Dave W

PM sent. Dave W

After looking at slomove's list, I'm not complaining about 2 exhaust hangers, a water pump, and a windshield, in 22,000 miles. But I think I'm going to check my fuel lines this weekend! Dave W

Here a few shots from the blats in MN. Everybody had a GREAT time. Dave W

Roberto The first thing I would do is remove the thermostat and place it in a pan of water and slowly heat it up to see when or if it will open. If it is not a air lock, and it does not sound like it, then high probability that it is the thermostat. If you do get a new thermostat I would drill an 1/8" dia hole in it to help with filling the system and removing the air. Dave W

I have mud flaps that clear the ground by about 3". There is a definite reduction in the stone chips in the spats and fender. But I still have a lower band of about 4" that gets a lot more sand blasting on the spats. Probably about 2" ground clearance to the lower edge of the flap may be the ticket. I just made them to a lenght that I thought looked the best if flaps can look good? Dave W

My old MG had a cork valve cover gasket with the same problem. I found an after market rubber gasket for the cover and was able to use the same gasket over and over between valve adjustments. The other thing is to make sure the valve cover sealing surface to straight and is not bent from over tightening. Dave W

To be on the safe side, I would mark the engine damper at the 34 or 35* that you want and checking the total advance at 4000 RPM with a timing light. I would also run the engine a little higher to verify that all the advance is in at the 4000 RPM. Dave W

I drove my Seven "once" on a section of un-plowed road with 3" of snow. Progress was only about 5 MPH at best. You are actually lower then any of the other vehicles that traveled on the road so you are pushing all of the snow in the center between the tracks. I think I would pass on the DD. Fair weather and dry, Dave W

Mike Time for a new Bosch cap and rotor on that cross flow. There are stock pile of cheap rotors floating around for the cross flow that cause nothing but problems. "black in color with type rivet design" Dave W

If you going to get the mount welded, go ahead and reinforce or gusset the area that is cracking at the same time you repair it. It not that much more effort once the mount is removed. Dave W

I do not think my car is close to 50 yrs old, but it might be a fun one day event to visit. It would be less then a 150 miles for me. I can't tell if the auto-x type track is open to all cars? Dave W

Also the rolling radius of the tires should be taken into account. I would put the trans in high gear, and turn the engine over by hand [5 or 10 rev] and count the tire revs. I would bet that you do not have a the typical over-drive top gear but a 1 to 1 ratio. Dave W

I,m using a 1974 shortern Sprite rack. Which gives me about 2.5 to 2.6 turns lock to lock. The rack travel is 1.78" per rev. As mentioned it all depends on the steering arms that you are using. Just figure that you need about 20* of turn angle for a road car, for the tie rod attachment point on the steering arm. Dave W

It appears from the photo that there is enough space that you could remove the center eye mounting brackets and re-position them much lower on each side of the diff, so you would get a raising rate suspension. Dave W

Josh Yup those engine rebuilds alway take 3 times longer then they should. Hope you got out last nite before the rain started. We should still have a few nice days before the frost-bite weather is here. Dave W

The selector could possible be out of adjustment or the dog slightly bent. There is a punger on each side of the trans trail stock located on each side of the shift lever. The selector shaft contacts these pins to resticts the travel to align the shift dogs. I would try adjusting the stop to see if it would help. If it does not help you may have to tear it down to inspect the shift fork shaft and the gear set. It might be easier to just find another trans if the adjustments does not work. Count the number of splines on the output shaft first. [20 or 22] so the drive shaft will mate up to the tranny. Dave W

Slomove I would try to find a lower rose joint with a larger 12mm I.D. and smaller threaded male end and just use a longer bolt and spacer on the shock. If you can not find the matching size, then you could use a female joint and install a two diameter stud with the correct threads on each end to connect to the bar. Dave W

