Something for Mr. Rice

This is even better. (Magnetic stuff doesn't stick to Bondo ..) As a side note... I found some spray colored glitter (tinted yellow and tinted red) at a surplus dollar store a while back. Gave the red crap to Rick. We're waiting for the right pimp car show,and we are going to bling up and hang wit' da boyz in da 'hood Jeff

"Lee Aanderud" wrote..

Hot Damn!! I've gotta get me some of this for Trish's convertible! What could be better than flames on a red Avanti convertible??

I tricked her yesterday...went to get a new pair of tires on the front to get a little more ground clearance. Those 205/55/R15's were allowing the exhaust crossover to scrape the pavement whenever we hit a bad bump in the road..so I figured a tire with about 3/4" more sidewall would still keep that big n little look she loves and give us just enough clearance underneath to prevent that damned scraping!

I was right...went to a 215/60/R15 and VOILA!...no more scraping and sparks under the car on our way to dinner and back last night AND it still has that "rake" we both love!

My "Trick"?? When I got back home yesterday about 2pm, I emailed her that the problem was cured...I told her they'd had a BIG SALE on wheels and tires and that I had bought a complete new set of 18" wheel and low profile tires and had them installed on her car.

She's not a big fan of that look...although I've used that one tire website that allows you to see an AVANTI and then lower it over the wheel/tire combo you select...and she agreed that it looked pretty damned good. It even allows you to change the color of the car to closely resemble your own! If you want to see it, try:

Avanti is under "Classics"...then select Studebaker Avanti. I'm disappointed the only other Stude they have is a 40 coupe...they should add the 53 C/K body style...but at least they have the Avanti!

Anyway...back to my story. I had her convinced that I'd put new 18" wheels/tires on her convertible and that it looked GREAT...and if she didn't like them, I'd simply switch them over to my Avanti! She got all excited and wanted me to take a digital photo and email it to her at work! I couldn't...since I hadn't actually done it...so I had to just ignore her email request and her phone call to see why I hadn't answered her email!

What I thought was a pretty good "gag" turned out to not be so funny when she got home, worried that something had happened to me because I hadn't answered her email or her phone call...and then she saw that she still had her same old tire/wheel combo on her car!

She was actually disappointed that I hadn't actually spent the $1500!!!

Actually, I saved us a WHOLE lot more money yesterday when I tuned her Edelbrock-carb'd engine to pass the annual emission inspection. I had already convinced her that if it didn't pass this time, we should just put a fuel-injection unit on it with an O2 sensor setup and it would automatically regulate the fuel/O2 rato so it would pass with no problems.

Damn my mechanical abilities!! I was able to set the timing and adjust the idle mixture to where it actually passed with 0% CO emissions...after being 5 times higher than the 1.2% allowed before I tuned it.

So there went my excuse to spend $3K on a new Holley Stealth RamJet setup for her Vortec 330hp crate engine. That's the savings I used to justify spending all that virtual money on her 18" wheels and tires when I was tricking her!!

DAMN,DAMN,DAMN...little did I realize how badly I've infected her with this hot-rod disease that I had! BOTH would have been fine with her! So today we're going to look for someone with some 18" wheels in stock that can try them on for fit and clearance before I spend money to order them and then discover they won't really fit unless I air-bag the suspension to get clearance under the fenders.

Oh woe is me...a wife that actually WANTS me to spend money on (both) our hot-rods! This is TERRIBLE!! What a monster I've created...and just MARRIED!!

hahahahahahahaha!!! Some days I just LOVE BEING ME!

Bob (and No, before youask... I don't want to "adopt" anyone OR trade her for your wife)

Jeff Rice wrote: