Houston....we have separation

I went and picked up a couple ratchet straps this morning.  I strung them up to the rafters and started raising up the rear end.  It wasn't as easy as I thought it was going to be.  One side at a time until I raised the body high enough to clear the top of the front shocks.

After wheeling it outside, I took a little time to tape up any exposed holes or electrical connections.  I would have liked to take the rest of the wiring harness off but it was just too darn cold outside to do that.  I covered the engine with some plastic and I'll get to it later this week when it warms up.  I hope to maybe degrease the everything before I pull it inside for disassembly.  As you can see, the engine and trans need it.

Separation...

No, my wife hasn't left me.  I finally was able to separate the body from the drive-train.  The article I had read said all you needed to do was remove all the nuts/bolts except those on the top of the shock towers.  I didn't trust that and that was wise.  It would be unwise to do that.  The coils would have quickly shot the subframes downward.  Instead I left the shock town nuts on plus one nut on each side of the subframes.  Then I dropped the whole things down to the floor with a board under the lower control arms to protect the rotors.  This worked.  As soon as I removed all the nuts, the coils sprung the body upward.

My hope was to hang the body from the rafters and roll the drive-train outside to degrease next week when the temps get high enough.  Well we couldn't get it high enough without ratchet straps.  We will get some tomorrow and roll it out.  Then we'll drop the body down and remove the last items.

Almost there...

My wife gave me a wonderful Valentines present...time out in the garage.  Each time I'm out there I know I'm getting closer to getting the body off the drive train.  Earlier this week I was able to disconnect and drain all the brake lines.  I'm not going to be able to salvage the lines though.  There are a few of the fittings that just don't want to come off the master cylinder.  I've looked through the Speedway catalog and brake lines aren't that expensive.  That and I doubt I could really reuse much of it anyway.

So my son and I worked hard tonight to try to get the body and drive train separated.  I read that you can just remove all the nuts/bolts besides the tops of the shock towers while it was up, then lower it to remove them, and then lift the body off.  I didn't trust to have everything just hanging there, so I left one bolt in each corner before lowering the car down onto boards.  That's as low as I can get and still keep the rotors off the ground.

So all I need to do is remove 12 bolts/nuts, disconnect the fuel lines, and disconnect the clutch line before it's ready for a test lift.  If all goes well, the body will be ready for the chopping block by the end of the weekend.  Then I will need to build a dolly to go under the engine & transmission.  I want to keep them connected and leave them alone until I'm ready to actually work on them.  Just plan on sealing up it's holes, covering it, and rolling it into a corner.

My goal is to start on the frame in the beginning of April.  Next month will be hectic with spring break and me finishing my degree.  The only goal I have for next month is building the Build Table.  I need to sell some more parts to cover the next investment.  I need welding gas, steel, and material for my table.  I'm still at $1000 cost so far, but it sure has been worth it.  I've really enjoyed taking this car apart and spending time with my son.

I can't wait to start on the frame with him.  I even bought him his own welding helmet this week.  I figure I will do the cutting, he will clamp it to the table, and I will take weld it.  He plans to take Welding Merit Badge at summer camp this year.  Maybe after that I'll let him take a few (unimportant) welds?

Making some progress

I did some modifications out in the garage yesterday.  Hung three sets of lights to put some illumination on what I was working on.  Once they warmed up, they worked great.

I pulled a late-nighter last night despite the coldness.  It's so cold out in the garage that my fridge is keeping the beer warm.  It doesn't take too long for my beer to ice over once I open it (which is how I like it).

Earlier in the day I pulled the wiring harness through the firewall.  No way to pull the whole thing out until I could pull the heater core.  I went back later with the intention to just pull the top off.  The top was getting old and had the normal cracks along the hinge points.  Someone forgot to unzip the top before putting it down, so it had the big rip there.  Then there was a rip under the window.  I decided there was no use even trying to salvage the top.  So that made it much easier to wrestle the thing out at the end.  I pulled the latches hoping I might be able to see them.  I'll pull the vinyl off when it warms up and strap the steel.  Can't see where anyone would want the frame.

