Need new Pistons/Cylinders; Car off to Bodyman Tomorrow
The car is going to get transported to Don Mills' place tomorrow to (hopefully) get the rest of the bodywork done. He is a very nice guy and is more than willing to let me hang around and learn/lend a hand. I hope we can at least make a dent in the remaining repairs during the next month. I spent about 3 hours cleaning up the replacement nose clip I bought months ago, and I am thinking now that it may actually be usable. I'll let Don make the final call. Before the nose, the doors probably take precedence in terms of bodywork, and I have all those parts.
I have pretty much finished my repairs on the right side door bottom and leading edge, and it looks plenty good enough for where it is. All of the repair work is either on the bottom of the door, where it is difficult to see, or on the inside, where it will be covered by the inner door panel. Regardless, I've done my best to reconstruct it as it was originally made, with good weld technique. I'm always practicing when I can. The left side door doesn't need repairs nearly as extensive as I did on the right side. One thing I can say for the goopy undercoat stuff that was so difficult to remove-- it did a fantastic preservation job where it was applied.
Concensus on 356Talk has lead me to understand that honing out the existing pistons that came with the C engine will likely be a mistake, and at very best will work but will not last too long. I'll get a big bore kit and put the cylinders away for safe keeping -- they could be bored out for a big bore Shasta kit later. As for the cylinders, I think they were bead blasted, but I can't be totally sure. Probably, they are junk. The rings are new though... eh. eh.
I got the crankshaft, rods, and lifters mailed off to Ollie's in California. Right after I did that, I found out that Tim Berardelli, who did the reconditioning on my front suspension spindles, has a full machine shop. I'm sending him my camshaft for a regrind, and my rocker arms to have the tips surfaced properly, because they are pitted and worn.
Basically, I have a lot of balls in the air but not a lot of things that I can do personally at the moment. Maybe I'll go grab the '59 engine and tear it apart to see what monster lurks within...
Posted by pbrown at December 20, 2004 09:12 PM
