Gina- She's Gone

For the past few weeks, I've been keeping busy getting my Mazdaspeed Miata, Gina, ready to sell. Actually going as far back February, I've been picking parts off the car either using them in other vehicles or selling them off. All the bolt-on engine parts, including the downpipe, had to come off. I removed the Flyin' Miata radiator fans too. More recently, it's been more about making the car presentable to sell. I had to remove both front and rear bumper covers and redo what the Maaco did haphazardly and incorrectly. That took courage, as I've been putting that job off since I got the car back from the painters. That was one of the things that really deflated my attitude about the car. I had to remove the new short shift kit, the oil filter relocation kit and figure out how to electrically reattach the OEM radiator fans. Then came the polishing and waxing. Finally, she was ready to get some pictures taken. I found a nice winery parking lot to take some photos. Rather than use my cell phone, I brought out the big guns and employed my DSLR Nikon. I went out the later part of the day, so I could get the setting sunlight. Pictures turned out fantastic! There was just so much to tell about the car that I decided to put it on a blog page, so I wouldn't be confined to such a small space on Craigslist. I paid my $5 to Craigslist to list my automobile and set up my ad. It was fairly succinct, but I included a link to my blog, so if anyone was really interested, they could read more details there. Additionally, I left a link with one of my Facebook posts. Well, it worked! Almost too well!

In the meanwhile,  I took the car in to get smogged, so I would have a smog certificate to hand over with the sale of the car. To my surprise, the car failed! Apparently, I hadn't been driving the car all that much, since I disconnected the battery to work on the stereo, so some of the monitors hadn't yet cleared! That was a nice waste of $30! Stupid me! Since then, I've been trying to run the car through the emissions cycles, so I could take the car back in to smog.

So almost immediately, I started getting inquiring CL emails. The car sold in a week and a half, and that was only because I had to wait for a buyer, Dylan, to drive up from SoCal on a Sunday. I only showed the car twice. The first guy, Danny, was a local coming in from San Jose. Dylan actually tried to butt in and swoop on buying the car, before my appointment with Danny, but I told him no- I had made a commitment to Danny and I was going to see it through. I told him that he would be next in the queue. Danny and I went for an excellent test drive through Foothill Road in Pleasanton. I figured he would appreciate it and it would give him the opportunity to push the car a little and get some feedback. All was great till the end of the drive. When we got back to the parking lot, we noticed that we picked up a nail in one of the tires and it was losing air fast. He didn't want to commit to the non-refundable deposit, as he said he would, when we arranged the meeting, and said he would text me in a few hours with his decision. It was a no, which I figured it would be. My guess is that he had business in Pleasanton that day to drop off his BMW for a warranty issue and he just acted interested, because he wanted to test out what an MSM was like. No big deal. Except now, I had to deal with a flat tire!

First, Danny gave me the idea to call Emily to pick me up and bring tire into a shop to get repaired. After we said our goodbyes, I realized that there was a spare tire in the trunk! I could also call AAA if I wanted to- after all, that's what I'm paying for, right? But I'm no invalid! So I got down to business and decided to test out that spare tire I've been hauling around for all these years. It only took me about 10 minutes to swap tires. Getting the trunk to stay closed on top of that big tire took more time than changing tires! After I got home, I was going to take it into Costco, but realized that the purchase was more than 5 years, so Costco probably wouldn't help me. Emily found that Les Schwab fixes flats for free! I didn't believe it, so I called our local Les Schwab and they said bring it down! I was shocked! I dropped off the tire and they told me that the puncture was at the corner of the tread and they might not legally be able to repair it, but they said they would do their best. A couple hours later, I got a call that the tire was ready for pickup! When I picked it up, the tech told me that he tested it twice and it held air. The puncture was made by a 2" nail that we picked up on our test drive in a construction zone! Because the hole was so big, he said that he used a huge patch to fix it, a patch that they fix semi tires with!! I tipped the guy, since the repair was free and I was on my way.

After I picked up the car, I needed to do some driving to try to clear some smog monitors. Took it to some far away remote road, so I could do some weird cycles. I hadn't noticed, but it was getting late. Then my wife informs me that I need to pick up dinner at a restaurant before they close! I got on the freeway and drove as fast as I could! While doing 85, I noticed that the back of the car started hopping. It was that darned big-ass tire patch that was throwing the wheel off balance! Dammit! One more thing I had to take care of before showing the car again! But I did manage to make it to the restaurant, just in the nick of time! The following morning, I took the loose tire to my nearby Big-O where they were able to do the balancing, while I waited. It only cost $12.50! What a deal! The car was happy again!

My appointment to meet with Dylan was this morning. But of course, a few days ago, another guy, Ryan, was trying to snake the car away from Dylan! He was willing to drive up from Santa Cruz late at night after getting off of work to pick up the car. I told him I already had a buyer appointment, but he begged me to let him beat him. I gave him one chance to see where this would lead. Of course he didn't respond to any of my emails for 6 hours. That pissed me off and he lost his one and only chance. Even yesterday, I was receiving Craigslist responses where one guy was going to be in the neighborhood and wanted to check out the car. I told him I was at work until midnight. He was hoping the car would be outside, where he could view it- if it checked out, he would put down a deposit. I told him I had to see my appointment first. But good God! These people! all trying to climb over each other to get to this car!

