More Home Improvement, and Busy, Busy, Busy

FOURTH time I've  written this post. MY Muse has apparently vacated the premises, leaving me too busy doing other things to keep both my readers in the loop!

Anyway....got the house pressure washed and painted, and they did a very nice job. No runs, spills, drips, and they were a great bunch to work with.

 New Paint.

 

And we have a new resident here, courtesy of my son feeding bills to the guy at the Larimer County Fair "Win A Goldfish!" booth until grandson #1 "won" a fish.

Meet "Pickles" the fish....

 

First time I ever tried taking an aquarium photo. Pickles can really scoot if she wants to. So now our Little Ones have a new thing to watch and learn about. Since they've been mastering the Electrical Board so well, we're going to start on Magnetism next, and then on to Electromagnetism, which should be a hoot. Tesla Coil or Jacob's Ladder, anyone? I've got this little power supply that came from a YUGE plasma-ball kind of thing, and.....

And the reason the inside of the Supra looks like this:

 

Is because all this stuff went to media blasting and powder coating today:

By the time I added up the cost of the paint (and the TIME) required to paint these,  I decided to just have the whole lot, and a few other pieces, powder coated. This is EVERYTHING under the dash, and the glass retainers for the rear quarter glass, along with the pedal assemblies. All the bushings in the pedals were worn out, and the ones in the clutch pedal assembly came out in chunks. Makes getting a proper clutch adjustment very difficult if there's all kinds of slop in the mechanism. I stamped ID numbers in them as I pulled them out of the car, and clouds of fine rust particles rose up every single time I hit the marking stamp with the hammer.

I spent yesterday scrubbing out all nine molded air ducts for the HVAC system, and the water looked like mud after each one was scrubbed. I'm waiting for the correct size foam tape to finish these up. This is a 'before cleaning' shot.

 I did that because all three sections of the HVAC unit (Blower motor and fan, the evaporator core box, and the heater core box) were contaminated with oily, sticky dust. The heater core box was cleaned first, as it was just very dusty, with some junk inside. When I got to the evaporator core box, I was stunned. 

This is the side facing the heater box:

 Not too bad, right?

Wait'll you see the backside of it.....

 

 

 The core was about 3/4 blocked with dirt, leaves, trash, and oil. Where'd the oil come from? It's compressor oil that's mixed in the refrigerant to lubricate the A/C compressor. And since this area was soaked with it, I'd say I finally found the Freon leak in the system.

And then I found this in the upper cowl area, where the air enters the HVAC system through the blower motor.

Rodent nest? Not sure, as there was ZERO odor, and it easily came out.

So I've been pretty busy, and yes, this turned into a whole lot more work than just replacing the heater core.
 

Post Coming Soon.....Please Stand By.....

 

With apologies to The Control Voice....

Yup.....got The Busies the last few weeks. Lots of stuff happening this week, including my Nuclear Stress Test at the UCHealth Harmony Campus. I tend to ask a lot of questions about things, and considering I was a Components Engineer for the "Gamma Cameras" and "Radioisotope Immuno Assay" product lines for about nine months back in the late 1980's, I always surprise the staff doing the procedures.

 Anywhoo.....Y'all be safe and vigilant out there! 

Home Improvement

 Our basement Egress Window has been jammed solid since we bought this house almost eight years ago. I tried vacuuming and blowing out all the junk that had built up in the tracks, lubricating the release handle, Applications of Force ranging from a few gentle taps, to OMG....YOU'RE GONNA BUST THE GLASS! , and the window just wouldn't budge.

Plus the 4x4 timbers used to frame the window well on the outside were decaying and shifting. A couple were rotted enough that I was getting worried we'd have a cave-in, so we put it out for bid, and wound up with this.

 New double pane Pella window, and a completely new window well. The window guys did their thing while the other guys dug out and replaced to old, rotted wood.

And with the new window open, there's a very nice breeze that airs out the basement.

 And with the dashpad out of the Supra, I can do a deep clean on it, sand down the mountain ranges formed by the cracks, and trim, fit, and attach the new dash cap.

 And I even had some help doing it from my Racing Team.

 

 NWS has been forecasting 60~70% chance of precip the last few days, but all we've received are some thin groupings of big rain drops that don't even wet the ground. They're getting clobbered East of here as usual, but nothing here.

Enjoy the upcoming weekend, stay in Condition Yellow, and keeps those heads a swivelin'!

WOO-HOO! I Got The Dashpad Out!

 GROAN....whatta PITA! 

After removing all the screws, including the ones you can barely find, let alone see, I managed to get the dashpad out.

Yes, that's RUST. Toyota applied NO protective dip, coating, or paint on the steel parts behind the dash, and they start returning to their native state after a few years.  Now I don't need to pull all these rusty bits to swap out the heater core, but they're coming out and getting sandblasted. I'll ask my guy at the powder coating place how much extra it will cost to have them powder coated vs my buying numerous cans of paint at $20 a pop. I'm guessing I'll just get them coated, as that way they're ready to go back in the car as soon as I get them home, versus taking a week or more to get them primed, cured, painted, and the paint cured.

