Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Posted by
Tobias Davis
at
9:16 PM
Pictures: Painted the engine block. Forgot to get a picture of it clean. This matches my red, silver, and black theme.  I got the head and the pistons back from the shop. Don't know what that green stuff is...  The interior. Despite the general appearance, there is not much terribly wrong with it. Missing buttons, seat covers, floor mats: Done!  Here she is! There is very minimal rust, and besides paint color fading it looks great!  This is what I pulled the Geo with, with a car dolly from U-Haul. I also found out that the water pump broke. | This morning I got the engine head back, with freshly installed intake and exhaust valves, and the pistons installed on the arms. Total bill was $184, it would probably be about $100 if you only needed the valves done and the head resurfaced, but I wanted a couple other things done. Here is what the machine shop did: Resurface head, install 3 intake and 3 exhaust valves (they also bought the valve stem seals but I bought the valves), hone and cross-hatch cylinder walls, remove old pistons from arms and install new ones. I think that's it. What do you think? Was $184 a reasonable amount? I think they did good work, and had great customer service. Anyway, after I got the head and pistons back, I cleaned up the head, taped it, and painted it red. You can see a picture of it painted, but I forgot to get one of it bare. As I probably stated before, all three exhaust valves were burnt out, and one was missing a small chunk. I forgot to ask for them back to get a picture, but the one was pretty bad. Probably why it wouldn't run except at high rpm's. Painting the head didn't take very long, probably about 5 minutes, but cleaning it with paint prep cleaner and taping it took over half an hour. Keep that in mind if you decide to do anything like this: Prep time takes the most time. Later that afternoon, I went to move the Geo from it's holding spot out at my parents farm to the friend with the garage who is so graciously lending me some space. I rented a car dolly from U-Haul for less than $50, and headed out. It's an hour from my house to the parents, and an extra 30 minutes to the friends. On the way to the parents, the truck didn't have much power but I thought it had enough to move the car. Turned out I was right! I moved the car into the garage, and Wednesday I will head back over with lots of parts to get started: Clean engine compartment, paint engine compartment, clear out interior, clean ventilation system, mouse-proof ventilation system, seat covers, floor mats, extra bits, install engine, double check everything, break in rebuilt engine, done! (I think) Done with news about the car, but here's a side story of the nights events: After I moved the car and was headed home for the night, the battery light started flickering. I thought it was maybe a loose nut, so I pulled into a gas station and billowing clouds of smoke pured out from under the hood! Oh no, I forgot my flashlight! Thankfully, it was "only" steam, but (after purchasing a $3 flashlight) I couldn't find where the water was leaking, and I thought it might be a blown gasket. After a while, I got up the gumption to pour more antifreeze in and, on removing the cap, heard a loud gushing noise: The water pump was leaking gobs of fluid out near the fan spindle! So I guess I have to get a new water pump... I decided to try and make it at least to the U-Haul to return the car dolly, and headed out from the gas station. Well, I got pretty close, but the spindle on the water pump was the part broken, which means the serpentine belt didn't have much tension, which means the battery didn't charge, which means when the engine died at a red light it wouldn't restart. Thankfully, the truck died right at a gas station, and as soon as I got out to think a tow truck pulled into the station to get gas! I meandered over and got him to tow the truck, return the trailer, and drop me and truck off at my house. The cost: $65. That might have been high for a tow, but he kind of fudged on the towing/DOT rules by towing me with a trailer in tow, so I didn't mind a whole lot. Cost of everything today: Machine shop bill $180 U-Haul rental $48 Gasoline $23 Tow truck $65 Summary $316 Cost of the experience? Not really priceless, but it was an adventure. |
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