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After many long years of collecting rust, dust and various kinds of
animal feces in garages and under tarps, my old Kaiser has finally begun
its restoration. Yippee! Santa brought me an engine hoist this year so
I could finally get serious. I am shown here hooking up a chain to a couple
of head bolts so we could pull the Kaiser's engine and transmission in
February 2002. |
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Here is the successful Kaiser team of (left to right) Steve Rasmussen,
Matt Harr and The Kaiser Kid. We pulled the power plant without incident,
which is rather surprising given the car repair horror stories each of
us brings with us. Actually Dias is the tallest of the three - the two
stumpy guys in back are standing on boxes to give the mistaken impression
of greater height. We celebrated by drinking Red Hook India Pale Ale. Thanks,
little dudes! |
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Matt donated an old wooden engine stand that served as a temporary
home for the 226-cubic inch "Supersonic" engine. It fit the old Kaiser
six-cylinder surprisingly well. While my engine got used to its new
home, I expended great effort and lost some blood trying to remove the
bell housing so I could mount the engine to a new engine stand (again,
thank you Santa!) Unfortunately, coolant had leaked into bad places and
seized up the motor, making removal of the flywheel, and thus the bell
housing, difficult. Crap! |
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I pulled the head, poured penetrating oil everywhere I could, then
got the motor to turn. Huzzah! With that achievement, off came the flywheel,
then the clutch assembly, then the bell housing! Here is the engine
finally mounted on its pretty new stand. With the Kaiser Relief Fund
now quite tapped, it looks as if the engine will be residing here for some
time. Donations are gratefully and discretely accepted. |
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Here is another shot of the engine. The intake and exhaust manifolds
were taken off before this picture was taken. |
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Kinda sad, isn't it? This lonely picture is of the space the Kaiser
engine called home for 50 years. When my weird cousin Steve and I worked
on this Kaiser 20 years ago, we never pulled the body off the frame . .
. that's exactly what I plan to do next! I hope to accomplish this by the
end of summer, 2002. Stay tuned for more photos . . . |