Day 2 was carb day, and it all ended with a bang.
My daughter went to sleep for her afternoon nap, and I ran out to the garage, rubbing my hands with anticipation. The carbs had been removed on Sunday, and I'd spent the evening reading, re-reading and re-re-reading everything that I'd have to do.
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice, but in practice, there is.
The first problem is that my carbs look much more corroded than the ones in any pictures:
Fortunately, it would seem that over the last 30 or so years, no one has overtorqued the bolts, and as my wife said after the waterskiing accident, I lost my bottoms!
The floats are in great shape, and seem to be resting within spec. The jets all came out easily, and were mostly clean. There was a little bit of gunk in the bottom of the carbs, but very little varnish. If I had to guess, these have been cleaned no more than a couple of years ago.
I cleaned one set of jets at a time, to make sure nothing got mixed up. Odd that the main jets are different sizes for each carb - must have to do with the off centre air intake.
Hmm... looking at these pictures, note to self. Do not use that loaf pan again for banana bread.
Now, a word to the wise, that I should have kept in mind. If you have rusty bolts, soak them before you try to remove them with something like PB Blaster. I did not, and now I can only get one breast exposed - ah - top removed. These little bolts are pretty soft, and I'll be going to the hardware store for four new ones after I drill out the one I've now rounded.
Otherwise, everything is coming up roses. I was working in the garage with the front and side door open, help open by a pile of bricks, and was running out of time before I knew my daughter would wake up. Sure enough, as though it was a sign from above, a huge gust of wind told me it was time to clean up by slamming the side door and shattering the window.
So, that's it for today. God told me it was time to stop. Tomorrow, I'll finish the carbs, and then get back to work on dropping the engine.
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