Second Seat In

Yesterday, after dinner, I donned grungies and proceeded to do what had to be done to get the front passenger Cobalt seat installed in Glinda. I placed the seat in the car lining up the outboard rear mounting screw, and marked the locations of the four feet on the floor. The angle grinder with a wire brush made quick work of removing all coatings from the areas to be welded to, while the bench grinder’s wire wheel cleaned up the four pieces of square tube. The angle grinder, now with a cutoff wheel installed shorted the feet so they’d fit into the tube pieces. After rolling the MIG welder out to the car, I welded the four pieces of tubing to the floor. For some reason the welding was not a nice as the driver’s side even after adjusting the feed rate a few times. I remembered that I’d put the heat setting on C, but I’d forgotten what had worked for the speed before. It also could’ve been that the connection to ground was farther away than last time. So while it didn’t look as good, the weld was still complete enough to provide good anchors. Once the four tubes were attached and the welds had cooled, I covered all the exposed steel with primer and let things dry while I turned my attention to the clutch again.

This time I decided to actually follow directions when setting the locations for the two clevises (or is that clevii?). After putting Glinda up on the ramps, I slid under the rear and disassembled both clutch linkage pivots. I tugged on the cable with roughly 15 pounds of muscle and spun the first clevis down the thread until the pin lined up with the hole in the fork (z-bar). All this with the fork set as close to 7/8ths of an inch from the cross-member as I could measure. With the fork engaged with the clevis, I then pulled all the slack out of clutch and spun the second clevis until the pin lined up with the corresponding hole in the other end of the z-bar. The final instruction was to, “Back off (3) Adjusting Rod three turns and assemble to lever with (2) Clip.” When something’s underlined, I tend to think it’s important. Well, I backed it off three from being inline and now the clutch grabs as soon as it’s off the floor. I think three should be two. Since the rear was up on the ramps, I

Having given the primer some time to dry, I decided I could install seatbelts and the front passenger seat. The seat bolted right in, so now I've got the ability to transport a passenger.

Before calling it a night, I started Scarlett’s engine to see if my vacuum blocking had fixed the right side’s cool running. The engine fired right up and there’s now a significant amount of vacuum at the right carb’s air horn and no hissing when I put my hand on top. However, the choke still didn’t move much from cold, but I can attest to the exhaust manifold putting out the heat. Not sure what the deal is – maybe the thermostat is bad. I’m thinking of investing in a new tool – an infrared gun to compare right and left sides. Also, thinking I’ll swap right with left carbs to see if the problem stays with the side or follows the carb.