Random Thoughts... [Automotive Edition]

If Dodge ever make a hybrid Challenger, they should call it the Challenger Angel. 1.7L engine, 77kw battery, MPGe 77.
 
Charging the battery in the car is perfectly safe - over here, many car battery chargers come with harnesses to permanently install in the car to allow for in car charging via a quick connect plug. You can even buy units that permanently install in the car and you just plug and extension cord into, like an electric block heater.

I have several older/collector cars. Each one of them has a battery MAINTAINER attached to it. A maintainer monitors the battery's state of charge and turns itself off when maximum charge is attained. Using maintainers, I don't have to worry about whether or not my cars will have enough power to start - and - the batteries seem to last much longer when they're attached to one of these. Modern maintainers can also differentiate between 6 and 12 volt systems without being physically 'switched', which is very handy if you have a 6 volt car like my 1951 Chevy.

As to whether or not you disconnect one or both of the battery cable terminals when the maintainer is attached is up to the owner. I've done it both ways and can't see any difference. Good quality maintainers (for example: Battery Tender or Schumacher) just aren't that expensive - usually in the $50-$60 range. Compare that to the price of new batteries today (almost every one well upwards of $100) and the maintainers make perfect sense. I've been using these for well over 10 years and have never had a problem.

Edit: Being the OCD guy that I am, I also have maintainers on both of my riding lawn mowers...

SL
 
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MKX had a pretty swanky brown leather interior in one of the 2016 Black Label themes.

xM2GMk3.png

:drool: I love the lincoln interiors. Continental interior is one of the very nicest I've ever been in, up with the new XC90 and current S-Class.
 
Was doing suspension work on a friend's first-gen Xterra, which basically ensures that if you're doing anything to the control arm you're going to have to cut at least one of the UCA bolts as they almost always have frozen into the bushing sleeves.

There's no room to fit a grinder so you're stuck sawzall-ing through a big-ass hardened suspension bolt and sleeve, twice. After 30 minutes of sawing with a good-quality metal-cutting blade, the blade was completely toast and I'd only made it 1/3 of the way through the first cut.

I swung by HD and saw they had these Freud Diablo blades with carbide teeth. A bit pricey compared to the normal blades and a thicker kerf, ($12 for a 6" blade) but oh man, 100% worth it.

Diablo_Steel_Demon.jpg


I'm totally blown away. That blade tore through the bolts and sleeves in ~20 seconds per cut, even with my cheapo Mastercraft sawzall. I'm not sure I could have gone that fast with a grinder, it was amazing. Plus, the blade looks as good as new. If you find yourself needing to hack through thick metal in small spaces, grab one of those, it'll be your new best friend.

The above post came in handy this past weekend. The local Pick N Pull chain was having a half off sale, thomas and I had located a suitable Jeep ZJ to pull the steering box from (to fix the horrible stock Cadillac variable steering ratio box through replacement) and I had neither the time nor inclination nor ability due to my recovering injuries to sit there trying to pop the Pittman arm off. Or for that matter try to separate a ball joint in what turned out to be artificially tight quarters. I did, however, have a borrowed Ryobi reciprocating saw and I recalled the post about the Diablo blades. I duly went to Home Despot and grabbed one of the above blades plus some others from the same outfit for cutting plastic and light sheet steel. (Yes, there's a very good reason why we didn't just get a rebuilt ZJ box off the shelf - will eventually post up on thomas' Caddy thread about that.)

Get down to the junkyard and while the steering box and Pittman arm aren't blocked, the way they've put the ZJ on its supports means that there's no way in hell I would be able to get the tie rod off the Pittman arm let alone get the arm off the box. Turned out that Diablo blade is even more ridiculously effective than previously mentioned. In order to get the box out, I cut the tie rod - through the adjuster sleeve.



It went through 30mm or so of (tempered?) steel in somewhere between 5-10 minutes and was none the worse for wear afterwards. That was absolutely astonishing.
 
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Holy crap, that's a way worse job than I was using that blade for. Glad my recommendation helped!

Good call not getting a remanned ZJ box, 99% of them are garbage.
 
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Holy crap, that's a way worse job than I was using that blade for. Glad my recommendation helped!

Good call not getting a remanned ZJ box, 99% of them are garbage.

Yeah, this was the lowest miles (I think 124k), newest year (98) and best looking box we could locate in the PNP system. It appeared to be either an original or a dealer replaced part as it still had a build sticker on it (which would vanish upon rebuild):

 
The above post came in handy this past weekend. The local Pick N Pull chain was having a half off sale, thomas and I had located a suitable Jeep ZJ to pull the steering box from (to fix the horrible stock Cadillac variable steering ratio box through replacement) and I had neither the time nor inclination nor ability due to my recovering injuries to sit there trying to pop the Pittman arm off. Or for that matter try to separate a ball joint in what turned out to be artificially tight quarters. I did, however, have a borrowed Ryobi reciprocating saw and I recalled the post about the Diablo blades. I duly went to Home Despot and grabbed one of the above blades plus some others from the same outfit for cutting plastic and light sheet steel. (Yes, there's a very good reason why we didn't just get a rebuilt ZJ box off the shelf - will eventually post up on thomas' Caddy thread about that.)

