I started removing the trim to get the car ready to head in for body work and paint prep. I had to drill out a few of the nuts and bolts that held the trim on because they were rusted through, but in the end everything came off quite easily. I used a sharpie to mark on the back of the trim where it came from. I expect I will be getting new trim in the end, but just in case. I started to remove reflectors and badging, too. The harder parts of removing the trim around the windows is still to come.

After Kwan replaced my gas sending unit, I could finally tell how much gas was in the tank. However after a few days of driving, I still had just over 3/4 of a tank according to the gauge. Just to be safe, I got off the freeway in Hayward to get gas. Sure enough I was only down by 1/4 of a tank. Awesome.

As I got back onto the freeway, the transmission started to make a griding and rattling sound. Suddenly, a loud clunk sounded and the gear shift lost its connection to the transmission. The shifter just floated freely. I quickly pulled over to the shoulder and called for a tow truck.

A funny thing, though. I got on at the last entrance before the toll plaza. And according to the tow truck company I spoke with, it turns out tow trucks aren’t allowed on the bridge, which I was now technically on. They told me to call 911. Just as I was about to, a Highway Service Patrol truck pulled up to help. He hooked up my car to his truck while I waited in his passenger seat, listening to other drivers debate how stupid cops are when they try to make arrests in neighborhoods with gangs. The general consensus among tow truck drivers is that cops get what’s coming to them when they do that. But I digress…

I got dropped off back in Hayward and Beth came to pick me up and get me to work. Kwan worked is magic and arranged for a tow truck to pick up my car and get it to his shop. As usual he had me back on the rode that evening. It turns out the pin that connects the shifting linkage to the transmission somehow popped out. Who would have expected that one?

I dropped my car off at Beyond 2 in the morning to have the fuel gauge repaired and to have the timing and carb adjusted. Kwan did an awesome job and got it done by the end of the day. He also serviced the speedometer and got it working again. Hooray!

On my way home in the evening, the speedometer began moving erratically again and whining. Then the needle broke off of the gauge. Oh well, another item to fix eventually. Kwan offered to take a look at it when I’m in again.

I broke down today on the San Mateo bridge on the way to work. As I headed up the overpass portion of the bridge, my car stuttered and stalled. I was able to get into the far right lane, but since there is no shoulder, I quickly started to back up traffic.

I called 911 to let them know that I was the cause of the backup and they sent out the big CalTrans pusher truck. I got a push up to the top of the bridge and then I coasted down to Foster City. The truck pushed me the rest of the way off of the freeway to a parking lot.

I was still at a loss as to what was wrong. I had just filled up the Thursday before, so I knew I had gas. I popped the hood to take a look, but everything looked fine. The CalTrans driver came over and peeked in, too. The only thing amiss was that the fuel filter didn’t look like it had much gas in it. We decided to dump a gallon of gas in the tank anyway, and sure enough, the car started right up. What gives? Where did all of my gas go?

I had adjusted the carburetor fuel mixture over the weekend to fix my rough idle. In the process I must have made the mixture much more rich than before, so my mileage estimates were all off. I had run out of gas. Time to get the fuel gauge fixed.

Without the time to do it myself, I called Kwan at Beyond 2 and he offered to fix it the next day.

The rims and tires on the Silver Bullet are not meant to be driven on, especially 50 miles a day. The sidewalls have bubbles and each tire is a different brand.

I purchased a set of 14 inch BBS basket weave rims from Beyond 2 with
a good set of tires. I picked up the tires on Friday after work and drove up the next day to Petaluma to Jen and Seth’s.

On the way I stopped at German Auto Sport and got a set of lugs for the new rims. Unfortunately, I needed just the nuts, not the nut/bolt combo that I ended up buying. Seth and I spent most of the day driving to every auto store around Petaluma looking for lug nuts that would work. We finally found them in Cotati.

The rims mounted easily without spacers, but we discovered that the front bumper was bent in on the driver’s side and it would hit the tire when it turned. So we tied the bumper to Seth’s truck and pulled the bumper out almost back to where it should be.

We also bled the brake lines, which were full of air and fluid that looked like coffee. I was going to also replace the front passenger caliper, with an extra one I had, but it turns out this car has two piston calipers instead of the four piston calipers. Since it was built early in 1969, it still has some BMW 1600 parts on it. The car stops much better now, but it needs a real brake upgrade soon.