Month: February 2002

One Twist Too Many

Law and Order, the original, is one of a few TV shows I still watch regularly. I usually tape it, because it is so much better to fast forward through the commercials. We normally watch the tape on Fridays with dinner as we wind down from the work week. For whatever reason, we didn’t watch it then, we watched it tonight. They usually keep me guessing until the end by using plot twists, so it is hardly ever who you think it is.

Tonight they needed to link a guy to some money used for paying someone to kill his mistress. No matter how hard the DAs looked they couldn’t find a connection. They finally got the guy’s wife to come forward with a bank withdrawal form that made it look like he had gotten the money from one of his kids college funds. The jury convicted him because of it. Afterwards the assistant DA noticed the similarity between the wife’s handwriting and the signature on the withdrawal slip. The DAs confront the wife to see if she will admit to fabricating the slip. No way will she do it. They are left to believe that the wife set up the husband. Neat trick. Too neat I say. First thing they would have done is get the police to verify who actually withdrew the payoff money (if there ever was money withdrawn.) And even if they didn’t because it was the final nail in this guy’s coffin, certainly his defense lawyer would have checked out the slip.

Close, But No Cigar

Predictably, I put the top up the ride to and put it back down for the ride from work.

Man those guys in the Trussville Mazda parts department are good. Ordered the cubby hole yesterday and got it today via UPS ground. Bad thing was it was too big for the hole. When I checked Miata. net Garage section there was mention of some trimming required to use bigger cubby that I ordered, but to the extent I thought. This thing needed, in my opinion, major rework. About a 1/4″ off the bottom had to be removed and there was no way I was going to get a straight line across the 7 inches or so of width. I sent it back. They were real nice about taking the part back, I’m just out about the $10 it took to cover shipping in both directions.

My next option was $80 for one of those Really Nice CD Caddys from Serious Auto. But before I did that, I went and visited the company’s Mad Scientist in residence and borrowed 4 toggle switches. Wanted to see how they would look in my temporary cardboard blanking plate before I spent that much on something I could only “see” on the web. Made up a couple of labels and stuck them on there too.

Not too bad for a first attempt. I don’t like the labels yet, maybe I can find someone who still has one of those old dynamo pressure labelers. I think maybe I need lights too. Just wire the lights through the switches so they come on when the switch is up… Maybe get one as a momentary on to use as the garage door opener. I can see this mod getting out of hand.

Started down, went up, now down.
Top Transitions since 02/01/02: 12

Chocolate & Carmel Creme Savers

Nabisco missed the mark on this flavor. Yuck! 3 out of 4 ain’t bad, though. The first flavor was Orange & Cream. Just like those Creamsicles you got from the Good Humor Man. Next was Strawberries & Cream and while there wasn’t any childhood association to anything, they were just as good as the Orange. 3rd was Raspberries & Cream, mmmmm, delicious. So when I noticed a new flavor, Chocolate & Carmel I bought a bag. One taste and I knew we had to back to the store to buy a different flavor. If you are in the neighborhood, stop in I’ll give you a nearly full bag of C & C.

Toggle Switch Idea

Cold morning, so the top got put up before leaving the garage. Warm afternoon, so the top went back down for the ride home. This is the time of year where that pattern will get repeated for a quite a while. Average lows at night mid 30’s and average highs in the afternoon mid 60’s.

Mazda doesn’t make a blanking plate in the correct size to fill the spot in the console, so today I ordered a Mazda little cubby hole thing. It will fill up the majority of the gap and I’ll have to fabricate something out of aluminum and paint it with some black crinkle-coat paint to fill the rest. Thinking maybe of getting some retro looking toggle switches to put in the plate. I won’t hook them to anything, just label them things like, 50 Cal. Gun, Oil Slick, NOS, Bat Hook, etc. Inspired by this, but they want way too much for them. They also make some for the power window switches but I could never use them as I sometimes hit them with my elbows and those switches would probably hurt.

