The penIS mightier!

[spanish pants]

Today was a productive day. I´m finally starting to take a break from working and taking a personal day once a week.

Carpet came out today using the trusted Exacto method. I´ll give it a good clean next week and start looking into carpet dye or paint.


Heater circuit leak finally pinned down to the junction between valve and heater core. Need to look into diy and what should be replaced here.


I managed to get the rain gutter trim off which was easier than I thought, but the lower window trim would not come off. Finally got tired and decided to go for a chorizo sandwich and carbonated water.

I´m just doing disassembly but getting to this point has been a huge pain in the backside in more ways than one, and gives me an appreciation for those guys who can dive into their car with no fear and rip out their interiors, build turbos, fabricate, etc.

I have a few days more worth of removing things but I finally have a date from the body shop...26th of Febtober.

[spanish pants]

Now...are we spending all this money here instead of on our Alfa....?

haha JK! I like the look of this car.

Don´t even mention the Spider. I feel pangs of guilt just thinking about it sitting in the garage while the e30 gets all the love.

I´m great at starting projects but worse than usual at finishing them. With the turn of events in my life I´ve made a promise to finish at least one car to a level that I can be happy with and I can´t keep more than 2 cars at this stage. Of all 3 the Alfa is the least practical so it´s going on the block to help fund part of the e30 project.

I´m going to roll it out of storage next week to take the for sale pictures

[LateFan]

I’m sincerely sorry for poking at you like that. And I know exactly how you feel about not being able to finish things.

[spanish pants]

I’m sincerely sorry for poking at you like that. And I know exactly how you feel about not being able to finish things.

Thanks for the apologies but no offense taken. I should have thrown in a smiley to let you know it was all in jest. :p

It does bother me to have to let it go, but in the end it´s just a thing that is causing me more anxiety than pleasure. Hopefully seeing the e30 finished will ease the guilt of having to sell it on. Wishing it goes to an Alfisti that will bring it back to life.

I aven´t been keeping up to date on many threads but how many "strays" have you got in progress?

[LateFan]

Well good.

Yes, there is a point where even something you really like causes more stress than it's worth. Time to simplify.

the ratty collection, hmm...
Alfa still up on stands waiting for me to finish suspension rebuild, new rear axle, brake system, fuel system, driveline, clutch, rear main seal, rebuild Webers....gawd, how am I gonna finish this?! (It is SEVEN degrees F in my garage this morning)
Audi A4 wagon running fine, just needs high mileage upkeep.
'04 Volvo XC wagon in the garage getting new cam seals, timing belt, vacuum hoses, etc.
Volvo 850 T-5 wagon needs a list of things done before I can list to sell in the spring. Hate to sell this car.
Son's Land Rover LR3 doing well while he's in grad school, but you need to keep up with those Land Rover maintenance things.
Other son's E30 is off at school, doing fine. Still a long list of fixits and upgrades to do, including a manual trans laying in pieces in my garage. Maybe in the summer we can swap it.

Keep up the good work! Good luck!

[2mAn]

Its always tough to sell off stuff you have an attachment to, but the way I see it is that ones an anchor, a distraction and is preventing you from getting more work done on the realistic project. I had been dragging around this 1600cc VW motor that I really wanted to build something with, but selling it really got the ball moving on getting my Datsun so its a win in the end.

Its not easy thing to do, but life is a lot easier without all the anchors

[LateFan]

Yeah, do you ever start to slide into old man hoarder mode and say "Oh, I should grab those headers on ebay to go on that craigslist head I bought for that engine swap in a car I don't even have yet!"?

End of distraction - back to Mr Pants' thread!..................

[spanish pants]

Well good.

Yes, there is a point where even something you really like causes more stress than it's worth. Time to simplify.

the ratty collection, hmm...
Alfa still up on stands waiting for me to finish suspension rebuild, new rear axle, brake system, fuel system, driveline, clutch, rear main seal, rebuild Webers....gawd, how am I gonna finish this?! (It is SEVEN degrees F in my garage this morning)
Audi A4 wagon running fine, just needs high mileage upkeep.
'04 Volvo XC wagon in the garage getting new cam seals, timing belt, vacuum hoses, etc.
Volvo 850 T-5 wagon needs a list of things done before I can list to sell in the spring. Hate to sell this car.
Son's Land Rover LR3 doing well while he's in grad school, but you need to keep up with those Land Rover maintenance things.
Other son's E30 is off at school, doing fine. Still a long list of fixits and upgrades to do, including a manual trans laying in pieces in my garage. Maybe in the summer we can swap it.

