Been a bit slow BUT...

Things have been a bit slow working on the car in the last few weeks, but the engine is just about ready to get dropped in, and once it is, it's a downhill run to get it ready to drive. I don't see many more roadblocks, at least for awhile.

Meanwhile for Christmas I got all kinds of goodies - like 1200 watt work lights, ratcheting wrenches, various breathing apparatuses (apparati if you will), a shop vac and more!

Engine Prep Continues

Today I got the broken stud out of the engine block. Also, I bought a tap and new studs so once the engine is off the cradle, I can retap the bad threads and everything will be good as new.

I test fit the EGR plug in it's new location and there IS room for it, although it will be tight. Also, I came up with a great way of blocking off the open ports - by using the old fitting, and welding a piece of scrap metal to the top of it. Oh yeah, things are going pretty good again :-D

Engine prep starts

I wrapped up a bunch of loose ends on the chassis and then got to work preparing for the engine install. First I removed the smog related stuff and removed the belt and cleaned it up a bit. It's certainly not a show-queen, but it's a lot better :-P Then I put the dead-pulley in place where the A/C compressor was and re-routed the belt. After that I bolted the transmission mount up to the frame.

Before








After








So left to do before installing the engine and transmission are these:
1) Fix a broken exhaust manifold stud and a stripped stud. I want someone who has done this before to help - I'm nervous because the aluminum block is softer than the stud.
2) Re-route the EGR using the smog pump stuff. (requires some ingenuity and welding). I need someone who can weld to hook me up on this one.
3) Block off all open EGR, smog, and vacuum openings. I hear that the EGR port is really hard to block off because the threads are odd shaped. Hopefully the smog port wont be too bad. I might just order an EGR blockoff kit just for the EGR plug. What to use to block off the vacuum lines? I heard irrigation plugs will work.
4) Swap out the oil pan. I can't do this one until the engine is up on the hoist. That should be fun...

Brakes done!!! Whew.

This morning I headed over to NAPA to pick up my brake line stuff...again :-P So at long last the brakes are complete. Also, the fuel lines are connected to the fuel tank and run up to the engine bay. I ran the vapor line from the back toward the front and have mocked up where the battery cable will go. I haven't decided for sure where to mount the battery - mainly because I don't understand the instructions :-D

In preparation for the engine installation, I thought it would be a good idea to go ahead and install the heater box. Here's a pic of he box installed. So now I really do have to figure out what I'm going to do with the EGR and Smog stuff.

Brakes are about 95% done

So I went back to NAPA and the guy that ordered the stuff realized he ordered the wrong thing and went back to the catalog to remedy the dismal situation. Only then did he realize, and soon thereafter portray to me, the actual depth of dismality of said situation. NAPA does not even have the fitting that I need in their catalog. Which means instead of 2 fittings, I now have redo the plan for that section and I now need 4 fittings and 2 new lines. The good news about this is - NAPA can't really screw this one up.

It will be Saturday before the parts are here, but I think that is ok because I have everything I need to run the fuel lines and battery line. I will knock those out in the next day or so then spend most of vacation working on engine preparations.

Still aiming for a Jan. 1 engine drop-in.

Brakes are about 80% done

So I ended up deciding to go with pre-flared lines and fittings. I ordered some stuff through NAPA for next day pickup and this evening I finished about 80% of the brake lines with Tom. All I have left now is to run the long line from the ABS unit to the rear and I have to go back to NAPA to get 2 fittings (they gave me the wrong thing!) Other than that the brakes are finished. Hopefully I can run the fuel lines tomorrow and then get the battery relocation finished during the holiday and can drop the engine in on new years day!

Egad brakes suck...

I've basically been treading water for a few days on the brake lines. The (main) trouble is that the tool I bought to flare the brake lines doesn't work. I'm not sure if it is because the lines are too hard or if the tool just sucks, but it is not properly flaring. So I've pretty much narrowed it down to 2 options after trying a few things:

1. Get a more expensive flare tool.
Upside: All the lines would be perfect fits.
Downside: More chance of a leak from a bad flare, chance this tool will suck too.

2. Buy pre-flared lines of the 'right' size and adapters for the ends.
Upside: No flares to do! No chance of a misshapen flare. No wasted money on bad/once used tools.
Downside: Adapters means more chances of a leak, lines wont be perfect fits, have to find all the right sized adapters.


