It's alive!

After another busy weekend, I am happy to report that the engine does indeed run!

I got my radiator back from the shop on Thursday and finished hooking up the cooling system this morning. Good thing I picked up a lot of coolant because the system took about 5 gallons to fill. I was, however, disappointed that the radiator cap I got does not fit.





After filling and bleeding the cooling system, I changed the oil and installed the new filter. While I was under the car, I checked for coolant leaks and didn't find any. I added a few gallons of fuel and waited. Ok, no fuel leaks. I turned the key to get the fuel pump running. Ok, still no fuel leaks. Pump the gas pedal a few times, turn the key and...



Ok, so it didn't happen quite like that. The engine did start right away, but didn't run very well. It wouldn't stay running unless the choke was on and it would die right away if I touched the gas pedal at all. However, after it ran for a few minutes, I was able to turn off the choke and rev the engine. At one point when I was sitting in the driver's seat reving the engine, TK comes up and says, "do you have a fire extinquisher?" I say, "why yes, I do!" At that moment, she screams, "good cause you're gonna need it!" and a big white cloud rises from the engine bay. I immediately shut off the ignition and jump out of the car. Turns out it was nothing serious. Since I didn't have the correct coolant cap, I left the expansion tank open. As the engine warmed up, the coolant burped and came out the tank. Since the expansion tank is strategically located above the rear header, guess where the overflowing coolant went? Coolant + hot header = cloud of white smoke.

Anyhow, I've run the engine about a dozen times now. What a great sound! The (really bad) video does not do it justice. Also, excuse the poor quality and orientation of the video. TK was manning my phone and didn't realize it shot video in landscape.

Now that I know the engine runs, I'm going to focus on putting the rest of the car back together. Hopefully, I'll have a chance to bleed the brakes this week, then focus on reassembling the interior and chasing down electrical gremlins.