Dear Dick
Welcome!
First off, none of us keep the original lump of iron in our cars. Get a hot
wrench and cut that sucker outta there! Don't bother with the formality of
unbolting anything. No wonder you are having trouble keeping up with the
soccer moms on their cel phones in their SUV's full of screaming brats. You
need to buy the biggest displacement engine you can find, such as an Olds
442, Chevy 454, or a Ford 460. Be sure to mount a six-pack on top of which
ever one of those you choose, and straight pipe headers too, of course.
You'll need the automatic tranny that's attached to the engine from the
donor car. No one wants to screw around shifting gears in traffic. That's
no darn fun! And talk about a heavy clutch pedal. If any of the car's
frame members get in the way, just get out your blow torch and commence a
cuttin' Jethro. most of what's in there is superfluous and over-engineered
redundancy anyway. Just keep going until it fits. Your prop shaft will
have to be shortened to about 6". In fact, I don't even bother with a
driveshaft per se. I Just weld the tranny output shaft to the the pinion
shaft. Works like a charm every time! By the way, don't worry about that
rear end. That baby's got it where it counts! It'll take ALL the torque
you want to throw at it, and then some. However, in the very remote
possibility you should twist or even break an axle shaft, they are very
plentiful and inexpensive to replace. I'll bet now you're wondering if the
suspension can handle the weight. NO PROBLEM, rest easy. That's another
one of the many areas that are over-engineered in these cars. Oh yeah, and
you need to go to a forklift dealer and get solid tires too. Gosh, but we
had a long string on that, remember folks? Lastly, I suggest switching to
drum-brakes all the way around. They have far better fade resistance than
those silly disc brakes. My learned colleagues will no doubt advise you
further, but that should keep you humpin' for now...
Your new freind, Martin
Cooler, two steps ahead of the bill collector, but still having a bad day.
-----Original Message-----
From RichHed99 at aol.com [mailto:RichHed99@aol.com]
Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2000 11:56 AM
To: spridgets@autox.team.net
Subject: New to list/car trouble
Dear Spridget owners,
My name is Richard and I have a 68 Midget that looks to be seriously
modified, I guess the guy before me (don't know him bought car from a
garage)
really knew his stuff. However, some things just don't seem right about the
car. Maybe you can offer me some advice?
The car is supposed to be race tuned but really runs out of revs at about
5,500rpm and I tried changing from 4th to 3rd at 4,800 revs to get the revs
up in 4th but the wheels almost locked and the nose dived. The carb is
supposed to be a racing car carb and has squareish looking holes at the top
with flaps at the top. I though the flaps were slowing it down so removed
them but it made no difference.
The car is plain awkward to start and with the cooler weather here has got
harder and harder to get going. Any ideas?
The car seems a bit darty when you go fast and more wallowy when you go
slow.
The suspension looks complicated and I cant understand it. I put more air
pressure in the back tyres and less in the front to balance out the
dartiness
but haven't tried it out yet - will this work?
Whats all this stuff with roll bars I have a big bar near the back seats but
don't see how it can help the suspension unless it is the extra weight
giving
downforce and grip to the tyres.
How can I get the car to go faster? At the moment a lot of family cars seem
to overtake me?
Richard Head
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