"back when the chrome was thick and the women were straight"
Heheheheheheh!! Those were the days. I cut my teeth tinkerin' on a '64 Beetle, a '66 Goat, a '69 Cutlass, and a '69 Ford 390. (Never mind the Rambler!)
A lot more happens over in my neighbor's garage than mine. He has better lighting and HEAT!! (We're in the central part of coastal Maine, so that's important.)
I got hung with the nickname "Wilson" after the guy over the fence on ToolTime. All because I first met the neighbor, Dave, by way of conversation under the moonlight across a ditch full of cattails where all he could see was the top of my ball cap and the bottom of my beer can when I tipped it up.
And one night, across the cattails, I hear, "Hey! Wilson! You know anything about points ignitions?" Another friend of Dave's was swappin' out blocks on a four-cylinder Chevy (OMC? OBC?) in a small lake boat he'd bought, and had no idea how to line up and time the distributor. I'll give him credit, he had a good book, but had no idea how to read it.
It was rewarding to be able to SHOW him (from experience) how to figure out how to wind the distributor back onto its gear and have a prayer of ever timing her up. Still, I got roped into the Titanic's first trip out onto the lake, tuning her up under a load. She had other problems develop, but we did make it back to shore. 8<( or is that 8^)
To be fair, both Dave and this friend (Jeffrey, to give him a name) have in the past made their livings as mechanics on big trucks, but they're young enough (mid-thirties) to have missed the experience on what I call first-generation gas engines that you and I have. So I have something to teach them. On the flip side, they've been good (and patient!) in helping me to learn with projects on suspensions and other projects (theirs and mine) that we get going on over there.
But they're good to work with. When called for, I get the books, and we share experience back and forth, as the job requires, to get the job done.
I always look at those certificates hangin' behind the service writer's counter that the techs earned. They don't make me doubt their competence, but they remind me that some of them are old guys who just went to school to learn to work on the new ones. The younger guys, all many of them know is what the OBD tells them. And there's a whole class of them in between that gets the old ways but don't have a lot of experience with it. And that last group is the bridge.
I know I have one tech that I always ask for when I need to take the Ram in for things like the 100k check on the valves on the Cummins. I trust him to run 'em and adjust those that need it and leave alone those that don't.
Glad to hear your son has the interest to look over your shoulder and get his hands dirty on the old motors. And he'll know and understand more about a motor than OBDII will ever tell him or his classmates. We can help folks on this board, whether we're givin' them specs that they could get from a book, or helpin' them wade through terms they don't know in the books, or sharing the benefit of our experience. I've been talkin' about how critical the first point is, but the last two are what will make the difference to make sure there are folks around who know how to make a machine run as it should.
I figure it's all for the good, as I don't expect the certification outfits will be issuin' any more certificates attesting to expertise in carburetion.
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Today's Featured Article - Tractor Profile: Allis-Chalmers Model G - by Staff. The first Allis-Chalmers Model G was produced in 1948 in Gasden, Alabama, and was designed for vegetable gardeners, small farms and landscape businesses. It is a small compact tractor that came with a complete line of implements especially tailored for its unique design. It featured a rear-mounted Continental N62 four-cylinder engine with a 2-3/8 x 3-1/2 inch bore and stroke. The rear-mounted engine provided traction for the rear wheels while at the same time gave the tractor operator a gre
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