Too Close for Comfort

Last weekend Ariel's dad and her two younger sisters did a horrific thing. They dismantled and cut up a '64 4-door cousin of mine. Here's a picture of Victoria cutting off the roof. Here's a link to an online photo album documenting the savagery. Their justification is that the car didn't have any suspension (Tom had removed it to rebuild and put under his Corvair), had rust issues in the floors, front and rear valances, and elsewhere, and its drivetrain is powering Heidi (Ariel's older sister's Corvair). Add to that 4-doors aren't that desirable, so cutting it up and transporting the pieces to the Corvair Ranch for others to use on their Corvairs somehow made it all right in their minds. I'm not convinced.

Blinker Bad? Tighten the Socket

Over dinner, Ariel shared with the family that my right front blinker wasn't blinking. She claimed she was sitting behind a car in traffic signaling to turn right, and there was no blinking reflection off the car ahead of her (her dad was very impressed she'd pay attention to this). Tom verified the issue and in a few minutes had it fixed. He first verified that the bulb was good. Then he pulled the metal socket out of the plastic housing, bent the contacts a bit, reinstalled everything, and lo-and-behold I can blink on both sides again.

No CO / Flipping a Fanbelt

The new exhaust gaskets showed up in the mail Friday, so that night Tom installed them. Before reinstalling the bottom engine shrouds, he started me up to check for leaks. Feeling no blowing air from places that shouldn’t, he put me all back together. Ariel drove me around Saturday and never got a reading above zero on the CO detector. One of the first things she told her dad upon arriving back home was, "Dad, I was stopped at a stop light, and I couldn't hear my car." Guess I won't be setting off any more car alarms :-(

With that problem solved, I decided I needed to bother them one more time. As Ariel was entering traffic on the interstate, I flipped my fanbelt off causing the GEN/PRES light to illuminate on the dash. Ariel immediately pulled on to the shoulder and shut off my engine. She called Tom and he drove out and installed my spare fanbelt with Ariel holding the work light for him. Neither of them were happy with me. Oh well, an old car’s gotta’ have its moments.

Scary Carbon-Monoxide

One of the many unusual things about Corvairs is our method of keeping their passengers warm on cold days. Since we’re air-cooled, there’s no hot liquid available to run through a heater core like most other cars. GM designers copied VW’s method of circulating air (the same air that’s cooling the engine) over the hot heads and cylinders and then plumbing it into the passenger compartment. With an engine that has all its passages sealed properly, this is a safe condition. However, on a cold day when an exhaust gasket (packing) fails, the heater becomes the deadly deliverer of carbon monoxide to the passenger.

This happened to me last week. Ariel and her sister noticed a new, unpleasant smell in the car. They said it smelled like exhaust. Ariel’s dad took a look at my exhaust system and didn’t see or hear anything amiss. Remember that I have a very loud dual exhaust system, so trying to listen to something different is not very effective.

Regardless, he put a CO detector in the car, and the next day on their drive home from school the alarm went off. Ariel called her dad, and asked what to do. He told them to turn OFF the heater and roll the windows down and open the floor vents. That night he replaced my loud exhaust system with the much quieter stock one, and lo and behold he heard an exhaust leak inside my engine. After removing the sheetmetal shroud that covers the driver’s side exhaust, he felt a significant leak at the exhaust manifold to head junction.

I’m now off the road until new packings from the Corvair Ranch show up in the mail.

SCARY, VERY SCARY!

Stopping That &*^%$* Leak

Last weekend, Ariel and her dad went leak hunting at my rear window. They found that the water is coming at the top-middle somewhere. Ariel ended up removing the trim sticks that hold the headliner in place around the window. With everything dried out, Tom applied more butyl rubber and they crossed their fingers.

A couple of evenings ago, Tom went to move me out of the driveway, and my starter would not respond when he turned the key. Nothing, not even a click. He tried the hotwire in the engine compartment and only got spark at the battery terminal. The next morning, after a few more hotwire attempts the starter finally responded and I fired right up. Dirty battery terminal perhaps. They’ll get cleaned, I’m sure.

Yesterday, Tom reinstalled the trim sticks and also cleaned the battery terminals to, hopefully, prevent any more starting issues. He also removed my driver’s door panel. His plan was to add a speed-nut so he could install the second screw that holds my armrest in place. With the panel off, he discovered that the waterproof paper that protects the panel from rainwater is missing. Put that on the Clark’s Corvair Parts list. He put the door parts back on without the panel so I’m functional. He also adjusted the latch-plate (AGAIN) to help with my latching problem.