Well, I mounted the Anti-Lock Brake System Controller last night. This was a little challenging because the older style models are huge, and the manual doesn't have anything in it about where to mount it. I think the typical donor car does not use ABS. But given I'm building this car to withstand weather, I think I want ABS for the rain. Although an on/off switch would be awesome. Here is a pic of the mounted unit, as you can see I had to make some stuff up for it because they don't have a prefabbed mounting position on the frame.

Cockpit Aluminum

I spent 8 hours in the garage today riveting panels. Lucky for me it warmed up a lot today! Diana came out and helped for awhile which was really helpful for the passenger footbox. Here's a few pics:

Steerin'

With the pedals in and the hydrobooster loosely fitted, I decided to go ahead and start on the steering system even without my back-ordered part. I got the donor steering rack in and bolted up - only to realize that it seemed really loose. I poured through the bags of donor parts and found the steering rack bag which had some rubber bushings I forgot to put in. SO, I had to unbolt it and remove it and slap those bushings in. It wasn't too bad though, so after I put the rack in the 2nd time, I attached the tie rods and gave the car a 'rough alignment'.

Then I deciphered some more instructions and despite the manual giving me the wrong part numbers - and wrong box location - I managed to get the upper steering column mostly fitted. I had to grind a bracket down a bit so it would lay flush, but it wasn't too tough. Once that back-ordered part comes in the steering will be finished.

A nudge forward

Last night, Josh and Brandon came out to help work on the car. Josh worked on fitting the hydrobooster while Brandon and I mounted the fuel filter. Brandon took a drill-face picture of me, and that is the only picture that I have from last night to post right now. I'll take some pics after the hydroboost is done and the pedals are finished.

I got gas

Chronicles of a gas tank. Diana scrubbed the tank yesterday in preparation for painting, and when I got home I sprayed the first coat. Meanwhile, Tom headed over and we torqued the suspension to the proper specs and finished a few lingering suspension issues. After that, I sprayed a final coat on the tank and we hoisted it up onto the frame.

Rear Suspension/Axle

This will be quick and short because it's about 2 am and I have just finished working on the car... My goal for the day was to complete assembly of the rear end. I got home about 6 and worked straight through until after 1. But I got it done! Here is a pic of the assembly. It's kinda hard to tell what is what in this pic, but you can get an idea.


There was a lot of drilling...a LOT of drilling. I broke 2 bits including my new 9/16 metal drilling bit. It made me sad because I had just bought it the other week, but then it made me feel kinda awesome for breaking a drill bit so huge :-D.


The evening had a few frustrating moments and several puzzles solved. I didn't get a chance to eat dinner, and I nicked the back of my hand with Carl's grinder - (that is a nick you won't do twice!) But once Everything was done, I put the wheels on and got to hop up and down to test out the suspension. It's official, the car is now a rolling chassis!! It probably wont roll very straight or well, since the steering hasn't been done yet, but it will roll!

and without further adieu

To WORK!!! The other day Diana helped me to unbolt and lift the body off the frame and things have moved along pretty quickly from there. I labeled all the panels and traced the frame onto them, then removed them all. I riveted 3 panels in place that needed to be done before the front suspensions could be done. The riveting is a slow process of:
1. Measure and mark the rivet locations
2. Drill out the aluminum
3. Screw the aluminum on the frame
4. Drill out the frame
5. Remove the panel
6. Clean off the metal shavings
7. Silicone the frame
8. Rivet the panels in place

After the panels were riveted in place, Carl came over and we got the front suspension completely installed. To the left is a picture of the passenger side coil over shock. It was a pain in the butt, with tugging and pushing and pulling and maneuvering. Trying to get things to fit that aren't QUITE lined up can be a huge problem when they are made of metal or under a lot of pressure! :-P

Arrival

The cobra has arrived!

Dad drove up from Greensboro and helped me load 'er up. The truck driver lowered it out onto a dolly, then we pushed it down the street. They had to park the truck 2 streets away so there was a little ways to go. Then we wheeled it into the driveway and plopped it onto some jack stands. Then dad and I unpacked the boxes and put them into the garage in the order that they would be needed. After that I had to head in to work. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to wrap up the parts prep and be able to really get cranking on assembly soon.

