Now I Really Need to Get On the Stick

I spent part of Saturday afternoon working on Glinda. I drove her into the garage guiding her front end up onto the ramps to give me good access to all the front suspension fasteners. Using an eye dropper applicator, I liberally applied the proven 50-50 mix of ATF and acetone to as many threads as I could get to before rolling the car down off the ramps. Then, I dug out all the silicone and hardened original adhesive that filled the channel surrounding the backlight. With all that out of the way it didn’t take too much of an effort to cut through the remaining adhesive with my nifty windshield removal tool. With the glass out of the opening, I was reminded of the filler work I’d had to do a few years back. Back then I hadn’t wanted to remove the glass so I’d carefully brushed off the loose rust, treated the remaining rotten steel, and artistically sculpted bondo to fill in the missing metal. That work was followed by a few coats of primer and paint to hide my handiwork (as pictured to the right). I now get to make the repair correctly – with sheetmetal patches MIG welded into cleaned out holes. Holes that will be carefully cleaned up to remove all rot. All this work is additional to my current plans of trackification, hence the title of this blog. By the way, I love mixing the aviation origin of the phrase with a car blog.

Speaking of trackification, Friday evening I had a very nice conversation with one of the more respected Corvair racers, Dave Edsinger. Dave had me share with him my plans for the car and what I’ve already done. Fortunately, none of the handful of new suspension parts I’ve purchased will have to go back. Furthermore, he gave me a lot of help towards getting Glinda set up to be an awesome streetable track car. Some of the changes he recommended for the front end included getting heavy-duty springs and cutting a coil off, shortening the control arm bushing spacer to increase the stiffness of that joint, and installing the quick-steer arms I’ve got. For the rear, he urged me to buy some 250# stock car springs and ensure the bushings in strut rods, control arms, and stabilizer links are all in good. For both ends, he gave me alignment values he’s found work best and encouraged me to find some good shocks (“even in they’re used”). The new front end bushings should all be her this week, so I may need to make a trip up to the Corvair Ranch Saturday morning to get Jeff’s mechanic to press off the old and press on the new. That means I need to get Glinda’s front end disassembled this week.

Like the title says – it's time to get on the stick.