A Lot and a Little

There’s been a lot going on fleet-wise, but only a little to show for it. The “lot” that’s been going on includes a couple of just-say-no’s, a that’s-so-awesome, and one thank-you-very-much that’s led to quite a bit of shopping and dreaming.



The first just-say-no was my passing on the V8 ‘vair. While the seller is offering an exciting beast of a Corvair for a VERY fair forty-nine hundred dollars, the situation just isn’t right for me to pull the trigger. Even though replacing the built 302 Chevy smallblock that currently resides in its back seat for something tamer would net me a couple grand and selling Glinda should get me a couple more, there’s just too much time and money that would be tied up in the deal – there’s that two parts of that dreaded TTT again. This car, by the way, is still available. In addition to the JPEG, you can click here to see a bunch of photos that were taken a couple years back by the car's builder before Earl (the seller) purchased the car and did a lot of finishing work. Earl can be reached at 410-705-8823 or earlbirdman@yahoo.com.

I still struggle with all the time and money I’m putting into Glinda, a car that I’ll always have to be doing rust repair on. It would be such a time-saver to have a solid, rust-free LM coupe as my track car/street car. That brings me to my second just-say-no. I was using the SearchTempest website to torment myself this morning and came across a listing for a 65 corvair 140 prodject(sic) with no price. Not one to ever pass on a misspelled Corvair ad, I clicked on the link and was rewarded with a number of photos of a very solid-looking primer gray coupe with its rear-end sitting high in its drivetrain-less-ness.

I shot the seller an e-mail asking about the condition and what he (or she) was asking for this prospective replacement to the rusty Glinda. I received a reply rather quickly telling me the car’s as solid as the jpegs show. The seller told me to, “Give offer if u want to come see it.” The response is still in my inbox, but even if I could get the car for a few hundred dollars (seller says, “need to get this car gone”), and even though I could easily borrow a trailer and make the roundtrip to Youngstown, OH for about $150, and even though this car’s already got all the manual shift and clutch parts in place, and even though I’ve though I’ve got a tranny and diff that’ll bolt right in, I don’t have a running engine. Because of that I haven’t really given it much more thought (yeah, right). Here are the photos that were in the ad.



The that’s-so-awesome occurred last evening when I received a photo-text from the guy that bought Rich’s Corsa. He’s in the final stages of reassembling the car after its new paintjob is finally finished. It is one really cool car now. It’s wonderful to see that he’s gotten so excited about it, and I really appreciate the frequent updates he sends me.

That brings me to my thank-you-very-much. The other day I got a phone call from my folks. My generous dad started the conversation by telling me he’d just sent a donation to the Tom Hughes Racing Fund (I’m calling it THRaF). He’d been reading between the lines of one of my Facebook postings, and decided I needed a fund and he needed to be the first contributor. Since finding his $500 check in my mail a couple days later, I’ve made a list of luxuries I’m going to get with the fund:
- Flamethrower Coil - Mufflers - Shifter Boot - Bucket Seats - Throttle Linkage Kit - Tunnel Pivot

Lucy’s For Sale…Again

I was perusing Craigslist today using SearchTempest, and discovered a listing for one of the ex-fleet cars. Lucy is available for $2600 in Woodstock, VA.

Doesn't sound like the sellers have done anything to her since they bought her from me.

The Entire Fleet Is Grounded Until Further Notice

For the first time since November 27, 2005 no member of my family is relying upon a Corvair for transportation. Let me repeat that. The run of over eight years where I HAD to have at least one Corvair roadworthy has come to an end. See the Car Status sidebar.

About a month ago, I told Ariel that Ringo was not roadworthy anymore. She was granted temporary usage of the truck, while I pressed Glinda back into daily-driver duty. Two weeks later Ariel bought a Honda CR-V. Her life has already dramatically changed – no more “creepy, old guys” approaching her at gas stations; no more people yelling at her at stoplights about their mom owning one of those; and, most importantly, no more dreading the impending (and inevitable) Baltimore Beltway breakdown.

While it was nice to experience normal throttle performance again, Glinda’s failing transmission was utterly annoying. Left-hand turns of any magnitude prompted a downshift. This was really upsetting when I was doing 50 on an offramp. It got to the point where I had to pop the shifter into Neutral before coasting through and then put it back into Drive once we were straightened out.

With all four members of the fleet congregated in my garage and driveway, it’ll be interesting to see which one will be first to make its way back onto the road.