Get down to the junkyard and while the steering box and Pittman arm aren't blocked, the way they've put the ZJ on its supports means that there's no way in hell I would be able to get the tie rod off the Pittman arm let alone get the arm off the box. Turned out that Diablo blade is even more ridiculously effective than previously mentioned. In order to get the box out, I cut the tie rod - through the adjuster sleeve.



It went through 30mm or so of (tempered?) steel in somewhere between 5-10 minutes and was none the worse for wear afterwards. That was absolutely astonishing.

I'd have expected it to go quicker. I'm a true believer in those blades, and have never had a cut take more than a minute (except the time I was trying to cut through a rubber bushing with it). I suspect your sawzall of insufficient ass (or you weren't putting enough weight behind it)
 
I'd have expected it to go quicker. I'm a true believer in those blades, and have never had a cut take more than a minute (except the time I was trying to cut through a rubber bushing with it). I suspect your sawzall of insufficient ass (or you weren't putting enough weight behind it)

Both, actually. The saw was a basic 'blue' Ryobi One+ model and it was such tight quarters under the truck that I couldn't put much weight behind it - really only enough room for the saw, barely. Hence my astonishment at how fast it cut even under those circumstances.
 
Yeah, this was the lowest miles (I think 124k), newest year (98) and best looking box we could locate in the PNP system. It appeared to be either an original or a dealer replaced part as it still had a build sticker on it (which would vanish upon rebuild):


Good find, that'll be the original box - factory-installed boxes were -AB in '98, service boxes were -AD. Low miles, should last a long time.
 
Good find, that'll be the original box - factory-installed boxes were -AB in '98, service boxes were -AD. Low miles, should last a long time.

We're hoping so. That box is the inexpensive way to get the last 12.7:1 fixed ratio box that people pay a lot of money to retrofit to their older American cars. Basically, what this GIF demonstrates for the before and after:
ezgif.com-optimize.gif
 
Are the 90s panther steering boxes better than the 80s one that I?ve got?
 
Are the 90s panther steering boxes better than the 80s one that I?ve got?

IIRC that depends on what steering box you have. I remember the P71 and Handling and Performance Package cars having better steering boxes than standard civilian cars.
 
Are the 90s panther steering boxes better than the 80s one that I?ve got?

The 97-02 one is. However, it's not a direct drop in like the Jeep box is for the Cadillac or an all-factory-parts swap like putting a Saginaw pump and four-bolt Saginaw steering box in my Bronco (I have to swap in a Ford E-van pump, bracket and steering box plus use Excursion hoses). The box bolts up to the frame but you have to fab the linkage and fab the hoses.

http://www.idmsvcs.com/2vmod/suspension/front/gadget73/index.html

- - - Updated - - -

IIRC that depends on what steering box you have. I remember the P71 and Handling and Performance Package cars having better steering boxes than standard civilian cars.

Same box, they disabled the VRO (variable boost) system for more consistent steering effort.
 
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Good find, that'll be the original box - factory-installed boxes were -AB in '98, service boxes were -AD. Low miles, should last a long time.

Very glad to hear that. We've been looking for a good low milage ZJ donor for .. well almost a year basically. But they were all either fucked up, milage beyond believe, obviosuly leaking from a mile away, or just not there so far. But now when Spectre prepared for this trip to the yard due to the sale, and the matter came up yet again, I was pleasently surprised to find 5 ZJs sitting in this specific yard, and not too long either. I did some Google VIN research and found 2 of the trucks. One was the donor here. It was a truck that looked to be in very mint condition when it was auctioned off locally just a week or two before it was listed on the junkyard, and it had a listed 124k miles on it. So this was the one I had Spectre take the closest look at after also checking all the others. And then he sent me pics from on site, with this sticker on there, and quick research reassured me that this is indeed the OEM box and a 12.7:1 box too (a '98 "BT" box). So we were looking at an OEM last year low milage (relatively...) box that didn't leak and was sitting in a truck that itself looked super mint, and apparently got traded in for some recycling bonus crash4clunkers kinda crap. Poor Jeep. But hey, I got a $32 steering box out of it :D. If anything I might have it resealed prior to installation in the Caddy, but I am not even sure that is neccessary.
 
I got screen shots of the above at the time and bookmarked it for future reference:





https://autoforwarder.com/en/detail/3560785-jeep-grand-cher-1998

My guess is that it either had the automatic transmission fail and/or it was traded in under the AirCheck Texas anti-smog program. When it got to the yard, the engine was marked with orange paint on the oil cap indicating the engine had been destroyed a la Cash For Clunkers.
 
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Would have been a great chassis donor for Rick I think ;)

Yeah, he could have swapped in his driveline. The ZJ and XJ are closely enough related that that can be done. Real shame, too - it looked to have been really clean and in good shape before it got to the yard, like someone had taken good care of it.
 
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