Sajeev writes:
Have I told you that I love you? Very, very much? Well it’s true, as your questions are the lifeblood of the column I envisioned many moons ago. And that’s why I’m again asking for your help to keep it running. Otherwise I’ll be forced to continue progress on my Edelbrock crash cymbal.
Yes, I took an air cleaner lid and put it on my drum rack. Yes, it sounds even worse than it looks, even after a fair bit of hammering. And if you people don’t start refilling my query coffers (sajeev@thetruthaboutcars.
Trust me, you don’t want to hear about that. It doesn’t end well for either of us, I assure you. Please!
Help me from going off the rails! Send me damn near any question you have about your car, your dream car, or any theoretical technical question about cars that’s always stirred your mind organ.
If you want “New or Used”, email Steve directly at steve.lang@thetruthaboutcars.com.
Send your queries to sajeev@thetruthaboutcars.
Per your request…..
-Nate
Okay, as a drummer, that looks cool as hell. Probably doesn’t sound the best (but trashy, which is cool), but still, that’s bad-ass.
Another drummer here… Love the idea of the Edelbrock crash. I bet it would sound like a China hat. Tell us more about your kit…
Also, in the meantime, can you advise me on how to stuff a turbo Ecotec into my Pontiac G6?
LS4 swap. Duh.
Oh dayum, he went there.
And a magical transmission that won’t grenade very other year?
Duh, indeed. Silly me…
The kit is a 7-piece Pearl Masters Custom, I am quite happy with it after a bit of reconditioning. Even better, I bought it for $500 so it fits in LeMons rules.
5 piece Ludwig Accent (the old ones before they cheaped them out), jazz sizes. Zildjian hats, crashes and ride, a Sabian 8″ crash and a China hat made in… China!
Sounds like a trash can lid. Love it.
I like that kit. Honestly I have “dream” (IIRC) branded hi-hats from China and they are quite fantastic.
No, it doesn’t sound like a China yet…but if I don’t get a nice fat stack of Piston Slap queries, I might be hammering it to the point it does sound like that.
Okay, here’s a quickie for us ’80s car types: how to replace old preformed, tight-radius-bend, rubber air and coolant hoses that are NLA from the manufacturer? I rigged up a 90-degree bend using a brass elbow and some regular rubber hose, but that won’t work in every situation.
There are numerous silicone hose fabricators on the internet that might have products that would work. They will also last much longer than rubber. For example: http://www.siliconehose.com/ If their off-the-shelf stuff doesn’t work they can create something custom.
I replaced the crappy fabric wrapped rubber vacuum hoses in my B5 Passat with silicone hose after the originals started to rot and fall apart.
How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
Why do we drive on parkways and park on driveways?
Is a toll road still a “free”way?
Can a parenthetical question only truly be asked by a parent?
What is your evil twin Sanjeev up to these days?
Maybe go back to running a school and don’t use those tired nuggets of wit on the kids or they’ll revolt. By revolt I mean they’ll all tweet mean things about you quietly and then ignore their lessons.
Aren’t you a ray of sunshine.
I’m not on contract right now, but thanks for playing.
I think you meant to send those questions to Worried Wordsmith or Lexical Lacuna!
I’m under the impression that English is more prone to this sort of thing than other languages.
If you’re smart you’ll keep those damned woodchucks and their busy, busy teeth away from your vehicles. It did make for an interesting conversation with my insurance agent though.
Are you sure they weren’t ordinary wood rats (aka pack rats)? They like to chew rubber, wood, and plastic too, even coolant hoses, but are especially damaging to electrical insulation. Wood chucks are a type of groundhog.
Oh I know packrats and I know woodchucks. Also packrats are much less likely to send my wife tearing back into the house yelling about “some kind of beaver-looking animal under the car.”
Near as I can figure, this guy hitched a ride in the engine compartment and then spent the night in the garage. He took out 90% of the wiring under the hood, various vacuum hoses, fuel line, and surprisingly even an AC line. He got in on some external damage as well by climbing on top of the car and sliding off leaving claw marks in the clear coat. He must have climbed up the garage door tracks and dropped down on top of the car to accomplish that feat.
I’m still waiting for the Vellum Venom on the Ford Sierra ;)
Also I’m thinking about scrapping/selling my Sierra project car, as there will always be too much work left on it, and the body is rusting apart faster than I can find time and money to build a proper garage for it. I could enter that as a question formally for ‘piston slap’ if you like ?
It will be VV’d after I finish a big project on it. Feel free to formally ask your question, it might be fun.
I’ll give it a try, but I’m not sure it will be coherent enough to use…I’m a complex (but simple) soul ;)
How can the Fox body be re-purposed for the 21st century?
i.e. engine/transmission swaps, interior mods/upgrades, brake upgrades etc.
Oh boy you’ve opened a fair bit of can-o-worms stuff there.
Easy answer would be a coyote swap backed with a nice TKO and a full on Maximum Motorsports front suspension set-up with SN95/New edge spindles/brakes with a Terminator IRS swap out back if your so inclined.
Moving up the nuck’n futs scale you could scour the world for a wrecked 2013/14 GT500 and swap in the 5.8 backed by a TKO or T56 slap an OD blower pulley and OD crank pulley on with full exhaust and lay down a tire destroying 700+ horsepower in a very dependable package.
The former would make for a dandy road course car as the coyote is a bit lighter than the already light 5.0 HO these cars cam with.
The latter even in all aluminum trim is a minimum 75-100 pounds heavier than the stock V8 so its more of a street bruiser or 1/4 mile car.
In either case sub-frame connectors, a good roll bar/cage and torque box enhancements will be called for as even the Coyote in base trim puts out enough grunt to mangle a fox car.
Nice post! I was just making s*it up off the top of my head.
Matt Farah of The Smoking Tire has been doing an “upgraded for the 21st century” fox body mustang project, seems pretty cool.
e-mail submitted
Trifecta Tune. All that?
I got two questions. One for each car! I will Email as soon as I have some time.
Methinks your about to unleash a flurry of TTAC-reader questions and inquiries. I applaud you for opening the floodgates.
Enjoy your sleepless nights, Sajeev! Lol!
(Psst: Most people count sheep. I recommend counting ’96-’01 beige Camrys :)
….and….
Done. There you go.
miata ride tuning sent
About 30 queries in the hopper, that’s a lot of weeks to cover now. Thank you all for supporting the madness that is TTAC’s Piston Slap, I truly appreciate it.
Now I just have to wait and see where I am in the queue. ARGH! I’m Gen X and I hate waiting! I need instant gratifaction! ;-)
Aw, I was gonna ask “Why the heck would one wheel’s TPMS not work for a year then suddenly start working fine?” My car seems to heal check engine lights and TPMS problems on its own.
CALIBERS ARE SUPERNATURAL.