Where the heck is SafariRob?

[peter]

Anyone? :-k

[astrozam]

I have sent a couple emails to Rob askin how he has been doing but I have heard nothing back from him.

[dunedog]

:-k Time to get out the hounds.........

Who's out o h 10 near him?

[Rebel]

I've got his cell number in my old phone directory,,I'll put the charger on it tonight and see what I come up with.

What about you Darren,,didn't you call him a month or so ago ?

I also sent a couple of emails but no reply.

[NotDadsW41]

He's alive. He posted today over on my site @ b-body.org. I told him to stop in over here.

[astrozam]

Thanks for the update Cecil

[NotDadsW41]

You're welcome Zam!

Rob said he'd stop by. He's been busy with his Oldsmobile project rather than the Astro.

[SoCalli V8]

I did speak to him a while ago, and I will call him this weekend to express our concern about his where-abouts....

[Rebel]

Glad to hear he's still kicking. I checked my one old cell and it's a bad number for Rob so charging another to see if it's in it.
Darren, if you would, pass that number on to me. If you'd rather not, no problem,,understand.
Tell him we all said hello and to stop treating us like a red headed step-child.

[SoCalli V8]

I had a fun convo with Rob this morning.... he is doing fine, and will be here to post back shortly.

He was thankful of everyones concern.

[SafariRob]

Guys, you've got me blushing. I'm still here, I just ran out of things to say a while back and then got busy helping out a friend who was in the hospital being treated for leukemia. His boiler gave up with the cold weather and I got a call from his wife. I just figured that the pilot needed to be lit...five weekends later, I and some of the guys from work replaced the boiler (the burner had rusted out), the circulation pump (the impeller sheared off due to low water), the thermostat (don't know why but it smoked a resistor on its circuit board), and built a new distribution header out of copper tubing (the original header was made of plastic and after 19 years it was a mass of leaks). By the way, my friend's leukemia is now in remission and he's out of the hospital. Although the treatment put him through absolute hell, he's now looking forward to returning to work.
I was way out of my league in trying to get his heating system back working—I had no clue that so many things were defective. You'd think that a leak would be obvious, but all the leaks were small and I figured that, sure, they might be a problem, but not the BIG problem. I raided the parts off my “Franken Heater” in an attempt to get his system working at low cost, but there was too much wrong. It was maddening. Finally, one of the guys at work who used to work for an HVAC company decided to take a look—I'm sure glad that he did as I'd still be trying to deal with it.

Haven't been doing much with my Astro. It's engine miss is much worse now and it has a lifter that's making a lot of noise. I suspect that the lifter is bad, but the Astro will have to await its turn as I'm now working on my Olds (weather permitting). I've decided that the Chevy 350 I'm rebuilding is going into the Olds as a replacement for the tired 307 now in there. I intend to convert the car over to TBI fuel injection, too. That's phase one, phase two will be to swap out the 200 4R automatic transmission with a Tremec TKO 500 5 speed manual transmission. The catch here is that I know of no 77-96 GM B-bodies that came from the factory with a manual transmission, so I can't easily find a clutch pedal assembly to bolt in. So far, I've partially adapted a clutch pedal from an 81 El Camino to do the job. I'm not going to use the mechanical linkage, though, even though it could be made to work. I've decided to go with a hydraulic throwout bearing and a clutch master cylinder.

The 350 block has now been machined: decked, cylinders bored, main bearing caps align bored. The heads are up next for rebuilding. I think I've finally found the perfect machine shop, Bryan Engine Rebuilding here in Bryan, Ohio. They fully expect that a customer will want to be around to watch the machining being done, and give you full run of the shop. If you express an interest in the technical aspects of what's being done, you'll get everything explained to you and probably also put to work. So far, I've assisted in all the operations, even if it was only grunt work like lifting the block into place on the boring machine and bolting on the torque plate. I installed the new cam bearings and freeze plugs after some instruction. I'm looking forward to fitting the bearings and pistons. I sure won't have anyone to blame but myself if the engine is hosed when I'm done.

Bryan Engine is a fascinating place for a gear head. At first look, it's a jumble of engine parts scattered and piled all over the greasy place and it smells strongly of parts cleaner solvent. But soon all kinds of wonders present themselves to you. In one area is three mid-1930s Lincoln V12 engines, one of which runs, and the other two are waiting to be rebuilt. On another engine stand is a 1937 Cord V8, also awaiting rebuilding. I've heard of such engines before, but now have seen them. Farm equipment engines, diesel and gasoline, are being rebuilt. There is a veritable mountain of Chevy smallblock blocks just sitting there because, well, Chevy smallblocks are as common as cornfields in NW Ohio. (In fact, if I were wanting to build another Chevy SB, I'd go to a machine shop, not a junkyard, for the raw block because the machine shop will find you exactly what you want and you'll know the condition of it, too.) As I poked around the shop further, I saw two 6-71 superchargers sitting on a shelf beside several Muncie 4 speed transmissions in various states of disassembly. A little farther away sat a Muncie M22 “Rock Crusher” transmission that had had its bearings replaced and was waiting for its owner to pick it up. I fondly remember the sound of the Rock Crushers from the muscle car era. I'd love to install one in my Olds, if only for that divine gear whine, but really want an overdrive transmission.

Here's some pictures I took inside Bryan Engine.

This one of the walls. As you can see, it's a manly place. Women typically won't come inside for some reason.



Here's an engine that'll make you take a double look...count the sparkplugs!




This is another of the Lincoln V12 engines. It may be a V12, but those pistons are sure small. Kinda makes you think that this engine is really just a Briggs and Stratton on steroids.



A freshly bored and decked Ford flat head V8 sits here.



Here's the bottom end of the above flat head. Can you believe that there's only 3 main bearings?



Finally, a couple of 6-71 blowers on a shelf:




Like I said, this place fascinates me. I'll post more photos as I get them.

[GEJ]

Good to hear from you Rob.Stop in whenever you can Bud.

[peter]

Glad you're ok and DON'T pull that $hit on us again, ok? We were really strarting to wonder if everything was ok.

Keep in touch, ole friend. Say Bonjour to the Missus for me as well

[dunedog]

Well,,,,at least we'll know where to look for you next time you drop out....lol

My friend owns a shop and it is very much the same. Although the exodics are either foreign born or these hugh aluminum block drag motors. But yah,I poke around and see all sorts of weird stuff.

[phr1$k37]

Wow. What a great guy! Goes MIA and comes back with a full report!
Best of luck on the project!