The Crusty Cuda: Whole lotta Shakin' (N96) Goin' on!

[njsteve]

The trick is to put a couple dabs of RTV on the chrome before you sandwich the grips to the handle.

I remember that buzz/rattle from the old days! And when the top bezel would get loose, it would add a nice ensemble tone to the jiggly sound of the loose plastic grips.

Ahhhhh, the memories are rushing back now.

[njsteve]

More finagling around today. I stripped all the upholstery off the rear bench seat cushions. Now there's a few hundred broken hog rings flung all over the basement. That was some nasty foam, burlap and stuffing there. And lots of mouse poops. I was surrounded by all three of cats at one point or another during the afternoon while they supervised my work. I guess they smell the mice residue.

I ordered the full rear bench installation kit from Legendary. Thay had it in stock and it is supposed to ship out monday. Sure is expesnive but it does have all the needed material: raw cotten, burlap, muslin, foam, etc., in one kit. They were having a 20% off sale today, too.

I tried to get the fuel gauge to work. The gauge itself works. When I pulled the blue lead wire off the sending unit and grounded it, the gauge immediately moved toward full. So it looks like a bad sending unit. I ordered another one from Rockauto and it should be here next week. Of course I had filled the tank completely already so I will have to siphon it all back out again and then loosen one muffler to get to the side mounted sending unit.

[njsteve]

She actually moved under her own power today! I wanted to get her out of the garage so I could sweep the place out. She hasn't moved from that spot since arrival in August. I grabbed a milk crate from the garage and started her up and away we went...20 feet or so out into the driveway. I just let her idle while I cleaned and swept the floor. I started around noon.

I then pulled her straight back in and started on doing the front end alignment. I had already set the torsion bar ride height a couple weeks ago and constantly rechecked it after adding the battery and filling the gas tank, and hopping in and out of the car to do the carpets and dash. So it was pretty well jounced by this weekend. Measured at the fender edge, in line with the center cap of the wheel, the height was 25-3/4" tall at LF, RF, and RR. LR was 26" tall.

It took most of the afternoon since I was using a race car alignment gauge with built-in levels. And you have to zero the bubble level for the floor's angle in case it isn't level (most floors are not), for each side before to attaching it to the car.

It took quite a bit of practice but once I got the hang of it it is rather easy (on anything but a Mopar with upper control arm cams). GM style suspension with shims would be much easier.

A bias ply tire, manual steering equipped Mopar uses different specs than one with power steering. From the 1970 service manual they recommend 1/2 degree positive camber left and 1/4 degree positive camber right, and then for caster: zero to 1/2 degree negative. Remember this is for bias tire, not radials. It was really a wrestling match with those cams. You have to loosen the retaining bolt just enough to let it rotate but if you loosen it too much, the cam overrides the retaining tabs and you're a goner. I overloosened one side and partially bent the tabs that guide the pass side rear cam into an arc. I had to pull the entire upper control arm back out and hammer the tab back into place. I then reset the entire passenger side again. The whole cam adjustment recipe is like operating a WWII tank. You have a wrench on both cams. If you move both cams the same direction, you adjust the camber. If you move one cam away and one toward you, you adjust caster. You do the camber first...and then hope you dont mess it up by doing the caster. With these weird manual steering specs, it was really touchy since it was at the absolute limit of the cam travel to try to get the negative caster without throwing off the camber. And then to top it all off you have to torque the retaining nuts...without moving the same cams out of place.

I was able to finish around dinner time.

Tomorrow I will set the toe and make sure the steering wheel is still straight.

[John Brown]

Used to do drag car alignments at home using such tools. Slip plates were made of 1/4 steel on the floor with an aluminum plate on top, and grease between the two to allow the suspension to remain in a relaxed state. Worked out quite well.

[njsteve]

Actually, I just used several sheets of really slippery, thick, polyethylene plastic. I cut them into 12" squares and placed them on top of each other, under the front tires. It's like having the front wheels on ice. I can turn the wheels with one hand! Who needs power steering!