A Leslie Wong Blog

Seero matches the video from one of film’s greatest car chases in Bullitt, with Google Maps, so you know where to play Bullitt when you’re in San Francisco.

kianet over at Digg writes about a Wired story: “The go-fast gurus at Ferrari are working on a successor to the jaw-dropping Enzo that could be the lightest, quickest two-seater ever to roll out of Maranello.Ferrari sees lighter cars as the best way to reach its goal of increasing fuel economy 40 percent and reducing emissions 25 percent without compromising its reputation for performance.”

My Alfetta’s curb weight is around 2700 lbs (1227 kg) and has about 110 hp (82 kW). I wonder what a 2200 lb (1000 kg) car that has 600 hp (447 kW) would be like.

(photo courtesy Stéphane Duquesne)

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…was my friend and barber for the 25 years I lived in Manhattan. He said a lot of great things during my time in his barber chair. One of the best was, “The more people get fucked, the more they like it.”

Look at this CablesforLess 3 Foot 500MHz Cat6 Patch Cable, then buy this AK-DL1: Ultra Premium Denon Link Cable.

Our BMW Bavaria exhibited the symptoms of a faulty solenoid on the starter. The battery was fully charged and I re-tightened the positive battery cable connection on the solenoid. Turning the key didn’t produce a click out of the starter. After I tapped the solenoid with a breaker bar; the starter cranked and worked normally.

I used the Bosch Vehicle Part Finder, which specified a SR71X Remanufactured Starter. I ordered it from my local NAPA store ($109 USD).

I wasn’t looking forward to removing the old starter, though it turned out to be easy. I managed to remove the two bolts holding the starter to the block using only the box end of a straight 17mm combination wrench. A 17mm half-moon wrench would have made it a little easier.

The smaller diameter of the new starter made it simple to use a socket wrench to reach the bolts when I installed it. It took about 5 minutes. The car started on the first turn of the key. The next turn of the key did nothing.

I removed the steering column cover and looked at the ignition switch. The half of the switch soldered to the wiring harness was falling out of the steering wheel lock housing, leaving about 5mm between contacts that needed to touch.

In retrospect, I probably could have repaired the old switch, had I seen two of the parts that fell into the bottom dashboard cover. Since I’m apparently on a replace 36 year-old car parts jag, I ordered a new switch from Mesa Performance. The switch is actually an E21 part (61 31 1 358 932), about $100 USD. They told me it was cheaper for them to buy a complete E21 switch and sell me just part I needed rather than buying an E3 ignition switch.

I had to reuse the Molex connector from the old switch and grind off an alignment pin on the new switch.

After I installed everything, the car still wouldn’t crank. I measured 12v+ on terminal 50 on the solenoid when I turned the switch to start, but it just clicked. Then I shorted the cable from the battery to the motor windings connection on the solenoid and the starter motor didn’t turn.

I took the starter back to NAPA and it tested OK. Frustration escalated. The starter motor wasn’t getting enough current – I measured the voltage and it was OK. Before reinstalling it again, I used a wire brush around the starter opening on the block to remove the surface rust. Then I removed and cleaned the ground strap between the block and the frame. As a precaution, I also replaced the positive battery cable; the old one seemed a little too flexible in the middle for 4 gauge copper wire.

When I put it back together and tried it, it cranked, ran for a few seconds and shut off. I tried this several times because it seemed like the fuel bowls in the carburetors were empty. There was smoke coming from the resistor next to the distributor. In the wiring diagram, the second small wire went from the solenoid to 12v+ on the ignition coil. I disconnected that wire from the solenoid and everything worked normally.

It burns me when something breaks and the easiest fix is to get a new one. I try to repair things before I go out and buy a replacement.

Many years ago we bought an HP Officejet g55 All-in-One (C6736A). The Officejet g55 is an all-in-one (AIO) with printer, copier and scanner functions. At the time, it’s specs were good as a photo printer too.

The printer recently started jamming when printing multiple pages. The first page would print OK, but would not fully eject, so the next page would be crumpled, creating a paper jam.

The mechanism that ejects the paper after printing, appropriately called the paper pusher bar, had broken tabs. An OEM HP part, C6429-40031, is no longer available from HP. The same part is listed for the HP DeskJet 930C and Officejet g85, among others. I found it for $12 USD at Printer Works, though with shipping and tax it ended up costing about $24 USD. I guess that’s better than junking the printer, which most people would do.

A Google search turned up a user named Bert at fixyourownprinter.com, who gave excellent, though not trivial instructions, for repairing the problem. The photos below are an attempt to illustrate Bert’s instructions.

1. Remove the rear cover
2. Disconnect cables
3. Remove the scanner
4. Remove the side and top covers
5. Remove paper handler
6. Remove the Paper Pusher

To see larger versions of the photos, see this flickr slide show.