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Could it really be October already? I'm still waiting for those hot summer days and it looks like we have been bypassed another year. That's not a bad thing actually since I never really got that heater box adjusted on the Speedster. Driving over to the Museum of Transportation for our annual Concour last month, there was that little breath of warm air on my left foot that whispered, "fix me, fix me". Of course with older cars you get those whispers often. Sometimes too often. But that's the good part if you're a car freak, there's always something to tinker with. I think that the word tinker actually means to fix things that really don't need fixing. I'll give you a recent example. The new brake shoes on the Speedster worked so well at the last autocross that it produced some real G forces under braking. Enough force that it caused the gas gauge sender on the top of the tank to leak. That meant that a new gasket was needed, which meant that my tinkering skills were called into action. For the last few years I have always replaced old cork gaskets with new rubber gaskets of my own design. For a few reasons. Such as, the thing is leaking now and I need to drive the car somewhere tomorrow and the right gasket is five days away by mail-order. Such as, it only takes a few minutes to cut a gasket out with a pair of scissors. Such as, it's easy to put boltholes in with a single hole paper punch. Such as, I've got plenty of material available ever since my wife put in the fishpond with the new pond liner and I got the leftover scraps. With a new gasket at the ready I removed the sending unit to discover that two of the six screws weren't really all that tight. That alone probably would have solved the problem but since I'm already here I might as well continue, besides it will give me a chance to clean up the top of the sending unit. And while I'm there I can put a little steel wool to the wiring to brighten up the color on the electrical leads to the unit. So two hours later I've cleaned the steel wool drawer, cleaned the wiring, resoldered the eyelet on the wire to the gauge, (did I mention that I broke off the eyelet while I was cleaning the wiring?), cleaned the cupboard where I keep the gasket material, cleaned pond dirt off the cupboard doors with Simple Green (while I was there), refilled the Simple Green container, cleaned the top of the sending unit, glued the plastic shield back on the top of the sending unit where the wires connect (it always comes off when you remove the wiring), and installed the newly cut gasket. It looked great when I finished but I probably could have solved the problem by just tightening up two screws. But just look at all the things that I got done that I otherwise wouldn't have gotten touched. That's what I call tinkering. My biggest problem is that I tend to get sidetracked off to other jobs while tinkering. The gas-sending unit was pretty straightforward even if I did wind up tinkering in a couple of unrelated areas. Like cleaning the steel wood drawer, cupboard doors and refilling the Simple Green sprayer. That's an absolute straight shot compared to some of the Harry Homeowner stuff that I tackle. A simple, mow the yard, operation goes something like this: A. Move the car forward to allow the mower to be driven out of the garage B. Move the tool cart away from the mower 1.Put away the five tools on the tool cart from the last job a.Clean the sockets that fell into the oil drain pan before putting in tool drawer b.Clean the Gorilla Glue off the screwdriver that stuck to the sockets 2. Fold up the car towels that got left on the cart after the last car wash C. Fill the mower gas tank with gas 1.Transfer gas from the 5 gal tank to the 2 1/5 gal tank to make filling the mower tank less exciting (overflow smells up the garage) 2. Fill mower tank to 3/4 only as full tank finds overflow (see a. above) D. Find a suitable baseball cap and ear protection E. Fire up the mower and pull out into driveway F. Close garage door to prevent dust and dirt from getting onto cars in garage G. Clear off the yard to allow nonstop mowing once in gear 1. Pick up 150 feet of hose in back yard 2. Scoop up dog deposits and throw into the woods so they don't stick in the tractor tire treads and smell up the garage E. Open the two chain link gates so mower can be driven through in second gear without lifting F. Drive mower into back yard and determine which pattern is to be used that day 1. Crop circle 2.Corn rows 3. Fenway hatch The above process gets me on the tractor, in the grass, blades spinning, and tractor moving. There is a similar process that is followed to finish the task. It doesn't take as long as it sounds but as you can see it is certainly easy to get sidetracked. But for me that's part of the fun. That and the sense of accomplishment when the job is done. Or should I say the jobs are done? Whatever your method of job completion is, just remember to Keep the Faith!! |
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