<VV> Weekend Update

[Norman C. Witte]

This weekend I tackled a bunch of small jobs on the '65 Corsa.

The first order of business was to install courtesy lights.  I ordered a set
of brackets and the wiring harness from Clarks.  This was a very easy
upgrade and looks very nice.  It's as simple as screwing on two brackets and
plugging in the harness in two places.

After that I installed the missing pivot cap for my passenger seat.  About
time.  While I was at it I also tightened the scews on my rattling shifter
base.  Amazing how two little changes can quiet the interior down.

Continuing on the missing parts theme, I put the car up on the stands and
installed the french locks that should have been on my exhaust manifold hold
downs.  After that chore was done, I adjusted my throttle linkage at the
transmission.

>From there, I pulled the carbs with two tasks in mind.  The first was
getting the jets changed out.  Everything I told the list last week was
wrong.  Instead of 49s in the primaries and 53s in the secondaries, the
primaries had 54s and the secondaries had 49s.  I left the 49s in the
secondaries and changed out the 54s for 51s in the primaries.  While I was
at it, I also modified the air horns for the turn cut out tubes, which I
fashioned out of 3/16 brake line.  This project went great, and on a road
test on one of my favorite entrance ramps I can report that I was not able
to make the cutout occur anymore.

While I had the carbs out, I found out why the car is so cold-blooded.  The
tang at the end of the throttle lever that comes in contact with the fast
idle cam was bent down way too far on both carbs, so I essentially had no
fast idle when the motor was cold.  I adjusted this and am happy to report
that the car now will hold an idle when cold.

While the carbs were off I installed a new set of Champion plugs.

The next task after reinstalling the carbs was to try to get the secondaries
to open up fully.  After some adjustment I got them working better, but the
limiting factor seems to be that I cannot make the secondary linkage on the
left side short enough.  Unfortunately, I did not have a die to add threads,
so next weekend when I go to my mom's I will get my dad's tap and die set
and cut some more threads in that rod.  There seems to be enough adjustment
on the right side that once I get the left carb properly adjusted the right
will not be a problem.

After playing with the carbs, I moved on to the brakes.  I pulled the rear
drums, sandblasted them and clear coated them, so that there's no rust
peaking through my wheels anymore.  I had a set of aluminum drums from an
'82 Trans Am that I had already sandblasted and clear coated, and I also put
those on.  They look quite sharp.

Other than that, didn't get a thing done all weekend.

Norm Witte