Today John and I worked on the 124 Coupe.
We removed the radiator and the alternator v-belt, and bought a new v-belt -- though we haven't yet installed it.
We replaced the stretched and loose timing belt with a new one. To remove the timing belt cover we had to remove the t-pipe that fits through it to the top of the head. That destroyed the gasket but thankfully we had a spare in our various parts bins.
I removed the old plugs, but it appears the new plugs I got are different than what is in the car now. Meanwhile the existing plugs don't look bad. I put the old ones back for now. Then we pressure washed the engine again (now that we had more access), and flushed the old coolant out of the motor, along with some old glycol gel.
We think the rad is silted up and will need to be hot tanked, but we're not sure if we want to spend our money to do it or just try flushing it and then leaving the more serious work to the next owner (since so far the owner hasn't jumped at our offer to buy the car). We're going to need to replace the various hoses to the head, thermostat, and radiator.
I washed out the trunk area (one of the few areas I didn't get when I cleaned a couple weeks ago) -- essentially I sponge washed it to keep it from getting too wet. It took 4 little buckets of water to get it clean; I had to keep dumping out the silted water in the bucket.
We bought a new battery and installed it, but didn't hook it up yet. While the one in the car didn't seem that old, it wouldn't hold a charge.
The owner's son claimed to have spent several hundred dollars trying to get this car running. I haven't found any evidence of it. When we got the car it looked like it had been sitting out for years, being thoroughly dusty inside and out, in the engine bay and in the trunk. The timing belt looked old, the v-belt was so hard it held the triangulated shape of its fit in the water pump, alternator, and crank pulleys. The hoses looked spent and the t-stat and head t-pipe both looked corroded. John checked the oil this morning and it appeared to him to be overfull. I had planned to change the oil, anyway; I have oil and filters to do both cars and will likely tackle that in the a.m. when it is still cooler out. John added some brake fluid to the reservoir. If we can get the various engine maintenance issues sorted and get it running, we'll have to bleed the brakes just to make sure that they work properly (though they do work in the driveway, so we know that the system isn't completely perished). While working on the car today I got down low in the front and looked underneath. The anti-sway bar rubber bushings are spent -- I suspect most of the rest of the rubber is in similar condition.
Oh, and on top of it all, I found more rust today.
It has bubbling all along the rear valance right behind the top of the rear bumper. It looks like it is penetrated, too, so that's going to require some work to repair as well.
John made a key for the Spider and we finally got its trunk open and put the trickle charger on the battery. This looked like a deep cycle battery, but I don't know. It tested at about 5.5V before charging and by the end of the day it had 11.86V. Can't seem to get it to or above 12V. I'll have to see if the charge holds until the morning.
I'm sure there are other things we did, but can't think of them at the moment. As always, we start the project and then realize a tool we need is at the other house...we really need a shop where we can keep all the tools and the cars. And a lift!
As I said above tomorrow I will do the oil changes on both cars, and we will likely tackle the Spider's timing belt, too. Hopefully the Spider will be in a bit better condition. If the battery holds up and we can get the belt(s) and plugs changed, and remove the old gas, we might be able to see if that one will start. Oh, and we're also going to finish up some stuff on John's house before his bride comes home from visiting their daughter in TX. And get another set of the blanks cut to fit the doors.
