We need a Mike Veronesi in Southeast Louisiana! Tell him we'll feed him if
he comes down. Out here in the boonies it ain't so easy to find folks who
are comfortable working on a 46 year-old vehicle unless it's a pickup or a
tractor. If my '58 Southampton had a Deere motor in it, I'd already be
motoring daily.
They sell "Mopar Muscle" magazine at Wal Mart, at least that's were I
finally found a copy today of the October issue. Barnes and Noble, I
suppose, is too snobby to carry such rough and tumble fair because I rode 15
miles to the next town after being assured that they carried it, to no
avail. THe article has great techy descriptions of all of the model and
accessory variations for the '57 through '59 Imps. The website, of course,
has much of same the information already, but it's nice to have it all in
one place and on paper.
I spent this afternoon in a barn north of town, pulling ten years of crud
and dust off of a '71 Carmen Ghia convertible that the owner wants to sell.
I had great fun, but I kept wishing it was an Imperial Ghia Limo! Maybe
next time. (The Ghia wouldn't start, by the way, despite my ministrations.
Bad coil, and cheating with a bypass [channel wrench] didn't work. The guy
bought it 12 years ago right after it had been restored, drove it 500 miles
and figured he was too old for it. He's now 83 and he was perfectly able to
help me shove it out into the light to work on it today. I plan to follow
in his footsteps if I can. I won't write more about it [stop worrying
Steve], as it's non-Imp, but rest assured it will live again! )
The Ravin' is still in the garage down the street, resting comfortably
despite the 95+ degree heat that makes me think of something cooler to do
every time I come close to going down there to work on it. I did pull the
radiator last weekend and it's been riding around in the backseat of my
daily driver waiting for a long lunch hour so I can take it out to a country
mechanic I keep hearing about who still boils out radiators. There's an old
radiator shop here in town that's been in business for 50 odd years, but I
used to bring stuff there from my '62 Chevy when I was in high school and
they always took forever and treated me like crap. Old, bad memories die
hard, and I'll be danged before I go back there even after 25 years. The
Imperial and I both deserve better.
I'm thinking of buying a cheapy sand blaster to clean off some of the engine
components and other parts of the car, especially the rims. I don't have a
garage (yet. The slab has been poured but the rest of the cash hasn't
arrived) so this all has to take place in the driveway/yard/garden shed.
In particular I want to clean off and re-paint the air cleaner, just to get
a start on cleaning up the engine compartment, and next the valve covers and
oil pan. I've read Kerry Anderson's/Elijah's great articles about painting
Elijah's car, so I've got a start with respect to instructions about
prepping surfaces, but can anyone give me any specific advice as to painting
engine parts? And how about cheap, I'm-only-gonna-use-it-for-one project
sand blasters? I thought I might start looking for a blaster by checking a
few local pawn shops. It never ceases to amaze me what I can get from
places like that in the way of "single use" tools. I painted our house
about ten years ago and got the greatest sanders from there.
Happy Firepower motoring everybody!
Patrick Moore
'58 Southampton 4 door
Covington, Louisiana.
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Meyer" <donkiyoti@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2004 4:59 PM
Subject: Re: IML: A Mechanic 4 U! and Exhaust
On Sunday, Aug 22, 2004, at 14:39 US/Pacific, M Turner wrote:
> This is an unpaid advertisement! Mike Veronesi of East Bridgewater MA
> has been working on my 1962 Imperial Custom Southampton for the last
> several weeks, replacing lower wheel bearings, cleaning & rebuilding
> the carburetor, bleeding the brakes and adjusting them. Mike replaced
> nearly all hoses, corrected the elevation of the car and put new
> brackets on the torsion bars. Mike also found an ace muffler shop
> that replaced the cherry bombs (Yes! cherry bombs) with nice dual
> exhausts. He also showed me driveshaft problems to be corrected,
> because the rubber has vulcanized. He will undertake that repair
> shortly.
>
It's always nice to find a good Imperial-friendly mechanic! I've found
a place like that in Tucson: Meyer's Garage on Grant Road. (No relation
to me).
And cherry bombs make great resonators! I had a dual exhaust put on my
'65 using those so-called "turbo" mufflers. Well, they were too loud
and they would set up a harmonic frequency that would drone and give
you a headache. I had a couple of big, long glass-packs added after the
mufflers, close to the tail pipe and that mellowed it out beautifully.
I love how this car sounds....
Back to the Home of the Forward Look Network