It's ALWAYS Something

The lovely Loriann and I spent this last weekend sampling the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of Philadelphia. While enjoying dinner Saturday evening at our very favorite Thai restaurant, Loriann’s phone rang. It was Ariel. To make a long story, well just not so long, Lucy’s oil filter blew out as Ariel was pulling into her apartment parking lot. Once she saw the TEMP/PRES light go on, she immediately shut off the car and coasted into the nearest parking spot. She got out, walked around to the back of the car and almost slipped and fell in a big puddle of oil getting bigger by the second. She looked into the engine compartment and found the oil filter coated. She was planning on driving home the next evening, so Loriann and I changed our route home from Philly to swing through Millersville. After getting there, I verified that it was indeed the oil filter leaking badly at the housing interface. I’m wondering if the rubber seal from the previous filter got left in place when I last changed the oil and filter. I’m SO thankful the blow-out happened within feet of her parking lot rather than on the highway on her drive home. TYL!

Guessing that was a sign that I REALLY need to get Ariel’s car on the road, I took yesterday off and worked all day on Ringo. First up was re-rebuilding the transmission (this time with the proper gasket/seal kit). There were no issues other than I discovered I was missing the small spring behind the primer plunger. It must have popped out when I disassembled the trans originally and ended up who-knows-where. As long as Ringo’s current one still had the part, I was okay. After going as far as I could without the spring, I lowered the drivetrain and rolled it out onto the floor. A few minutes later, I had the cover off the old Powerglide and the spring in hand. To satisfy my curiosity, I pulled off the front pump of the malfunctioning PG. Lo and behold, a chunk of something metallic was sitting in the bottom of the cavity. I removed all the other subassemblies I could, but didn’t find what had broken. Back to the rebuilding, I installed the spring, plunger, and front cover and then moved on to rebuilding the valve body with new gaskets. The hardest part of that task was reinstalling the e-clip. Finally, everything was bolted back to the PG including the oil pan. I’d left off the gasket since I wanted to look inside the transmission while engaging the shift cable. Only four bolts held the bad PG to the differential and they came off easily. Rolling the transmission jack away from the drivetrain freed the PG and I replaced the bad with the good. I engaged the shafts as I rolled the rebuilt transmission into place and torqued the four bolts. I rolled the complete drivetrain back under then engine compartment and then up into place. After installing the two bolts and two nuts that secure the powerpack, I hooked up the wires to the alternator and then looked at the clock. Since it was nearing ten and I was dead tired, it was time to quit before I did something stupid.

All that’s left is hooking up the gas line and shifter cable, patching the leaky shift cable with heat shrink, reinstalling the rear axles, and bolting on the trans pan and filling it with ATF. I should be able to drop Ringo off the jackstands early this evening if I leave work at 4.