Too Tight?

Mikhaila and I had a few goals to attain last night, and we got to most of them. First, we wanted to return Ringo’s borrowed parts. While Mikhaila removed Ringo’s carbs, fuel lines, and throttle linkage, I finished rebuilding two carburetors I’d started on months ago. We bolted them onto Scarlett along with GUP fuel lines and linkage. We started the engine and I adjusted the idle speed screw. I was so intent upon the two screws, I missed that right carb’s fuel fitting was not tight enough and gas was spraying all over the front of the engine compartment. I immediately pulled the coil lead from the distributor cap. We wiped up the gas and tightened the fitting before moving on to Ringo. I found a fuel pump that did not have the word BAD marked on it, and we installed it into its hole in Ringo’s engine. Fuel lines went in next while Mikhaila bolted the carbs in place. We retrieved the batter from Scarlett’s engine compartment , dropped it into place, and attached the leads. A push of the “start” button and Ringo fired right up. I kept waiting for the engine to stall due to a bad pump, but, instead, I was rewarded with some spewing fuel from another loose fitting. Actually a good sign since it indicated the pump was still good.

With Ringo functional again (just in case someone wants to test drive him before buying), we moved on to the second goal of the night; checking compression. I had Mikhaila remove all the spark plugs while I swapped the battery back into Scarlett. With the compression tester screwed into Cylinder #1, Mikhaila turned the key to spin then engine. The needle did not move – zero compression. I connected the tester to #3 – same result. I moved it to #2 – 65 psi. This was an improvement of 20 psi from the last time we checked compression – certainly moving the right direction. As for #1 and #3, I must’ve gone too far with tightening the valves during the readjust of months ago. Pulling the valve cover and re-setting the lash is now at the top of the to-do list.

The final goal for the night was to pull the transmission shifter linkage from the trans and reinsert following the manual’s directions. We didn’t get there.