Starting parts prep

With the extra junk out of the way, and the garage all cleaned up, it's time to start getting parts ready to go in to the '65 chassis. The first step was to cut off a full coil from each of the rear suspensions springs. I first attempted to do this with a hacksaw - this ended in failure. I thought I was making progress at first, until I just realized that I had only cut through the paint on the surface. The stock springs flatten out that the top, so I'm not 100% sure how this is going to seat in the cobra since it's now no longer flat. So I ran over to ace hardware to get a metal cutting blade for the circular saw. That made quick work of those springs :-P

After cutting and cleaning the springs, it was time to work on the rear end. I started out with a wire brush scraping off the rust. Ford doesn't put any kind of coating on the mustang's rear axle so they are all rusty. Someone had, however, in the past painted the differential cover so it wasn't rusty. Also, there were two different color gasket seals on the diff cover screws and the oil was in good shape, so it's just yet another sign that the previous owner really took care of the car. The differential oil is one of the first things to be neglected by an owner.

Changing the differential oil can be a messy process because there is no drain plug, but I got lucky and actually didn't spill any. The real pain in the butt was cleaning all the old gasket material off. I spent about an hour working on that. This tedious stuff is what I can't stand - scraping off rust and gasket material, etc.

The gears inside look like they are in great shape, and there was no sediment at the bottom of the diff; another good sign. I've pretty much scraped all the rust off that I plan on scraping. I bought a can of brake parts cleaner and a can of caliper paint, but I think I'll wait to paint it and let Josh hit it with his spray gun - it'll look much better. I also got the control arms off and scraped. I had some trouble getting the brake calipers off so I left them alone for now, but they will need to come off and get cleaned and painted as well.

Exit Donor

Say goodbye to my little friend - the cobra donor. The body panels and frame have all been sold! I cleaned up the garage a bit and now there is a LOT more space. There is a local guy named Sean that did a factory five replica with basically the same donor as me. Here is a video of his first test drive of the cobra w/ no body on: Test Drive

A HUGE thanks to Carl for coordinating everything between fastlane and for bringing the trailer out. Also thanks to Justin, Brandon, and Seth for helping maneuver the shell onto the trailer. Our powers combined...

Driveshaft

I took the driveshaft in to a shop called Brakes, inc this morning to get it shortened. Starting at a rusty 4 feet long or so, the roadster requires that it ends up at a mere 13". And although it cost me slightly over twice what they quoted me, they did do a good job and gave it a nice black coating. I had him show me the length on a measuring tape before I took it home.

They were a different sort of business. I came in the front door and the guy told me to go in and talk to Jerry. After walking through several warehouses filled with heavy equipment, I final came upon Jerry. When I came back to pick the driveshaft up later, I went back to that same place to find Jerry and he handed me the driveshaft and just told me to pay up front. I could have so easily just driven away! The only info they had on my was my name and phone number. Anyhow here's a pic.

Phase I complete!

Tonight I removed the last of the donor items from the car. I'm trying to sell all my leftover stuff as a package to FastLane Motorsports; I should know if they are going to spring for it tomorrow sometime. Otherwise, I REALLY need to respond to all these Craig's List emails I've been getting. So tonight I pulled off the transmission mount crossmember brackets and a fuel overflow hose. She's ready to be recycled now!

Note to self: make a copy of the title before I give it to the scrap-yard or to fastlane. Now the next step is the arduous task of donor part preparation, which includes cleaning. I hate cleaning. Maybe someone can give me some pointers on the best and fastest ways to remove and prevent rust from components like the rear end and gas tank, exhaust manifolds etc.

Pulling the Engine and Transmission

Or more accurately, pulling the frame FROM the engine! It's a pretty great idea that Josh M gave me and doesn't require a hoist. Here is a vid, watch the magic happen!

I got off work early today and headed to Lowes to pick up some supplies. I built 3 small dollies for the chassis and a large one for the engine. Then after Brandon got there, we removed the rear end and finished pulling a few small parts. In the manual, they say there is a clip that is riveted to the donor brake lines that you need to keep. I can't find this bugger anywhere. The only riveted brackets I could find were on the fuel lines. I may have to make a bracket later. After the rear end and drive-shaft were off, it was time to remove the engine and transmission.

Me and B-Zone get ready.










The engine has been conquered!










...and as you can see here, I'm all done with the kit and ready to hit the road!

Suspension pics

Here are the front struts still attached to the brake assembly.

Here is where they came from! Nothing left in the front but the engine!

Here you can see the rear end lying on the ground with the shock disconnected and springs removed.

