Thwarted at Every Turn

Yesterday was a downer. It started with a phone call from Ariel informing me that her blankety-blank car was sitting on the shoulder of the beltway with a busted fanbelt and that Victoria was on her way to take her to her job. This is Ringo’s second belt failure since he’s been back on the road, so there’s definitely an issue I need to address as soon as possible. I’m thinking I installed the harmonic balancer too close to the engine so there’s a misalignment between that pulley groove and the grooves of the alternator and idler.

Since all the other licensed drivers in the family were unavailable, just installing a new belt and driving him home was not an option, so, after dinner, I loaded the trusty tow-mobile with all the accoutrements needed for Ringo’s homeward haul, and Mikhaila and I hit the road. It didn’t take too long to attach him to the Suburban, hook-up the towing lights and safety chain, and soon after we were parked in front of our house. The whole adventure took less than an hour. I put on a new Clark’s belt (AGAIN), but didn’t tighten the idler as much as it had been previously. Hopefully, Ariel is able to make it to the weekend without being stranded again.

Since I was in my grungies and the garage was open, I went to work on Luna trying to undue what I’d done last Saturday. I hadn’t had much time over the weekend for Corvair work, but I did eke out an hour Saturday morning before anyone had gotten out of bed to try and finish installing the repaired blinker switch assembly. Before quitting for the day, I’d got to the point of discovering I’d left out the spring that’s supposed to go under the steering wheel I’d just bolted down.

Back to last night. I removed the nut holding the steering wheel to the splined shaft and tried to pull the wheel off – no go. I went to the shelf and pulled down my hub puller kit, but none of the myriad of included bolts were small enough to screw into the small threaded holes in the wheel’s hub. I was able to find a couple screws in my soup-can of discarded fasteners, but neither were long enough for the puller. So, it was DEFINITELY time to quit for the day. A trip to the hardware store will be needed before my next visit to the garage.