Frosty

So what's new with Franken Chevelle?

I have a 15-year old at home......with an XBOX 1,,,,,and a XBOX 360...... and he is finishing his first week of driver ed.....and he is the one that wants the 47-53 Chevy 5-window pick-up. Hell, yeah I know about GTA !

Whew! For a minute I thought he was doing a pretty good imitation of JUSTA's GOAT!!!! Or how about "DANGER WILL ROBINSON! DANGER!". Havoc's tractor could double as his Halloween costume ! A few backlit LEDs, some duck tape. Voila! Instant costume!

Sounds like you've been playing Grand Theft Auto again.

...and a clutch that fits the Sunbird !!!!

Remember that when one cylinder is going on the compression stroke, another cylinder is going on the exhaust stroke. A compression test is always a good thing. If you have a compression tester, do it. It will certainly give you a sense of the state of your piston rings.

Ghosty - the man has been to stunt driving school. I need someone to show me how to do a proper rolling 180 turn while on the Bandit Run. Besides Canuckistan surrounds me on 3 sides, to the north, south, and east. I'm pretty much screwed in that respect....Wisconsin is to the west.....home of cheese, brats, and beer (which is something to brag about when you stop and think about it). What are your driving credentials? I am, of course, taking applications.....send your resume, picture(s) of your car(s), and list of favorite straight porn sites, with a SASE, to.......

I think this could work.

Looks kinda familiar - '72 Lemans (with the GTO option) - since all 72 GTOs were a Lemans with the GTO package again. The GTO was no longer its own model like was was in '71. Lucerne Blue with white interior. Also looks familiar....needs a white top though.

Flowmasters are for pimps and sissys Jedi! Real men run open exhaust!

Woodward Dream Cruise 2013 - 1968 Bonneville station wagon with a 455 Sign found on the same Bonneville

Well it stinks that he sold it out from under you, still there are plenty of 400s and 455s out there. Keep looking and keep doing your homework. You can still buy and install your sub-frame connectors and brake upgrades in anticipation of the 455. You can also nore and stroke a 400 with aftermarket parts too. So unless you have to have a block with 455 stamped on the side, you have options.

The Bandit Run is on my must do list once I find the time to sort out the little electrical gremlins in my '86 TA. I might need a co-driver though. Any volunteers?

I suspect that you are hearing the compressed gas and/or air exiting the motor as the exhaust valve(s) cracks open as you cycle the crank.

...and a huge hole in the steering column! When do we get to see a picture of the screwdriver key?

Sounds like a good candidate. If that does not pan out, continue looking at the diff and the pinion gear, or perhaps the main bearings on the carrier. I agree that square cut gears might be a tad bit noisier but not to the extent or pitch you are experiencing IMO. I definitely believe you have a bearing that is screaming "replace me, replace me".

Sounds good to me.

Okay - no one else is going to comment that this picture shows that there appears to be 6 of the 8 original 1969 Trans Am convertibles all in one place at the same time? All 8 convertibles were RAM AIR III cars, 4 were automatics and 4 were stick shifts.

Those are both excellent places to examine. 60-year old needle bearings is excellent shape would be hard to imagine after all these years - not impossible, just improbable. Is there a bearing on the back end of the diff going to the PTO (that we cannot see in this picture) that might also need to be inspected? Again, don't overlook any bushings either. They can become galled or pitted and start grinding on their contact surfaces too.