Spench'n

Josh M came over today and we knocked out the front and rear suspension. We came up with a pretty great plan that will eliminate the need for an engine hoist at this stage of the game. Which means that I can get the tear-down done quicker. Although the suspension was a pretty big triumph, it came at a price.
1. I banged my wrist and it's swollen up now :-(
2. I had to spend $122 on tools (I knew this was coming though)
3. Josh cut his finger trying to get the driveshaft bolts off.
4. I broke my camera.

The night came to a close around 10:45 when we both needed to get some other things done. All in all very successful. The rear end is mostly disconnected and the front suspension is totally off.

I was taking some pictures at the end of the night and dropped my camera which broke the zoom lens and now it is stuck closed. DOH! I'll upload some pics tomorrow - meanwhile go vote in my poll from the last post!

The important stuff

This may be jumping ahead...a bit, but now that I've ordered the kit, the important stuff can be dealt with. Like the color!! So I set up a poll on the right for the best color scheme. Please vote! One thing to bear in mind is that black paint will show flaws in the body much more evidently than white paint. And since I am working the body myself, there could be a few of those!

Black w/ Red. This is pretty close to what I would do. Notice the pinstripe on the outside of the main stripes. My roll bars will be black.






White & Black. The main difference I would do here, mine would have black stripes and probably no black rock-guard.






White & Blue. The main difference here is that my car would not be a die-cast model. Lol. This one is really awesome, but I would have to chrome the roll bars later because they are coming in black.

We've taken the next step.

Tonight we ordered the kit although our breakfast nook, dining room, guest room, and office all remain without furniture (Chris and I had agreed that furnishing the house would come first). Factory Five announced today that for the next 100 kits ordered there would be a $2000 discount, and we simply couldn't pass that up.

Maybe I should win some kind of good wife award for being supportive and flexible. This award should come from Cartier. Also, Chris should de-ice my car every morning this winter since he'll be using my parking spot in the garage.

We should know shortly what the estimated kit delivery date is, and there will definitely be a party!

Bunch more stuff

I got started working on the car today after I did some yardwork. First I removed the shifter, then climbed underneath and pulled off the transmission wiring harness. Then I pulled off a bunch of other stuff like the hood release latch & cable, and the fuel evaporative canister. Then Brandon came over and we started working on the exhaust. While he broke some bolts loose on that, I removed the E-brake handle. We had to run to the store to buy a hack-saw to remove the exhaust. We got all the exhaust off from the H pipe back, but it's pretty much impossible to get the next section off until the suspension is off.

So, next I"m going to do the suspension then finish up the exhaust, then pull the engine and transmission. Then do the rear end and the gas tank. After that it's just a little bit of cleanup and time to find someone to get rid of the frame.

Front Harness

Brandon came over to work on the car for a couple of hours this afternoon. I didn't have much time because I need to get some work done, but we got some good stuff done in a short time. First we got the speedometer sending unit off/out of the transmission and stored away safely. It's a pretty neat looking gizmo, but I haven't taken a picture yet. I'll probably forget, but if I don't I'll post it up here.

After that we removed the clutch cable, throttle cable, and cruise control cables. Then we removed the front harness. I have had a pretty good time removing all the wiring so far. I just hope I'm able to figure out what I need to keep and what I don't, and get all that crap sorted out. Here is a shot of all the wiring hanging up. There isn't much left. Engine wiring and transmission wiring is about all.

Little stuff

I had about 4 or 5 hours of cobra time today. I was hoping Diana could work with me but she took allergy medicine and fell asleep :-/ Anyhow, I got the speakers pulled, the rear bumper off, the tail lights off, rear seat-belts out, the entire rear harness labeled and removed, and made an attempt at getting the convertible top off.

Here is the rear harness hanging up in the garage. I had to loop it over the hook 3 times to keep it from draping onto the garage floor. Now that the dash and rear harnesses are out, there are (almost) no wires behind the firewall. The exceptions to that all under the car - transmission, O2 sensors, gas tank, etc. So everything was going great and I had come to a point where I had to decide on what to do next. It was either front wiring harness or convertible top.

Tom had mentioned an interest in working on removing some wiring harnesses with me, although I expect he was mostly interested in the dash and rear harnesses which are now done (sorry), but that let me to work on the convertible top. I broke loose all the huge bolts and undid all of them. After working through some tool failure (ahem, the socket wrench) all the bolts were off and I decided to try to lift it out. The canvas top is connected to the car by the most retardulous design. You can't lift it up because the canvas is connected, and you can't undo the canvas because the thing is all sitting on top of it. Even after I pulled it up and rested it on the little back windows O_o I discovered another inconvenience - ford used crap nuts (yes folks, crap nuts) to hold the canvas on. They are something like 16mm 20 point nuts made of extremely soft plastic. Diana put it best when she said they might be made out of chocolate. I don't have anything that can get them off and I pretty much ruined one with a pair of pliers. It's irritating anyway because you can't expose the second one until the first one is off and you lift the top up more. Look at the picture of this crap nut.

