$736. But most importantly...THE NOISE IS GONE! Yay! I diagnosed it correctly! Now all I hear is the rumble of the engine, just the way I like it. All told, it was about $1100 to get rid of the noise, but the sound of silence is worth every penny.
Yeah, and you're still way ahead of the game than if you'd bought a BMW... You're A/C bill was a little higher than I expected, but not outrageous. Right on, man. In other news, I finally got started on my, er, I mean Jungle Julia's LS swap. I tell ya, it's SOOOOO satisfying tearing out old, shitty parts from a vehicle, knowing you're either A) Not going to ever need them again (Fuck that big, ugly cruise control module,; that piece of shit didn't even work.), or B) Replacing it with something better. EDIT: Toytoy, were you planning on replacing the whole control arm, or just the bushings? Because if it's just the bushings, might I recommend buying some polyurethane ones. You can get a complete set for your car for probably about $200; I would need to check the price, but I've done complete bushing sets on a few vehicles I've owned over the years (my 'Bird included) and that's about the normal price.
be careful with the poly bushing. they change the ride. because they are harder they have a stiffer rider but better feel.
Yeah, I'm still on the fence about poly bushings. I had them in my RX7 and they do stiffen up the ride a lot. I was also 30 years younger then....I don't know if I could take that constant beating anymore, especially since I'm nowhere near as aggressive with my driving as I was back then.
Yep. It’s a pretty standard upgrade for old Porsches. The poly-bronze bushings really stiffened eveything up. Exactly what you want for a “track” car but not necessarily for the grocery-getter.
I upgraded the IRS bushing on my 2004 Cobra and the handling went from being a squishy turd to a car with decent handling. Also got rid of the horrendous wheelhop those cars have.
Yup. When I was prepping my 3.2 for auto-X my original plan was fully poly-bronze. I was advised by a couple of more experienced folk to leave one pair rubber (I forget which, hey it was ten years ago) because the increased stiction and competing suspension angles would leave me wihth almost no suspension movement. Even with upgraded shocks, torsion bars, & anti-roll bars, the car is fairly compliant on the street. Not exactly Buick-like, but bearable.
My RX7 with poly bushings, sub frame connectors, and upgraded sway bars rode like something designed to haul Buick sized rocks. North Idaho roads full of frost heaves and pot holes were not an optimum environment for it.
I gave up waiting for a used side view mirror painted in the correct color and ordered a new one that I'll have to have sprayed. Hopefully it doesn't run more then $200. I'm now down to the front control arm bushings and having the nose and hood resprayed to bring the Z to stock specs. Once it's a solid, original appearing car with everything working, then I can start personalizing it. One thing that bothers me is the steering wheel. It's kind of your connection point for the whole car and my steering wheel is a stock, non leather wheel. It's in great shape, but I haven't had a non leather wheel in years, and it just feels cheap. Every now and then I come across a nice factory leather wheel on e-bay for $200-300 without the air bag assembly. This change over is not something I'd tackle myself. I imagine it's something I'd have a body shop do? Does anyone have a ballpark idea of what it would cost to change my air bag to another steering wheel?
Toytoy, you can change that wheel yourself in about 15 minutes. But if you're hellbent on having a pro do it, I'd take it to a mechanic, not a body man. As far as the fee goes, shouldn't take more than an hour, so whatever that rate is.
Took the mirror into a body shop today....$130 to have it sprayed and installed. I should be able to see down my driver's side without craning my neck by Monday. Yay! Also ordered AC/Delco rear control arm bushings. And I decided fuck it on the front end and instead of doing just the bushings I'm going to replace the upper and lower control arms.
Last time I checked, a can of Rustoleum was $5.99 at Home Depot... In other news, today I got to drive a cammed, tuned, 2014 1LE Camaro (supercharged 6.2) with a six-speed and longtube headers, unsupervised. It had street-legal drag slicks, but those weren't enough. Anything past 1/4 throttle would trip the traction control. Maybe I'm just getting old (I'll be turning 37 soon... Shit.), but I do think there's such a thing as too much power. If you have a car so powerful that you've got to baby it everywhere you go, or you might get into trouble, that doesn't sound like much fun to me. I'm sure that if I drove that car every day I'd get used to it and change my driving style accordingly, but there's still the possibility that I might punch the gas too hard one day and go sideways. And I know this from experience; in my mid 20s, I had a '79 F150 with a built 460 (ask if you want details), a T56 six speed, and a posi that I shimmed so tight that it might as well have been a spool. You couldn't give that thing more than half throttle at any speed if the road was wet. If you gave it too much throttle in ANY turn, it would spin out. I was really proud of the truck I'd built, but I felt like I couldn't really enjoy it.
A supercar you've probably never heard of : A 1959 Facel Vega, French built, powered by a big block Mopar and drop dead gorgeous.
I am quoting myself and compiling this together for posterity and update. I'll spoiler a lot of it so I don't clog the thread. Spoiler: open for long version Update, since it's been long enough . . . that did NOT work. After about 2 weeks out from replacing the accelerator pedal position sensor, I got the message again. So, I replaced the throttle position sensor AND the pigtail connector to it. They came together, so I guess I'll never know which one was actually the solution. However, the original wires and pigtail clip seemed like they were all intact and contacting, so I think it was the sensor. The old one was riveted, so I did have to drill those, which sucked. The new one did not come with replacement hardware, and I don't have a rivet gun. So, I used threaded bolts / nuts that I had that were a perfect fit. The nuts were not lock nuts, but I used LocTite and have set myself reminders to check their attachment over the next 6 months. So, far so good, and no more message.
New issue question (2004 Chevy Silverado, 4.8L): - night before last, I had a small puddle of antifreeze under my truck. I couldn't see any leaky points at first, and I assumed it was my water pump going bad. I drove several hundred miles yesterday. Each time I parked, I looked for antifreeze drips. I barely noticed anything. This morning, same puddle under the truck - we're talking about maybe 3 capfuls. Not a lot. But, there should be none. With a little more light and poking around, I believe the leak is coming from a failed attachment or possibly split hose right at the attachment. The existing fitting looks like it's not designed to be changed out. It's the wye that splits to the heater core and the overflow tank. This: I can't seem to find just the wye. The hoses have 408,000 miles on them, so I am assuming just changing everything in the picture out is the way to go? Any reason not to do that, or anything I should know?
Hey, I figure if I got over 400,000 miles and 15 years out of 'em, I call that a win. I can still buy the OEM style with the molded Y, but I see on the parts places, I can also get the metal Y with pipe clamps. I'll probably go back with the OEM style. Thanks Dixie.
Just ordered new u-joints from rockauto.com. Got 2 of the exact same part # for less then Autozone wanted for 1. I'm fixin' to order a couple of front lower control arms from them too. GM discontinued the part, so I'm going to have to go aftermarket....rockauto is by far the cheapest price. Their interface is kind of a pain in the ass and you can't always trust their part recommendations, but a little researching and you can pretty quickly determine which part # you actually need.