Date: Tue, 05 Mar 1996 19:23:00 +0000 From: [email protected] (Dave Williams) Subject: A Day in the Life of... To: [email protected]
0615: roll out of bed, go out to the shop (beautiful morning, 55 degrees, who cares if it's raining?) Find out brand new boring bar has no insert. Find a whole string of proper-sized inserts in toolbox (these things cost about $8 each), but the screw hole size was too small. Damnation. Get a KB123 piston and D0OE head and start fitting the piston to the chamber. It's a domed Chevy piston, and the dome is the wrong shape for a Ford. Oddly, it won't fit a closed-chamber Chevy either. With clay, Dykem, chalk, and patience, I manage to get one dome fitted. Now I can use it for a pattern for the others.
0815: go back in the house, start getting ready for work.
0910: on the way in, I notice the barbershop I used to go to is open again, and I'm badly in need of a haircut. New barber takes 45 minutes to give me a haircut that makes me look like Bill Clinton. Considered suicide, but if I can't fix it with scissors tonight, I can shave my head with the dog clippers.
0955: call my boss on my cellphone to tell her I'll be late
1045: scratchy throat develops
1055: Scott Griffith calls to gloat about finding the mother lode of NAS hardware for cheap. I tell him he is despicable and hang up on him.
1320: spend half an hour fighting my way eight miles or so as the crow flies, since the part of town I work in appears to have no direct connection to the industrial part of town. Shell out $207 for two bevel gears, which will go into the center drive of the Marauder. Fight my way back across town, snagging the world's worst chickenburger from a Wendy's in the way.
1430: scratchy throat has turned into full-fledged sore throat and moved up into nose. Coworker notes his child has chicken pox. Great.
1530: supervisor tires of snivelling and whining and sends me home
1610: almost make it home before 17 year old girl with big hair and Camaro run stop sign and crash into TRX, bending entire front of car off to right. Use cell phone to call 911, which is apparently staffed by cretins.
This is the same intersection where I got nailed in May 1988, also on my way home from work. Last time it was a DWI, my bike was totalled, and I wound up with one leg shorter than the other. Not that I'm against progress, or anything, but I could have done without the repeat performance.
1615: JPD arrives, in the form of Patrolman Scott Leger, who just happened to be driving by on the way to somewhere else. Patrolman Leger did an entirely professional job. The blonde with big hair will get a ticket, at least.
1620: Patrolman Leger is handing my license and papers back when his walkie-talkie asks if there's an officer near Main and 1st to handle a VC. Patrolman Leger looks disgusted. I decide not to worry with a wrecker. The puddle of coolant leaking out from underneath isn't *that* big, and home is only a mile or so away. TRX is hurt bad; it crabs detectably on the way.
The bumper almost got knocked off. It is carried on spring-loaded
standoffs, which in turn bolt to some of the body structure. The oil
cooler and trans cooler brackets share those bolts. Could be nasty.
The splash panel and header panel are history, as is the driver's side
headlight mechanism. The core support is displaced; the hood, which
hinges in front, popped an inch to the side when I unlatched it. The
driver's side fender is cropped off in front. Something got the
radiator - either the torque from the bent core support, or it got
pushed back into the engine. There was only about a finger's width
between the radiator and water pump.
There's a track event next month. Goddamnitalltohell.
I've taken photos, and will try to get the adjuster out to look at it
as soon as possible. The header panel has been pushed back under the
hood, which won't open. Somehow, miraculously, the hood escaped visible
damage. That's good, because there's half a day of surgery on the
underside. It'll take tin snips on some of the wreckage to get it open
undamaged. I'm pretty sure my new $200 radiator is history.
Further bad news: the steel triangulation bars I put underneath, and
the strut tower brace, almost certainly aggravated the damage by
providing a load path for the impact to displace both sides instead of
one. It will be interesting to see what some of the stuff looks like
under there.
I guess we'll see if the insurance company notices the engine swap and
gets in a snit. They didn't used to care. Nowadays, who knows?
On the good side, unless there's something seriously bent after I get
the bent metal off, the car should be fixable. Unless the Insurance
Fairy waves her magic wand over the car and makes it all good again,
I'll likely do most of the stuff myself. Strip the bent metal, order a
new header panel and splash panel, and take it down to one of the local
body shops with a frame machine. Get it pulled back into shape - now
would be a good time to get the car *straight* - and take a look at the
core support. I had already thought about hacking it out and replacing
it with tubing; now would be a good time. I just happen to have a good
left fender and headlight retractor mechanism on hand. The bumper
appears to be just scraped, but I have an extra one of those too. I
have visions of body seams opening like wounds when they put the thing
on the frame machine. I guess I'll just have to see how that one works
out.
I was just getting used to driving a car that was all one color that
wasn't primer.
[email protected]========================DoD#978=======
can you help me...help me get out of this place?...slow sedation...
ain't my style, ain't my pace...giving me a number...NINE, SEVEN, EIGHT
==5.0 RX7 -> Tyrannosaurus RX! == SAE '82 == Denizens of Doom M/C '92==
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