Build Thread 1978 Mercury Cyclone. The pig is in the pen.

droopie85gt said:

Dude, I am from Memphis, TN. You don't think I thought of that? Get some ZIP ties and a grocery bag and ZIP tie the bag over the neck. It will work..trust me. Of course, have an open flame nearby in case you getting any leaks. And before you start, say the opening stanza to the Redneck National Anthem,

"Hey Y'all, WATCH THIS!!!!!"

Click to expand...

madmike1157 said:

It's my 3 day weekend. Just like the three day weekend that I get every other week now.
Other than bragging about that (which if you know me, you'd know that that would be the LAST thing I'd want to do....),
That leaves me with the arduous task of having to come up with a plan to fill it.

Somewhere in this span of days,..working on some neglected part of this house will corrupt one whole day (I'm thinking Sunday).
On Monday at 8:30 AM we sit with the builder to lay out our electrical and cable and basically commit ourselves to the build of the new house. I'm thinking that that will last through the morning,..so Only Monday PM will remain to do anything car related.

And I so hate having to cram anything into just a part of a day.....

That leaves today to get any serious work done to the Monster...

Now I know that if you've been following this build, you've got to be thinking: " But I thought he was finished with that thing?"
Fair assumption,...and to that I'd just remark:

Is anybody ever finished with one of these things?

Uhhh........

The fuel delivery bridge hasn't been crossed. I'm thinking that I'm gonna eliminate the ball valve altogether and substitute a piece of braided hose in it's place. The problem with that is how it'll look when I'm done. ( well,.....that and the fact that I don't intend to drain the tank while I do this).....That'll probably be the real problem with this endeavour...But I'm up for it,..I gotta plan.

Depending on how pssed off I am (and how bad I smell like gas) after this,..that leaves a few odd/ends that have to be done that are far too easy for me to blow off..
I just have to force myself to do these or I'll be driving the thing with those little odd/ends incomplete forever.

Boring things things like:

Install the visors...6 screws.
Paint, and install the dash trim pieces.
Run the gold pinstripe tape around the inside of the right front rim.
Figure out how to get the dome light (that caused me to dimple the roof) to illuminate.
Build the passenger side end cap and trim.......(This will probably be one of the last things I do....)
Sand, mask, and paint the grille mesh satin black on the G gills. (Maybe this will never get done).

Then of course there are the things that'll be way too easy to resist:

Driving the car around and letting it self tune.
Re calibrating the speedo so that btch wont be 7 mph off.

Then there are the "necessaries" for continued driving:

Adjusting the rockers one final time to make sure that they are lashed properly. (Till the next time I decide to re-adjust the lash, however long that'll be)
Evacuating and charging the AC system.
Finding out why the mode switch doesn't change the vent assignment when switching the switch. (right now,..only blows through main vents) Great for A/C,...sucks ass for heat.

Then,......there's this:

I've got cracking going on under Dave's paint on the trunk deck. Big, cracking/shrinking happening under the finish that will no doubt compromise the top coat some day. All I think that's missing to finish it off is a day sitting in the Alabama summer sun.

More, and more it looks to me like the Monster will have some future date in a paint booth. With me dimpling the roof, and now the crazing that is going on (tells me that Mike's prep/body work didn't like the solvents that soaked into them when it was painted),..there's some distant date w/ a two tone in the Monster's future..

C'est la Vie.

I'm going down stairs.

Click to expand...

madmike1157 said:

Ok,...midterm update (while I wash the gas smell off of me).

The fuel blockage had nothing to do with the ball valve.

It had everything to do w/ the red kote gas tank liner I used to seal the welded up holes in the tank. Whether or not some of that got into the pick up while I was sloshing it around, or some of it broke off and found it's way into it, it was 75% blocked.
When I opened the ball valve this morning, only a trickle of gas was running out of a 1/2" diameter hole was pouring all over me.

I removed the ball valve to discover that the 90 degree fitting was almost completely blocked up by this junk. Removing the 90 degree fitting revealed that the blockage was before that. (and this is all while what ever gas flow was running out that hole).
I put my 10 gallon drain pain under the tank, and got one of my 3/8" diameter, long flex bits and started threading the thing into the hole and all of the sudden freed the blockage. This was of course followed by a gushing stream of gas typical of what you'd expect if you put a 1/2" hole in your full gas tank.

Fortunately, I was able to transfer the drain pan out after it had reached capacity other wise I'd have a gigantic gas spill to deal with.

This is what was puked out of the fuel line:


It's all back together now. I checked the flow and it's all good. I wonder if the fact that the pump was starving will change fuel pressure now to the point of affecting the tune? Guess I'll find out today.

The finished delivery system still looks jacked, but it is what it is. Compared to the big long -8 hose that was there before,.this is a better looking solution.

Click to expand...