Limped home...

[JTinJacksonvilleNC]

Well, guess it's true. When it rains, it pours. I finally get to a point where I can finally bring home my '89 240SX coupe, and what happens? Search everywhere I can possibly think of and I can't find the d*mn keys anywhere. Ok, I can deal with this, even though it pisses me to no end. I look in the glovebox to get the key code, have one of the salesmen at work call our local guy and get me one made. Costs? $11.00 no biggie. I get that key, and guess what? It doesn't start the car. It doesn't even unlock the doors, so scratch that $11.00 off. Next idea, change the column keyswitch. I check our computers at work and we don't have one, anywhere. I check the locator only to find the only people locally that have one are a rival that has d*cked us on several occasions and he wants $35.00 for it. What to do? Ah ha, send the wife. Cool. She goes there, waits forever for them to, I guess, manufacture the cursed switch. Finally she gets it, brings it to me at work so I can get it swapped in. I get my hands on it, check it out to be sure it's ok, but it's not. The plastic cover that keeps gunk out of the switch mechanism is broken, it's from a manual trans car, but going into an automatic car (yes I requested one for an automatic), and somehow, the idiot removing it from the donor car managed to cut into 3 of the wire leads. The cut wire I can deal with. The electrical part of my switch was fine, I'll just use it. Done, no problem. I get the old keyswitch out, look at it and the new one doesn't have this small wiring and harness coming off it. At this point, I'm not sure what it is, but I gotta try it anyway. I install the new keyswitch, plug in all the harnesses but the missing one, turn the key and it starts. I'm overjoyed! I reach down to the shifter to put it in gear, but it won't move? Ok, just figured out what that little harness is. Think JT, you can figure this out. Ok, use a jumper wire to complete the circuit. It works! Now, I can limp this thing on home after work. I work the rest of the day with a spring in my step because I know that this afternoon, I get to drive her ! Now I am keeping in mind that when I got this car, I knew it was starting to get a little water in the oil. That's why the previous owner got rid of it. I figure, I don't live that far. Change the oil, and coolant, and that'll be enough to get her that short a distance (maybe 15 minutes normally). Besides, the wife will be around in the truck if anything bad goes wrong. Ok, 5:30 rolls around and here we go towards the house. I get about half way there, following my wife in the truck, and I start hearing a noise. Careful, I pulled over and did a walk-around on the car thinking. Got it! Check the lugs. Not entirely sure they all got tightened properly when put on. Well, that was the problem. Good thing I happened to be taking my tools home at the time. It takes a special tool to tighten them, and I have it in my toolbox. Finally, back on the road, and I'm 3/4 there when the wife pulls in for gas. I pull in behind her and park while waiting for her. I looked at my guages and noticed the temp was a bit high, so I sat there for a few letting it cool. Now, the wife's back in the truck and we're headed for the house, we get to the turn at the road I live on, and the car dies right there in the right turn lane in the center of a highway with two lanes going either direction, and there's more cars behind us. Waving them around and raising the hood to aid cooling, I told the wife to turn on her hazzards until I get it going again. A few minutes go by, and I'm thinking, I gotta get this car out of the middle of the highway. Well, the temp hasn't gone down much, but all I have to do is get across two lanes and I'm home. I close the hood, get in and start it (not an easy task when overheating as many of you know, I'm sure) and after a few tries, am successful. Watching traffic and praying the car won't cut off, I get it across and to the house where I parked it last night. Haven't been out yet this morning to look at it and assess any more damage I may have done, but I've learned that it doesn't pay to let enthusiasm or emotional attachment to a car override good judgement. I just hope I didn't hurt it too bad. I'll keep posting my progress with it. Any ideas, suggestions, etc. are more than welcome. I've never cracked open a KA24E before and don't want to miss any of the little details that may wind up being very important.

[All_Motor_KA]

Can you post some pics of your seat and seat brackets? I would really like to see them. And good luck with your over heating problem. Keep us posted.

[JTinJacksonvilleNC]

I hope to be posting pics of the whole build-up soon. A kind of step by step bit I guess. For pics of the brackets, I'd have to remove them again to get. If I do (possible in the near future to do some rewiring) I'll be sure to take some real good ones from different angles for you. I can post some interior pics as soon as I replace a broken radio trim.