Back in the saddle (well, driveway actually)..

Barney's back in the driveway, after spending the last two weeks at S&S having the heater core repaired. I can't remember if I posted it or not, but the Climatizer core I had rebuilt, which installation is covered in older posts here, began leaking upon its first use. Nothing worse than seeing that telltale fog appear on the windshield and seeing the yellow liquid dripping onto the carpet -- especially when you've just replaced the failed part.

But leak it did, and for a few weeks I got away with driving it by closing the heater valve, but eventually the pinhole grew to the point that even the backpressure off the water manifold was causing a constant drip.

This time, I went the lazy route - instead of disassembling the Climatizer and taking the core to the shop, I drove it to the shop with a printout of the heating system schematic from the Shop Manual and said "fix it, please." Unfortunately, it took nearly 3 weeks for them to obtain the right core (their supplier kept sending the wrong size), so I missed having Barney on the road on Independence Day, which I really wanted to do.

But, I got him back Tuesday and have been happily tooling around since then. This morning I went to Ace Hardware for some garden soil and the shopping center's maintenance man stopped me to ask questions about him. I'm no attention hound, but I have to admit it's nice when people notice. Barney may not be the most beautiful car in the world, but he does attract people's notice!

Next up on the list is getting the long-delayed rear springs installed. Details coming soon!