty to be done for sure, here is the synopsis for today.
Meta-Labor:
- assembled the shopping list (for the stuff that centerline carries anyhow)
- deposited my monthly paycheck (the most important part of most projects)
Labor-Labor:
Removed the pedal-box, Dan came in early to help out and “restored” hella fasteners on the wire wheel as I removed them from the assembly. Thanks Dan!
I had to act quick as I didn’t want to disassemble the thing and forget what went where..
I had to wrastle the F*#@ out of the clutch pedal which was frozen solid in its bore. after plenty of passes with the torch adding lots of heat, PB blaster, and torque to the assembly I finally pulled that bugger loose expecting it to be hopelessly corroded and junky.
Frozen and crusty, but free from the chassis thanks to my little firend the 28V makita electric impact wrench!
However after about a hour of cleaning things up the parts were fitting up nicely and were looking good! After studying the assembly, it’s not surprising that it was the clutch pedal that froze, the brake pedal gets a nice bronze bushing to float in while the clutch is steel on aluminum, straight up in the pedal box housing.
The exploded pedalbox assembly, all freed up and cleaned up ready to go back togehter before I forget what goes where.
As soon as I got the thing apart I had to cut out to pick up my daughter from school and couldn’t get back to the shop until around 8pm. but I used a few stolen nightime hours to re-assemble the pedal-box. For the assembly, I used a bit of wheel bearing grease to try to keep things free moving and protected from future corrosion.
all buttoned up (less the brake MC)
I was in a groove so I started in on the master cylinder. It was a total M*$&@# F*@(#$ to get apart so I expected it to be a wild goose chase down garbage-part-alley. But surprisingly, lots of elbow grease, hammer banging, and a few improvised scrubbing tools later and the thing looks pretty usable! Of course, I’ll need to order a rebuild kit for the seals to make it totally plush. The bad news is that water must have entered the brake lines and been allowed to sit for many years, because the inside of all hydraulic lines looked like garbage. I guess I’ll salvage the fittings, and add:
- bend, flare, and fit new brake lines
to my list of things to do..Hmm I wonder what the wheel cylinders will look like..?
Next big push might be Monday night or Tuesday. Lots of other things on the calendar.