--------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00015 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 08:39pm \/To: ROY J. TELLASON (Read 0 times) Subj: Battery sizes -=> Quoting Roy J. Tellason to Alan Morrison <=- RJT> I've seen the Exide spec sheets on their overall automotive product AM> I am curious about the sizes of a few batteries if you still AM> have it. RJT> I don't have it, but I could probably get my hands on one... Nevermind Roy. While at WalMart one day I noticed they had a real application manual, with the specs in front. There were some group sizes mentioned on here that I wasn't familiar with. Now that I've refresshed my memory, and checked out the unfamiliar numbers my curiosity is satisfied. RJT> guess it's just too much trouble for some people to check the water RJT> level from time to time. Too many people buy that "maintenance free" RJT> stuff, and as far as I'm concerned there ain't no such thing. I never need to add any water to my batteries, but in a climate like AZ or with a regulator that overcharges, you sure would. I've read the details on the Delco method of keeping the liquid in the battery and was impressed that it was much more than I expected. I had previously thought it was just a long vent route or similar, but it is more involved and has some scientific principles behind it. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00016 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 08:48pm \/To: ROY WITT (Read 0 times) Subj: Camaros -=> Quoting Roy Witt to Alan Morrison <=- AM> I wasn't sure if they sold 302's to the public in '67. They did in AM> '68 and '69 as I looked at a few '69 Z/28's before finding a 350 AM> RS/SS. RW> Yes, they did sell them in 67. I'm not so sure there were 302 Z's in RW> 69 though...could be. I bought a 68 RS/SS396 in January of 68 and it RW> cost $4300 bucks. That was a lot of money for a car in those days. I saw where they were sold in '67 and yes, they were in '69 also, which was what I searched for a while, before giving up on finding a good one for less than $3000 dollars (which as you say was a lot of money then). Some have appreciated after all these years; The bad part is the cost of parts has also. AM> BTW there were a LOT of fake Z/28's then. Every time I looked at AM> one I would check all the badges (some would forget the interior AM> ones) and finally look for the 12 bolt. RW> This wasn't so if they were new...right? Oh, no, these were used vehicles I was referring to. I was a teen working for peanuts during this time and couldn't afford a new one. Besides at the time the ones to have, were the hot '70 and earlier models. I can still remember the first '69 Camaro I saw as a kid, of an age to be real interested in cars. A bright shiny, new Canary (?) Yellow one that was parked in the church lot. Could walk around and check it out, which was a treat because we lived out from the city where even Corvettes were rare. AM> Oh for the days of 100 octane gas and high-compression, AM> high-reving V8's. RW> There was a mid-western gas that was 105 octane (c1965). It was RW> purple colored, so you wouldn't mistake it for something else, I RW> guess. I never saw anything like that on the west coast. Around that time we lived near a recently abandoned air strip that belonged to the owner of our subdivision. We had a minibike that we would drive out there and empty the hose of aviation fuel into the tank, and could ride for quite a while on that. The stuff was a light green color and had a different odor than most gasoline. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00017 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 09:45pm \/To: PAT BREEDEN (Read 0 times) Subj: 1987 Chrysler -=> Quoting Pat Breeden to All <=- PB> Here's another problem with my mom's 1987 Chrysler. The electronic PB> odometer quit working and now just shows ------ blank... Not sure about this... If it lights up blanks it has juice but no info is supplied by what feeds it. If it does not light at all it may just be a supply wire off. Come to think of it, a wire from the the feed may do this too. Follow the speedometer cable from the transmission to where it goes into the device that converts revolutions into an electric signal. Then see if it has good connections on each end. It should output some voltage when spun at sufficient RPM. Also the cable itself may need replacing. PB> The driver's side electric window quit working and I was just PB> wondering what the steps are to remove the inside door panel PB> to get at the motor and guts inside the door? I once had an 87 Cordoba that had an electric window that wouldn't roll up. You could manually raise and lower it if you could get a grip on it. I don't remember if you heard the motor running when you pressed the switch but it was the bushing between the motor and the driven shaft. I removed the door panel, but it was years ago. Best I recall, the arm rest, and handles have some screws to remove. Then just go around the perimeter of the door panel with a thin screwdriver or similar, until you encounter a fastener. There are probably several nylon push-in fasteners that can be carefully coaxed from their holes. Be careful to not damage the panel, the fasteners are old enough to be hard and may break. Most auto parts stores carry replacements in their 'Motormite' or 'Help' sections. Once inside on mine, it had about a 2" diameter nylon bushing around the motor shaft. The nylon was wasted and one was not available from the dealer. The shape of the hole was such that a thickness of small wheel weight would fill the gap. Since lead is malleable, a little coercion with a mallet shaped them to fit the space. This worked flawlessly for the remainder of the time I owned the POS. Did I mention this car made me fix something different every week. Well almost; the previous owner did not take care of it so it needed a lot of work. