Car Thread

[T2K]

 

We kept the wife's last grocery getter 17.5 years and it was still pristine, a garage queen. Had 54,xxx miles. Went to Wilymart and bought a .79 cent orange and black FOR SALE sign, tossed it on the hat rack. Car on the driveway. Next door neighbors son bought it the next day. It wasn't a manual though.

[T2K]

Had a black 1994 S-10 extended cab 4-wheel drive enhanced 4.3 litre Vortec CPI V-6. Work driver/boat puller/garage queen. I bought a 2006 Silverado but couldn't let go of the S-10. After 1 1/2 years the Silverado had 1,500 miles. One day the door bell rings repeatedly, waking me up. I'm not happy. Open the door and notice an Alabama Power Company truck. The guy says he had driven by my house several times over the past several weeks and noticed that the truck had never moved and asked if it was for sale. He wanted to buy it for his son. I told him that I drove the truck to work every night, he just didn't see that. I asked for his number and told him I would think about selling the truck. I later told the wife and she said yippidy yappidy you never drive the new truck blah blah blah. I called the guy 2 weeks later and he bought it. It was the "for my son" part that got me. That was the second truck I sold following the "for my son" line.

 

 

[DizRotus]

You can teach an old dog.  

 

When my sister-in-law excitedly asked me if I wanted to drive her new third generation Miata with automatic, I reflexively said, "No thanks."  Her feelings were hurt.

 

Today she shows up in her new car.  In January she bought a Honda Accord with the proceeds from her diesel Jetta buyback.  It didn't take long to be bored by the Accord, so she bought this.

 

This time I eagerly accepted her invitation to drive it, despite it having only two pedals.  I was surprised to see it has less than 1000 miles.  It handles well and is quite quick; much more fun than an Accord.

 

[burninator]

Almost ready to fire. I discovered brake fluid in the old vacuum lines, so I'll be replacing the brake booster and master cylinder today. Otherwise, vacuum and distributor and that should be it. 

 

 

[HDBRbuilder]

On ‎6‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 2:24 PM, juniper said:

Not much of a car guy but I like to go fast sometimes.... Sad story, was at a guys shop yesterday giving a guy a ride home that works for me sometimes, the owner of the "shop" a wealthy gent, likes to buy pre 1920 cars and rip them apart and copy the parts..... there was a 1905 Mercedes, one of only 2 known Bugattis, another very early Mercedes, a 1909 Alpha, a very early Fiat, a nice Rolls, early engines of all types and parts everywhere.... this was hoarding at an extreme for what purpose I don't know.... The smell of Rustoleum and the sight of dollar store brushes confused me. The owner is a good guy but a little eccentric I would say. What makes the story sad is I dont think these cars will ever be put back together...

I worked at the pattern shop of an iron foundry whose owner was a car collector and motorcycle collector and ran with a bunch of other vehicle collectors.  Every now and then I would come to work and find some kind of casting in bits and pieces or in some other state of disrepair sitting in the middle of my workbench for me to make a pattern for so that new replacement parts for some kind of car could be made.  I made lots of patterns which were vehicle-related, such as straight-8 Hudson exhaust manifold, and that kind of stuff.

 

The most interesting one, although not that difficult of a pattern-job, was when I walked in one morning and there was this weird-looking more-or-less assymetrical plate thing which was broken on one corner, and was originally cast in a crappy low-grade aluminum/aluminum alloy of some kind.  Come to find out it was (I can't remember exactly which, front or rear...) an engine "block" plate for a lower engine block which was a bolted-together affair with separate bronze-type cylinders mounted within units of two cylinders each for the upper portion of the four cylinder engine block mounted to the top of the lower portion of the bolted-together block "box".  If that wasn't weird enough, it was to be re-cast using ductile iron, instead of "aluminum whatever-it-was".   It seems that it was more common than not for the two protruding corners of this piece to eventually crack and break off.  That was because of a combination of the material it was originally cast in and the AGE of that material which weakened the overall piece over the years due to deterioration.  So the owner want to make a few of them in ductile iron so that they would not tend to break at the corner protrusions over the years.  Those protrusions were used to stabilize engine mounting, which on that particular piece had a large round projection sticking out of it, which was a SINGLE-point engine mount, which allowed the engine to rock from side to side from the torque generated from its rotating crankshaft and flywheel.  The ear-like projections that tended to break off over time were to limit the engines rocking motion side-to-side by those protrusions putting pressure on solid rubber blocks mounted to the car frame on either side of the engine "block" at the points where they both could meet  and stabilize the vibrations.  The boss believed that making it out of cast ductile iron would solve the breakage issue, but the rest of the block would remain as in the original...made out of those aluminum-like plates bolted together.  Well, I made the pattern and rigged it we made a few adjustments in order to get some excellent parts out of the deal, which were nice exact copies of the original part in ductile iron alloy.  But they were basically a failed experiment for A TOTALLY DIFFERENT reason.  Because they were ductile iron and not that alloy stuff!  It seems that as the engine heated up, they would simply NOT remain sealed to the other engine "block" plates and leaked oil like a sieve.  Simply too much difference in the two metals used and their heat expansion/contraction properties for the gasket material used to seal the plates to each other!  What did the engine go into??  A VERY early STUTZ BEARCAT!  Yep...some weird stuff was found on my workbench on a number of mornings!  LOL!

