Catching Up - Glinda

With Heidi out of the garage and back on the road and Victoria’s licensing appointment at Motor Vehicles less than a month away, it’s time to get serious and complete Glinda’s roadification.

In concert with Brianna driving Heidi out of the garage, I had Victoria start up Glinda and give her a short drive around the block before pulling her into garage. V said she still pinged some, so I bought a pint of octane booster and poured it into the full tank of fuel.

Sunday past, before Brianna and Nicholas drove Heidi back to VA, I thought it would be great to get a group photo of the four functioning ‘vairs and their operators. Needing a reasonably large plot for the photo op, I sent Ariel out in Ringo to scout out a good place at the school behind our house. I had to jumpstart Glinda to get Victoria going right behind her. Fairly soon after, Ariel returned to tell me that Glinda had died and wouldn’t restart. I grabbed the jumper cables and rode over in Ringo to meet her. After connecting up the posts, I had Victoria crank the engine while Ariel revved Ringo’s engine – nothing. With Brianna and Nicholas wanting to hit the road, I sadly gave up on having that Kodak moment and waved goodbye to them. Before pulling away Brianna promised me we’d have another opportunity.

With Victoria driving and me holding the tow rope, we took the PT Cruiser back to her car with the intention of dragging the uncooperative vehicle back home. One more try with jumping I decided, and hooked up the cable ends again. This time, I got behind the wheel to turn the key. I discovered the shifter was still in Drive. What an idiot I was not to have made sure Victoria understood that Corvairs with automatics had to be Neutral in order for the starter to engage. I moved the lever, turned the key, and Glinda's engine fired right up idling nicely. I told Victoria to drive her car and put back in the garage. Once there, Victoria shared with me that she ran much better than the earlier in the day. Good.

Finally, last Sunday I was able to carve out some time in the garage, and I spent it welding patches. I got the four in for the right front fender and now there’s only three left. I also took the time to expose more rust – not good. With the twisted-wire brush attachment on my grinder, I attacked the underside of the trunk and the seams between the valance and the front fenders. Both places could use replacing, but I’m going to go the route of POR-15, Tie-Coat Primer, and Bondo and keep my fingers crossed that the repairs last more than a year or so. I also removed the trunk weatherstrip and brushed down that channel – an infamous area for rust to invade. It’s not so bad, but I’m going to have Victoria include that when she lays down the POR-15.

Yesterday evening, I ground down the welds and noted they didn’t turn out too badly. They will still, however, provide nice opportunities for Victoria and I to hone our skills of Bondo application.