Coincident to the V8 Corvair e-mail, I also received the announcement of an upcoming track day. This one just two hours away at the New Jersey Motorsport Park. All (and I emphasize “all” in a significantly sarcastic way) I need to do before then is finish Glinda’s 4-speed swap and get a helmet. I have all the way until September 8 to do what needs to be done.

Speaking of the V8 Corvair e-mail, I received a follow-up e-mail, so I’m convinced it’s not a hoax. However, while the seller said things like, “I don't expect anywhere near my original purchase price” and “LET’S TALK,” I can’t believe he’ll entertain the kind of offer my savings and the lovely Loriann would allow. Also, buying it would necessitate selling Glinda, and she needs work before that can happen. Oh well, time will tell.

Probably a Hoax Not A Hoax

I received two intriguing e-mails late last night offering to sell me a ’66 V8 Corvair. Here’s the body of the ad:

I HAVE A 66 CORVAIR V-8 AVAILABLE. I WOULD LIKE TO KEEP IT IN THE "FAMILY", (CORSA MEMBERS}. WELL DONE, SOLID CAR, VERY FAST. MY NAME IS EARL GRAY, MEMBER # 03113. HARD TO FIND PARTS, AND LOT'S OF LITERATURE GO WITH CAR. I LIVE IN PARKVILLE MD 21234. LET'S TALK

In both cases the sender went on to include a phone number and a reply-to e-mail address – the same in each e-mail.

Initially, I was skeptical of them, but some sleuthing this morning has given me some hope that it’s on the up-and-up. A few Google searches on the e-mail addresses and sender’s names turned up that sender #1 was, indeed from Parkville. So, I replied to the included e-mail address and am now waiting for a response.

Regardless, the words, “WELL DONE” and “VERY FAST” indicate to me that this vehicle will be out of my price range unless the seller really wants to sacrifice $$$ to ‘KEEP IT INT THE “FAMILY”’.

The following photo is one I pulled off the web just to illustrate the insanity of how close a V8 ‘vair’s engine is to the driver.


UPDATE: I just received the following e-mail:

I will try to get some pictures sent to you sometime today; this was a spur of the moment decision. I paid $8500 for the car several years ago, and had it shipped here from Texas. It was basically a shell and a motor. I spent a lot of time getting it "street" legal. Except for the 302 Z-28 motor in the back seat area, and the Chevy 14" rallys it looks stock. Sounds good too. It's silver with stock black interior. It has a stock am/fm radio, and optional stereo multiplex these I did not get around to testing or wiring up, a stock Corsa dash and glove box with original paint. I also have a complete telescoping steering column and steering box, I did not get around to installing. It has drum brakes, I have the disc brake conversion brackets. The radiator is under the rear deck lid with two puller fans, I don't care for the front mounted Kelmark version. I have a lot of other parts and a whole bunch of literature, everything I have will go with car. As far as price goes, I don't expect anywhere near my original purchase price. So I say, LETS TALK. Feel free to call me.

Two-and-a-Half Hours to Fix a Switch

Actually, it only took a half-hour to fix switch, but it took two hours to finally decide that that was the problem, remove it, and then reinstall it after the rebuild. When both the gas gauge and the wiper stopped working, I jumped to the conclusion that GM’s construction of the switch uses a pot-metal (soft) housing retaining the plastic, copper, and steel of the switch’s internals, contacts, and connectors. The basic function of the switch is to connect combinations of blade connectors to the housing, and, thus, to ground. This completes different 12 volt circuits running through the wiper motor causing it to spin slow or fast. As I posted before, when I was installing the clutch pedal, I had to undo all the wire bundles under the dash. I surmise, then, that I yanked on the wires going to the switch, causing the contact-to-housing connection to fail. I ended up removing the switch from the dash, disassembling it, cleaning the contacts, coating them with di-electric grease, stacking all the pieces back into the housing, and then crimping the housing to the insulator making sure I caused the housing to touch the correct contacts within the switch.

With the switch back in place and the wipers wiping again, I turned my attention to the other dash-mounted failure – the gas gauge. I removed the screws retaining the heater controls and pulled it out of the way to give me access to the back side of the gauge. I then pulled off the connector, turned the key to ON, and measured the voltage at the tan wire – 12.4 V which just happens to be the reading on the voltmeter that’s bolted under the dash. Therefore, the sender is still connected to the gauge, but providing no resistance to the electron flow, indicating – to me – the float is on the bottom of the tank even though the tank is full of gas.

Given all the time I wasted on these two projects, I didn’t have time to do anything more on the car that evening.