Well, now I had my wish... I could walk
outside and there it was,
staring at me, beckoning me, all day,
every day. It was also staring
at my wife; she stared back. Nobody
blinked. Stare Tanya! Stare!
Why am I whining about this? Isn't this
what I wanted?
Well, yeah, except for two things...
Money & Heat.
The Money thing is easy to understand,
I had already made a mockery of my
projected budget.
Jiminy Cricket was a fixture in my ear:
"Hey Brad, didn't you promise to re-do
the kitchen?"
"Yeah, I'll get right on it." was uttered
from beneath my
ever-growing Pinocchio nose.
The second factor, the Heat, well that
just comes with the
territory: Bakersfield summers routinely
hit 105+ degrees.
So, the Ranchero project kinda stalled for awhile...
Around this time Rich convinced me to
nix the 750 Edelbrock
carburetor (which was actually a Weber
carburetor with
an Edlebrock nameplate on it) and get
a Holley. So bye-bye
750 Eldebrock, bye-bye $400, hello
830 Holley Double Pumper
(ensuring many "Hello gas station"
salutations for the future).
We had a few test and tune runs (I won't
say where) and we were
quite pleased with the performance;
anything past half throttle
made the weather-checked rear tires
go up in smoke...
The car didn't accelerate very much
do to the poor traction,
but man, that reving 429 sure sounded
great!
I'll have to get a video of that someday.
Rich did some more wiring, and as the
daily heat index began to rise,
the motivation began to fall. We drank
many beers while standing
around in the heat looking at the car...
standing around looking at it
wasn't getting much done. So, I prompted
myself back into action
by returning to the place where it
all started:
I figured that if I had a few new parts
laying around, I would be
more motivated to wrench on the Ranch.
The bumper
arrived and we got back to work with
a new mantra.
New mantra: If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the sunlight
So Rich and I spent many nights staying out of the sunlight...
We decided to make a project out of
stripping the front end down
to bare metal. At first we tried to
drive a dual action pneumatic sander
with my wimpy little air compressor.
My compressor wouldn't keep up.
So, I borrowed my dad's compressor;
it wouldn't keep up. So, we bought
some air fittings and hooked the compressors
in tandem; my garage
circuit breaker couldn't handle the
load.
It was enough to make a guy want to drink ice cold beer (in the shade).
Later, my neighbor Kenny backed up his
work truck
that had a diesel powered air compressor
mounted on the back:
The aforementioned diesel compressor
had little or no muffler;
so the noise brought my wife Tanya
and son Ross out of the house.
Once they saw how well the sanders
worked with adequate air
pressure, they volunteered their services.
Unfortunately, the diesel
fumes and deafening exhaust clatter,
turned the truck mounted
compressor into yet another non-viable
option.
Not willing to be thwarted that easily,
Rich and I made a trip to
Harbor Freight Tools where we found
some reasonably priced
random orbit sanders. There was no
stopping us now.
With all of the ugly red "paint" removed
from the front end,
the old mounting holes for the simulated
wood grain could clearly
be seen... Great, Bondo and ripples.
Great.
After un-painting the front, we decided
to un-assemble it in
preparation for a little primer:
Next, the fender extensions, headlight
buckets, and hood scoop
insert had a date with the sandblaster:
Heck, we all had a date with the sandblaster...
After the blasting was done, it was time for a little primer...
First, the little pieces:
Then, the big pieces:
Wow, now I have a half primered hot rod... just like a real redneck!
Now it was time to see if I remembered where I put the body bolts...
So far so good... Let's try that EBay bumper now...
Nice... no more painted-over chrome (on front anyway).
If you've been paying attention to the
dates on these pictures,
you probably noticed that the elapsed
time between getting the
car home, sanding, primering, and reassembly
was a dismal
116 days... Woo! I'd better slow down
or those cobwebs might
fall off of my skeleton...
Pretty lame eh?
Well it's nothin' compared to September 2007 through January 2008...
Inexcusable!!!
My beloved hot rod reduced to a catch-all junk heap.
I can only blame it on holiday poverty (financial, mental & emotional).
New Years Resolution:
Finish this car!
(Right after Tanya's new kitchen)
(Which has now been bumped
by new patio project)
(etc...)