I was surprised how many of you reached out after my last (first) newsletter. Maybe surprised isn’t the right word, let’s go with…delighted! That’s a better word anyway. Delighted to have you all here, let’s talk.
Project Cars: Spa Day
If you read the last installment, you know that Tom and I fought a hard battle to the death (we did not die) to remove a stuck pipe plug in a 440 that he’s rebuilding for a friend’s Plymouth GTX. The stuckness was only one indicator of the amount of rust in the thing. Another indicator was seeing all the rust in the thing.
Yeah, so, you may be more or less aware that big water-cooled engines like this have passages that are cast between the outside of the block and the inside where the sexy pistons do oily sexy piston stuff. The water is supposed to circulate through those areas and cool the engine (being oily and sexy is hot work, as you all well know).
What happens when an engine sits and fills up with rust is that even if the inner oily bits are fine, those water jackets can be all clogged with scale and crumbly metal, then the water doesn’t get through, or not as much gets through, and it causes overheating that is very hard to track down. So that rust has to go.
If you are fancy, and plan to “do it right,” and “have it machined properly,” there are lots of ways to clean up an engine block, including impressive-sounding procedures like acid-dipping and thermal-cleaning. But we are not fancy, and we do not want to take the block for machining and we are not rebuilding it with lovely new parts. Soooo…electric spa day for the 440.
First, soap and water and the air hose. This was not actually as effective as we had hoped, but it looked hilarious and the dogs were fascinated by the bubbles. Somehow I didn’t get a photo of that. I have failed you.
Next. Engine in clean water. Battery charger NEGATIVE on the block and POSITIVE on the noble piece of scrap metal that will give its life for this. Don’t mix it up. You will be sad. Turn on the charger, I think we ran it about about 12 amps, but 6-10 will do. You just want it to be constant. Some of the newer chargers may shut off, so use one that will go uninterrupted. The electrolyte bath is a combo of water and water softener (Sodium Carbonate, or soda ash. Common brands include White King and Calgon. You want the powder kind, not the liquid.) The appropriate amount is however much seems to make it work. I’ve read about 1/2 cup per 5 gallons of water. We winged it. Wung it?
I am now going to try and explain some chemistry that I barely understand, so I recommend you look this up if you want accuracy. Whatever.
Rust is formed when oxygen, water, and iron spend time together. Electrons change places, the water breaks into oxygen and hydrogen which then bonds on to the iron and ruins its life. All things return to earth. All men must die. All engines must rust. It is possible to knock that bond apart using electricity, and that’s what we’re doing here through a process of electrolysis (not the hair removal kind). By making a conductive bath with water softener, and charging it with a battery charger, we can fight the forces of entropy, and triumph over evil. As the electricity flows through our hero, it breaks the rust back into oxygen and hydrogen and sends it back to the hell from whence it came. I mean, it makes it into bubbles that come up from the surface. Do this outside. Hydrogen, yo. Remember the Hindenburg?
I think the orphaned electrons need somewhere to go so they follow the flow to our sacrificial anode and that mother-fucker gets hella rusty. Poor guy. Anyhow, your good part gets clean and your anode gets rusty and it’s pretty astonishing.
Our engine was a real mess, and we spent about four days doing this, swapping out the scrap metal when it got too corroded. We probably could have gone for one more round, but we ran out of scrap metal.
Let’s talk safety real quick. Despite what would seem to be the obvious danger, electrocuting yourself is unlikely unless you dunk your extension cord in the tub. The bigger dangers are in using the wrong additives or the wrong materials for an anode. Stainless steel will corrode and makes the water poisonous. Dumping that water is dangerous and illegal and will give us all cancer so don’t do it. Using cleaners other than soda ash can result in cyanide gasses forming, so stick with the formula, eh? And again, do it outside what because of the hydrogen.
If you want a more scientific set of instructions on this, I recommend you go to antique-engines.com.
Dog Break!
Here’s a nice dog I met on the No Braking podcast right before I locked my keys in my car. I guess it was already after I had locked my keys in my car, but before I had realized it.
Ok, this one is already so long, and I’m boring myself. Next time I’ll tell you about the snarly Jaguar I drove to see a snarly Jaguar, and a major fuck-up I did in researching a big story. But first, Feeeeeeeelings. (From the last round of Instagram Story questions I did @Challengeher)
“How do I tell if a girl likes me?”
How do you know if a girl likes you? How do you know if a boy likes you? How do you know if a teacher likes you? How do you know if your grandma likes you? Do they seek out your company? Do they listen to your stories and ask questions about your life and remember your answers? Do they know what foods you don’t like? Do they tease you kindly? Do they stop if you ask them to? A girl is no different from any other person. Now, just because someone likes you doesn’t mean they like you romantically, and the only way to find that out really is to ask, and to be gracious if the answer is no. It’s hard, I get it. Life is risk and pain. Love is worth it all.
Ack, but what about when people like you, but they have their own issues or fears and they show it in weird ways like by being mean, or running hot and cold, what then? This is gonna be hard to hear, and there’s always a little dance of mistakes and misunderstanding when you’re first getting close to someone, but if someone is repeatedly cruel or confusing to you, even if it is because they like you, they aren’t ready to be an important person in your life. Let them flow by.
A side note on the above. Even if the answers to all those first questions are yes, and you are POSITIVE that this person likes you, you then need to ask yourself, “Is this person in a service position to me or a dependent position on me?” Someone in a customer service or PR position will be friendly and likable because it is their job to be so. Someone who is your student or employee will be friendly and likable because it could cost their job to not be so. Do not hit on people who have to be nice to you for their paychecks or grades.
That’s it. That’s all I got. I’m going to watch the 24 Hours of Le Mans for a bit and then go to the Velvet Painting museum in Chinatown. Those things will have already happened by the time you read this. Stay cultured, peeps.
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