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The "What Did You Work On Today" thread

3M views 36K replies 388 participants last post by  cerial 
#1 ·
4 hour work day for me at the shop. Used the time to do a valve body swap on a '01 Jetta 1.8t auto .... I successfully installed a transbrake on the car .... that however wasn't my intention.

Its in 2 gears at once in park, all other gears (R/N/D/2/1) are forward gears.... they all seam to be first gear.

I have it torn back down most of the way. Tuesday I'll actually get the VB back out and see whats up.... but part of me wants to take it out for a test drive the way it is just for the fun of it.
 
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#18,084 ·
Absolutely beautiful Pugsy. I do see you have moved a little of the body shop into the house. :D

John
When I remodeled my bathroom I used my body tools all the time. LOL I couldn't believe how much I used tools out of the garage on a long air hose. I used my 8" orbital ND 900 to sand down a filler on the floor before the vinyl flooring was installed. OMG the damn floor was ready for primer! LOL

Brian
 
#18,085 ·
When I remodeled my bathroom I used my body tools all the time. LOL I couldn't believe how much I used tools out of the garage on a long air hose. I used my 8" orbital ND 900 to sand down a filler on the floor before the vinyl flooring was installed. OMG the damn floor was ready for primer! LOL

Brian
I had the air line from the garage fed thru the door lock hole for the longest time.
I finally caved and bought a pancake compressor.
Now I'm trying to figure out how to shoot some latex touch ups on the newel posts with my little touch up spray gun. Got the tools in the garage, gotta use em'
 
#18,086 ·
John and I replaced both the rear axle brake lines, installed the master and bled the brakes on the '66.

I need to make a patch for the trunk seal channel on the extension panel. I had 1 rust hole and thought I would patch it. Today we started digging at it and the entire channel has little holes...:mad: I cut that channel off the replacement piece because it didn't match perfectly and I "thought" the channel was OK. Now I can't find the piece I cut off and may have taken it to scrap with some other crap a few weeks ago..:drunk: I have an outer rocker that looks like we can modify to work, but it's going to take a lot longer than if I had the right piece in my hand.
 
#18,087 ·
today was a great day at work. I'm on top of all my jobs, parts, supplements. Today was tearing down a light front end hit. lower rail replace, upper rail swung over, support replace. Tomorrow I put together a rear body replace job I did and a door skin! I love doing door skins! I will also finish up welding my aluminum skateboard and post up pics of that. Aluminum welding can be frustrating with the cleaning aspect vs penetration. It's a lot different than steel.
 
#18,088 ·
tig welding aluminum got a whole lot easier for me today. So stoked! If your settings aren't correct forget about it! with steel your rod doesn't always have to be as close to the cup's gas as they say but with Aluminum, it's crucial. Every detail is so crucial, my welding gloves are too contaminated and are contaminating the rod! Other than that, the beads are finally flowing consistently and I'm not sharpening up my tungsten every minute. I have to write these settings/ combination down. Wheeehew! Everything is going amazing at work too. Happy Thanksgiving people and save a prayer for The Native American people of this country. They were here first.
 
#18,090 ·
Still getting ready for winter. Tuesday, I put the winter tires back on the Silverado and attached the plow. Then it got backed into the cold storage side of the shop to use yesterday after we got a few inches of wet, heavy snow overnight.
Yesterday. I changed the trans filter and fluid on the HHR. I can't believe I never did this earlier. The fluid was dark and smelled old, as it should since it's original with 95k on it...:rolleyes:
Then I had to change the thermostat. I kept getting the check engine light for a code that indicated it was running too cold. Looked it up on the HHR forum and found the thermo was a common culprit for that and changed it out. Pulled the main fuse at the bat while doing that and it cleared the code and the light went out..:D
Then on to changing the original serp belt. The 3/8ths square drive hole in the tension pulley bracket for a release tool was so close to the body, I couldn't get a breaker bar in. I have an old Craftsman bar that broke many years ago, so I used the square drive on a long drift. The drive was still too wide, so it got ground down to fit. All the screwing around to remove the plastic access cover and make the tool took 4 times longer than to actually change the belt...:drunk:
 
#18,091 ·
PM service is a great way to Reduce unexpected repairs,,i have all of mine done exept the old 88 Silverado 4x4 that Dad left me,,i have been working on it the past 3 weeks on and off between Dr appointments and test..got to work on it about 3 hours yesterday got all under hood hooked beck up and heater & AC box installed and the dash,,started hooking up wires ,:evil::evil::evil: I had left out the Actuator motor it fits between hvac box and kick panel, i guess i will take it back out this weekend if weather is still good,,it was 76 yesterday,,

Sorry Mitch:thumbup::thumbup:
 
#18,094 · (Edited)
Not a lot of progress on the T. I am having a flare up of my bone disease and it is trying it’s best to destroy my right shoulder. So I been working in the shop on things I can do 1 handed.

I am stripping paint and rust from the rear window center section. It isn’t easy but it is forward progress. I was looking at my roll of rubber windshield setting tape and decided to figure out how I was going to make the tape lie flat where it makes it’s curves along the T strip.

I tried stretching the rubber but it would tear instead of stretch. I then decided to lay the tape out and cut it where the curves are and see if I could put the cuts back together. First I tried super glue. That worked but the seam was then hard from the super glue. I tried rubber cement. It was not satisfactory and left gaps.

I then came up with a workable solution. I laid out all of the straight runs and overlapped the rubber at the turns. I then made a cut through the overlap and finally used two pieces of “Friction Tape” One under the cut joint and the other over the top of the joint. A tiny bit of heat and a 1 inch deep well socket, I rolled the socket over the junction of tape and rubber and the friction tape literally embedded itself into the rubber strip holding the two pieces together. The thickness of the tape remains the same making for a good weather tight seal. Well that problem solved.

I still need to SPI the T strips and the other mounting edges but can’t do that till I have the rear window center section cleaned and stripped. Ahh but the window section is about half way done so maybe another week or two, depending on the shoulder..

So while I am resting the shoulder I decided I needed a dose of Shiny. I assembled my coil overs but that did not work. I needed more. I decided to put the passenger header on the engine and look and check clearance, both headers clear everything! I like the look, now I can look at the chassis and see something shinny and new and it feels like progress.
Finally, we are here today with family to give thanks for what we have and to enjoy family time.

I made a small discovery yesterday getting ready for today. I was trying to remember where I put my bottle of 15 yr. old “Old Rip Van Winkle” Handcrafted Bourbon.. As I dug deep into the secret stash I found not 1 but 2 bottles of the Bourbon. One bottle still factory sealed. I had totally forgotten I bought two bottles of this stuff way back when and stashed one bottle for a special occasion. I believe I bought this Bourbon back in 2005 or 6. So I guess it is 25 year old Bourbon now. Bottled by my far distant cousin Pierre in Kentucky..

I want to wish everyone a happy thanksgiving no matter who you are, after all we are all just Human Beings on this big rock in space!


Photo 1 tape
Photo 2 tape 2
Photo 3 header 2
Photo 4 header 4
Photo 5 Bourbon
 

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