thrustnut

Sweet, guess I'm getting some new door panels!

Just got in on the door cards. Any idea how many more we need?

Sorry I dumbed it down a little. It had to have compressor assist just to take off, ram jets are only efficient after your moving.The little I know about them I learned in T56-A-15 school, just basic principles. Another thing I herd was that there is a sonic boom happening inside every jet engine, but the act of compressing the air keeps it contained. (True?)

The Ram-Jet engines used on the SR-71 are essentially just a burner can, a fuel nozzle and a ejection nozzle. No real moving parts, and the faster you shove air in, the faster you go. So no real top speed on the engine, it was airframe limited.

JM, You think with your wealth of information you could help solve the problem instead of shooting down everything everyone else try's. Why bother replying if you don't even try to help.

I was messing with the input shaft trying to see if it would turn back and forth with the output shafts fixed (like it was sitting on pavement) which it did and the diff that's in the car now did not. What do you think fixed MY problem if all I did was replace the rear end and the clunk went away? Like I said nothing was loose, everything was the same going in as it was coming out. Not trying to be a jerk, but it seems pretty obvious that if I replaced one part and the problems fixed that the part replaced was the problem. I'm a mechanic also, I was looking for the problem, not to replace the diff. I was hopeing to find something else under there that could have attributed to the problem, but there was nothing there. Sorry my test was lame, but not a whole lot of diffs on aircraft and with no problems with anything on the car and input shaft movement on one diff not evident on another, I thought it was a pretty safe bet (which it was). Thanks for the offer on checking my rear end, but I'm sure I can do the same test. You should offer this service to Jacob80 to help find his problem. Anyway Jacob80, good luck with your diff problems, obviously my results where not valid... I will wait for my clunk to return...

Like I said, I'm not an expert. I was giving him the information I obtained from having the same problem and finding a solution. I would think that since I only changed the rear end, DID disassemble the old one and couldn't find any hard evidence of broken parts, that the play that was evident in the old rear end and non-existent in the new was the culprit. There's not that much going on back there, and most rear ends are pretty cheep, in most cases cheep enough that it's not worth rebuilding. BTW I have a junk 3.54 if any one wants it.

I am not an expert on this, but I did recently get rid of my rear end clunk which sounds to me like the same clunk you have. I had previously replaced the transmission mount, the tranny cross member mounts (with poly) the rear diff mount, and the mustache bar mounts (also with poly)with no success. I recently replaced my 3.54 with a 3.90 from a member here as a last resort. I didn't notice anything abnormal when removing my diff (nothing loose, missing, ect.) that would have caused the clunk. When I had the two diffs sitting on the bench next to each other I noticed that my old diff had just a tiny bit of play if I held the output shafts and spun the input shaft. The 3.90 I replaced it with had NO play at all when doing the same thing. I pulled the covers and again, nothing obviously wrong with the old diff (broken gears, metal shavings). The fluid level was low, but clean... can't say if that had anything to do with the clunk when installed in the car, but with both diffs empty only my old one had the play. The only other things I did when the rear end was out was clean up my half shafts, check play on the half shaft U-joints (they where good) and lube them. The last thing I did which was unrelated was replace my LCA bushings and pins. I personally believe now after this that ANY play between the input and output flanges is too much, but again I'm not an expert, just my opinion after some observations and fixing the problem.

I had RCI five point harnesses and NEX seats in my Z. The sholder belt was a Y-style harness, so it and the lap belts could mount in the stock locations with the stock hardware. The submarine belt I wraped through one of the lightning holes in the forward seat mount bracket mounted to the floor under the seat. I never used the submarine belt (just a tad uncomfterable) and I never raced it. I have gone back to stock now with Pulsar seats. Guess I'm getting old, it was just a pain to get in and out of and the fiberglass seats where hard on the butt.

Just bought some West Systems G Flex epoxy to fill the holes between the body on my 77 and the MSA body kit. I filled them with regular bondo body filler about five years ago, and it's cracking (go figure) but the car has never had a nice paint job, so no big deal. My plan it to get all the old filler out, the spots that where a ways off I backed with fiberglass before I filled. I will check and make sure the fiberglass backing is in good shape and then fill with the G flex and collodical sillica. It sounds like this stuff will work pretty well filling between the body and the glass, it's supposed to be pretty flexible. Let me know if anyone has used this product and your results. If no one has, maybe I can post my thoughts if anyone is interested.

Good luck from another Ex-smoker. You will be amazed how different things taste and smell after a couple weeks. I quit going into spring time about four years ago and could not believe all the stuff I could smell. Taste was even better, you don't realize how all the flavors kind of run together when your smoking. I can taste the difference between Coke and Pepsi now, Dr. Pepper was my favorite for a long time, now I don't like it much. Maybe some incentive to keep it up!

The last off runway trip this RG had was an etreamly long landing into the dirt and an embankment at the end of the runway. Again, pilot wrecked the plane, turned around and taxied back to the FBO. The killer is this plane is a replacement for the last 172RG that was totaled on landind (gear up- pilot error). I don't understand what it is about a 172RG that makes them so hard to keep on all three wheels on the runway. I got dibs on the prop, I'm sure it's unreparrable (bent back about 10 inches up the blade, still has some runway stuck in it!)

Direct drive prop, engine has to come out and get sent out for teardown and inspection. Got the wing tip off, suprisingly little damage to the forward wing close out end cap. Wing tip is shot though. I will try to post a pic of the prop... pretty cool looking.

Just had a guy nose our 172 RG into the runway a couple days ago. I don't think have ever seen a prop so messed up. He got mixed up in a crosswind and landed on the left main and and the prop, somehow hitting the right wing tip on the ground in the process. After the incident he drove the plane through the dirt between the runway and taxi way... at what point do you just stop and call it a day? BTW the prop on there was a fresh overhaul, less the 15 hours on it. Oh well, whats 6,000.00 in airplane parts. Oh, and this is the third off roading prop strike type incident in this aircraft in three years.