Cracked the A/C open and was able to get a few of the fittings loose.  I need to stop by HF this week to pick up some larger wrenches.  I don't want to chance things by using adjustable too much. Ripped the carpet out.  Carpet is in good shape, but the pad was shot.  It still had moisture in it from when it was as the salvage yard.  Noticed crystals everywhere (did I mention how cold it is in my garage).  Had some issues getting the passenger kick panel out.  One bolt was completely rusted away.  Finally got the computer out.  Drained the coolant so I could pull the radiator and heater core.  Got a little nervous when I seen this brown crud at the end.  I checked the web and they said that was normal.

I finally got some time to work on the car.  Its still cold out but at least warm enough to work out in the car with the heater going.

Spent some time taking the wiring apart in the the engine compartment.  I think I've done as much as I can without draining fluids.

I also decided to have some fun and take the dash out.  Wow is it going to take some time to get the wiring pulled and labeled.

 

A little more

Well we came home from scouts tonight and juggled the car around the garage to make some room on the passenger side.  No more doors, no more fenders, no front bumper.

I think now is a time to do a little cleaning before we dig any further.  There are a lot of bolts (whole and broken) all over the floor.  We also need to take some time to get some parts on Craigslist to gain some room (and money) back.

Is it an addiction?

First off I think my son is more addicted than I am.  He came home from school today and went right out to the garage to try to get that bumper off.  He called me up on my drive home asking for suggestions.  He eventually got down to just two stripped plastic screws around the grill.  So when I finished my school conference call, I went out and popped them off.  That's the nice thing about dismantling a car.  You don't have to remove every bolt in a proper manner.

Tomorrow I have a feeling that he will try to remove the bumper sub-assembly.  We need to jockey the car around the garage to make enough room to remove the passenger door.  Then he can remove the other fender.

I need to find something that will remove the sticky stuff on the convertible top left over from when it was shrink-wrapped.  The top isn't perfect, but I hope to get something out of it.  It has the typical rip above the back window from where someone lowered the top without unzipping.  Other than that, it just has some small cracks along the side where it folds.

Can't stay away...

I wasn't planning on working on the car any tonight.  The only plan was to let the boy go out and do a little work on his own.  He was having trouble breaking some bolts loose so I went out to just help him a bit.  Once I stepped into the garage, I couldn't stop.

We're still fighting to get the front bumper off.  The boy is doing good at breaking bolts.  I'm glad we're scrapping the car.  We did finally get one fender off.  I think we're down to two more bolts to get the bumper off, then three more to remove the other fender.  I'm letting the PB Blaster do a little work.

Tonight I also removed both the seats and the driver's door.  I will need to jockey around the car to make enough room on the passenger side to remove that door.

I found out tonight that there is someone on my team for my last MBA class that needs to finish the team simulation as quickly as possible.  This means that I'm likely going to have to spend a couple hours per night for the next couple of weeks to do this team simulation.  Maybe I can take this time to get some of these first parts sold?

Slept in after a long evening.  Found that the boy woke up before me and was already out playing in the car. I knew he was dying to go for another ride.  So I went out to give it a jump start.  Figured out why the battery wasn't holding a charge.  It was crunched into the squished quarter panel.  I'm sure that it's cracked and at least one cell was dead.  

We gave it a jump and my wife came out for a ride.  She asked if she could drive instead and take the boy with her.  So off they went.  Up and down our road.  I'm sure the neighbors weren't enjoying it since it was running a straight exhaust.  Once we parked it, my daughter came out and said she wanted a ride.  So another jump and off they went.  I took it for a couple laps finally myself before parking it.

Spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning the garage and handing drywall.  I wanted to get the car inside today.  One way or another.  We were successful.