One thing I do have going for me, is that I don't *NEED* the convertible top. So if I really can't get it off, I can just rip it out of there and throw it away - which is far more satisfying than just leaving it on there to get scrapped. Plus then I would have revenge on it for pissing me off.

So although I only got to check off 2 items for the donor list (fuel inertia cutoff switch and rear wiring harness) almost all the sellable items are off the car. Pretty much the only things left are the side skirts and the convertible top. The rear quarter panels are welded on unfortunately so I don't think I'll be getting them off. Now I just need a genius way to sell all this crap off...

Great news for Cobra buyers!

Last August, Factory Five announced that they were going to raise their prices since material costs had gone up. Gotta pass that cost on to the ol' customer. All September long it was posted on their site that prices were about to go up. I recently read a post from their president that says they are not going to raise prices due to the economic situation. They want to make the cars as affordable as possible.

This is obviously good news for me! As long as I can get my order in before prices do go up. They only require a $1000 deposit to start building, but you have to pay in full before they deliver. I might shoot them an email and find out how long it will take to build.

Panels & Interior dwindle

I was having so much fun pulling all the panels off that I deviated from the book a bit and yanked off the doors and front quarter panels. Once I have all the panels off, I will try to sell them on Craig's list as a package deal. If that doesn't work out, I'm going to be offering a deal to all you guys - anyone who sells one of the body panels gets a 50% cut of whatever they sell it for. You can't hardly beat that! I really hate selling stuff so it's a good deal for everyone - plus it frees up precious space in my garage.

Speaking of freeing up space; Josh Minorics, a guy that works with Diana whom I recently met, and has a Cobra, and will soon be starting a 68 Stang project, came over yesterday to pick up some parts. We struck up a deal: parts for paint. He used to work in a body-shop and though I haven't seen his work yet, I'm sure it will be a much better paint job that I would have done! So he picked up the seats and A/C parts as well as some other bits and pieces like the console and dash. They were really just taking up space in my garage and as aforementioned, I hate selling stuff, so this works out great for both of us. So he came over, brought his torx 50 bit for the removing seat-belts and we hung out and had a brewski. He's a cool guy and seems very knowledgeable about such things.

The Dash

Tonight Diana and I finished disconnecting the dash and got that sucker out! It was tricky trying to disconnect the wires while it's still on, but they aren't really long enough to remove the dash first - so you have to 'work the nessie' - if you will...
Here is my helper disconnecting a bolt that she could get to better with her small hands.

Mid-Term Pics

So I'm not quite HALF way done yet, but I feel like half the car is off. So I'm calling this the mid-term.

And here is a shot of some of the stuff piled up in the garage - I need to get rid of some of this stuff asap.

Pedal Box, Steering Column, Random prep

Working under the dash is quite a bit more painful now with the carpeting and seating out - there are some 2 inch studs sticking out where the seats attached that can really do a number on your back while you are working under there. Just the same, victory was attained against the pedals yesterday (once we abandoned trying to interpret the archaic factory five manual in favor of just figuring it out ourselves).

We also pulled the steering column out and removed the gauge cluster. After that we started the next step of removing the computer, but it can't be gotten to until we remove the A/C ducts and fan motor - so we started pulling off the dash to get to all that stuff. While Brandon removed dash bits, I worked on disconnecting the A/C lines in the engine bay. Those little spring lock connectors are a REAL pain when you don't have much room to work.

So a lot was done yesterday, but out of all those steps, I still need to pull the computer and still need to get the steering wheel off the steering column. It seems like it's pressed on there and I'm having some real trouble getting it off.

Lots of stuff getting done! I'll upload some pictures tonight.

