Torino Headaches

Sorry for the SUPER long post….

Ok, so here’s a bit of an update over the past few days. I took a 4-day weekend this past holiday and purposely didn’t plan anything because I wanted to get the interior put in before my parents arrive this upcoming weekend.

Started by pulling out the vert top hydraulic assembly so that it could be taken to the shop. Then installed the radio speakers and started the car up and let her run for a good 10-15 minutes with the heat on high so I could make sure no leaks on the heater and that the radio worked. This is when problems started…

I noticed that the ALT light would come on and go off and come on and go off every couple seconds…. The interior light (I had the door open) was flashing dim and bright dim and bright. But the radio worked and no leaks on the heater (so that’s good). I went ahead and put the dash and everything back on and started the car back up and checked lights, etc. I noticed that the illumination lights for the clock weren’t working and then also noticed the clock itself wasn’t working. So dash came back off so that I could test it. If I ground the clock illumination lights, they light up. But testing the clock connector (two wires), I get nothing. Spent probably an hour tracing it and looking through multiple wiring diagrams. I cannot figure out why it wouldn’t have power and apparently no ground. It appears to go straight into the 14401 wiring harness and to the main dash ground and the power to it comes from the same cable as the cigar lighter (which has power).
Dash

Gave up on that and decided to try test fitting the carpet. I had got it out of the box hours earlier and let it sit in the sun to release the folds, etc. brought it in and laid in the car and it’s WAY too long lengthwise. I pushed it as far up as I could against the steering column, looked at the manuals and saw that it appears you need to cut a semi-circle out of the top so that it rests around the column, so I folded it over just to check and it’s still WAY too long. The “heel inserts” are still basically UNDER the seats. There’s also about 6″ of extra over the rear of the transmission hump.

Carpet-1

Carpet-3

Carpet-2

So on Tuesday I called ACC and asked them, I got some really moody woman who didn’t understand I had a Ford even though I told her multiple times, she kept asking if it was a “GM”. She basically wouldn’t help me at all because I couldn’t give her an order number (I gave her the part number on the box). I had purchased the carpet set from MAC’s about 2 years ago. As with most of you, I assume, I bought things as they were on sale and as I could afford them. 2 years ago I got a huge bonus and MAC’s just happened to be having a 35% off sale. At the time, I also didn’t think my car would be stuck in “painting jail” forever. So I bought a ton of stuff, needless to say, that’s really biting me in the ass right now.

So I called up MAC’s and the rep basically said “sorry we can’t do anything since you bought it so long ago”. I called ACC back and got a different person and he was more helpful basically saying “that doesn’t sound right can you send us pictures”. So I sent pics yesterday and am waiting reply.

After that I put the weatherstripping on the top, that worked out well and then tried to put the handles on the top. These were in a box ever since I bought the car and I never opened it. Well I guess I should have because there’s not enough parts in the box to make two full handles.

Top handles

After that I decided to put weather stripping on the rest of the car… So I got out the box and started cleaning it up… I’m not sure what this peice is called but as I was cleaning it, it just shattered in my hands:
Broken weather stripping

I also noticed that the stripping that goes around the side and bottom of the door was missing all it’s pins and that the body shop bondoed over all weatherstrip pin holes in the door. I put on what I could and it looks good.

Spent some time cleaning up and polishing parts to get my frustrations out:
Door handles

And putting on some small details:
Rear bumper/fender

Pass Fender

I had also noticed that the brake proportioning valve was still leaking but this time from the big nut on the bottom. So on Tuesday I called up Chockostang and asked the guy if the one I returned he had rebuilt or just sent me a new one (because this is now the THIRD time I’ve sent it back to him). He said he couldn’t remember.. I told him what was wrong this time and he said “There’s just a bass washer under there, crank it hard and it will seal”. So I cranked it hard and in the process it slipped and I busted off the plastic part that the wiring harness connects too… So back to finding a new one of those.

And then from my other post, I took the vert hydraulics to a local shop and he said they were fine. Installed them back in the car and they still won’t move the top.. I think what I will do next there is get an external battery charger thing and hook it directly to the pump and see if maybe it’s just not getting enough power.

In other good news, my hideaway grill set will be arriving from Germany today!!

Lastly, I enabled my “belt buckle protection” so that when neighbors stop by the car is protected from their leaning.
Belt Buckle protection

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