I just spent part of Saturday, Sunday, and last night giving the Envoy a tune-up. It consisted "simply" of a new air cleaner, spark plugs, and plug wires. The truck has 99,200 miles on it, so its due for all of the 100k maintenance. I purchased a new K&N reusable air cleaner, 8 new AC Rapidfire 6 platinum spark plugs and a set of Bosch plug wires. The kid actually wanted to help me work on the car, so I let him. The air cleaner was the easiest thing to do. We were both stunned at the old air filter. I honestly question when it was last replaced. It felt like it was 2 pounds heavier with the amount of dirt literally packed into it. The thing that most amazed me was the dirt ladden moth clinging to the outside of the damn thing. It would not fall off! We had to wipe a whole bunch of dirt off the bottom of the air cleaner housing too before we set the new filter in. The throttle body was pretty carboned up too. I removed the throttle body and cleaned it thoroughly with throttle body/carb cleaner on both sides of the butterfly blade. It throw some error voltage too high/too low codes when I first restarted the truck. I cleared them and that was the end of that. The worst part was changing the plugs and plug wires. The passenger side of a 2008 Envoy Denali with a 5.3L V8 requires you to jack up the passenger side of the vehicle, put it on jack stands and remove the front tire. This gains you access to the #4, 6, and 8 cylinder spark plugs. Spark plug #2 is conveniently buried behind the shock mount tower with barely any room for 2 fingers, let alone a wrench or pair of pliers to get the boot or plug off. It took over 2 hours of the kid and I trying to pry the boot off from the bottom and the top before we had any success. We destroyed the old plug wire in the process. With the use of a universal joint and several long extensions I was able to get the plug out and the new one in. Getting the new plug boot on was almost as challenging as getting the old one off since you had to make sure it was secure and tight fitting. We were eventually successful!! However, it was getting late on Saturday night so we quit there. Sunday afternoon we resumed our work and did the driver's side. Its much easier to get to all of the plugs but its still not as easy as you'd like it to be. The #1 cylinder was the most difficult to change because there is a engine temp sensor mounted just above the exhaust manifold there as well as a bracket that is bolted to the alternator bracket that holds several thick electrical bundles going to the engine bay fuse panel. Remove the bolt holding the bracket and remove the electrical connection to the sensor and now you have a shot at getting to the plug. Changing this side took less than half the time we spent on the passenger side. We took the truck for a quick test drive and I plugged in my ACTRON OBDII diagnostic reader into the OBDII port. The engine didn't feel quite right. Under hard accelerator, I threw a P0302 code. Cylinder #2 misfire. Dang it !!!!! I did some research on internet on what could cause a P0302, bad spark plug, bad wire, bad coil, bad fuel injector, or even clogged fuel filter. Since none of this existed until I "tuned" up the truck, I figured it was something I did - plug or plug wire. If that was not the culprit, then I would look to move coils and injectors around and see if anything changes. I didn't want to rush out to buy a $100 coil or injector just to find out that I didn't need to spend the money. The internet also showed me how to access the #2 plug from the top. Remove the entire air cleaner assembly and mass airflow sensor, unbolt the windshield washer reservoir (which is the bottom of the air cleaner pan too). Unbolt the retaining strap next to coil#2 on the engine. Now you can get your hand on the plug boot and spark plug from above without removing the front tire. Even with this information in hand, it is still a very tight squeeze for your hand between the engine and the shock tower. It still took a long time to get a spark plug socket and wrench on the plug and get it out. I inspected the new plug. I thought I might have damaged it installing it. It looked fine. I checked the gap. Holy Mackerel!!! Was it way out of spec !!!!! The gap is suppose to .040. When I put my gap gauge on it, there had to be at least another .015-.020 gap beyond that. It was huge!!! So needless to say, I corrected the gap. I re-installed the spark plug (again not a quick or easy thing to do) and the plug wire, then buttoned up the rest of the truck. I did a quick test drive last night near the house. No codes under hard acceleration. Engine also seems to run smoother too. I went to the gym this morning on the expressway, did the hard acceleration thing again, still no error codes. I'm hoping I might be beyond this. I will keep the OBDII reader plugged in for another day or two to be sure though.

I am no tractor expert, but I did find this interesting forums advise that I think you might find useful. http://www.farmallcub.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=52728 http://forums.yesterdaystractors.com/viewtopic.php?t=441465&highlight= As I have suspected, bearings or bushings. I suspect bearings since it takes a lot for a bushing to fail. One of the forums mentions needle bearings on a drive shaft between the tranny and diff in one of the models of their tractors (not certain this really applies to you or not). However, I can see original needle bearings failing at this age. I still think bearings are the issue. However, gear/shifter/shim alignment seems to be pretty important too. Proper lube and level sounds important too. Those are my thoughts anyway.

I was told it was and that the missus daily driver was responsible for the first stain on the brand new concrete.

So when do we get to see the inaugural grease stain on the new driveway?

Havoc's remembering how much fun he had with his glovebox lock. Must be something about locks on dashboards that drives him more insane. Of course, back in the day, a sawsall was how a lot of guys installed custom car radios too.

I had the wonderful opportunity to replace the power window regulator in the Envoy today. The window rolled most of the way down and would not come back up or go all the way down. I took the door apart rather quickly and found the the wire cable on the regulator had started to shred and jammed itself in two places. I will post pictures of it in the morning - I've too damn beat tonight to even bother. I was lucky to find an Advanced Auto that (A) was open on the 4th of July at all, ( still open when I called them at 4:00 pm on the 4th of July, and © had the replacement regulator I needed in stock. $130 later I have a working window again! Voila!