Maybe down to road a few years

 

Midge may be coming home this weekend.
Hoping to get up there early Saturday & get her cleaned up. All that I think I have left to do is get the underbody cleaned up & hit the paint with some compound. Planning on putting her in the local July 4 parade & car show. Local bodyshop is sponsoring the show, so I may talk to them about paint/wrap options.

 

Dude, that's exciting as hell.
I love living vicariously through you!

 

 

Tentative route home for Saturday.
Bit of highway, and a lot of back roads.

 

This is gonna be awesome. I'm jealous.

 

Hoping to get a ride up there early Sat morning, do a bit of underbody cleanup, then make the run home.

 

If I were local...I would hook you up.

 

I'm driving my car home too! Unfortunately our routes will not come remotely close to overlapping.

 

No flat plane V8 here, but she does sound pretty good for a wonky exhaust setup.

 

Yet.

 

There is a guy in Dallas that has a 302 swapped Midget, called the Mini Cobra
Takes some significant chassis strengthening to handle the torque increase.

 

Orbital DA, what's your size preference? Assuming I suppose I'd eventually make use of it on the Exploder & MiniBus as well. 10in, or would a 6in palm DA work well enough & be more maneuverable?

 

5-6in for sure. Getting into smaller areas is way more valuable for a DIY'er than covering a huge area fast. If you're doing this for a living, get a big one, a medium one, and a small (< 3") one.

I personally have a 5" DA polisher and think it's great.

 

Thanks, I was thinking the 6in would be better than the bulky 10in 2-handled DA.

 

This type is cheap and bullshit...it's only intended to put wax on a car.

Get a legit 6" like Sam said...orange/white pad and some 105/205 or even just klasse AIO.
If you want to step your game up you can do rotary with the 3M perfect it system...you can 2k cut and buff like a champ but that's a little more advanced and risky.
I'm there...and I just want to add a little portable 3" full rotary milliwaukayyyy...but that's a story for another day.

 

3" DA cordless is dreamland.

Shit, any cordless is dreamland at this point. I don't use mine often enough to justify the expense though.

 

It's funny, Brian lent me his Milwaukee...so I bought the quick connect system and perfect it pads and polish/compound...
I use it on my Makita corded and I don't know WHY but it seems like it's SO much more cumbersome to have a cord LOL.
A little M12 Milwaukee is in the cards for me...I have a HD gift card but I'm waiting for open box or some shit.

 

Wait for Prime Day and see what Bezos has to offer you.

That's a good idea though, I should see if they have one in the battery system (Ridgid) I'm in...maybe around black Friday or something.

Having a cord (or air hose) sux. I've switched almost everything I can over to being cordless. Only things remaining that aren't cordless at this point are my stationary big tools and the two Festool products I own but I can't afford the cordless versions of those. I have one pneumatic nail gun that needs to go and I'll be all set.

 

I'm Ryobi, but doubt it would be practical to have a DA with a 40v battery handing on it.

 

Beef up your guns...
it'll be worth it.

Sam, I'm with you on that...cords seem so peasantlike.

 

Ryobi has a huge 18V line. You don't need a 40V battery for a polisher lol.

Agreed! Ever since I got a cordless impact, everything else had to go. Even got a cordless framing nailer (that I'm going sell soon) for doing the basement and that was awesome.

 

True, I haven't dived into the RyobiOne line yet. My light power tools are Bosch. Yard equip is Ryobi 40v

 

Trip deferred to next weekend, going to get the parking structure/enclosure built this weekend if we get our power back on.

 

Dude, bosch and ryobi?
diversify!

 

Had the Bosch for years, impact driver died last year.
May make the full jump to all Ryobi, undecided.

 

let me know how much, i may be interested

 

Will do. Need to finish the basement project first...

 

My dad has a 7", so I'm going to borrow that to get the Midget ready for the 4th.

Will probably keep an eye out for the Ryobi sales that have the freebies attached to it.

 

tmi.

 

Saw that coming when I typed it

 

also tmi

@SamDoe1 well well done.

 

In other news, we got the 'garage' started last Saturday. 3 trips to Home Depot & most of the day to set 7 posts
Will go up & get the car Sat morning & get the roof on the garage when we get home. Probably pour some concrete in a few places, as it's not very even at the moment.

 

"my dAd's gOt A 7 iNchEr!!!"
Sorry, that's all I'm gonna see from now on.

 

Short version, she's home.

Long version:
Went up to my dad's to bring the Midget home & build the 'garage' to park her in.
Got her out for a little shakedown warmup, just 5 miles around to make sure all was good before the 80 mile drive home.


So far, so good. She was running great.
Loaded up & hit the road, with my dad in tow with some parts & tools to get the cover built.


Stopped for fuel after getting off the 75mph highway by his house. Kept it around 70, which has it humming along at 4k RPM.
Bit of coolant on the ground, but not a lot. Grabbed a gal of water just in case, and kept an eye on the temp gauge.
About halfway, got stopped at a light & the temps shot up, went green & she was bucking a bit. Killed it & pulled over to find more coolant on the ground.




My dad had to turn back, as we didn't bring the ramps for his trailer. About 30 min on the side of the road waiting. Leading though is the fan clutch is bad & it's not pulling enough air at a stop. It was running great otherwise.
Back on the trailer, hopefully for the last time.


What should have been a little over an hour drive home, took closer to 3. We had to winch the car onto the trailer, as there's 3ft wide tin under it & it would've hit multiple times underneath.
A long day later & she's home in her place.



Also picked up a car cover, since it's not a fully enclosed space.
It's a Budge D1, for now. Was a little concerned it'd be too big, since a lot of the reviews mentioned it being a great fit on a Miata, which for being a small roadster, is still a fairly bigger car than the midget.
But, the cover fits well & should keep the elements & critters off of her.



And, my security camera still has a good view

 

Very cool update, man.
Love it...
A little drama makes it all memorable.

 

Yeah, if it's the fan clutch, seems a conversion to a non-clutched fan is the simplest fix.
The Spitfire 1500 used a non-clutch fan, as did the UK-spec Midgets. Sounds like it's just a water pump & fan replacement.
And, the parts for the conversion are reportedly cheaper than either the fan clutch replacement or a elec fan conversion.

 

Sorry to hear about the troubles, but at least it's where it needs to be!

 

Hoping to get he replacement parts ordered & get another shakedown drive soon.
Wife wants to do a short staycation semi-local. Hoping we can take the Midget for that.

 

If it ain't on a trailer at least a few times, you really aren't having fun .

Seems like an easy fix, keep up the updates!

My mom owned several of these cars in her 20s and ultimately her last one was totaled. .

She loved it.