Interior & Fuel Lines

The next step is cleaning out the interior - I've really been looking forward to this step! While I waited for Tom to come over to help me with the fuel lines left over from the last step, I started unbolting the seats. The rear bolts go through to the underside of the car and were extremely rusty. I had a very very hard time breaking these loose and unscrewing them. When I finally finished, I set the seats down in the garage facing the driveway and sat down in one to drink a beer. Right about then, Tom showed up. Tom had the idea of relieving the fuel pressure at the fuel pump; instead of by cutting the lines, we would just disconnect them. Sounded like a good idea, and Tom volunteered to take this task on. It went quite well, very anticlimactically actually. The manual is very unclear about which parts of the fuel line we need to reuse, so we decided not to cut anything at this time.

With the fuel lines dealt with, it was time to get the back seat out of the car. After hurting my back trying to brute force the seat out, we resorted to the Chilton's manual for instructions. This guide has already proved itself extremely valuable. Here is a picture Diana took of Tom and I disconnecting the center console.

After we finished with that, we pulled the carpet out. One word: NASTY. It was pretty disgusting, smelly, and just plain out gross. Tom even ran into a wet bit of carpet - I can't even begin to imagine what the heck that was.

Once we finished with the carpet, console, and seats, we pulled out the aftermarket stereo cables and had another beer while relaxing on the front seats. I gotta tell you, these seats are actually very very comfortable. Like little mini couches.

Uh Oh

Last night Diana and I tackled a few smaller tasks in the engine bay; disconnecting sensors and cables, labelling connectors, etc. We pulled the horns out too - unfortunately one of the connectors broke, but I'll worry about that later. Everything was going great until we got to *dun dun dun* cut the fuel lines. Well, we paused on that step because the fuel lines are still pressurized. Tom is going to come over on Wednesday, that way there will be someone to put the flames out and drive me to the hospital when my face catches on fire.

Steering Rack

Brandon came over today to help me remove the steering rack. I showed Brandon where the bolt was to disconnect the rack from the steering column itself and he popped that one off pretty quick. Next we had to remove the tie rods. It seemed like it would be a pretty easy job until we got the dust boots off and saw the size of the tie rod itself. I didn't even have a wrench big enough to fit around it! Off to the auto-parts store (I remembered to buy some gojo while I was there - finally!)

Well, one really big wrench later, we had one of the inner tie rod disconnected from the steering rack. While I worked on the 2nd one, Brandon started working on popping the outer tie rod out of the spindle on the wheel. You do this by hitting it real hard with a hammer - there just isn't much room under there. The instructions specifically say to use a dead blow hammer but since I don't have one, we just started whacking it with a metal hammer. Well, I got the other tie rod off with no trouble and we decided to remove some body panels to give us more swinging room with the hammer. No avail. Before we bent the tie rod bolt up too bad, we decided to go buy a dead blow hammer; trip #2 to the store :-( Every time I spend money on something unexpected, I feel the cobra kit purchase getting further and further away. Sadness.

Anyhow, when we got back, we took the front wheels off and could really get a solid whack on it. unfortunately, the deadblow hammer was too soft and started breaking apart. So I took the metal hammer to it one last time and with a huge 'this sucker is coming off one way or another' swing, broke it loose. Victory! We got everything pulled off and out with no problems from there. Another successful step toward finishing the donor teardown. I really need to stop at some point and clean all these parts up. But that probably wont really happen until I'm waiting for the kit to arrive with nothing else to do.

Anyhow, here is a picture of the front of the car as it is now. The big pieces removed are: radiator, master cylinder, hydrobooster, condensor, steering rack, body panels, wheel wells, and wheels.

Step 3: ABS

When I got home from work today, I mowed the yard and double checked my diagrams for the Antilock Brake System. I decided it would be easiest to remove if I pulled a few of the A/C lines. So I mapped out the Engine bay portion of the A/C and then discovered that you need a special tool to disconnect those lines...I'll worry about that later. So instead I decided to pull the Intake off. It was REALLY dirty, I doubt that is as been cleaned in 20,000 miles. There were leaves and tape wrapped around it haha!

So after I finished that, Diana got home and helped me to get the ABS unit out. I cut the brake lines while Diana unscrewed the mounting bracket. We drained it out and lowered it down without much fuss. Well...I turned the steering wheel so we could get better access to the unit and a good bit of brake fluid pumped out onto the floor. No prob I threw the 'nasty towel'* on it - should be soaked up in no time. We labeled the ABS unit and then cleaned up. Now it's time to eat!


* The nasty towel is what I have used to cleanup all the spilled radiator coolant/power steering fluid/brake fluid etc. It has this weird attribute of never drying out. It keeps absorbing, but never gets drippy. It stinks pretty bad though :-P