Replacing rear lenses

Time to start changing-out the tail light/reverse light lenses that I got for my birthday.

One of these things is not like the other...




This is gonna' be good!

Engine Tuning

After concentrating hard on what was required for rego, now that the big Chev is road legal it was time to see what condition the engine was in.
The Australia Day holiday gave a prefect opportunity to spend some time on the Chev, so JtC made the trip north.

The day before (25/01/2012) I grabbed from Rare Spares a Dist Cap, Dist Rotor and points.
Plugs came out and generally looked pretty sooty so rich running or plugs too cold. Also, the colour change on the outside electrode was generally pretty close to the tip which shows retarded timing (pictures to come).

The spark plug leads (wires) read between ~ 12 and 15 thousand ohms and were cleaned with wax and grease remover and re-routed to tidy things up a bit.

Next was compression test, done on a cold engine...

Cylinder #1 ~ 160 psi dry
Cylinder #2 = 152 psi dry
Cylinder #3 = 160 psi dry
Cylinder #4 = 158 psi dry
Cylinder #5 = 110 psi dry/138 psi wet
Cylinder #6 = 156 psi dry
Cylinder #7 = 147 psi dry
Cylinder #8 = 108 psi dry/110 psi wet

...where wet is a test after squirting some oil down the spark plug hole.

#5 is reading low and ~ 30 psi increase with a squirt of oil seems to point to leakage past the rings.

#8 is also reading low and the fact there is almost no change with a squirt of oil seems to point to a burn valve.

New plugs (NGK B5ES) were gapped to 0.030" and put in. A new distributor cap (Bosch GD607) and rotor (Bosch DR65) went on also.

I picked up a new contactor set/points (Bosch GD143V) and condensor (DC10) as well, but it looks like the Impala has points with an integrated condensor (Bosch GD45 I believe). Might need to do a swap, though JtC reckons the existing points are in great nick.

Joe reset the dwell to 30 deg and gave it a short hit around the block; felt a bit doggy so advanced the timing (remember the plug reading earlier) and a second drive showed it goes a LOT better. Might cop more advance as it 'aint pinging yet.

Finally, Joe adjusted the reverse light switch so the reverse lights come on when the car is in reverse... as well as adjusting the Park/Neutral cut-out so the car starts in Neutral now.

Thanks Joe!

Electrics #2

Joe is back today to continue part 2 of the electrics saga. Today's installment... the rear of the car, namely reverse lights and number plate light.

The Chev came with a blown reverse light fuse. Replacement of said fuse and re-testing simply blew the fuse again, so there is a short.

Breaking out the test light and tracing the wires back from the reverse switch showed we had power all the way to the back of the car.

Once at the back, we could tell the car had been in a minor bingle in a previous life as the LHR brake light bulb sockets were non-original (and badly fitting, incorrect replacements!) c/w splices in the wiring.

It wasn't long before the trouble shooting super powers of JtC came to the fore when we found a short in the RHR indicator bulb socket...


The good one (LHR) is shown here, but the photo shows the live centre contact (live) that was bent in the dodgy one and was touching the bulb socket (earth) itself - which was depressed into the plastic housing - and, hence, creating a short.

After removing this short - and a quick test - we (thankfully) found that this was the only short. Nice!

So the decision was to run up to Auto One and see if we could source some generic replacement bulb sockets that would fit for both the dodgy LHR stop lights and both rear indicators.

A quick search found these:
Narva 49828 (Single Contact Bulb Housing)
Narva 49838 (Double Contact Bulb Housing)

Both were a perfect fit for the indicator and tail lights respectively. A HUGE win! We grabbed some spare stop light bulbs, spare indicator bulbs and spare fuses.

We also grabbed a replacement number plate bulb as a quick test at home showed it was only a replacement bulb that was needed. Simple fix.

Once home, soldering ensued...



Finally a picture (or two) tells a thousand words...





A HUGE day in the hunt for a Blue Slip! not much left on the list now.

Carby is off + other stuff

So the Rochester 4G-C came off today in readiness for being pulled down...



Also... the reverse lights fuse (10A) is blown, so hopefully that is an easy fix.