What did you do to your non-G Body project today [2024 edition]
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The 2025 Calendars are HERE. Two different editions, two different sizes, and a digital package!! Starting at $12.97US
Stimulating the oil companies are ya? They'll get theirs out of me come September when we move all our gas guzzlers halfway across the country loaded to the gills.
Y'all just trying to get away from all that mixed precipitation that seems to be attracted to the east coast and new england states this year, Right? Might want to rent that trailer for the trip down, just in case you discover an urgent need to bring along a inflatable boat and a motor to move it. And keep a hairy earball tuned to the state weather channels; never know what might pop up to ruin an otherwise peaceful and quiet day on the interstate.
Nick
Nick
I really need to do this to the van, been meaning to get a scrub brush and just use some dawn to give a good scrub with the same expectations or close. Would make a huge difference on it
With the unseasonably warm weather decided to get the car out and get some pizza, with the excuse of trying the thick crust vs. the normal go to
I can't remember the last time I ever even cleaned my own car, probably 30+yrs. I usually goto the car wash and pay to have it done, but this truck was different. I could tell this truck had been used by a construction guy by all the dirt/gravel/mud/pebbles/grunge/dust and body oils & sweat ground into the carpet, door panels, and seats. but it turned out cleaning what I did wasn't that bad.
tried two different cleaners, Purple Power and Chemical Guys Invinsible All Surface Cleaner, alternating between doors. both seemed to be equal in cleaning ability. about the only difference I observed, subjectively, was that the PP seemed a little more "tacky/sticky" and a little stronger scent of "windex/ammonia" compared to ChemGuys. again, that was subjective and all 4 doors were open the whole time. even then you had to get within a couple inches to smell it as the wind wasn't blowing.
did the drivers side first and pre-soaked it a couple times but that made no difference and the dirt/dust didn't run down when wet. the technique was squirt cleaner, scrub with brush wet with water, then wipe down with paper towels. water ended up being brown. started over on passenger side wiping down with water and scrub first which got me cloudy water. went thru the same squirt and scrub with wet brush then wipe with paper towels. water at the end of it was a lot less brown, but that may have been just the fact that passenger side sees a lot less activity.
been 18 hrs with doors closed since yesterday, let me go and check it right now..... nope, no residual stink build-up by the PP or ChemGuys cleaner.
so, both work but which one is actually "better" for the door panels so it doesn't degrade the surfaces? 🤷♂️
I have been battling a 1950's bathroom. Pink tile and everything. The drain flange had no putty and was leaking. The rubber washer was split open. The tub/shower valves needed to be taken apart and re-built. New seats and washers. New packing. The diverter valve was missing the packing nut, and leaking. The body was bashed where the packing nut screwed in, so even a new nut could not screw on. I had to go to a plumbing parts pirate that charges mega bucks- but he had a new Price Pfister diverter valve assembly on the shelf. The bathroom overhung the foundation, so all the shut offs and the drain was unreachable. I could barely reach the drain with a very long nose pliers just to grab the split washer out. I had to fish the new washer in from above inside the tub. The hot water line had a 1/4 turn ball valve, but the cold was an old screw valve I had to turn with a pliers. Then the packing nut leaked. I had to reach it with a small adjustable wrench to tighten the nut. If you can see it, you can't reach it. If you can reach it, you can't see it. Sometimes I wonder if plumbers locate stuff just to torture future repair guys. I used some Rectorseal Tru-Blu sealer on all threads and washers. I hate leaks, but it may need to come apart later. This stuff has teflon to release easily. Anyway, it was all worth it because my grandson is pleased as punch that he can poop and bath upstairs again. 
Ever found that you needed a tool that just wasn't to be had? Supposed to be a part number and available but when you go searching, Uh-Uh?
For me tools fall into several categories; Store bought, home made from scratch, and those I term, "adapted" from the fact that they were designed and meant to do one thing but at some point were bent, folded, mutilated, cut, added to or had components removed, in order to make them do something else.
