DeTomaso Mailing List: November 97, Message #38
     



From: 	MikeLDrew@aol.com

Subject: PCNC Tech Session

Date: 	Sun, 2 Nov 1997 18:05:00 +0000



Capt Mike Drew

150 Westgate Dr.

San Francisco, CA  94127



Home:   (415) 334-7860



E-mail:  MikeLDrew@aol.com



Hi guys,



Just thought I'd give you the quick scoop on a very successful PCNC tech

session (the fourth this year!)  Weather was beautiful, sunny and in the low

80's!  I love California during El Nino!!!!



Don't have the numbers in front of me, but during the course of the day,

15-20 Panteras rolled through.  About 10 cars received varying degrees of

work, including a couple of non-Panteras.



Lee Scales can only do limited work on his car due to a neck injury years

ago.  The PCNC gang pitched in and yanked his stock exhaust system and

installed his new Jet-Hot coated Hedmann headers and GTS mufflers.  Luckily

Roger had all sorts of blowtorches, etc. to bend the tailpipes as required.

 They had 'em all sorted out and then Something Moved, and one muffler was

crooked.  Frank Wissman put a 1x2 of wood between the tips and bent and pried

while Roger heated the tailpipe with a torch, and Lee said, "a little to the

left, a little to the right..." etc. etc.  I had to leave for a few minutes

and when I got back he was gone, presumably happy with the pipes (the headers

bolted right on, no mods required.)



(Lee, since people have been asking about this stuff and since you're a

Lurker on the list, why don't you give a brief report on how they

work/sound/fit etc.)



Chuck Melton was talking on The List last week of taking a 12 ga. shotgun to

his stricken Pantera, due to a clutch that wouldn't work.  He and Steve

Liebenow attacked the problem and spent several hours working on it, from

what I gather they eventually had to completely disassemble the master

cylinder, Do Something (I think they lubricated it with some super-lube) and

then put it back together; worked like a champ after that, I think Chuck's

happy!



John Dilena hadn't really done a lot of work on his Pantera before.  With

lots of advice from Roger, he raised his car on the lift and installed a new

steering rack.  Once he was on the ground again, he got a quickie rods 'n

sticks front-end alignment, and he was on his way.  He reported the steering

MUCH improved, very nice and tight.



Tony Harvey did a full gasket change (intake, carb, valve covers, etc.), I

guess to cure chronic oil leaks or something.



Several other people performed more routine service (oil changes, bleeding

radiators, etc.)  I had the good fortune to have Jim Kuehne working with me

for most of the day.  (He's the fellow that got Dan Miller back on the road

after his rear bearings failed at Monterey.)  My GT-350 was Seriously Ill,

suffering both bad carb and ignition problems.  Jim rooted around his shop

and found a rebuilt carb the same as my old one, and just sort of gave it to

me!  He's now got my old one, maybe he'll rebuild it, maybe use it as a

doorstop, whatever.



He also pulled my stone-age Mallory dual-point distributor (complete with

toasted points) and Mallory coil, and replaced them with a rebuild Ford

distributor with vac advance, fitted with a Petronix electronic ignitor

instead of points.  A new Petronix 40,000 volt coil, new wires and new plugs

completed the engine work, and after setting the timing and dialing in the

carb, the car is absolutely transformed, it's a freaking rocket!  Geez, is it

fast compared to the way it used to be!  In an impromptu drag race I was able

to run with and slightly pull a more-or-less stock Pantera, which I was never

able to do before.



After most of the crowd had left, I put the car on the rack and started

dinking with parking brake hardware.  My car was fitted with a killer exhaust

system, and as the parking brake wasn't hooked up at the time, the muffler

shop removed all the levers, springs and cables and put an exhaust system

there instead.  Now I'd like to have my parking brake back, but the levers

interfere everywhere.  So Roger put these pieces in his vice, pulled out his

hammers and blowtorch, and heated and hammered and generally mangled the

thing into an absolutely unrecognizable piece which just happens to do it's

job extremely effectively!  I haven't actually hooked up the cables yet, more

engineering yet to be done, but I'm a lot closer.



There were probably 30-40 people there during the course of the day, and the

food went on and on and on.  Lots of pies, cakes, chips, steaks, burgers,

dogs, soda, beer, and wine.  A good percentage of the crowd was of the female

persuasion; although no women had to work on their cars this time, there was

plenty of socializing going on.  Coupla babies, coupla dogs, coupla little

kids, everybody had a blast.



So that's all there is to it.  I think San Diego could easily pull off an

event like this, so long as it was held at a home and not a hangar, and thus

it offered more than just nuts-and-bolts tech support, but amenities and

party atmosphere too.  I see no reason why other chapters couldn't do this

also; hell, even the guys in the boonies (Doddek, et al.) could probably pull

something like this off.



So go to it! :>)



Mike