READ the rules, then READ your last post... it's pretty obvious what your doing wrong. If I where a mod I would shed this one just to prove a point.

My buddy lived in base housing and had to chalk one of his tires because his parking pin was broken. The military housing inspecters came by and told him he had to fix his car or move it off base due to the non-op vehicle rule. He drove it to the housing office to show them that it ran just fine, and was actually fine when sitting most of the time, tha chalk was just a saftey measure. They told him he still had to fix it or move it, so he just quit using the chalk. On the oter hand, my HA sucks for the opposite reason. I live in a pretty nice middle class newer housing development and our HA won't enforce anything. I take care oof my place, try to not let things leak in my drive way or in front of my house, keep the yard up ect. but there's a dude down the street putting an engine in a Ford station wagon in front of his house (at the curb) and I had skate ramps in the middle of the street in front of my house for over three weeks. People had to drive around them to go down the street. No one did anything, so I called the city and had them torn down. So I guess the moral of the story is it can go both ways.

My girls (5 and 12) love to ride in the Z. It's usually a fight to see who gets to ride with Daddy. My oldest doesn't care too much about the internal workings, she just likes to cruse in the old car. My youngest is the opposite, she is my little helper out in the garage. She always wants to be in the middle and gives me tips for tuning my carb. She loves to go fast too, anything she gets in/on the first thing she wants to know is how fast it will go. I should set her up with a go cart or something.

I can't beleve you let your G/F have a drink in your car. It's been 15 years and I still have coke under my center consol from the girl I dated before my Wife. Oh, and she broke my dome light... and my sun visor...

Maybe he can't remember how to open the hood?

Water pump on a Subaru GL. You have to take the whole front of the engine apart to change it! And my latest task...SPINDLE PINS!

Politics is the reason I got out of the AF. I think if you get high enough in the food chain it's unavoidable... you have to go to the dark side. I was a shift lead running the flight line C-130 engine shop, cool job but the political side was ridiculous. I went to three meetings a day to keep those above me in the loop. I had a 7:00 am brief with the big dogs (which was the beginning of my shift) and I was expected to know everything that happened from the time I left the day before till I got in that morning. One of the worst reamings I ever got was because I changed my mind without prior approval. I told the Captain and Chief that I was gonna do things one way to get an aircraft FMC, then changed my mind on the fly and figured I would handle the situation a little differently to make the process more streamlined. Well I did it, and it worked, shaved about an hour off the time I had estimated and got the plane mission capable. Then I got my butt chewed for the effort. I guess your not allowed to change the plan even if it makes things more efficient. It's the same on the outside working in aviation, so I guess it was good practice. Just keep your head down, work hard (it won't be appreciated and you will be expected to work harder) do it for yourself and make rank. At least then you will get paid well to not like your job.

When the right side came out so easy I was thinking to myself "I don't get what the big deal is... these come out pretty easy." What's crazy is how a car can have all stock parts, installed at the same time (1977) and have one pin pretty clean with just minor corrosion and the other so corroded it was seized. I don't think it's close enough to the exhaust to make any difference. Getting that pin out ranks up there with hearing the engine start for the first time in five years. BTW, I tried the sledge method with it installed in the car and ended up mushrooming the end of the pin so bad it wouldn't fit through the hole anymore. Should have taken some pictures, the pin was compleatly covered in rust.

Wow, did you pick to wait that long, or was that the next opening? I wanted to wait 'till after the summer of my graduating year (1997) to join the Air Force. I think it was only three months or so between signing and basic, my recruiter called me every other week trying to get me in earlier. Congrats and thanks for serving!

Just wanted to share my success story. My wife was... not so interested, so thought I would share with people who might be, or can at least use the info to help themselves. I recently installed a 3.90 rear end in my 77 280 and got bit by the "while I'm at it" bug, so I decided it would be a good time to put all poly bushings on my lower control arms. We all know this means pulling the spindle pins, and after much reading, I was less then confident. I bought a pin puller from a member on here, which worked great on the right side which came apart no problem. I then moved to the left and in short order, broke my puller. The member was kind enough to send me a new all thread, and after two days of repeated Kroil coatings, heat application and slow turning... I moved the pin about half an inch and broke another puller. So I pulled the whole left rear corner suspension out of the car, brought it to work and cut the pin where the LCA and spindle connect. The pieces slid right out of the LCA (which I thought they would) then it was on to the Kroil bath. I soaked that pin for about a week and a half in a tub with the pin completely submerged in Kroil. When I pulled the spindle out of the tub yesterday, the Kroil had crept about half way up the lower casting.. it was actually wet not just darkened. Anyway, I drilled one end out about six inches down the pin with a bit just smaller then the pin to help release some tension on the pin and to give me a nice place to drive from. I then proceeded to knocked the CRAP out of it with a 3x air hammer (with a shop size air compressor backing it up @90psi) and a valve guide removal bit... it took a couple seconds, then started to slowly push out. So, after a week and a half of worry, the pin is out and I have all the new parts to get the arm back together and after about two months on jacks, take the Z out and try out my 3.90. I live in the Great North West... so that's weather permitting of course. So, in short it is possible, all you need is a hack saw, cut off wheel, torch, air hammer, drill, and about a can and a half or Kroil.

I did the same seat install in my 77. Let me know if you need any ideas on the bracket fab. My seats sit a little higher then I would like (plan on changing the brackets a little on the front to level them out). My biggest hurdle is that the aluminum pan that you sit in sits down so low you have to raise the seats a bit to get them to work right. They fit good and are pretty darn comfortable when installed though.