In the following case, I happened to need two pairs of vise grips with a specific throat depth in order to clamp and secure a bracket in place so that it could be checked for location and then sent to the welding bench for installation. When I did score a single pair of grips that looked like they would work, on test run, the clamping pads fell just short of being able to land on the bracket. I do/did have several pairs of the very deep throat clamps but for the job in question they would have hung out way beyond where I wanted them to sit and been a nuisance and a hinderance when the time for the welding came along.
So i came up with these.
For what I needed that would both work for the immediate problem and be versatile enough to use in other situations, I decided that a total throat depth of 8 inches between the clamping pads and pivot point where the fixed and movavble jaws came together would give me a shorter clamp that would be less clumsy and ill-mannered yet still possessing the general versatility that a clamp ought to have.
Not going to bore you 🙂 with the sturm und drang needed to drill out and remove the factory rivets. (LOL) The process did cost me a drill bit and I suspect that they were both hardened to some degree as well as been set with a press.
Once the rivets were out I could remove the end fingers that held the clamping pads, measure and lay out for how much of the channels I needed to cut off to get them down to the length I needed, introduce them to Dr. Dremel and a micro cut-off wheel, and then re-assemble the fingers back into position.
My first thought was to go with rivets the same as the factory had done but rethought that option given the amount of grief and work it took to remove the old ones, plus the additional pain if I didn't get the holes drilled exactly correct. So I went with plan X, as I had no real reason to make the fingers removable again for any reason, and introduced them to my MIG welder.
Post burn in, I swapped wheels on my dremel and ground a scalloped shoulder for each welded edge to give them a finished? look. Did all this for two vise grips because, who needs an orphan with out a matched second one? With two you can do things, and you can never have too many pairs of vise grips.
And here they are, set in place. All the reach I needed and desired with a little bit more in reserve for other projects to happen in the future that just might need that little more without needing a whole lot more. The fender is now ready to go to the welding bench this weekend.
Nick
For me tools fall into several categories; Store bought, home made from scratch, and those I term, "adapted" from the fact that they were designed and meant to do one thing but at some point were bent, folded, mutilated, cut, added to or had components removed, in order to make them do something else.
In the following case, I happened to need two pairs of vise grips with a specific throat depth in order to clamp and secure a bracket in place so that it could be checked for location and then sent to the welding bench for installation. When I did score a single pair of grips that looked like they would work, on test run, the clamping pads fell just short of being able to land on the bracket. I do/did have several pairs of the very deep throat clamps but for the job in question they would have hung out way beyond where I wanted them to sit and been a nuisance and a hinderance when the time for the welding came along.
So i came up with these.
For what I needed that would both work for the immediate problem and be versatile enough to use in other situations, I decided that a total throat depth of 8 inches between the clamping pads and pivot point where the fixed and movavble jaws came together would give me a shorter clamp that would be less clumsy and ill-mannered yet still possessing the general versatility that a clamp ought to have.
Not going to bore you 🙂 with the sturm und drang needed to drill out and remove the factory rivets. (LOL) The process did cost me a drill bit and I suspect that they were both hardened to some degree as well as been set with a press.
Once the rivets were out I could remove the end fingers that held the clamping pads, measure and lay out for how much of the channels I needed to cut off to get them down to the length I needed, introduce them to Dr. Dremel and a micro cut-off wheel, and then re-assemble the fingers back into position.
My first thought was to go with rivets the same as the factory had done but rethought that option given the amount of grief and work it took to remove the old ones, plus the additional pain if I didn't get the holes drilled exactly correct. So I went with plan X, as I had no real reason to make the fingers removable again for any reason, and introduced them to my MIG welder.
Post burn in, I swapped wheels on my dremel and ground a scalloped shoulder for each welded edge to give them a finished? look. Did all this for two vise grips because, who needs an orphan with out a matched second one? With two you can do things, and you can never have too many pairs of vise grips.
And here they are, set in place. All the reach I needed and desired with a little bit more in reserve for other projects to happen in the future that just might need that little more without needing a whole lot more. The fender is now ready to go to the welding bench this weekend.
Nick
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The 2025 Calendars are HERE. Two different editions, two different sizes, and a digital package!! Starting at $12.97US
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