Was out for almost three hours. Left a little after 8:00AM and 48* outside, return just before 11:00 and it was up to 61* out. Had the heater going the whole way. Very little traffic and sunny. When I got back I had to take the nose off and clean the dead sparrow out of the grill and rad. Dave W

I would suggest that you put a little RTV on the I.D. of the cap, before installing it. I had a cap blow off from a back fire. Since adding the RTV, I have not had any problems. Dave W

Ditto on Valvoline racing VR1 20/50, if your engine has an aftermarket cam. Made sure the oil being used has the ZDDP additives. Also most of the oils with a diesel rating will have ZDDP. Dave W

Love the DUCK, When he is driving are you straped to the rear rack? Dave W

Try Kinetics just $38 per LH/RH lite, in parts section http://www.kineticvehicles.com/ Dave

I just added a couple small brackets under the roll-bar mounting bolts, so I could attach a cargo net on the rear deck. But you are limited to how high you can stack bags without messing up your rear mirror slight line. Dave W

Reducing Buffeting in a Seven I have experimented with reducing wind buffeting on my Locost for several years now. The high vacuum “ low-pressure area” behind the front windshield is worst then if you are on a bike at the same relative road speed. I have tried several approaches to reduce the buffeting. Some worked, others did not, I have no way of measuring buffeting but these are my general findings for the various modifications. Winglets will reduce buffeting around 10 to 15% depending on size. The attachment should allow some air to pass between the screen and the winglet. Laying back the front windshield an addition 5* reduced buffeting by about 10%. It helped mostly at lower speeds and no change at higher speeds. A solid Plexiglas wind screen behind the seats, attached across the full width of the roll bar and at head height did not help. I also experimented with cutting down the screen with a gap on the top, gap at the bottom, and both top and bottom gaps to allow some air to fill the low-pressure air behind the windshield. Using solid Plexiglas did not help, It actually made it worst. Side doors, without the top. My doors are a lot longer then most. They run from the front of the windshield all the way to the roll bar. They reduce buffeting a good 40 to 50% when compared to an open cockpit. A Bikini top, you still have high vacuum area, but a high percentage of the air flow is behind your head. It reduced buffeting in the 30 to 40% range. Fixed sun visors that help defect the wind up over the top of the cockpit did help about 10%, but the visors probably need to 6 to 8” wide. My visors are only 4 ¼” wide, and worked the best when set about 20* from horizontal. Make up air, I have a defroster, and a 5 speed heater fan, but I can not feel any difference in buffeting with the system running. I would venture to say that it would take a lot more air volume then a typical heater fan could put out. For the 5% of the Sevens that use bikini tops, I just installed a rear window that attached across the full width of the roll bar just a couple inches behind your head. The car was tested with Winglets and a bikini top installed. With a full width windscreen i.e. rear window, installed it increased the wind buffeting.” This is without doors” and the results where basically the same that I had with a solid wind screen tested without the top installed. But with the bikini top installed the air flow is back and forth alternating from the left side to the right side. Air flow was verified by using a single turf hanging from the roof bow. I design the rear window with center sliding section this allowed me to adjust the center opening. Adjusting the rear opening 1 or 2 inches wide in the center section had almost no effect on the buffeting. I next tested the windscreen with about 20 to 25% of the total rear window area opened in the center section to allow air to suck out into the low-pressure area behind the windscreen. A moderate 20-25% area opening actually reduces the total wind buffeting probably in the 10 to 15% range Vs a completely open rear area. It was more effective the higher the speeds. It was tested to 100+ mph and it prove to be even more effective at reducing the buffeting at those speeds when compared to a completely open rear area. Using an opening in the center area of the rear wind screen appears to work much better then trimming off the top and bottom of the full width Plexiglas windscreen and warrants further testing without a top installed or the used of an open mesh type wind screen which allows air flow. Your results may vary; Dave W If anyone would like pictures just drop a PM to me.

Martin I think it might be wise to extend that skid plate pass the front edge of the bell housing, after looking at your photo. The extra wt would probably be worth the piece of mind. Dave W