It was messy and time consuming but I've been busy removing the decals. If I'm going to put on a fresh coat of paint, the old stickers have to come off. This also presents me with the opportunity to get my own sponsorship. (stay tuned).
Its pretty simple to remove.A drill with wire brush attachment and some strong arms and 5.5 hours latter I'm nearly finished.
I've also replaced the battery terminal ends. The old ones looked dodgy and with the inherent risk of a cabin fire, due to the fuel lines running through the cab, it was in my best interest to change these over. When your doing 140kh down the straight you don't want to be seeing blue sparks arcing inside, do you?
I flushed out the radiator and figured that replacing the thermostat would also be a wise move.
When i removed the old one and took it into the local boys at Auto 1 Margaret River, The new one just didn't look right.
The old one had 8 holes drilled into it. A bit of research on the Internet solved this mystery. 
The holes serve a couple of purposes. They allow water to pass through to the radiator whilst the engine is warming up. This prevents cavitation of the water in the head and block. But the main function is to protect the Head Gasket from failure. As thermostats get older there chance of not opening increases. Al owing some water to flow past will reduce potential damage to the head and gasket. Also as these cars are raced in 2nd gear, maximum RPM, the increased water flow back to the rear cabin mounted radiator, helps keep the engine from overheating.
Coming up next, The Holy Holley arrives!
Cheers Damon
2 comments:
how can someone know when their thermostat is not preforming well..... specifically in older cars??
also the pics of the boys are well funny...you should defiantly update them from time to time
peace
If your car looks like its always running hot, then its probably that the thermostat isn't fully opening. Thus reducing the amount of water flowwing back to the radiator. Solution, replace it. About $10 and a new gasket is a cheaper than a fixing a blown head gasket or even worse an cracked of warped head!
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