SLW was worried I'd get Tetanus working in there until I reminded her that I had a TDAP shot six months ago.

Since the instrument cluster is out, I'm going to put new lamps in it, remove the plastic cover for polishing, and clean 40 years of dust (and two dead bugs!) out of it.

 

 

I've wanted/needed to do all this work since I bought the car 12 years ago, and it's finally coming to fruition. 

The Legacy of the American Racing Equipment "Torq-Thrust" Wheel

 

Americans were always my favorite "mag" wheel. I had them on my little Ford Capri, both of my Corvettes, my El Camino, my race cars, and both of my Trans Ams. Clean, functional, and lighter than steel wheels. They weren't as popular as Cragar S/S "mags", but seeing as I never cared much for chrome, they were right up my alley.

The Hagerty Driver's Club just posted an article here, so if you're into old mag wheels, give it a read. 

And The Skies Were Opened.....

 Yowie....started raining about 45 minutes ago, and we've already received over ..4", and the rainfall rate just went up to 2"/hr as another cell moved over us.

Flash flood warnings are out for the burn scar areas, with some of them getting over an inch of rain in an hour, with more to come tonight, and through the rest of the week. 

The heat broke, going from 94* down to 67* in about an hour. So nice to have a rain like this. "Whiskey's for Drinkin', and Water's for Fightin'", and we thank the Good Lord for this rain. 

 

What's Up, More Paint, and Rain.....

 Another two weeks of Summer have passed. Got a decent amount of rain a few days ago, a full quarter-inch, and we got another tenth last night. Been high 90's here, but cooling off nicely at night.

Got a whole buncha parts cleaned and painted, and commenced work on the wiring harness. 

These are the headlight buckets with a their first couple of coats of "Super White II" on them.

 And the wiring harness, unwrapped and being cleaned and repaired in a few spots. Cracked wires, stiff wires, missing insulation, and things like that.

 This section of the engine bay is almost finished. I still have to scuff sand it and spray on the Super White II top coat, and then paint the bits that are supposed to be black.

 And I bought a new tool. It's a "Ratcheting Rivet Nut Setter", and is exactly what I need to put threaded inserts into frame rails and things.

 I'll be putting two 8mm inserts into the right frame rail so I can bolt my remote oil filter to the frame. The oil filter on these engines is located on the side of the block, angled UP. Which means as soon as you loosen the filter, a quart of dirty oil cascades down the side of the block, making a big mess.

And been doing yard work, chasing grandkids around, "Fixin' Things", and waiting a couple of weeks to get to see our Doctor again. She left the previous office (Yeah, THOSE guys) she was at, and has now joined UCHealth, which is the heavy-hitter out here, and whom our first provider with this Doctor was with. SLW saw her earlier this week, and she was able to get me an appointment much sooner than I expected. 

Enjoy the weekend, and always be alert! 

Happy Independence Day!

 

PAINT!

 Got a bee in my bonnet and shot some paint yesterday.

 Two medium coats of Eastwood :Safety White" Rust Encapsulator, and I'm happy it's a very good match to the OEM paint. I still have to top coat it with Toyota paint code 040, "Super White II", but it looks WAY better than it did.

 And the left front corner of the engine bay where the battery lives is finally rust-free!

 

Lazy Day.......

 Low 90's today, cloudy and breezy, and we'll probably get an afternoon shower because it's that time of year here.

Yes, The Fisher is still on the bench, but I've narrowed it down (again....!) to a voltage that is missing. Might be a broken trace on the circuit board, might be a bad solder joint (unlikely but possible), or a solder "splash" that's shorting something out. 

Found a local place that's great for getting odd bits sandblasted at a reasonable price and almost instant turn-around, so I've got a few more things to take to them.

These are the rusty suspension mount brackets, tow hook, and the headlight buckets back from blasting. The plastic sheeting is the weather seal that attaches to the inside of the door frame, under the upholstery, and keep water out of the car. 

 Before:

After: 

Quite a difference.

And this is after two coats of Eastwood's Rust Encapsulator. It's a heavy-duty primer loaded with zinc that's very effective at preventing future rust.

 

Today will be an "Under The Car Day" as I have to get the exhaust down-pipe loose from the exhaust manifold, pull the clutch slave cylinder and flex hose, and pull the fuel hose so I can get a new one fabricated. Then I have to get inside the car to get the hardware loose from the brake booster and clutch master cylinder so I can pull them out and fix the rust behinds them from when the clutch cylinder failed and dumped brake fluid everywhere, which did a number on the painted firewall.

 Annnnnd.....In the "Bubba Strikes Again" files, I found this loose ground lead wrapped around the fuel line from the tank.

 There are two of these ground leads; This one that is supposed to go under one of the starter mounting bolts, and another one from the cylinder head to the firewall. It's bad enough that the "mechanic" didn't put it where it should go, but then he wrapped it around a handy bracket so nobody would see the wire dangling under the car.

Oh, well......

So enjoy your weekend, have a Blessed Sunday, keep those heads swiveling and stay vigilant. 

 

We Hit 'Em.......Now What Happens?

 Breaking story from Newsmax.....