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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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#24,461 ·
Today I got around to digging the old Snapper out of the weeds today with the H Farmall. I'm going to repower it, I had a Snapper Comet years ago that had a 13 HP engine on it and it would mow just as tall of grass and weeds as you wanted to with that thing. Smile I'm thinking it should do fine with a 14 horsepower engine on it. I promised it to my son since he now has a bigger yard and is kind of looking for a riding mower.

 
#24,463 ·
Mitch, sandpaper won't screw you over. Sand, man.:D I'm a big fan of sanding. Yep, lots of sanding, thats what I always say. Never let me down, that sandpaper yet. Boyoboy do I enjoy a fresh sheet of sandpaper, yep. Whatcha do is get you some sandpaper, see. Then slide it around and throw it away a lot. Then by cracky you'll know what ya got. Had many a good time sliding paper, yes I have. Champion paper slider from way back I tell ya.

OK that was excessive but you get the point. You have some encapsulator to flood the seams after you flush em with w & g remover, right? After you have the pho bath solution treatment done to your satisfaction. I usually figure rust removal is a start-to-finish operation. Do all the acid and sandpaper tricks, wipe and blow, water base then solvent based w n g remover, dry, epoxy right now. Or fog with rattle can if not epoxying immediately.
 
#24,465 ·
Matt, look in the cab and see if the tracks are still bolted to the stand. It looks like they unbolted the seat base from the tracks and left them in the cab.

Well, THIS is so totally friggen frustrating !!!!!!!!!!
Last Friday, I thought I had discovered a miracle rust remover/preservative. A couple hours after I finished, it started turning brown and I/we, hoped it was just the protective coating discoloring. Well, I did nothing with this until this morning and it is SOLID RUST... not just a film, it is etched right into the metal. I had to use the Eastwood crap to even dent this and still scrub it all off with a course sanding sponge to get back to bare steel. GOD, I am so friggen p!$$ed at that crap !!!!! This fender was as smooth as a babies butt last Friday and now the entire surface is etched.
What REALLY worries me is, I deliberately poured a lot of that crap into the areas I couldn't get at to remove the hidden rust. Now this acid is sitting in there, eating the metal and I don't know what to do to stop it. Pouring the Eastwood on, doesn't remove this rust without scrubbing and there's no way to do that between the structure and skin. I guess I'll pour enough in to remove what it will and then rinse well and pour the phosphate mixture I made up in to try to stop the rust from growing.









As I got the rust off, I would rinse with water and then brush on the phosphate mix I had made up. It stopped the flash rust from coming back.





This is 2 hours later and it still has the white, powdery zinc on it. Hopefully, it won't rust again.

That stuff is looking damn good! I am faking it right now not doing that good but I am pretty confident that the little that stays will never rear it's ugly head again being it will be buried in epoxy primer and it won't ever be wet again.

Everything outside of these hidden areas in the cab will be sand blasted and clean when I epoxy prime it.

Brian
 
#24,466 ·
I got out there and prepped a few things for primer. Also did a little planning and I solved a problem I had with how I was going to have the rest of it sand blasted and then prime it, can't believe how easy that was. But something got done. All the hidden spots I will be priming look damn good.

Brian
 
#24,467 ·
The regional manager tinkers with everything. When I was brought aboard the numbers went up, we had a lot of production meetings, and the shop did the best it's done under that management. Geico shop of the month 2 months in a row and I probably did the most work during those months. Work gets dry and they ship me to this other shop undergoing the same kind of changes, but this one needs work! One guy made 160k last year at that location but the flow of things around him has caused him to put in his notice. He's an awesome guy. Anywho. One of the techs last week was drunk all week at work. You could smell it a mile away. My buddy also got him on camera sleeping in cars, and while drinking in the back of the shop admitting to sleeping with his cousin's sister. That's also on film-hehe. Another guy barely gets any work done and will go in the bathroom for long periods of time doing coke. Even admits to it. He's on thin ice. Manager made some sort of racial joke to a black man and now he's got a civil attorney coming to the shop tomorrow. I'm guessing he's looking for a settlement. Oh boy. I'm just gonna try to work as hard as I can and keep my head down cause either way, some people are gonna be gone soon. Wonder what project shop they'll send me to next? The pay is worth it.
 
#24,471 ·
Is it me or is today's current generation lazy? I'm starting to think kids these days don't want to work or put effort into anything they do. A lot of people around me agree to this. My rant for the day. :evil:
They were raised getting trophies just for showing up...why work for it when it comes free ?
 
#24,473 ·
Knowing you, it will be stainless. Why don't you just make two? :D

John
You guys' shrouds can be after my roof. (re: pugsy bait post on how cool thread last weekend) :D


I got a door and some various trim on the '71 job installed yesterday. You all know how assembly goes... one step forward, two steps back. Don't think I've hurt it yet anyhow. Going to be a nice car though, and being around it causes flashbacks for Footloose and me.:)
 
#24,478 ·
Got my new upholstery for the '62 today.
I went to a local upholstery supply this morning and bought a roll of synthetic cotton to replace the top layer under the old upholstery, and a bag of hog rings.
Quite the fight to get it pulled to the back of the frame to ring down, but I prevailed. Had to let it cook in the sun for a while to soften and stretch and then I just stayed out there and cooked with it, so it wouldn't cool off in the shop. Took about an hour to pull it back with zip ties to get the hog rings in, but it looks pretty good for a first time.









 
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