Fredericksburg to Carter Caves

Today's drive was mostly uneventful. No big mechanical problems, although we did have some vapor lock issues. We did drive all day on the interstate, and once we had the sun in our face beating down on the hood,  on the uphills (read: mountains) we'd feel the car feeling like it was running out of fuel. I switched on the auxiliary fuel pump and that solved the problem 100%.

When I replaced the head gaskets recently and had everything apart, I removed all the thermal wrapping that I had around the fuel pipes in the vee of the motor. I probably should have put new wrapping on and I likely would have had no issues at all today.

We stopped much earlier than we normally do on these trips -- about 6:15pm. We are staying at a state park in Kentucky -- Carter Caves State Park. They had rooms at the lodge that aren't too expensive, they had all-you-can-eat catfish for $10 at the restaurant, there was a campfire program in the campground, and tomorrow morning we'll be doing a flashlight cave tour. A nice diversion on the way to Louisville for this year's annual meet.

Once we get to Louisville, I do have a small list of maintenance items I'd like to address if we have time. First, we have a funky situation in the master switchbox which is causing one of the ignitions to stop working. I have kludged a fix by jumpering the two ignitions together in the fusebox, but this needs to be fixed properly. When I did the head gasket job, apparently I failed to install three conical washers where the passenger side exhaust manifold mates up with the downpipe, therefore there is a small exhaust leak at that junction. If I can source the three washers at the meet that will be an easy fix. I think that's about it....at least for now!

Looking forward to seeing everyone and all the cars tomorrow, but we're also really looking forward to the flashlight cave tour tomorrow....

On the way to Louisville.

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Revisiting and restarting

It has been a long time since I posted on the blog. I have a lot to report but will keep it short and refer you to pictures.

Our final stop on our trip home last August was just west of Louisville. Ironically, next week we'll be going to the 2012 version of the RROC annual meet -- in Louisville! The last day of driving was 615 difficult miles. Long story short we made it home, but it was not a fun day. We developed a severe water leak and had to stop every 15-30 miles the whole way home. You can do the math, and I assure you I am not exaggerating. Each stop required at least one gallon of water to top off the radiator. Water was spraying out of the engine compartment on the driver side and coating the windscreen and whole front side of the car with oily water. It was a race home because, as mentioned previously, we had no charging system. I made it all the way to Charlottesville before it finally was too dark to drive without headlights anymore. We stopped at Kohr's Brothers ice cream shop, filled all our water jugs one last time, then headed home with the lights on. Shockingly, we made it that last 90 minutes with the headlights all on, and when we pulled in the driveway at home over 7,900 miles after our start, I shut the car down, fired it back up, and it started with no sluggishness due to a low battery at all. After that, I was so stressed out from that last day's drive that I basically put the car away for a few months trying to figure out what to do next.

I retorqued the heads a few times, and indeed they needed the retorquing, so perhaps this was why I was losing water? I finally gave in and purchased new head gaskets and embarked on the job. You can see pictures of that work here:

3DL170 Head Gasket Job

We sure did find a smoking gun. Look at the inner material missing from the head gasket on the driver's side:

I replaced the copper clad head gaskets with new custom gaskets from Olsen's Gaskets (http://www.olsonsgaskets.com/). I have close to 1,000 miles on those now with a retorque and probably another retorque due, and all is well!

I also have most of the pictures from our trip last year posted. You can find them here:

2011 Rolls Across America

If anyone is interested, I can post the final stats (number of miles, number of gallons of gas, etc.). I haven't had the heart to add it all up yet.....:-). Also, if there is interest, I might keep this page active to continue documenting our adventures in 3DL170.