DRIVE

just got home and unloaded the truck, which contained:

…a good haul. In other news, the atlima may have kicked the bucket for good. It will start, drive about a thousand feet, and then die with a horrible coughing wheeze. I’m going to check the belt tension just to be sure & replace it if it’s bad, but the error codes all relate to the EGR system. I already tried removing the EGR valve & cleaning it (no improvement); then blocking off the valve & vacuum line (no improvement). A new valve is $250; which combined with the radius arm mount (another $250).

meanwhile the truck is running nicely although i need to remember to finish screwing in the ignition module and since the swap the speedometer kind of bounces. also since everything else is running beautifully, the smoke coming from the leaky valve cover is getting on my nerves. gonna swap out the gasket and replace all the bolts at the same time, hopefully this week (but probly not).

msd cap numer was 0408

got the truck running better than ever. problems were with the choke, and with an improperly set advance.

how apropos for today.

Installed MSD cap with NAPA rotor (shhh!), MSD 6A and MSD “High Vibration” coil- which I chose over the more common “blaster” because:

• it’s the “offroad” choice and if I ever want to sell the thing or drive it over a mountain/ pile of other cars/ through the Thunderdome it will come in handy;
• it can be mounted in any position (there’s a “your mom” joke in there somewhere); which means I can use the stock Ford bracket and existing cable; and most importantly;
• it is shiny

…the most gratifying part of the whole process was getting to hack about 10 feet of wire out of the engine bay. and not replace it. it’s just gone forever. beautiful. in theory all i have to do to get to 99% is drop a new carb in. torn between two holleys and an edelbrock. the stupid internet is filling my head with conflicting advice, and i don’t trust the guy at the motor shop, who wants me to build a racecar engine when what i really need is performance in the low rpm range. holleys are supposed to be the hands-down favorite, and unless i’m taking the truck rock-climbing, the street avenger is supposed to be the best possible choice- but i spent all summer tuning my current holley 4bbl carb; read hundreds of pages about it (including a book with the scintillating title, “How to Build & Power Tune Holley Carburetors,”); and it’s still running like crap- albeit with different crappy problems than it had in June.

…over at FTE, the owner of monster truck Thunder Beast is recounting the vehicle’s history along w/ all kinds of stories from the road.

1) hey theatre geeks, where’s the super-secret place to get a huge discount on a lighting controller? is it just ebay? only need a basic 8 channel. also need some gels and probly drapes.

2) bought an MSD 6A tonight for the truck. from a cop in a cop car. we met in a best buy parking lot. he had a buddy riding along. talked a bit about hotrodding, and a bit about nyc. nice guys, thought there was a brief awkward “i’m not a racist, but…” moment, from the buddy. he drives a 66 Mstang, other dude has a Chevy Bscayne. they gave me a bunch of great tips on local resources and finding events; a JEGS catalog (i check the website all the time, but it’s nice to have the physical reference). both were gearing up for Cruisin’ the Coast, which looks amazing and I hope I can do it next year.

    2a) in case you’re wondering, the MSD 6A is an ignition module. it helps decide when the spark plugs fire and how big the spark is that goes through it (also in this case, how many sparks). it was advertised as a 6AL, but the only difference is that the 6AL has a built-in rev limiter. fortunately, i have only a vague idea what a rev limiter is and no idea why i would want one. it looks like this: