It’s been quite a while since the last update and lots has happened, some good, some not so good.

We removed the center console so we could remove the carpet, old and smelly, long gone in the garbage. The floors where not in the best of shape, we cut those out and made new floors to go in there. Once we had that done, we covered the floor and doorsills with Chassis Saver, with the intent that I will never have to deal with rust again, at least in the floors:) Used seam sealer on a few holes in other sections of the floor. After that was completed, we installed FatMat sound deadening material on the interior. It was a good winter, however in the spring an ugly problem came to light. We could not get the car to idle properly and found an air leak where the intake manifold meets the head. Tried a few things and no luck. Ordered new gaskets, gasket goop, all to no avail. The intake had warped from the heat - OK revving to 8,000 rpm probably wasn’t a good idea, but hey, I got her over 100 mph! It was getting late in the season and we put her away for the winter.

Over the winter we ordered a few different gaskets from Europe that were designed for the Uno Turbo, with crush rings around the inlets, that was supposed to be the magic bullet. Well, that didn’t work out either. In the end, the solution was to grind the intake manifold on a large belt sander to get closer to flat, I’m sure with a belt sander perfectly flat is impossible. Next we did some grinding on the exhaust manifold at the mounting/mating points, the intent here was to remove enough material so the nuts/washers would put equal or more pressure on the intake manifold that on the exhaust manifold. If that didn’t work, the next idea was grinding washers so they would be stepped, putting more pressure on the intake than the exhaust. Well, we didn’t have to do that, after grinding the intake and exhaust, we how had a running car.

Of course, this process took many hours to get through, but it was worth it. On Saturday, I went for a 100 Mile cruise and no issues at all, another 50 miles on Sunday, and all is well. Nice to have my ride back.

The next step is to get the car to the team at MidWestBayless to have them completely go through the electrical to make sure all is well, then convert all the bulbs to LED, perform the relay mod for the wipers and headlights and a handful of over small things. During this process I’m trying to find a way to get my dash recovered or replaced. Looking at options now. Since the interior is disassembled at the moment, this seems like the perfect time to get the dash repaired. A little worried about the cost of this one, but I’m hoping to find someone to do a good job at a decent price. At worst, I will have to order a dash from Europe, but timing is the issue there. I think I have to send them my dash, they recover it and send it back, that will have to be a winter project, but hoping we can get it done while the car is in Ohio.