Tunebug comes to life

[AN5Sprite]

In the last installment of the Tunebug Chronicles I got the reworked head back from Hap. I put everything back together and during an early spring test run I was surprised to find that I was still rev-limited to 4k rpm. To make a long story short; I spent as much time and patience trying to figure this out as I could stand to spare. At some point I crossed some invisible annoyance level/patience threshold and decided it was time to fix this problem with two tools. 1. the phone and 2. money. I called this guy and on May 4th I turned the car over to him. Then I put it out of my mind and got back to work making fiddles. Picked the car up on Monday it it runs great now. I Put on about 120 miles Monday and Tuesday and had a ball doing it. Never had a Sprite that could accelerate uphill quite like this one does. The problem: the jets. The plastic tube that connects the jet to the float bowl was kinked and collapsed. On both carbs. Not totally obvious because they looked fine until the protective sheath was removed. I'm told that these are supplied too long and need to be shortened 1/4" before installation. Anyone else ever experience this?

 

[drooartz]

That's certainly not what I expected the problem to be. I suppose they slowly kinked as I drove it that first year, then at some point they crossed the line and couldn't deliver enough fuel.

Very happy you got the little guy all sorted out and back on the road. May you have many great miles/smiles to come.

 

[Trevor Jessie]

Hmmm... I've never seen that. The "spring" cover wasn't creased?

 

[AN5Sprite]

Nope. Spring covers looked 100% fine.

Thanks Drew. Also had the small hole in the floor welded up and a different muffler installed. I redid the seats with new foam/hair/covers and now I'm working on the door panels. So the process continues. I hope to rack up the miles and then this winter clean up and repaint the under-bonnet white.

 

[2091351]

I have seen that one before ...Ended up using the other style of hose connections (Barb) and Fuel Injection hose......never saw it again. :thumbsup:

 

[drooartz]

Thanks Drew. Also had the small hole in the floor welded up and a different muffler installed. I redid the seats with new foam/hair/covers and now I'm working on the door panels. So the process continues. I hope to rack up the miles and then this winter clean up and repaint the under-bonnet white.

You'll have to post some pictures of the seats -- a project I had really wanted to get to but never had the time. How were the seat frames?

 

[AN5Sprite]

The seats were interesting...A mix of red and blue vinyl with a little duct tape thrown in there. All painted a blueish black. Most of the metal was good. I stripped off every bit of paint and rust with a series of wire wheels, repainted everything and re-covered with new vinyl/foam/hair from AH Spares. One seat base was a total loss. The metal crumbled while I removed the vinyl cover.

 

[Hap Waldrop]

That interesting on the jet tubes, those were Joe Curto supplied jets,

 

[drooartz]

New seat looks great, surprised at just how blue the old ones look against the correct black of the new one.

 

[AN5Sprite]

No kidding. I thought the old ones were black too.

 

[jlaird]

I like the seat, well done.