Ruined Engine, Our DMC and More...

["Heather" <hnwwoodzell@xxxx>]

Note: I am writing this to relay to you all the events which led up 
to us having a properly running De Lorean. 

My goal is to make friends, share stories, and have fun, which is my 
definition of "living the dream". 

I do not know, nor do I claim to know, all the proper names for 
parts, their problems, or any technical terms. 

Please do not flame or make fun of me for "not making sense" or think 
my story is far-fetched. I have all the paperwork to prove it.

Anyway, on with the story! ;)

You may remember (but hopefully not) our post last summer on the DMC 
we bought, where we about had a "lynching" here on the board because 
I made the mistake of doubting Rob Grady. As I'm sure you all know, 
you were right, he is, obviously, the man! He's been the most helpful 
and hospitable guy to us that you can imagine, and even called on his 
own time to check on the car, even though at the time we were having 
a local mechanic do the work. 

When we brought the car back, (from New Jersey) it had been sitting, 
ignored and unloved for little over a year at that point. The 
previous owner took it to Rob for (among other things) fuel 
contamination, and then after Rob fixed it, they brought it home and 
let it set for over a year, thus contaminating it again! If you're 
out there somewhere, I'm just sayin'.. why'd ya do it? lol.

Naturally, the car was less than happy, but amazingly, it made it 
through the 50+ mile trek from the drop-off point of the car delivery 
all the way to our house... but that's about it. One day, as it was 
sitting in the driveway idling (very poorly, I might add), we looked 
down and saw oil.. POURING out from under the drivers side. Luckily, 
we had spoken to a gentleman in the nearby town of Troutville and he 
reccomended a place in Roanoke, VA called The Sports Car Clinic, and 
so.. we had to put our poor car on a trailer, and haul her 50 odd 
miles in another direction. 

Then, a nightmare..

What was believed to be the front crank shaft seal, turned out to be 
something much, much worse. Coolant had, at some point, leaked into 
what I call the galleys underneath the intake manifold, and had just 
sat there... and sat there... and sat there.. the oil leak was 
coming from a hole that the coolant had eroded in the engine block!!!

We tought, Oh, Jesus.. this is it. Our car is done. ..Not so!

The team at the Sports Car Clinic first cleaned the "wound" carefully
and thoroughly, and welded the holes (FOUR of them) closed with an 
epoxy, sealing the deal with a silicone. This not only cured the 
problem and SAVED THE ENGINE, but prevents further damage from ever 
occuring. So, as you can see, welding is definetly not out of the 
question. Well, on top of that, as I had discussed, there was, once 
again, fuel contamination. Miraculously, they were able to not only 
fix the problem in a resonable amount of time, but were able to save 
the fuel distributor, the warm-up regulator, and all 6 injectors, 
which saved a good bit of money. 

Onto the small(er) things: They fixed a leaky exhaust, new driver's 
side window motor regulator, had to replace a bushing in the steering 
column, cold start was wired wrong (we don't even need to discuss the 
amount of "rigging" that previous owners had attempted.) new thermal 
time switch, battery, wiper blades, ect.

What's Left: Automatic tranny shifts HARD into second.. so hard that 
it sometimes scares you.. but there's nothing so bad that warrants 
transmission work.. like Rob says, "if it's not broken, don't fix it 
just yet!" ..needs weatherstripping on the drivers side door, will 
need a brake job real soon, needs a coil box cover, instrument panel 
brackets seem to be loose or broken, 'cause it shakes really bad 
sometimes... Some cosmetic work needed, although all leather is 
intact, all carpeting A-Ok, Door struts are factory (or appear to be 
because the other two sets have the PJ Grady Stickers on them and 
look much newer) and have yet to start sagging! :) AND original 
owners manual still in the glovebox. :)

As far as the car's overall performance? Well, knock on wood, it runs 
beautifully. We refuse to store that car for long periods of time.. 
We picked her up at the Clinic on New Years Eve, and it was about 50 
degrees here (VA), and we drove her all day and half the night, and 
do you know, that car stayed cool as a cucumber? The Temperature 
gauge went to 1/4 and stayed there. (and yes, it works.. it 
overheated when we first got her, and it was way up).

We cruised the mountains, the city, .. I'd say we put over 100 miles 
on the car new year's eve and new year's day combined.. it runs SWEET!

So the next time you see a chick driving a De Lorean, it could very 
well be me.

Heather Grace Morgan
#0809