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00018 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 10:05pm \/To: ROY J. TELLASON (Read 0 times) Subj: 325i -=> Quoting Roy J. Tellason to TOM WALKER <=- TW> That is Right, they were, They have a V-8 and a V-12 though TW> but NO V-6. At least as of last years models. RJT> Once I realized what I was looking at, I didn't blame them for not RJT> wanting to move it out of there -- it was a V-16 engine! RJT> Dunno who made it or what it was supposed to go into, though. Cadillac had V16 power way back about 1930. These were one of the top- of-the-line, luxury touring cars of the era, and were probably killed by the depression. RJT> I'll bet that thing had one *hell* of an interesting power curve! I don't remember the spces, but typically long stroke, large displacement engines that had a lot of torque and very little horsepower. Best I can recall they were in the neighborhood of 450 cubes and near 100 HP. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00019 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 10:11pm \/To: ROY WITT (Read 0 times) Subj: 325i -=> Quoting Roy Witt to Martin Bishop <=- MB> speed of that car is only around 120 mph, the dash reads all the way MB> up to 140???? and in most camaros it reads only up to 80 or whatever MB> [the late 80's camaros]. Mid 80's American cars... as per federal mandate. RW> My 1970 Firebird goes to 160, it never did nor will it ever see that. The 1975 Monza shows 120 but is made such that straight down is 140, which it has seen... once. RW> My 1988 IROC Camaro goes to 120...It's seen that and more. They changed somewhere between 1986 and 1987 then since my '85 has the 85 MPH unit. At 85 the tach is on about 2400. I took it to over 4000 in OD once, although I don't think the TCC was locked. Best estimate is around 145 mph. Does that sound about right for a well broken-in 5.0 TPI? --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00020 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 10:31pm \/To: ROY WITT (Read 0 times) Subj: American Sports Car -=> Quoting Roy Witt to John Pummill <=- RW>> Seen any of te Panoz cars yet? The builder must have an in RW>> at Ford, since it uses a lot of Ford parts, engine and RW>> chassis... JP> Not yet, I guess it will be like the Detomasso ?? (Pantera) DeTomaso Pantera. RW> I'm not sure the engine is mounted behind the driver...could be, but RW> the coupe I have a picture of has the looks of an RX7 and looks like RW> it might have enough room up front for the engine.. They are mid-engined with a 351 and a transaxle. Looks pretty close to a race car setup... I saw one once at a car show with the bonnet up. BTW, there may be one in the San Diego Auto Museum. It has some late 1800 and early 1900 autos, but also some later ones and sporting types. RW> ... San Diego - Home of fast Chevrolets and good-lookin' women. Do you have that backwards? Oh, I noticed SD's Corvette Diner over on 5th Avenue (?) closed up. Saw it in a magazine recently, and had forgotten about it. It was a fifties style malt/burger joint with good food and a pricey menu. It had a late fifties or early sixties Vette in it, and lots of memorabilia. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00021 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 10:43pm \/To: KENNY HENDERSON (Read 0 times) Subj: American Sports Car -=> Quoting Kenny Henderson to Roy Witt <=- RW>If that's the case, the difference is minimal. The Viper has 275/40x17 RW>tires all around, and the C5 has 245/40x17's up front and 275/40x17's RW> out back. KH> I'm pretty sure the Viper's tires are wider then that. Also, you may KH> want to double check those C5 tire sizes as well. A Viper I saw ('94 GTS) had 275/40 ZR17 in front and 335/35 ZR17 in back. The '97 C5 shows the fronts as 245/45ZR17 on 8.5" rims. The rears step up to a 275/40ZR18 on 9.5 x 18" aluminum rims. All C5 tires are GoodYear Eagle Run-Flats. The export C5's get magnesium wheels, of unkown dimensions, but probably the same sizes. BTW, if anybody is interested in a Viper vs Vette shootout, I have an article from a specialty magazine I could post. It has Lingenfelters '90 ZR1 and a Venom 600 Viper among other contestants. One of these turned in a 134 mph 1/4 mile speed. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00022 Date: 12/26/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 11:35pm \/To: TOM WALKER (Read 0 times) Subj: American Sports Car -=> Quoting TOM WALKER to ROY WITT <=- -> Else where in this echo, Alan and I were discussing 302's built by -> Chevrolet, back in the late sixties. TW> Didn't GM fairly well Successfully RACE those 320's ? I think they TW> produced the Street Car despite it's drawbacks because of the TW> Requirement of Qualifying as a Stock Car fro racing. The Chevy 302's and Mark Donahue won the championship in 1969. Despite having less torque than the 350, it was a well respected street car in '69 commanding much higher resale than the 350 equipped versions. They had four-bolt mains, solid lifters, forged pistons with 11.5 compression and about a 7000 RPM redline. The only 350 that had all these goodies was the 370 horse LT-1. TW> And didn't FORD do the same thing with their HEMI V-8. Sell enough TW> to the Public to qualify it as a Stock Car? I've only seen one. It was sitting in a local race-car shop on a stand. I never saw one on the street, but remember reading about some Boss 429 Mustangs and (I think) either Fairlanes or Torinos. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00023 Date: 12/27/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 12:17am \/To: JACK NELSON (Read 0 times) Subj: Battery Terminals -=> Quoting Jack Nelson to Tom Walker <=- CGM> Why do cars now have battery terminals made of steel instead CGM> of lead, TW> The biggest reason is COST of the terminal itself I would TW> suspect. Bean Counters RULE detroit nowdays. TW> So do my Subaru's. BUT they are built in American Factories under TW> Heavy American Bean Counter influance. :-) :-) JN> Then why are there steel instead of lead terminal connectors on JN> my wife's made-in-Japan Toyota LS400, commonly known as a Lexus? JN> No American influence there, only German. :-) Some are convinced any poorly designed part must somehow be the fault of a US company, even on a Japanese designed vehicle. BTW, my 23 year old Chevy with the sidepost terminals still have the factory tinned copper terminals encased in polymer. --- Blue Wave/386 v2.20 [NR] * Origin: River Canyon Rd. BBS Chattanooga, Tn (1:362/627) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 246 AUTOMOTIVE Ref: EGZ00024 Date: 12/27/97 From: ALAN MORRISON Time: 09:39pm \/To: ALL (Read 0 times) Subj: Panoz Roadster Friday, November 15, 1996