In the end, I sold the car to Dylan, a young 20-year-old, who drove 400 miles to pick it up. He was a nice kid, who needed a playtoy to take to the track with his other friends who already had rides. As a matter of fact, he already booked two HPDE days in advance- one at Buttonwillow and another day at Streets of Willow Springs! I really wanted this car to get back to the track, where she belongs. I threw in a bunch of things, like the boost gauge, cell phone mount, soft top care products as well as the Carbotech pads and brake rotors. I made an add-on sale where I sold him the MiataRoadster short shifter for $300. It was a good deal for him, since it was barely used. It was good for me just to get some money back for it. I know it will get good use!

Almost Ready to Test the Jeep!!

With a medium amount of effort, I was able to get the breather hose mod project completed. I found that Lowes was selling 1/2" I.D. fuel hoses in 10' segments for under $8. They also had the connectors and clamps I needed, so one quick trip to my local Lowes did the trick. It cost me just under $40. I wasn't sure exactly how I was going to tackle this, but I was thinking why replace the entire hose systems with new stuff, if the old stuff was fine- I just need to extend what I already have.

I started with the rear differential breather first since it was the easiest to find. The breather cap was hiding just behind the right fender liner. I connected, then ran the hose along the passenger frame rail to the front of the Jeep. Supposedly, the transfer case breather hose on the automatic is only like 5" long, but information that I found on the internet was conflicting and confusing, so much more research had to be done, and I mean much more!! After hours of looking (over a span of several weeks off and on), the short TC breather hose info was shown to be incorrect! The real location of the TC breather hose end is at the firewall, about halfway down near the battery! To me, it's still about a foot lower than I would like it to be, but because of it's difficult to reach position, I decided to start a new hose, rather than extend the existing one. I T'ed the hose into the line that was coming from the rear differential.

The front differential breather end is easy to find- it's located just behind the drivers fender liner, which puts the height at the top of the tires. Not very high. I extended the hose and again T'ed it into the line running from the rear differential, right by the battery. So the rear diff, transfer case and the front diff are all tied into this one common hose. The terminal end breather cap sits just under the level of the hood at the firewall, which is more than adequate.

The transmission breather hose already sits pretty high from the factory and is located on the passenger side of the engine, right under the removable plastic engine cover. But the way the factory clips it in, the position is more lateral/horizontal than vertical. The breather cap is supposed to bob and protect the opening orifice with a bubble of air, but I don't see how that is possible, if the cap is sideways. I popped it out of the last clip and positioned the cap so it sits vertically. Done! That was easy.

So now, King is ready to ford DEEP water crossings! Like just about up to the top of the hood deep! I feel way comfortable with that! Water will be coming into the cabin, before I drown the components!

Okay, on to the next project! Time to get those skid plates back on the underside of the Jeep! If there's anything I've learned from installing the gas skid is that parts do not fit very well on Jeeps that have already been off-roaded. Parts are bent, parts are dented, things just aren't in alignment anymore the way they were coming from the factory. Plus this time around, I would be installing the extra spacer plate, so I can make more space for the exhaust crossover pipe. I first installed the transfer case skid and spacer with the use of the floor jack and that wasn't too bad, except now there's the gas skid that I have to contend with. That's an additional width of metal so bolts seem to have gotten shorter! Getting the driver side bolt in wasn't all that hard, but getting that gas side bolt was a total bitch!! Matter of fact, it took a couple of days of trying to figure it out. My first idea was to just run to the hardware store and get a longer bolt. I was able to find the diameter then the pitch, but to find that together in the proper length wasn't going to happen. I did a quick search to see if I could buy one on the internet and that would be possible if I wanted to purchase a lot of 100! No, that's not happening! My next idea was to have to unbolt everything again, just so I could tip that metal closer and make that the first bolt to go in, then bolt up everything else. That idea indeed worked, but I struggled to get the other holes lined up. Eventually it all worked out with the exception of one hole- I'll just have to hog it out with the Dremel. The part of the skid plate that is overlapping the gas skid is bent to meet the hole. And does the skid plate make contact with the crossover pipe? Absolutely! It touches at the lowest part of the pipe making very firm contact. But after taking him out for a test drive, there were no adverse sounds or clunks. I would believe that it should act as additional support for the engine and transmission adding stability. It could in time wreak havoc on the exhaust system, weakening the spacer/extension interfaces. Only time will tell. 

There are a couple of left over things that need to be taken care of in order for all these little projects to be considered "complete". One of the middle bolt holes on the overlapping skid plates needs to be relieved a little bit in order for me to thread in that last bolt. Also I left out a couple of washers, when I put the oil pan skid back on. I'll try to get these things taken care of before heading out on my upcoming crawling trip!