Alice looks great with her new shoes! The exhaust smoke may clear itself after some new breaking in of the engine. As you said it sat for 30 years so things got used to being where they were. Piston rings, bearings, valve springs, Etc. will all need re-broken in to "forget" the last 30 years. Take it easy on Alice for a while and treat her as a beautiful woman. She is beautiful and you have work hard on her so time to enjoy and work out the bugs.
Drove around the block today and it's like riding on a cloud, smooth and quiet. The rebuilt brakes are doing they're job very well and doesn't pull to the sides. On the negative side it seems like my thermostat housing are either cracked or warped because they are leaking badly. Going to try and flatten out the gasket surface with a sheet of sanding paper on a piece of flat glass and see if that cures the leaking.
Looks like I got the thermostat housings to seal up which is great news. Another plus is that it seems like my charging system is working too, 7,1-7,2 volts at idle should be ok?
Today was the day for inspection and I'm happy to say it went well, now I'll just have to wait for the title and plates to arrive by mail. The left brake light quit working during the inspection but they looked the other way and decided it was no big deal Since the right brake light works, and both rear turn signals I'm thinking there is something wrong in the turn signal switch.
The weather here in Sweden have been great these last days and it seems like it's going to be this way through the upcoming weekend too so I really hope my plates arrive on friday. Meanwhile I did the most simple upholstery job one can do: a blanket over the worn and dirty seat Also covered the primer spots with some light blue spray paint. Once dry I will make the new paint look a bit older and then buff and wax the whole car. Won't be perfect but a closer match then red oxide primer. Plans for the summer other than driving and putting some miles on it is to install either 1 or 2 inch blocks in the rear to level it out and either put a glass pack muffler on it or loose the muffler and go with a straight pipe.
Plates and title arrived today so just had to install the plates and go for a little drive. Beautiful weather this evening and around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, perfect for a pre-friday cruise.
Don't know if it really was required but I've been told some inspectors are grumpy about that so I put them on just to be safe. Will peel them off because I can't really stand looking at them.
Took a little longer drive this evening (about 20 miles) and Alice is running great, oil pressure is good and it's not overheating. Had her up to a blistering 65mph without issues.
You got that car looking and apparently running good. It was alot of work but keep going. Straighten out the little things that will popup and keep moving forward. Good on you for getting it done in Sweden.
Well, sun is shining and car is running great. Then this happened. Don't no if I got a bad quality tube or if I messed up when installing it. The tires are for tubeless use but I decided to go with tubes since I don't really trust those rivets that holds the wheel together to be air tight but I might have to reconsider now.
Good news is that my expensive Firestone tire survived and it seems to be holding air pressure without a tube. Now I just need to remove the tubes from the other 3 wheels.
Did you find the failure point on the tube? Sometimes the tire likes to spin on the rim and it puts pressure on the valve stem, causing a crack or break in the stem. I've had good luck running tubeless tires on those type of wheels. For extra peace of mind, you can smear some bead sealer around the rivet holes to keep air from seeping through.
Yes, I found a small tear in the tube. Not by the valve stem or the tube seam, maybe I managed to get some dirt in there while mounting them or maybe it got wrinkled somehow. I removed the tubes from the rest of the wheels today and they all seem to be holding air.
A good heavy coat of brush on primer like RustOleum or the likes will help prevent small air seepage. Do this before you remount the tires and you can add color like semi flat black but not really necessary. just an extra ounce of prevention and rust preventative.
I decided to do nothing at the moment but they did get a few coats of paint when I refurbished them the first time a couple of months ago.
Tires still holding air so I went on with other things. As you can see the rear bumper shined up pretty good, I did the rest of the bumper after the picture was taken and the RH corner was sadly really bad as far as chrome goes. Guess that's why it was covered with some sort of silver paint. Also did a test spot on the paint, just gotta do the rest of the car now.
And now the whole car has gotten a very quick buff and polish. Looks alot better IMO. Before and after pics.
That cleaned up nice. Now all you have to do is find the missing trim piece, which shouldn't be too hard.
First test drive without tubes went great. For some reason I think it rides nicer without tubes. And a couple of pictures of the lightly buffed paint in natural lighting. Looks a lot less neglected now, can't wait 'til I get some lowering blocks for the rear to level it out a bit.
@Mikko_ the car is looking great and those bumpers and grille. Man they really cleaned up good as compared to what they were. A lot of work but it is rewarding.
Looks like it's cleaning up nice! Have you tried anything on the surface rust on the front fenders and hood? I'd bet a good going-over with a very wet steel wool soap pad would take a lot of that off, then you could re-buff/wax it and I'd bet it would match better. Your touched-up paint spot isn't as noticeable now that it's buffed, too.
The Jalopy Journal
