No Duals for Glinda

After a prolonged battle, I had to give up on installing the dual exhaust. When I test-fitted the left-side Flowmaster muffler, It sat right next to the valve cover – not even enough room to fit a heat shield. I’m not sure what this pipe was designed to do, but it can’t be used with a muffler. Once that decision was made, I grabbed the nearest usable stock exhaust pipe and was thrilled to find it had two reasonably useable gaskets on the input ends and an adapter on the output end. So, only one more adapter was needed to go from two-and-an-eighth to two-and-a-quarter. One pipe clamp later and the inlet was done.

The outlet end of the muffler needed to restrained, and, stock-wise, this is done using a metal strap attaching the muffler body to a hanger bolted to the engine. Sadly, I then found out the stock strap is too short to go all the way around the fatter Flowmaster, so I ended up using a hose clamp run through an opening in the hanger’s flange and then around the muffler’s output tube. Stock, non -turbo Corvairs all have ninety degree elbows on their muffler outputs to aim the exhaust to the side. With the smaller diameter stock pipes, the elbow turn is pretty tight, but with the two-and-a-quarter inch Flowmaster outlet, the elbow on the shelf at Advance Auto had too large a radius to allow it to fit between the end of the muffler and the car body. That meant the outlet of the muffler pointed straight at the rear grill. So off that came. Looks more racy.

I then fired up the engine to check for exhaust leaks, and, while it’s not totally sealed, it’ll do for racing. It would be in better shape If I’d spent the hour to remove the old gaskets and use the new ones in Clark's kit, but this condition will have to suffice for now. By the way, while not nearly as cool sounding as Jonathan’s Corsa, the single Flowmaster is a great aural improvement over stock. I need to take a video and post it. As soon as the engine had started, I noticed that the TEMP/PRESS light stayed illuminated. Since the engine was cold and the oil pressure gauge was reading nearly 50 psi, I knew there was an electrical problem. With the engine off, it took only a minute of sleuthing before I found the exposed connector in the engine compartment grounding on the alternator. With the connector moved to a safe location, the light went out as soon as the starter started cranking. Speaking of lights being out, the left taillight wasn’t working. It only took some bending of contacts to put that right. Next, I wanted to feel how close the clutch’s adjustment was. Still up on jackstands and with no wheels mounted, I made sure the rear drums were in place and the parking brake fully on. With engine running, in went the clutch, into first gear went the shifter, and then out came the clutch slowly. About halfway in its travel, the engine rpm started to drop. Wow, that seems just about right. I tried all the other gears and, happily, was able to engage all. TYL for everything.

At that point it was nearing 9 PM, so I called it a night.

All that’s left is mounting the wheels (having gotten the leaky front wheel repaired this morning) and droppin the car off the jackstands before hitting the road. After the test drive, I still need to get the car up on ramps to tighten the stabilizing rod ends (they need to be torqued down with the suspension at ride height).

I’m hoping I’ll also be able to get to adjusting and reinstalling the racing carburetor, mounting the new throttle cross-shaft, and doing the tune-up.

I will definitely need to pack for the track before Monday morning early rolls around.