Yes, I know, I’ve been inexcusably absent from updating this site in the last five weeks. The drama of the last couple of drives really got me in a bad mood and working on the car was turning into a chore, not something that was fun.
All posts by George
First Pass of the Carnage Report
This morning I got the car up on jack stands (not an easy task with the particular combination of floor jack and ride height that I’ve got) to start making a pass over the car to see the results of the first drive.
Registering the Car and First Drive
Its been a busy week with the car, and I probably should’ve written a couple of posts over the coarse of the week, but better late than never. As the last post said, the car was basically done last week, as far as getting it registered is concerned. The goal for this week, if possible, was to get a VIN number for the car, perhaps get it registered, and maybe even get a chance to get a first drive in. My parents are here this weekend, and getting a first drive in would be a nice coincidence, as they were here the day I picked up the kit, the first time the body went on and would be here for its first drive.
Some of the people who are following my build may have already read the story of this week elsewhere, and we’ll get to it, but I’ll start at the beginning of the week, when I was getting my VIN number.
Done. (For Now)
Well, I’m not sure how more direct I can be than that. Its done, as far as I’m concerned, for now. There’s still some minor issues, and I may work a bit on those over the next week or two, but its time to deal with the state.
I started off today planning on just getting the car down from the jackstands, but ended up working a few hours on the car as well.
Almost There …
I spent another five or six hours working on the car today. My goal going into this weekend was getting the car done, as far as registering it is concerned. I didn’t have a long list of things on that punch list, and frankly decided to take care of items that were on my “post-inspection” punch list, too.
Its not “done” yet, but its close and I see no reason to think it won’t be by Tuesday.
Heater Valve and Door Latches
An quick midweek update: I’m getting very short on tasks left before getting the car inspected. At this point, its largely wrapping up some of the electrical work before putting the dash on, but there were a couple things I decided I wanted to take care of tonight.
The door latches weren’t installed completely — the latch on the door was, but the catch on the chassis wasn’t. I wanted to get the doors wrapped up.
I also bought a replacement heater bypass valve last week because I decided I wanted to have a variable electronic one, rather than a simple on/off vacuum actuated one. I also wanted to swap that out today.
The Home Stretch
This was one of the more productive weekends of work on the car that I’ve had in months, if not since last summer. I’m getting down to the end of my punch list of things to get done before getting it inspected, and its starting to really feel like I’ll be driving it this year.
The list of remaining items to get it inspected was pretty small — wipers, fix the hazard lights, get the seats in, the dash and steering wheel installed, and install the mirrors. While there’s other stuff to do on my list, like get the heater ducting run completely, strictly speaking they’re not necessary to get it inspected.
I managed to get a lot of those items taken care of this weekend.
Windshield Repair and Install
After the disappointment of last weekend, with discovering I had the wrong splash panel and the windshield was cracked, I really wanted to try to make more progress this weekend. Its getting close to September, and it won’t take many more wasted weekends before I can’t get the car on the road this summer/fall.
I had talked to Factory Five this week about the windshield and the splash panel, and they were going to ship me both. Knowing the condition packages from them have gotten here in before (drop kicked was the way I described it to them), I decided I’d rather take part of a day this weekend and drive down there. Its about 90 miles each way, but its worth the time to avoid getting another broken windshield and losing more time.
Rear Spash Panels and Windshield
Rear splash panels and windshield would be the title of this post if I didn’t run into yet more problems that are going to cause me to spent more money and time because of things that Factory Five screwed up.
I started off wanting to do two things this weekend: get the rear splash panels installed in the rear wheel wells, and get the windshield installed. As I’ve said for a few months, the windshield is the thing really blocking me finishing right now, because I’ve got a lot of tasks left that I can’t do until its on.
As has happened numerous times in the past, problems with the parts in question left me mostly stuck.
Final Body Bolting and Elephant Ears
I’m starting to get back into the swing of things working on the car. I’m still pretty busy with stuff most weekends but I’m being better about taking a few hours here and there to work on the car. Today was a good work day — I spent about five hours working on the car, and actually managed to make a good bit of progress. Its been two months of frustration getting the body fitting and bolted down, but I’ve finally gotten it as close as its going to get, and all the bolts are in.
I also got the front elephant ears installed.