October 1999 Archives

Just one day after getting the car back on the road, we ran into another problem. After the long drive the previous day, the next morning I opened up the garage to discover a large puddle of gasoline under the passenger side of the car. The gas tank had developed a leak.

As you all know in order to replace the gas tank you need to remove the engine. So this project of replacing the gas tank also prompted us to "freshenup" the engine as well.

Budget wise the long term plan for this car was to keep it on the road until may of 2000 when we could start a full restoration. Knowing that I would be rebuilding the engine in may anyway, I could leave out some essential rebuilding items ... or so I thought.

So the plan, ( at the time, it has since changed ), is to replace the fuel tank, intake manifold, carb, camshaft, oil pump, oil pan, push rods, and rocker arms. This supposedly would get the car back on the road and last until may of 2000 when we do the restoration.

Sounds great in theory :)

The first task was to replace the u-joints in both axles. This is pretty straight forward. What is not clear is which way the axles go into the car. The axles can go with the larger end towards the tire or the larger end toward the tansaxle. We opted for the latter.

Rebuilding the rack was an all day job for me. I also wanted to clean up and paint the rack properly as well. I clear coated the aluminium shell that surrounds the rack. The bushing that was supplied by Hall Pantera was too large for the shaft that I had. I had to use emory cloth to reduce the inside diameter of the bushing to keep the rack from binding.

After both these tasks were accomplished we were back on the road. My wife and I went for a long trip around Scotts Valley. My wife fell in love with the car. She cannot resist the italian designed body.