Saturday, August 17, 2013

Adding KITT's Steering Linkage

My goal for today was to clean up the garage and go through the rest of the hardware looking for other brackets that may need to be painted with POR-15. I did not end up finding anything that I thought needed to be painted aside from the parking brake assemblies for the rear calipers, the steering gear box bracket from yesterday, and a fuel and brake line bracket that I missed in the last round of painting. I am sure there will be more, but for now I think these should take care of any more unexpected surprises.

I spent quite a bit of time putting tools away and doing some general clean up in the garage. I am looking forward to being able to put the Freestyle back in the garage, but the replacement hatch glass is still preventing that and I am not yet ready to move that back under KITT.

I decided to work on the steering linkage, once I got tired of picking up. ;)

I started by bolting the idler arm back into place.


Friday, August 16, 2013

KITT's First Introduction

Cary brought over his voice box project this afternoon. He has been building a working voice box from the Knight Technologies wiring plans. It is only partially complete at present, however it was complete enough to allow KITT to make his very first introduction.

All I can say is I am glad his scanner (vision) is not operational because I can only imagine the witty retort he would have for my explanation of the current state of his body and the mess in the garage. Here is a video of his very first words.

Unavailable, Replacement, Missing And Dirty Parts

I spent a lot of time this week prepping the hardware I need for the front end install and trying to find replacement parts for items I had not planned on. 

Here is the bag of front end hardware. It contains the castle nuts, the old tie rod boots, the washer-style seal for the center link, and the dust boot for the idler arm. 


Tuesday, August 13, 2013

POR-15 Touch Up

Today after work I wanted to paint the damaged areas on the rear end. This is by far one of the worst spots. This is where the rear end slipped off of the jack when we were attempting to mount it in place. This actually gouged the metal.


Installing The A-arms, Part 2

Sunday afternoon Sara and I installed the passenger side A-arm. This was a little easier than the driver side only because we had discovered a few tricks during the first installation. 


Monday, August 12, 2013

Installing The A-arms, Part 1

Dad stuck around to help us some more after Troy left on Saturday evening. Thanks Dad! Here's a picture of my main support team.


Sunday, August 11, 2013

Installing KITT's Rear End!

Troy came over yesterday afternoon and brought over the rear end and the fuel sending unit with a new fuel pump and fuel strainer. We started by installing the fuel sending unit.


Preparing To Install KITT's Rear End

Saturday morning my dad and brother Josh stopped by to see KITT!


Saturday, August 10, 2013

Odds And Ends, Part 4

Friday after work I applied a second coat of POR-15 on the flip side of the washers for the rear sway bar end links. Then I used a q-tip dipped in POR-15 to coat the inside of the sleeves for the end links. I thought it would be a good idea to at least have a single coat on the insides.


Thursday, August 8, 2013

Painting The Subframe Connectors, Part 2

Yesterday I started by prepping the rear subframe connector mounts for paint. I masked off the area I did not want to paint with painters tape and then covered that with a layer of duct tape for durability.


Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Have Talent - Will Weld

My friend Jake said he would be willing to finish the welding for me, so today after work I stopped at Troy's to get his permission to use the welder he left at my place. I did not feel comfortable just using it without asking. Troy said he did not mind and then mentioned that he had spent the morning finishing work on the rear end. I am planning to install the rear end this weekend.

When I got home I sent Jake a message letting him know that we had the okay to weld. I put away the brackets and gear selector that I painted yesterday and started hanging the three brackets I planned to paint today. Dad had mentioned that he would stop by after a bit and help with the painting. 


Monday, August 5, 2013

Odds And Ends, Part 3

I got some good news today! Bob from Fine Lines called me back to tell me he found the correct fuel line for KITT. It turns out that they had that particular line marked as being only for the V6 Firebirds. The assembly manual parts diagram I sent in confirmed that not only was that style used on the V6s but also on the Cross-Fire V8s. He said it was their mistake for not having it labeled properly and that there was no way for me to know it would be the wrong line. Tomorrow they are shipping out the correct line at no cost to me and I do not need to return the incorrect line. I have to say I am pretty impressed with Fine Lines right now and would recommend them to anyone looking for new hard lines for their classic cars. 

