Catching Up - Lucy

Only one more Corvair in the fleet that needs mentioning. My daily-driver Lucy, since returning from VA, has been running wonderfully. There were a few issues that I took care and one that I’ve yet to address. The latter is dealing with the constant oil leak – hence the picture for this post. The leak is rather annoying both from the point of leaving a mess on the ground and the engine smoking with dripping on exhaust manifold. I’m pretty sure that replacing the top cover gaskets will fix problem.

The issues I did deal with last Wednesday evening were electrical in nature. First, the left rear taillight had lost its connection to ground so I pulled the housing out, cleaned the ground wire and socket body, applied some bulb grease, and taped the two together. A couple tie-wraps to secure the tape and reinstallation of the housing and lens and the blinking bulb was bright again. Second, the turn signal switch under the dash was malfunctioning. After removing the switch, I opened it up and cleaned the contacts. More bulb grease and reassembly made the switch ready for installation. Before screwing it back into place, I attached and adjusted the tiny rod that actuates the switch – the one that emanates at the base of the stalk and runs down the steering column. While adjusting I discovered that the right front blinker light was not blinking. Another bad ground. To fix this, I slight bent the tangs on the socket’s ground clip and reinserted the socket into the hole in the car body. With the adjustment complete, the switch back in place and the two tiny screws reinstalled I can now warn the cars around me when I’m going to change lanes and turn. Given all the times I do both of those during my hectic commute, it’s a good thing that these problems were fixed.