Dr.Jass
Pastor of Muppets
So, this week's vacation has been centered around house cleaning.
Step one was to ship Curious V off to Uncle Scott's house, because I can accomplish very little with the dog around. Also, she's still shedding which adds to my workload.
Step two was to rid myself of all the cardboard around here. This is not an insignificant task, since I do much of my shopping online, both for parts I can't get through work and daily-living stuff. The weather has not been cooperative with my plan of burning it, leaving me with an enormous pile of cardboard in the kitchen I can do nothing with at the moment. It's not easing my situation at all. So, I moved on to...
Step three, cleaning all the dirty laundry. There's a lot, since Valentine likes to build a nest each night with my clothing. Some of it has holes--she wraps shirts around bones to chew on them, inexplicably--and some no longer fits. Once everything's clean, I'll determine what is kept, what becomes rags, and what goes in the trash. I'm about halfway through that now. While that's running...
Step four is to identify and find a place for all the auto parts littering every single corner of my house. There's an Edelbrock Victor next to the front door, and another kitty-corner from it in the living room. A set of W2 cylinder heads is next to the couch, with another set along the wall and my prototype heads Trans Am (W1 castings) sitting on the kitchen floor.
Step four is the reason for this post. Holy shit. I literally need an inventory-tracking system so I stop buying redundant shit. This became evident when I opened the third box of NOS mechanical valve gear for LA engines (early 273 rockers). I have at least five sets of used ones, one of which belongs to 71ChargerRT (and I really need to ship out, among other things). How many NOS LH MP/Crane W2 intake rockers does a fella need? Not including those in sets, I have at least 8. I have more sets of W2 intake valves than I have W2 heads. I found the Hawk brake pads and cross-drilled/slotted rotors for the Challenger... then I found the other set of Hawk brake pads and cross-drilled/slotted rotors for the Challenger. Mostly-complete A833 rebuild kit with NOS synchros? Yep... thank God I've got another coming. There's four Timken 23-spline clutch release bearing assemblies and three NOS 18-spline versions. I've even got two NOS AC heater valves for my Challenger--a one-year-only part, so I'm happy to have a spare. Spare taillamps for the Challenger, never mind that the ones on the car are perfect. How many Rim Blow steering wheels does a guy really need? Apparently six, if you count the repro one I finally bought. One came with the Valiant, and it's doin' time in the Challenger at the moment to facilitate moving it, should that need arise. It's the worst one I own.
Then there's the shit that's going to require me looking up the part numbers, because I'm not sure if they're for Agnes, the Challenger, the Imperial, or just because they were a good deal and I hoarded.
I won't even get into the audio gear, of which I'd actually started to keep inventory about a year ago. There's more 1988-'91 Alpine gear here than most, if not all, dealers had in stock at any given point back then. There's also at least 10 early Nakamichi car PA-3xx amps--the stuff built in-house and designed by Nelson Pass, not the later Zapco stuff (but I have one of those, just for good measure). They've got impossibly good specs.
I also now have a better understanding of why I have such difficulty finding tools in the garage, huge mess notwithstanding... about half of 'em are in here, buried under other stuff. Hell's bells.
Hopefully the weather will cooperate tonight so I can rid myself of much (or all) of this cardboard and packing material. It's really holding up the whole show. I can't even attempt to clean up dog hair, of which there's literal snowdrifts in corners and under furniture. By the time I finish, the basement that used to look like an auto-parts store is going to look like an auto-parts warehouse. Sheesh.
Oh well, the washer stopped... time to work on Step Three some more!
Step one was to ship Curious V off to Uncle Scott's house, because I can accomplish very little with the dog around. Also, she's still shedding which adds to my workload.
Step two was to rid myself of all the cardboard around here. This is not an insignificant task, since I do much of my shopping online, both for parts I can't get through work and daily-living stuff. The weather has not been cooperative with my plan of burning it, leaving me with an enormous pile of cardboard in the kitchen I can do nothing with at the moment. It's not easing my situation at all. So, I moved on to...
Step three, cleaning all the dirty laundry. There's a lot, since Valentine likes to build a nest each night with my clothing. Some of it has holes--she wraps shirts around bones to chew on them, inexplicably--and some no longer fits. Once everything's clean, I'll determine what is kept, what becomes rags, and what goes in the trash. I'm about halfway through that now. While that's running...
Step four is to identify and find a place for all the auto parts littering every single corner of my house. There's an Edelbrock Victor next to the front door, and another kitty-corner from it in the living room. A set of W2 cylinder heads is next to the couch, with another set along the wall and my prototype heads Trans Am (W1 castings) sitting on the kitchen floor.
Step four is the reason for this post. Holy shit. I literally need an inventory-tracking system so I stop buying redundant shit. This became evident when I opened the third box of NOS mechanical valve gear for LA engines (early 273 rockers). I have at least five sets of used ones, one of which belongs to 71ChargerRT (and I really need to ship out, among other things). How many NOS LH MP/Crane W2 intake rockers does a fella need? Not including those in sets, I have at least 8. I have more sets of W2 intake valves than I have W2 heads. I found the Hawk brake pads and cross-drilled/slotted rotors for the Challenger... then I found the other set of Hawk brake pads and cross-drilled/slotted rotors for the Challenger. Mostly-complete A833 rebuild kit with NOS synchros? Yep... thank God I've got another coming. There's four Timken 23-spline clutch release bearing assemblies and three NOS 18-spline versions. I've even got two NOS AC heater valves for my Challenger--a one-year-only part, so I'm happy to have a spare. Spare taillamps for the Challenger, never mind that the ones on the car are perfect. How many Rim Blow steering wheels does a guy really need? Apparently six, if you count the repro one I finally bought. One came with the Valiant, and it's doin' time in the Challenger at the moment to facilitate moving it, should that need arise. It's the worst one I own.
Then there's the shit that's going to require me looking up the part numbers, because I'm not sure if they're for Agnes, the Challenger, the Imperial, or just because they were a good deal and I hoarded.
I won't even get into the audio gear, of which I'd actually started to keep inventory about a year ago. There's more 1988-'91 Alpine gear here than most, if not all, dealers had in stock at any given point back then. There's also at least 10 early Nakamichi car PA-3xx amps--the stuff built in-house and designed by Nelson Pass, not the later Zapco stuff (but I have one of those, just for good measure). They've got impossibly good specs.
I also now have a better understanding of why I have such difficulty finding tools in the garage, huge mess notwithstanding... about half of 'em are in here, buried under other stuff. Hell's bells.
Hopefully the weather will cooperate tonight so I can rid myself of much (or all) of this cardboard and packing material. It's really holding up the whole show. I can't even attempt to clean up dog hair, of which there's literal snowdrifts in corners and under furniture. By the time I finish, the basement that used to look like an auto-parts store is going to look like an auto-parts warehouse. Sheesh.
Oh well, the washer stopped... time to work on Step Three some more!
If you can't burn them, I'm off the next two days you know. I will be making a dump run ( I can easily swing by and grab your stuff too.) along with a lumber yard run if you need shelf building supplies. The three I built for the new garage are full. I will likely need some building supplies anyway. My plan is to get after the old house over the next 4 days. Let me know what you want to do.