[JJkizak]

2 hours ago, HDBRbuilder said:

I worked at the pattern shop of an iron foundry whose owner was a car collector and motorcycle collector and ran with a bunch of other vehicle collectors.  Every now and then I would come to work and find some kind of casting in bits and pieces or in some other state of disrepair sitting in the middle of my workbench for me to make a pattern for so that new replacement parts for some kind of car could be made.  I made lots of patterns which were vehicle-related, such as straight-8 Hudson exhaust manifold, and that kind of stuff.

 

The most interesting one, although not that difficult of a pattern-job, was when I walked in one morning and there was this weird-looking more-or-less assymetrical plate thing which was broken on one corner, and was originally cast in a crappy low-grade aluminum/aluminum alloy of some kind.  Come to find out it was (I can't remember exactly which, front or rear...) an engine "block" plate for a lower engine block which was a bolted-together affair with separate bronze-type cylinders mounted within units of two cylinders each for the upper portion of the four cylinder engine block mounted to the top of the lower portion of the bolted-together block "box".  If that wasn't weird enough, it was to be re-cast using ductile iron, instead of "aluminum whatever-it-was".   It seems that it was more common than not for the two protruding corners of this piece to eventually crack and break off.  That was because of a combination of the material it was originally cast in and the AGE of that material which weakened the overall piece over the years due to deterioration.  So the owner want to make a few of them in ductile iron so that they would not tend to break at the corner protrusions over the years.  Those protrusions were used to stabilize engine mounting, which on that particular piece had a large round projection sticking out of it, which was a SINGLE-point engine mount, which allowed the engine to rock from side to side from the torque generated from its rotating crankshaft and flywheel.  The ear-like projections that tended to break off over time were to limit the engines rocking motion side-to-side by those protrusions putting pressure on solid rubber blocks mounted to the car frame on either side of the engine "block" at the points where they both could meet  and stabilize the vibrations.  The boss believed that making it out of cast ductile iron would solve the breakage issue, but the rest of the block would remain as in the original...made out of those aluminum-like plates bolted together.  Well, I made the pattern and rigged it we made a few adjustments in order to get some excellent parts out of the deal, which were nice exact copies of the original part in ductile iron alloy.  But they were basically a failed experiment for A TOTALLY DIFFERENT reason.  Because they were ductile iron and not that alloy stuff!  It seems that as the engine heated up, they would simply NOT remain sealed to the other engine "block" plates and leaked oil like a sieve.  Simply too much difference in the two metals used and their heat expansion/contraction properties for the gasket material used to seal the plates to each other!  What did the engine go into??  A VERY early STUTZ BEARCAT!  Yep...some weird stuff was found on my workbench on a number of mornings!  LOL!

 

Why two air inputs on the gold thingy?

JJK

[HDBRbuilder]

14 hours ago, JJkizak said:

 

Why two air inputs on the gold thingy?

JJK

What gold thingy?  Are you looking at a picture or something?

[Tarheel]

My 9 and 10 year olds.....

[CECAA850]

Mommas grocery getter.

[burninator]

37 minutes ago, CECAA850 said:

Mommas grocery getter.

My dad is on his second Macan, loves it. Had a grey Macan S first, and then replaced it with a red Macan GTS earlier this year.

[CECAA850]

We'll probably keep this S a while.  It's not quite 2 years old and a blast to drive.  It's really more fun than an SUV should be.  In about a year or so I'll be looking for an M2 or 718 for me.

[JJkizak]

1 hour ago, HDBRbuilder said:

What gold thingy?  Are you looking at a picture or something?

 

The intake manifold on the car. I suppose it's some kind of relief valve.

JJK

[USNRET]

46 minutes ago, JJkizak said:

 

The intake manifold on the car. I suppose it's some kind of relief valve.

JJK

My guess: clean out port, plugged after sand casting / cleaning the manifold.

 

or perhaps where the Chevy fluid is injected for reliability

 

edit: just what intake are we talking about; me, the 5.0 Cobra intake photo..

[HDBRbuilder]

54 minutes ago, JJkizak said:

 

The intake manifold on the car. I suppose it's some kind of relief valve.

