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It's been a really great summer for old guys with old cars. Lots of terrific car shows, Goldilocks weather, not too hot, not too cold and now a fall that seems to want to hang on until Christmas. Makes you think that that Sunday afternoon drives with the top down will never end. But of course they will, so it's on to the next project. That would be the well-known winter project. Everyone needs a really good winter project. Baseball will eventually end, football disappears and there you are looking out a frosty window at frozen earth. Don't wait until you're in the clutches of winter before making that list. They always say that having a written list gives you better focus and I am a believer. Besides, seeing something in writing somehow makes it more attainable. The trick is to be very specific when your summer driver becomes your winter project. It's not any help to write "clean interior" on your automotive to do list. You need to be more specific, like "remove and paint seat mounting rails". Of course in order to do this on our bathtubs you must first clean out the interior, remove the seats, take out the mats, and pull-up some of the carpeting. Suddenly the phrase "while you are there" looms into view. For some of us that will mean sneaking the family vacuum in the garage to give the car a quick shot. Out goes the sand from the beach, the fries from Mickey D's, and the leftover sunscreen. For others more hard core that means taping off the entire interior of the car to rattle can the bottom of the dashboard in flat black where nobody can ever see it, nobody but you of course. But what the heck "while you are there" it wasn't that tough. The car was only apart for a month and you weren't using it anyway. Some of the winter projects that I have seen in the past were pretty amazing. One year a good friend, who autocrossed an old Deserter dune buggy with a 356 engine in it, appeared at the first spring event with the same car and same drive train but he had turned it around. The Deserter was converted from a rear engine to a mid-engine layout. I can't imagine what his to do list looked like. My guess is that it probably didn't say "turn engine around in dune buggy". It probably started with something like "pull engine to clean and paint". But once out and on the ground I'm sure that the old "while you're there" rule came into it's own. While you're there you might as well pull out the transmission. After all it could use a good cleaning and it's only the linkage and a couple more bolts and it's out. Once that was out, welding on a couple of different trailing arms must have been a snap. And so it goes, little projects become bigger as you get into them. My advice is to start small and let the projects blow up on their own, because they always do. Something like "pull front wheels – clean inside rims" turns into new steering ball joints, new shocks and three hours polishing the aluminum hubs. Once that's done the rear rims look pretty tacky so off they come and then it's “those trailing arms look pretty dirty maybe I can clean them in place" (no you can't). But "while you are there".... you get the idea. The best thing about small car projects is that as soon as they’re done you can step back and admire your work. You don't need your wife, your kids or even the dog to tell you what a great job you did. You can see it yourself. The other night when it looked like the Sox were going down in flames (they didn't) I went out in the garage to see if there was some little job I could do during the seventh inning stretch. I have a very short attention span when it comes to TV. Old Blue, the '62 Carrera 2 that I am in the process of reassembling, was asleep in the lower garage. The Reutter badge that goes on the right front fender of the Carrera was in a plastic bag lying in a box on the workbench. It called my name as I walked by, just the thing for a quick project. The small screws that hold the badge to the fender are made of brass and look really terrific when polished. So the first task was to take out the screws and introduce them to the wire wheel that is almost a permanent fixture on my drill press. In no time at all they looked great, even the nuts that nobody will ever see looked like brand new. But then the badge itself looked sorta aged (what a surprise, and it's only a 42 year old car). So off to the cleaner cabinet to retrieve a container of chrome polish that would renew some of the original luster. The holes in the fender were cleaned out with an Exacto knife without chipping the paint and the badge went back on as easy as slipping on an old college sweatshirt. When it was on I stepped back to admire my work and I must have stood there for at least a couple of outs because it was the tenth inning before I got back to the game. I went back later to turn off the lights and while the badge looked great, that right front hub looked like it could use a good polishing. Maybe I should put it on my list. KTF |
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