I am determined to speed up the process of getting the rear end installed as well as the remaining welding finished. I decided to see if there was anything I could use to grind down the rear subframe connector mounts. I only need to have the outsides welded, the interior sides were done when Troy was here the first time. 

Here is the driver side rear subframe connector mount.


Sunday, August 4, 2013

Odds And Ends, Part 2

I wanted to make sure that I finished the brackets I started prepping yesterday so I can paint tomorrow, provided the POR-15 arrives. I started by using the wire wheel on the last of the three brackets.


Saturday, August 3, 2013

Odds And Ends

Today I decided to get some minor stuff done that I had either been putting off, or that was just not critical at the moment. I started by hanging the rear quarter plastics on the ceiling to get them out of the way. I secured each one with a bungee cord.


Filling The Engine Bay

I have been saying for quite awhile that I cannot wait to get to the point where I am finally putting stuff back onto KITT. It seems like all we have done is strip the car down and I am ready to start putting things back together. I mean sure the sound deadening was something we put into the car, but it also was not something that was originally there.

Well, these last few days I started doing just that. I decided to install the front to rear fuel and brake lines yesterday. I started by getting out all the new brake and fuel line clips I had purchased and comparing them to the originals I had saved. There were some slight differences, but nothing that would really matter.


Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Another Night Of Waiting In The Garage

I stopped in at Troy's shop after work and confirmed that he was still coming over this evening to help install the rear end. He said he was and I double checked to see if he needed me to buy anything or get anything ready. He said "Nope, just be there". 

And be there I was. I waited all night out in the garage. I have lost track of how many nights I have done this now. (If only I had a blog that documented it...)

This afternoon, after I stopped at Troy's, I decided to apply Threadlocker Blue to the bolts Sara and I had torqued on the rear sway bar end link brackets this weekend. This involved removing the bolts one by one, cleaning them, applying the Threadlocker, and torquing them again.


Sunday, July 28, 2013

Organizing

This afternoon Jonathan decided to go through some of the tubs in the garage and get out the parts we need to install the rear end. The first thing he found was the rear shocks. He decided to get them put into place so they are hanging and ready for installation.


More Birthday Surprises

We went to church and out for lunch today with our friends Jessica and Jake and they had a birthday gift for me. They gave me some really cool Pac-Man wind ups that have been on my wish list for a while, The Death of the Incredible Hulk movie and...


K.A.R.R from the Hot Wheels Retro Entertainment series. I have been searching for this for months! Thanks Jessica and Jake!

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Sound Deadening, Finally Finished (Kind Of)

I told Jonathan we could work on KITT all day long today, and that is what we did. 

Jonathan started this morning by test-fitting his new speakers. These are the 5.25 speakers that will go in the kick panel area. This is where the models equipped with the Bose stereo system had speakers mounted. The speaker magnet fits easily into the opening already in this area. We should not have to modify much to get these speakers to fit perfectly.


Friday, July 26, 2013

They Say It's My Birthday

Troy called this morning singing birthday greetings, and to tell me Farm Power Manufacturing had called him and said the mounting plates were ready to be picked up. Sara and I had brunch and then drove out to Farm Power Manufacturing to pick them up. The plates look like they will work great. These will be welded to the bottom bracket portion of the muffler clamp. The total came to $23, which is what I had expected, but the guy at Farm Power Manufacturing was quite surprised it cost that much. He said he thought it would have only cost a few bucks for the two little plates... which made Sara and I wonder just for a second if we were being ripped off. ;) My total cost to make both clamps was $32, which is a far cry less than the aftermarket ones that are available online for $100+. So no matter what, I think I did pretty good.