Knowing What You Don’t Know

There are a lot of things I don’t know how to do. The thing is, there one thing I’m very good at — learning what I want to know. As I’ve said, I don’t know much about cars and mechanical processes other than the basic theories. But, I want to learn. And Mona — Mona is a great place to start.

After speaking with Mr. Mechanical about the accelerator pump, he said it might be the power valve giving me some issues as well. The thing is — I’d need to pull the carb to fix it.

My heart stopped.

Pull the carb?

Fuck me.

So, for a few days, i mulled it over. After all, Mona had sat for 15 years, and that’s not good on gaskets, and who knows what’s been living inside that unit during that time. It just makes sense — rebuild the carb, Bjorn, just do it.

I watched some YouTubes. I read the Chilton’s. I even watched Destin from Smarter Every Day explain how carbs work and then go to the Holley factory and find out he was only kinda right. The carb rebuild videos helped and gave me confidence that I could do it — especially since I could have the video open while working and go step by step.

Right?

So, last Friday, I call the local o’parts store (LO’PS) and order the parts I need — rebuild kit, accelerator pump, accelerator pump spring, and a new gas filter. I was told it would all be in on Saturday by 8 a.m.

Saturday

I go through my Saturday morning routine — brush my teeth, meds, coffee, comics, etc. Few more YouTube videos to screw up the courage. Then get all dolled up and get the Ginger Goon’s harness on him because the LO’PS stores in town are dog friendly, and head out to the store. Before I left, I made sure to spray down the connections on the carb because I knew they’d be all messed up from years of sitting.

I should mention … there are three LO’PS in Grand Forks and East Grand Forks — and I didn’t order from the EGF store. So, I head to the store I thought I’d called the day before, only to find out that … nope, I had called the other store.

Dammit.

So, we get back in the car and head to the other store.

I should interject that I’m both excited and scared shitless at this point. I’m looking forward to digging into my Motorcraft 2100 two barrel beast. It’s going to be exciting. It’s not going to work and I’ll have to back up and redo stuff.

I.

Don’t.

Care.

I’m gonna be learning and doing! Whoot! Yeah, baby! I’ll be able to lean against Mona’s fender and say “Yeah, the carb was a mess, but, I rebuilt it.” I was even practicing the various humble brags I’d use.

Unless, of course, the person I chatted with at LO’PS on Friday didn’t put the order in. Which is what happened to me.

Okay, that’s not quite true. The pack of accelerator return springs came in. There’s a dozen of them. I need 1. I might need another in the future, but for some reason, I can only get a dozen at a time. But, nothing else came in.

*sigh*

I reordered it the parts, and they’ll be in tomorrow (Tuesday).

Dejected, I take the Ginger Goon and we help back to Bjornheim (my home, don’chaknow). And I think — I can still pull the carb today and get my work station ready. I put the dog on his cable, turn on the radio, grab some wrenches and sockets and open up Mona’s hood.

Gas line — ooooh, baby, she comes off easy.

Vacuum lines — takes a bit, but I work them off as well. So far, so good.

Nuts off the studs and do one more check — oh, shit — forgot the throttle and cruise control linkages. Cruise comes off easily — but…hmmm…the throttle link?

Okay, I’ll come back to that.

I try to lift the carb, and it doesn’t budge. I check — nope…all the nuts are off. Try again…still not moving.

…the fuck…?

I move around to the driver’s side … everything looks disconnected there except that damn throttle cable — but c’mon, it’s flexible…look in behind…nothing there…over to the drinker’s side and do a test lift…

Ah, hell. I forgot to disconnect the choke! Spray it down and let it sit for a bit, and then, break it free. So far, so good — haven’t damaged any of the fittings! Whoot!. And when I go to lift it, it comes right off the studs.

But, I still need to contend with the damn throttle linkage.

I grab the Chilton’s to see what they have to say. It’s a very concise, precise statement: “Disconnect the throttle linkage.”

Right. I know that. But how the ever-loving-fuck do you do that?

Remember — I’m not a stupid person. I know that there has to be something I’m missing. But, I sit there for almost an hour and can’t figure it out.

I even tried holding my tongue about 17,053 different ways.

Fuck.

Fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck fuck.

I put the dog in the back yard, then head into the house and start looking for videos on how to disconnect this type of linkage, and after about 20 different videos that had the EXACT type of connector I was dealing with. I start it, and just as he gets to that point, a flash card pops up stating that the next 15 minutes of video were corrupted, and the next thing ya know, he’s got the carb on the table…

That’s when I decided I’d had enough and went out and got the work station set up. While I was doing that, I decided “Tomorrow — if I can’t figure this out, I’m taking pictures and sending them to Mr. Mechanical for guidance.”

Sunday

Armed with a cup of coffee and a new attitude, I headed back out to Mona. I looked at the connection while sipping my coffee, and picked up a straight blade screwdriver and pushed against the connecter…

And it popped right off.

Now, if you saw me at that point in time, you woulda seen me laughing my ass off. I pulled the carb out, took some pictures, then looked back and saw there was a plate on the manifold. I took it off, and noticed that one of the corners had broke right off. Well, shit. I took more pictures, then took everything into the garage and sprayed a bit of carb and choke cleaner on it and set it aside until the parts came in.

However …

There was still work to be done.

With the hound on his tether, I pulled out the tools and set to finishing off Trixie the Trailer’s end gates as well scraping out the top of the trailer. The end gates went together pretty easy — 2×4’s for the uprights, 1x4s and 1x6s for the slats. Cut, measure, align, screw, and boom goes the dynamite! And everything fits.

Now, since I pulled the top, I’ve gone back and forth over what to do with it. Keep it for a cover? Scrap it? Repurpose? The more I looked at it, the more I decided I realllllly didn’t want it. I grabbed the Sawz All, a new blade, and a full battery, and with eye and ear protection in place, started lopping pieces off of it.

It was all sorts of fun, I tell ya!

Until suddenly, the saw stopped.

It was a tab bit warm. Well, warm really doesn’t describe it…I coulda cooked eggs with it. I set it to the side, picked up the scraps and tossed them into Trixie, and went through a bunch of the other stuff that needed to be put away or tossed out. By the time that was done, the saw had cooled down enough for me to finish up the sawing.

With that, I took a few more pictures, packed up, and came inside.

While I was looking at everything after, I realized that the rain we had late last week had perked up the grass and I was thinking — “it could use a mowing.”

And when the lawn guys showed up today, I was happy I got all that stuff picked up and put away.

The next step now — pick up the stuff from LO’PS and sit down at the work station and figure out if I can actually do a carb rebuild. Now, I’m at a new level of calm, so it should go well.

And, as always…pictures below.