Started down, went up, now down.
Top Transitions since 02/01/02: 10

3,000 Miles to Graceland

Was it about the good Elvis battling the bad Elvis? Or were they just giving Kurt Russell slightly good things to do so it would be OK for him to end up with the girl in the end. Courtney Arquette Cox can’t cry convincingly. Kind of interesting movie, but what’s up with the over the top gunplay? After the final shoot out scene, where like 16,000 bullets have been fired, 2 dozen bodies have been blown up or shot off scaffoldings, Kevin Kostner has been hit with like 30 bullets, one federal marshall looks at the other and says, “Make sure everyone’s OK?” Huh? Was that comedy? Oh well, at least they had some cool cars and some cool Elvis jokes….

Out You Bad Pollen

So busy writing about all that other stuff I did to the car yesterday that I forgot the real first thing I did. In Friday’s installment, I mentioned a ticking noise emanating from the heater/AC fan. I knew it was from behind the glovebox somewhere, so the first thing I did was take out the box. As it turned out I didn’t need to, no big deal, it is only two screws… Unhooking 3 wiring harnesses and removing 3 screws is all it took to drop the fan from its housing. Lo and behold inside near the squirrel cage was a dried out oak pollen cluster. It had taken about 11 months to work its way from up near the windshield and the fresh air intake down to the fan motor. While I had the fan out I looked inside where it came out of and sure enough there was one more pollen thing waiting to take the others place as soon as I buttoned everything back up. No more noise. 🙂

Drove over to Evans, Ga to check the Miata Club mailbox. The Weather said the temp was 57 so we left the house with the top down to enjoy the ride. Problem was the sun was covered by the clouds and there was some lingering fog around. After about 10 minutes we put up the windows, in 10 more we turned on the heater and after 10 more we put up the top, just too cold feeling. After stopping and checking the mail and then driving a bit further to make a donation into our retirement fund (Lotto South and Big Game tickets) we stopped at the North Augusta Greenway and took a mile or so walk. After walking we were warm enough to put the top back down for the last 1/2 hour of the trip.

Started down, up, now down.
Top Transitions since 02/01/02: 8

Whistle While You Work

Busy Miata day today.

First on the agenda was to remove the remove the “old” Sony CD changer from the trunk. Ever since installing the Blaupunkt MP41 San Jose MP3 player in the dash at Christmas the Sony has not even been on. Trunk space being at a premium to begin with in a Miata, a CD changer eats up a big chunk of it, it is nice to reclaim that room. All I have to do is fill in the carpet where I cut out a couple holes to mount the changer.

Second up was prettying the Blaupunkt install. When I first got it, I was so excited about installing it that I just used the kit that you get from Crutchfield. Functional, but it just didn’t look right, made the unit stick out of the dash about 1-1/2″ and was dropped down about 03/4″ from the top of the opening. Also I had a tendency to hit the face with my knuckles when shifting into 3rd gear. Took out the center console (removed 5 screws, remove the shift knob & unhook two wiring harnesses.) Took out the center radio surround (pop out the eyeball vents and remove 3 screws.) Then I could pull out the radio and the Crutchfield mounting plate. I then pulled off the trim piece from the head unit. measured carefully to see if this would work. Yup. Pulled the bracket off the stock radio and screwed the Blaupunkt into it and put it back in the dash. One down side was I now had a 03/16″ gap on either side of the unit (the trim piece hid that.) No hill for a stepper. Got an old stock blank off plate I had laying around cut 2 slivers of it and epoxied them to the console, not bad. The other down side to this was now I had a DIN and a half opening in the dash. I think Mazda makes some stock blank off plates in that dimension, just won’t be able to get one until at least next week. I would have ridden around with the hole there, I’m a guy, but my wife felt I should hide it some how. Used some of that old redneck multi-purpose construction material – cardboard. Sprayed it flat black and it doesn’t look too bad.

Third was finishing the dash lighting. It used to have green back lighting and all that is left of that is the light shining on the ODOs spots in the indiglo blue gages. Decided to make that light blue to match. Pulled the dash apart and popped out the bulbs, I then removed the green plastic condoms and exposed the bare bulbs. When I started to apply the blue glass paint I had bought this afternoon, it didn’t stick too well, but I kept at it. Two coats consisting of two applications of paint later, it was time to put them back in and try it out. They lit up sort of blue, but still looked greenish. SHIT. Pulled the dash apart again. Fortunately, because the paint didn’t stick too well in the first place it was relatively easy to remove. Put the bare bulbs in and now I have white light illuminating the ODO which is better than the green stock or aqua painted.

Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/01/02: 6