Monday, November 28, 2011

swiss cheese manifold...

so, i think the more i seal up the manifold, the more holes are made/found...  ran it on wednesday and it was idling up and down again, then noticed some liquid on the fan housing behind the manifold, stuck my finger on the backside of the manifold and it was all wet...

so, i think there are weak spots all over and every time i seal one up, it blows another hole in it some place else... so, i bought a manifold on the samba and i guess i'll replace it at some point...

here's some shots of the damage area from the left side of the engine near spark plug number 4 down the back of the manifold... the arrows point to where the holes were...



so, of course, i slathered it in JB Weld...




ran it on sunday and it settled into a decent idle again...  i am sure it's only a matter of time until it blows another hole out at a weak spot... 

however, i did get it out of the driveway and down the street...  i adjusted the brakes a few weeks ago, and they are better (the right front doesn't lock up when i tap the brakes)...  the clutch seems to be better, no slippage in 3rd...  the tires are rubbing on the headlight buckets in sharp turns, but i expected that... might raise the front a tad...

Monday, November 14, 2011

JB weld rules... and i am pretty smart...

so, used some JB weld to try and seal up the whole in the manifold...  here's some before and after...



so, not the prettiest fix, but i'll throw some flat black paint on it so it doesn't stand out... 

on the plus side, it seems to have helped... i wonder if sealing the manifold to the head blew open that little hole a little more so i could see it... anyway, it seems to be running better, still idles up and down, but then settled into a pretty steady idle, but it was still too fast for my liking...

i couldn't get it to idle down, and it looked like the accelerator cable was too tight, so i loosened it up, and bingo!! sort of... 

the best thing was after that, i was able to make it stall out by turning in the mixture screw!!!  it was actually doing something!!!  i guess the accelerator cable was too tight, just bypassing the idle pathway in the carb... so, i adjusted that, then adjusted the idle screw to get it close, so i think i have the carb adjusted pretty well now...

like i said, once i let it run for a bit, it settled into a decent idle... i'll start over with checking the valve clearance, timing, etc, and make sure its all on...  then i need to adjust the brakes (they drag bad, and may need to bleed them), then i can make sure the clutch is good to go...

anyway, here's some proof...

Saturday, November 5, 2011

so, there's good news, and bad news...

well, here's some more pics from the clutch job....  the good news is that i adjusted the clutch cable and now have the correct free-play in the pedal and can get it into gear...  i managed to move it around in the driveway, but didn't have time to take it out and see how the clutch slippage is...





now for the bad news...  when i had the engine running, it was doing the erratic idle thing worse than ever...  revving up and down a lot, all on its own...  again, sounds like an air leak, but we replaced the manifold gaskets... 

then i noticed this....




liquid bubbling out of seemingly a hole in the manifold...  now that i think about it though, that lower tube should just be the preheater pipe...  so, would that make a issue??

i tried to smell the liquid, and it didn't smell like gas to me, but not really sure what else it could be...  unless the condensation on the manifold under the carb made its way down there.... either way, there's air escaping to make the bubbles... 

might just throw some J B weld on it and see if that helps...