Tuesday was important to understand what was going on with my front suspension and the rubbing of the inside of the wheels from the upper control arms (A-Arms). Larry came over and we talked about what was happening while the car was on the lift and looking at everything. Read the manual a few times, measured everything (camber & Toe) and recognized it was all in spec with the exception that I lowered the car by using 8 inch springs. Realizing the Bruce had the same issue and bent the ends of the upper control arms and others had added spacers to allow for the clearance of a lowered suspension, I decided on made a few small bends and grinding the metal to shape.
Larry jumped right in and "formed" the new shape of the upper control arms. After our road test and back on the lift to see if the rubbing stopped (it did) I went back with a file and made everything smooth and painted the bare metal black (The devil is in the details).
I was having high temp readings on the temp gauge and couldn't figure out why as the engine was running at the right temp (168 degrees F) as confirmed by the heat sensor I had. Communicated with Ray at RD and said it could be a bad probe, bad voltage stabilizer or bad ground. Bad ground......that is typical for these cars. Crawled under the dash (which is getting VERY difficult now that the seats are in) and traced the ground wire to the voltage stabilizer and tested. Yup, it wasn't getting ground. Made a new wire, installed it and the temp and fuel gauge are now both running accurately.
The right side door was giving me problems as I could open from the inside and not the outside. Realized the lock was installed upside down, so Larry worked on the door and I finished installing the trim on the left door (I had to take apart everything I did the night before and put washers behind the internal door opener so it was proud of the door panel to install the black plastic trim piece. By the time I got done Larry was almost finished and he called it a day.
I then installed the right door trim (I'm smarter now).
My daily RD Enterprises box arrived with the three flashers I had ordered from Ray. Looked at them all, followed the wiring diagram and decided I would replace the Lucas flasher first. Yup, that was the culprit, flashers work perfectly now.
I had been waiting for the car to be close to done to Loctite the interior bolts that hold the axles to the upright. Removed four from each side and put blue Loctite on them then re-threaded.
Buttoned up all the wiring in the front bonnet area and removed the air horns as they were in the way of the spare tire (yes I always carry one of those). Will reinstall the air horns at a later date. Got all the wiring harness hangers installed and zip tied the wiring together. Put the jack in and a jack plate (wooden plate for protecting the fiberglass when jacking). Installed the front wire screen in the body opening and bolted in the bonnet.
It was 10:00pm at night. Good time for a road test! Told my wife I was leaving, grabbed my cell phone and took off in the dark. 30 miles later I was back on my garage, car up on the lift looking for any signs of leaks of rubbing. All good.
Once the car was back on the ground I tightened all the bolts for the suspension. Now that the car is lowered, getting underneath was a chore but there is nothing like laying on the concrete floor with a wrench in your hand to show the love you have for your project.
It was midnight. I had a beer to celebrate, took a shower and went to bed.
LOG39 here we come.
