My "new" car/project.

[bramagedained]

Managed to spend most of another day in the garage, though, I only maybe had 3 actual hours of work into it.

I had the nuts on the front hubs a bit too tight, when I got back from Brainerd yesterday they were hot. So today, I pulled them apart, re-packed the wheel bearings and put it back together.

I replaced the distributor<-> intake manifold gasket that was leaking. The nut that holds the clamp wasn't very tight again(I tightened it once before) so I added a lock washer. Happily, it fired right back up after having the distributor out and back in. I guess the pointers I made for where the housing/rotor needed to sit were good.

I did not yet go for a drive to see if it's better. That requires a first stop at the car wash to spray everything clean first anyway.

I figured I would replace the spark plugs while I was at it, since I had never pulled them nor had any idea when they were from. Now this part was interesting.

The casting marks and numbers on the block are easy enough to see and read. The block itself is from 1979 and I assumed the heads were as well. On a reference chart, the block was in a "passenger car".

Interestingly, the plugs that were in it, physically do not fit anything that came from GM in 1979. They do not have a tapered seat and instead use a washer to seal.

From what I've found looking, GM switched to using heads with a tapered seat in 1971.

Maybe the motor is more than I thought. Makes me wonder what cam/lifters/springs etc are actually in it. Or if the shortblock is even OEM. I was told it has a cam and idles like it. Also the 70's era Edelbrock intake manifold.

Anyway, all 8 plugs looked like the should. With the exception of half the insulators on all of them had black spraypaint from whenever the block was painted to get put in the car.