Keep up the good work! Good luck!

After seeing this, I shant complain again of having too many projects, lol. That´s a hell of a list of to do´s but it´s a great collection. Love the Volvo 850, I would hate to sell it too if I had it.
I can´t remember off the top of my head which Alfa it was you had, S2 Spider? Thankfully the pre 80´s Alfas are simple cars to work on but you´ve got your work cut out with you on that one.
Any links to any of the above, especially the Alfa and the Volvo?

Its always tough to sell off stuff you have an attachment to, but the way I see it is that ones an anchor, a distraction and is preventing you from getting more work done on the realistic project. I had been dragging around this 1600cc VW motor that I really wanted to build something with, but selling it really got the ball moving on getting my Datsun so its a win in the end.

Its not easy thing to do, but life is a lot easier without all the anchors

This is my reasoning too, but reason and desire don´t see eye to eye well when it comes to cars, food and ladies.

[spanish pants]

Yeah, do you ever start to slide into old man hoarder mode and say "Oh, I should grab those headers on ebay to go on that craigslist head I bought for that engine swap in a car I don't even have yet!"?

End of distraction - back to Mr Pants' thread!..................

Hahaha, and they all sat of the shelf happily ever after is usually how it ends with those things:)

[LateFan]

Any links to any of the above, especially the Alfa and the Volvo?

[spanish pants]

'67 1600 Spider (Duetto) ..bought this as just a used sports car in 1986.
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94 T-5 wagon at various stages of it's career...
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Wagons ho....something's gotta go
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Love the Duetto, such a great looking backside (sorry coda tronca) and an underappreciated sports car. I think every gear head should drive an old Alfa, be it a Spider, GTV or a Super at least once in their life.
You need to get this finished and on the road so I can live vicariously through you,

You weren´t kidding about the wagons. you just need a W124 Wagon to complete the set.

[spanish pants]

and now back to our regularly scheduled crap fest. After what was already a spectacularly terrible 2017, 2018 promises to be a continuance of terrible happenings and the adding of insult to injury.

I took the day off to go and finish taking the car apart for paint and decided to start the thing for the first time since bringing it home from the shop for a head gasket job.

Was happy to find that there was minimal rust under the carpet after sweeping away 10 years worth of beach sand, and then my day went to crap.


10 minutes after turning on the car I come back outside to find it blowing coolant everywhere. Opened the expansion tank to witness a rendition of Yellowstone´s Old Faithfull. You could literally see the coolant boiling and bubbling away in the tank.
Head gasket job with less than 40 km on it...nice. Add to that, that the same Dunce that did the head gasket also overfilled the oil to the tune of about 1.5 liters on an M42.
I called the shop immediately, and after an explanation of the goings on the owner says it´s highly suspicious that this should occur. Yes, highly suspicious I would say but with a different emphasis.

Lesson here viewers is to "trust but verify"...always, and that´s one to grow on.


I´m not even angry, I don´t feel anything which is a positive depending on your point of view.

[spanish pants]

Finally off to the body shop for a full window-out respray. Should be done in 3-4 weeks.
I will be stopping in twice a week to take pictures and check on the progress.
Tomorrow off to the dealership to order clips, grommets and other odds and ends for the reassembly.



Finally made its way into the shop from where it was stored. Getting closer!


New radiator support. The old one is a bit tweaked, no point in trying to straighten it out.
I was comparing the original on the car and this new one from BMW, and standards have fallen off in the last 25 years or so. The stamping on the new one looks to be of much lower quality.



I´m having doubts about the paint...visions of metallic purple with gold accents are swirling through my head. I should call up Crown Royal and see if they want to fund the paint job : )

[spanish pants]

I stopped by the shop todayto drop a few parts off and things are moving along.



Saw these out of the corner of my eye while I was there...freshly painted scooter wheels.
I like the colour but not sure if it works well on the D-force LTW´s.
It might work with similar colour on the body to tie the two together. Maybe pinstripe or ?
If if can find some Gotti´s or Zender Sport Stars then I´ll leave the wheels as is.
Now I know what women feel like when they go shoe shopping, so many decisions.

[spanish pants]

Not much happening with the e30. It´s some kind of religious festival and everything shuts down for the week.
Since the e30 is away time to give the e34 some love, in the form of an oil change and a catch can.

Needs to be stealthy so I tucked it under the MAF and next to the ABS. It´s the size of a can of Coke, so just enough room to squeeze it in.


Also rolled this out of the garage so I could take some "for sale" pictures. Much sadness and unrealized potential....single tear.