test

test

breaking the brakes

after running the car up and down the interstate all weekend i noticed some brake fade and a puddle of fluid near the driver's rear tire. pulling the tire off however revealed a leaky axle seal instead. never done one of these before but i figured now's a good time to learn.

first task is to remove the cover from the differential and allow the fluid to drain. while that was draining i pulled the brakes off the driver's rear. next step is to pull a bronze colored pin that runs through the center of the differential (seen above) and remove the little c-clip that holds the axle shaft in.

here's a shot of the axle hub with the brakes hanging off to the right. the old seal is sitting in that pan below (which happens to be the differential cover). hammering on the new seal was a little scary but it went in without much trouble. hopefully it won't leak anymore.

the whole process took about 2 hours. most of the time was due to having to siphon new fluid into the axle. this is some super thick gear oil and it took forever.

i'm going to wait a few days before driving so the black rtv sealant has plenty of time to cure.

painting

one of the typical paint schemes that trans am owners will do is the "collecters edition trans am" modification. this involves painting the bottom of the rear bumper flat or satin black. this area surrounds the exhaust pipes and license plate.

this is the bumper support hiding under the plastic cover

here you can see the area which i've begun sanding and prepping for paint

this is a bad shot, but you can sort of make out the black lower portion.

also in the shot is my beloved sentra

another paint job i tackled was making the red headlight green.

once again, sand, degrease, prime, paint.

the last bit of prep work i did was fixing the holes and cracks in the front bumper cover caused by the run in with the deer. the method i chose to reconnect the tears in the plastic is to apply loctite super glue gel and sand quickly before it dries. the dust created by sanding mixes with the gel to form a paste and fill in and seal the cracks. it isn't a final fix but it's a start. the whole bumper needs sanding and repainting still, as does the blue driver's fender seen above.

spring cleaning

more progress done recently...

here's an idea of what washing old dirty interior parts is like.

here you can sort of see my process for restoring the shine. i'm using a heat gun to melt just the top layer of plastic on the panels to bring a nice glaze to the surface. there's an "O" shape towards the bottom that's a little shinier than the surrounding areas, i took a pic before continuing to show the contrast.

since i decided to try and salvage the old carpet i took and sprayed 3 different types of cleaner on it. resolve carpet cleaner foam, dawn dish soap, and some purple degreaser, then i scrubbed and sprayed the whole thing down and let it air dry. above is a nicer cleaner carpet after being reinstalled.

speeding things up

my idea was to pull everything out and stash it in my living room, wash it all, wash the inside of the car out and reinstall in reverse order with fresh carpet...

here you can see the nakedness of the back seat once more.

...and here's my living room covered in car parts.

one year later...

flash forward a few months after my last post. time have changed. the economy is "improving" according the the bigwigs. i finally decided to foot the bill and get a registration for the firechicken. here she is after bringing her home.

well, i got to work on my car this weekend. beautiful weather to work with too! my task for saturday was to tuck away some more wires and lines, and to pull the interior.


as promised, here's a picture of the drivers side of the engine bay. you can compare this with the one in the last post. i rerouted the three fuel lines and hid the cable that pops open the hood.



another step i'm taking is changing the way the air filter sits, as well as the type of filter used. i've put a rubber pipe connection on the front of the motor and set the new air filter box lid in place, but nothing is attached yet!



before i show you what the inside looks like when it's empty, i figured i'd show you everything i took out. don't worry, it's not all sitting out in someone's yard for the rest of the week. i pick everything up before i go home each day.



here's with only carpet... it's not real, real dirty (i mean, i could clean it up pretty good), but i really want black carpet anyways, so it's trash.


and here's after pulling the carpet out! i need to bring out my vacuum and suck up all the sand and dirt hiding in all the crevices, then i'll start laying down some sound deadening.

well thats all for now, i'll probably spend some time this week cleaning all the interior plastics before i put them back in. i also have decided to redo the headliner like i did in my daily driven nissan. next step for the engine bay is a good cleaning...