Okay, epic pic time...
Do you know what this means? This means I am VERY close to being on the road today!!! I got the e-brake working, and took it for a spin around the block. I couldn't stop very fast, but it was well worth it anyway!!! That was the first time I have been behind the wheel in almost 2 years... let me tell you, it felt good. (I should mention, the guy who was supposed to get the calipers mounted and ready for me, who I paid a large sum of money to do this, messed up. The calipers were mounted on the forward part of the rotor instead of back, and one bolt was seized. The e-brake bracket that was supposed to have .6" holes drilled, instead had 3/4" holes. We had to weld in washers and re-drill and grind them to fit. I ended up having to re-do most of his work. *facepalm*)
After my victory run (Which was also just a test to see how well the e-brake worked) I decided to try my hand at carburetor tuning. I busted out my new Unisyn, and got to work on the idle air adjustment... whoa. One had the red slide on the bottom of the gauge, and the other was at the top. WAY off. Fixed that, but then it wouldn't idle, and kept stalling, so I set my tuning screw to 2-3k RPM and tried to adjust my high idle air adjustment... Also way off. After soaking one of the dogbones in PB blaster to loosen it, I got that evened out. Now comes the hard part: setting the mixture. I had to read the description 3-4 times before it started to make sense, and then I got to work. It was at this point that I discovered one carb was adjusted almost ALL the way lean, while the other was adjusted almost completely rich!!! No wonder it ran like shit! I tried to adjust it from there, but I decided it was way to far off to bother, and so I turned the screw all the way rich on both, and then leaned them both out an equal number of turns to start as my baseline. I started the car, and immediately it ran 100% better. I am confidant my amateur tuning is far from perfect, but I tried to dial them in a bit from there, and while it isn't perfect, I know it is better. I have no clue how it even ran before, and it ran surprisingly well considering. I drove it with it tuned like that for two years. Let me tell you though, this is better. Miles better. It purrs like a kitten at idle, and accelerates smoothly. The linkage is a bit loose from wear, so it won't hold a perfect tune (The idle varies about 200 RPM after revving. Usually between 800-1000 RPM, but smoothly at whatever RPM it picks, lol) but at least it idles now. Before, it was a crap shoot as to whether or not it would hold an idle, and even when it did, it was rough. People used to ask me if it was cammed, lol!
In any case, this deserves a video... unfortunately, in all my excitement, I forgot to shoot one. I will try to get one for you guys next week, and in it I will show off the new doorpanels, the working security system, the brakes, everything. Stay tuned!!!