Well there was a half an hour left before the boy's bedtime, so we decided we'd start taking her apart.  Took off the hood first.  Then popped the front turn lamps.  From there I worked on the wiper system while the boy started on a fender.  We were starting to have some fun before my wife came out to send him off to bed.

   

It's a busy week and we have our winter camporee this weekend.  So we will likely not be able to touch it again until next week.  I know it will drive us both crazy.

Bringing home the donor car

Well it has been a long day.  I've spent the last few weeks watching Craigslist trying to find a good donor car.  I came close to some great buys, but everyone knows that takes perfect timing.

Well there was one car that I kept being drawn back to.  It was a salvaged car about 3 hours away.  It was $500 more than I was wanting to spend.  I kept watching it through the week and decided if it was still around by Friday that I'd start making offers.  Well after some haggling, I got the price dropped another $300.  I put together a plan to drive down at 6am with a friend to go pick it up.  Then I found out that with it's salvage title that it was illegal for it to be on the road and that it needed to be towed.  Ouch.  A 3 hour drive to tow something back sight-unseen.  That's a little bit of a risk at the last minute.  I found a Uhaul dealer to pick up a car hauler, but that meant spending more money.  Top this also off with the fact that I wanted to be back for my daughter's soccer game.  Things weren't falling into place and my wife recommended that I might pass on this.  I told the guy that I couldn't do it right now and he said to let him know if things change.

I searched the internet more that night and just couldn't find anything I liked.  The more I thought about it, the more I felt I should keep trying.  So I decided that I'd post something on Facebook to see if any of my friends had a trailer I could borrow.  Then I decided to just rent a trailer here and drive down after the soccer games.  It was half the price to rent up here and I could pick it up later.

Well we got out of the soccer game earlier than expected so we thought we were getting a jump on our trip. But picking up the trailer killed that.  Our 15 minute gain in time was chewed up by a 45 minute pickup.  First Uhaul doesn't list if the trailer uses 4 wire or 7 wire connections.  So I needed to stop next door to Autozone to pick up an adapter.  Then Uhaul's server was down, so he had to re-enter all the info I already did with my reservation.  We finally got on the road at 4pm.

It was nice to do a long father-son road trip.  It gave us some time to talk and some time to talk over some Boy Scout merit badges he was working on.  Being 11 years old, its hard for him to find time to slow down. He had three merit badges that just needed little things to finish.  So the trip was productive.

We made it down there about 7pm.  So much for seeing it in the daylight.  When we got there, it wasn't in as great of shape as I hoped, but it wasn't too bad.  The battery was dead, so it needed a jump.  It fired right up.  That's when we found out that someone cut the catalytic converter out.  My son loved the "straight pipe" sound and smell.  We threw some tags on it and took off down a back road to see how it drove.  Oh how I miss having a 5 speed.  My son loved us peeling out in this loud little machine.  It went through the gears without issue.  Yeah, we're starting out with a good engine, clutch, and transmission.  The rest of the car is gravy.

So we load it up, grab some supper and head back home.  We hit rain/fog off and on both ways.  We still made good time and got home safe.  We let my son "drive" the car off the trailer as we pushed.  I think he enjoyed it.

Once we got home, we found out the rip next to the back window was worse than we thought.  It's my understanding this rip is common if someone tries to put the top down without unzipping the back window.  Someone started to fix it, but did a poor job.  I'm thinking about sewing a patch to it before I try to sell the top.  I'm thinking this little bit of effort may help bring some extra money.  We shall see.

Tomorrow we will take the family for a spin up and down the road.  It's a shame it's going to be dismantled, but I'm looking forward to eventually moving to the building stage.  We'll pull it into the driveway and throw a tarp over it.  It's going to be a couple of weeks before I'm going to have the time to start dismantling.  We have a little bit of work to do in the garage before we can pull it in.  Still insulating the garage walls to get rid of the drywall I've been storing in one bay for about six years.  That will also give us room for our 46 Chevy Truck cab that's for a project we are putting on the back burner.