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Exhaust fiasco & overdrive question

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M

moremonkey

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Last night I was finally ready to fire up the Healey so I could run the car up through the gears (in the garage, on jack stands) to see if I had oil pressure in the overdrive. Because it was about 6 degrees outside and the car was backed into the garage anyway, I rigged up a foil dryer vent to the tailpipe and ran it through a piece of plywood I cut to fit in the garage window. Very clever.

But in third gear there was so much exhaust pressure coming out the tailpipe it blew a hole in the vent hose, and in the 30 seconds it took me to realize what was happening and shut the car off, I smogged up the garage, set off the smoke detector (which set off all the smoke detectors in the house and freaked out the kids and the cat) and gave me a nice little headache.

The question for the forum (beyond the general "isn't this pretty amusing") is: what setups do you use to run a car in the garage with the doors closed? I don't like leaving the garage door up a little and running a vent out that way when the car is parked in bow first because I always get exhaust leaking back into the garage under the door.

Clearly dryer vent is not robust enough to do the job. There must be a simple, obvious way to rig something reliable and safe.

Incidentally, I was getting about 425psi at the overdrive pressure gauge. But I don't think the car was going into overdrive (there was a lot of catastrophe going on all at once by the time I hit third gear so I am not really sure. And I can't run the car to find out for sure until I have a new exhaust management system). Am I correct in assuming that with the gauge screwed into the fitting on the OD, the car will not shift into OD?
 

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Simple solution move to California and you can just open the garage door and get all them things done with out upsetting the CAT !!--:encouragement:--------:highly_amused:
 
Believe me, I've considered the California move. But my wife pointed out that we can't afford to live on the ocean there like we do here. And even if we could, we're not ready to trade warm weather for no traffic and low crime. But there are days when it is so tempting. I've spent many hours fantasizing about what my daily driver would be if it never needed a heater or snow tires. I notice your list of cars doesn't include any that come with seat heaters. My kids complain that our cars don't come with rear​ seat heaters.
 
Does anyone have any insight into whether or not the OD will engage when the pressure gauge is installed instead of the ball in the valve seat?
 
I do not know why the ball is not installed when the pressure gauge is used.
I drive with my home built gauge installed and the ball intact to watch the pressure build up if I suspect a problem.????
 
Interesting. I never thought to install the ball and spring with the gauge. Of course, I have no desire to drive with the transmission cover off either. The plan is to get the OD working properly this week, put the interior back together, and then wait for convertible weather and enjoy a trouble-free Healey summer.
 
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