Part One

Work Begins
Originally uploaded by The Put-Man.

It's late Saturday evening, and it's been a cold, dreary, wet August day. Awful fro driving convertibles, great for wrenching on them.

I'm loosening a complicated bit of something I can't quite see, and it's jabbing me painfully in the wrist, and suddenly a bit of it flings off with slight metallic pings as it bounces throughout the engine compartment. It immediately goes through my brain that it's a clip on the accelerator linkage, a part painfully difficult to locate, practically on back-order since the car was made - as it's machined from unobtainium by a blind craftsman in the old country whose family holds the exclusive rights to that particular design of clip which no other automotive manufacturer has ever had the madness to use.

My EYEBALL would be easier to replace...Hmmm...where ARE the safety goggles...?

Nevertheless, I get the linkage disconnected, and actually figure out how to remove the entire carburetor. (By the way, at least one of the four retaining nuts CLEARLY cannot be removed without disassembling the entire engine) To the horror of women everywhere, I take the carburetor, walk inside, and sit at the dining room table.

I spread out newspaper, and paying VERY CLOSE ATTENTION, I slowly disassemble the complicated bit of machinery. Unlike the last time I did this (circa 1987), I now have to wear glasses. The bit of paper with the exploded mechanical view is sometimes more clearly understood when viewed upside down, yet this does not seem to instill confidence in my audience. Once down into the guts, and after I've spilled a bit of gasoline onto my rag, the carb is split in two halves, and the brass jets are exposed. These need to be swapped with other jets, kindly sent to me by the same parts guy who copied the instructions for me. He'd a assured me the swap was "no big deal", yet now the car was dysfunctional, with it's vital bits disassembled into a thousand parts on the dining room table. It reminds me of a scene from an old 80's movie where the mechanic gleefully exclaims "I always wanted an excuse to buy me a METRIC set of tools!".

However, the little brass jets unscrew just fine, and the replacements are marked clearly, even if it does take a jeweler's eyepiece to see the markings.

I get the whole thing back together, and the method to my madness pays off. As I took the thing apart, I carefully laid out the bits one-by-one - taking up a good bit of the real estate on the table. Re-assembly is then just the opposite, and I have a map to follow. I also now know which two screws are the main adjustments.

This is a BIG development.

An hour later it's back in the car, all assembled. It's 11pm. Do I wait for daylight to fire it up and check?

Hell No!

I hand the fire extinguisher to my startled assistant who clearly now has more reservations than she did a short moment ago. I dash around with excitement, clearing tools, prepping like a mad crew chief in an island revetment who's ready to yell "CONTACT" and pull the prop of his newly repaired fighter plane.

Insert key...

Pull choke...

Tap gas pedal twice...

Turn key...

(To Be Continued....)