JJK

The engine of the Stutz Bearcat was in pretty much a continuous state of flux of changes from day one until production ceased.  This included the block components, number of cylinders, lay-out of the cylinder element array, carburation, and even the heads, etc...as the power-plant of the car evolved.  So unless I can see the pic you are referring to, I have no clue which version of the engine you are talking about.  In its day it was continuously one of the most advanced cars around both performance-wise and reliability-wise, and the pretty-much continuous evolution of the power-plant is one of the major things which kept it that way.

 

Therefore, if I can't see what you are looking at when you ask a question, it is pretty hard to give an answer...please post the pic you are referring to.

[oldtimer]

I recently saw a barn find show featuring a complete original bearcat.  They got it together and took it to pebble beach.  Pretty cool machines, the drawbacks seemed to be limited range and the cooling system.

[HDBRbuilder]

1 hour ago, oldtimer said:

I recently saw a barn find show featuring a complete original bearcat.  They got it together and took it to pebble beach.  Pretty cool machines, the drawbacks seemed to be limited range and the cooling system.

Actually, on the early Bearcats, the range was determined by the size of the drum-type gas tank mounted on the rear deck.  Later on, that type of gas tank was dropped.  Cooling systems on most "run-about" style cars in those early days was minimal to reduce weight...those early solid brass and copper radiators were HEAVY and water pumps were relatively small.  The whole concept of the "run-about" cars was basically reborn with the advent of the post WWII street rods of the early1950's until now...jalopies...reduce weight and keep everything to a low center of gravity for increased speed and better handling characterisitics, without having to invest much for upgrades.  Remember the T-bucket street rods with the fuel "keg" behind the bucket shell? Five-to-ten gallon "kegs" don't get you very far when the engine is sucking down fuel at 10 MPG or likely even less.  My father's 72 Chevy C10 Custom long bed pickup did good to get even 10 MPG with that 4bbl carb feeding the 4-bolt main 350 V8 and a turbo 350 tranny feeding the rear end...and that was at 60 mph on the highway!  I seldom borrowed it because I couldn't afford to gas it up...my 60 Studey Lark VIII got over 50% better gas mileage than his truck did on its worst day, and was more fun when tooling around with a load of my friends in it!  Butt-ugly, but fun...and the gals loved that ugly thing!  LOL!

 

[JJkizak]

6 hours ago, HDBRbuilder said:

The engine of the Stutz Bearcat was in pretty much a continuous state of flux of changes from day one until production ceased.  This included the block components, number of cylinders, lay-out of the cylinder element array, carburation, and even the heads, etc...as the power-plant of the car evolved.  So unless I can see the pic you are referring to, I have no clue which version of the engine you are talking about.  In its day it was continuously one of the most advanced cars around both performance-wise and reliability-wise, and the pretty-much continuous evolution of the power-plant is one of the major things which kept it that way.

 

Therefore, if I can't see what you are looking at when you ask a question, it is pretty hard to give an answer...please post the pic you are referring to.

 

The picture is the 5 liter Cobra by burinator.

JJK

[DizRotus]

I believe he's referring to the Cobra's plenum.

 

 

[sunburnwilly]

 

Edited July 7, 2017 by sunburnwilly
car porn

[HDBRbuilder]

13 hours ago, JJkizak said:

 

The picture is the 5 liter Cobra by burinator.

JJK

Having spent over a decade as a pattern-maker (in my not-so-distant past), that hole thing is where the core-lock comes out of the interior of the part being cast/molded.  In sand casting and other forms of casting the interior of a part will have a separate mold made for it out of baked fine sand.  That interior mold is called a CORE.  The Core must be "locked" into place in the sand of the mold for the exterior of the part to keep it from shifting as the molten metal enters the overall mold.  The part(s) of the core which accomplish that are called CORE-LOCKs.  When the part is finished the opening is milled (if needed) so that a "plug" can be inserted into that opening to seal the part from the outside (if needed).

 

For instance, on a cast water-cooled engine block, cores are used to define the interior water jacket of the block.  The core-locks extend out of the outer shape of the block into the outer sand mold to keep the water channels in the water jacket from turning out wrong due to shifting of the core while the molten metal flows into the casting mold.  After the block is cast, it is tumbled and the hardened baked fine sand of the core breaks up and comes out of the interior of the block through the core-lock hole in the block...and possibly other places in the block body.  Then that hole to the outside of the block is milled from the outside, and a plug is inserted to keep the engine from losing water through that hole.  Mechanics call these engine-block hole "plugs" the "freeze plugs" and they are fitted so that SUPPOSEDLY if the water in the engine freezes, the plugs will blow out as the ice expands and MAYBE keep the block from cracking.

 

Make sense?