Good find on the shock extension. I built some like the ones you had.

 

Nice!!

Really nice find on the extenders... thos look way better then the old ones...

I thought about getting some like the ones you had on to help, but didn't like how flimsy they looked.

 

Thanks guys. These will give me much more peace of mind. I also thought others might find this information useful too!

 

Nice upgrade christine

 

New rear brake calipers, pads and rotors. This didn't need to happen but I dropped the ball and was not good about checking the guide-pin lubrication, especially after launching my boat in saltwater. Ugh.

The result? The inside pads wearing down to metal, gouging the rotors, and a several hundred dollar fix.

I did find that one of the caliper pistons was starting to leak so maybe that was on its way out anyway. Rear brakes are so easy to ignore but I did so and suffered the consequences.


New rear brakes for the driver side.



New rear brakes for the passenger side.



I figured that it would likely not be able to be buffed out. (driver side)



Passenger side not as bad but the rotor was still toast.

 

I hate spending time and money on maintenance items. Much rather be doing upgrades but maintenance has to be done or it will cost much more to fix.

 

I knew those brakes looked new in the shock extender post lol

 

Looking forward to an update on how the Bilstein shocks ride and more updates on the Blazer build.

 

Hi there. The new shocks are working as expected. Before I installed them, there was some extra oscillations when I stopped and that has gone away. I'm hoping to get to some periodic maintenance to do to it on Sunday and at that time I'll be inspecting the undercarriage and suspension to see if everything is staying together too. LOL

I had some mods I hoped to do over the summer and even fall but working on my other car, an 82 Prelude took up a long time. There was challenges with the diagnosis and then getting parts. Upshot was loss of power at high-speeds. First dead-end was thinking it was the fuel pump. That was not it. It turned out to be a combination of the power valve not opening, the power valve diaphragm leaking and allowing fuel into the external carb vacuum control system (these are complicated on this vintage Honda), and then vacuum leaks from a blown vacuum advance and a a diaphragm for allowing fresh air to be drawn into the exhaust to improve emissions. It is all working well now. This car has evolved from a daily-driver to a hobby project. LOL

BTW, I am now an expert on rebuilding the TEC vacuum advances used on Hondas in the early 80s.


Blown old vacuum advance after trying to seal the old diaphragm with sealants.



The disassembled vacuum advance (the top is not in the picture) and nasty old diaphragm. I found out in my research that these were notorious for failing. I should be happy mine lasted so long. I did reuse the lip of the old diaphragm to take up a bit of space to help the compression seal of the new diaphragm between the back and top parts of the diaphragm.



The repurposed diaphragm from an Autolite (Ford) 4100 carburetor. This is the vacuum secondary diaphragm. If I had to do it again, I might just JB Weld the bolt to the back of one of these diaphragms instead of disassembling it. By doing so I'd preserve the original seal of the metal plates to the diaphragm.



The replacement diaphragm.



The vacuum advance uses a threaded rod as part of the mechanism to adjust the initial tension on the spring and the amount of advance/retard allowed. Used a bolt to replace this. I had to add sealant to the edge of the plates. Finally found that the Amazing Goop product worked best but only after trying a few others.



The initial test. I used a v-band clamp so that I can disassemble it.

 

Nice work. Always fun working on an older car like that.