December 1997
December 5, 1997: Two BIG boxes on the front porch. The interior has arrived from
Victoria British and an inspection reveals all is well save the cockpit panel. The color
is off on the panel...... it almost looks like black and brown stripes. There was one
pleasant surprise in the box: headrest foam and covers. When I ordered they told me these
were not part of the kit and were available at $75 per headrest.
December 7, 1997: It's the anniversary of Pearl Harbor and 2 days from my 50th. My
birthday will find me in NYC on business at Internet World for 3 days. Luckily Jeanne will
be joining me the 9th and 10th to help me celebrate a half century. Her turn is next
month! For the past week all of the work has been done in the basement sanding, painting,
sanding, cleaning, sanding..... etc..
December 9, 1997: The start of a new decade..... 50 years old today and Jeanne has
given me a wonderful previous 5 days (1 day for each decade). She really made each day
very special. My present, besides the TR6, was what every man who has a winter restoration
job needs:
December 13, 1997: Re-assembly of the dash begins. Why is it, that what you think will
be easy, turns out quite difficult and time consuming? As mentioned previously on this
page I redid all my fresh air hoses because they were brittle and cracked. Replacing them
was easy...... measure..... cut..... put on fitting and tighten clamp. However, getting
them up under the dash, even an empty, dashless, gageless dash proved daunting. It really
is pretty straightforward with one exception. Next to the fresh air vent, that shows on
the dashboard, is a footwell vent next to it, but behind the dash. This vent has to turn
180 degrees on itself in order to fit. So what's the problem? Well, you have to position
it in such a way as to leave room for the glovebox on the passenger side, and the wiper
switch on the driver side. And let me tell you, there are lots of ways you can position it
and nothing fits. After about 2 hours of loosening clamps, turning hoses and repositioning
everything, I finally got it right. Total assembly accomplishments for the day include:
dash top, crash pads, switch plinth and the cursed hoses. Tomorrow I hope to do the dash
face and the zillion wires that need connecting and maybe the windshield.
December 14, 1997: Today I spent
about 3 hours installing the new dash face and all the gages. Remember well they all got
reconnected to right place, the first time. There's only that I'll
troubleshoot another time. Next up...... reinstalling the windshield
December 19, 1997: Time to put
the windshield back in.
December 21 - 26, 1997: Ah
Christmas...........only in our case it's Ah Choo, cough, ache Christmas. Yes, that most
family, fun time of the year finds us in bed with the flu. Jeff and Sue arrived from Japan
on Sunday the 21st, their first time home in 2 1/2 years. The first thing Jeff wanted to
do was take a quick spin in the TR6. Top down, dry roads and 25 degrees found us cruising
the neighborhood at 10PM. After the ride he walked in the house and announced that he
wanted one!! I think he finally understands what I've been talking about all these years.
Jeanne got hit with the flu Christmas Eve and spent Christmas day in bed, Jeff and Sue
took off to New Hampshire to visit her family so that left me alone with the car. My fun
was shortlived as the flu hit me the next day.
December 31, 1997: After a week
of lying around in PJ's and bunny slippers trying to recover from the flu, I actually got
dressed and descended into the warm side of the basement for an hour. My goal was to
disassemble one seat and maybe even start it's re-assembly. Ambitious goals for someone
whose most strenuous activity in a week was taking a shower! Let's leave it at: I got one
seat apart, put my sweats back on and hit the couch.
Let's see
January's work......more
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