More progress and roadblocks

I have been able to spend many hours in the garage of late after getting all of the parts I ordered last week. First, I mounted the block plate that I had neglected. It was pretty simple. I did have to trim off a piece of aluminum from the plate because it is made to fit both my engine and another model. Basically, I needed a bigger hole for the starter to fit in. Fortunately, the plate was pre-cut with just little tabs holding in place the piece I needed to trim. I also had to do a little filing and lubricating to get the dowel holes to line up perfectly. Here is a pic with the plate in place...

And here you can see the hole for the starter. Notice that the bracket comes very close to the red battery cable, so I will probably have to lower that a half-inch or so later on.

Next I reinstalled the flexplate...

Then it was on to finishing up the fuel system. Here is the kit of parts to run the line from the mechanical fuel pump to the carburetor.

You can see the steel braided fuel line coiled on the left, the fuel log that connects to the carburetor on the right, 3 packages of fittings in the middle, a fuel pressure gauge and fuel filter (blue) that plug into the line near the carb, and a couple of extra line plugs.

I was not completely thrilled with the way everything went together, but I eventually figured things out. For a while I did not understand that there was already a plug in place where the pressure gauge went, and I had to cut the end of the braided line again like I did with the power steering lines. I fit the carb end up okay, but decided to wait until later to finish the routing of the fuel line down to the fuel pump as I was not quite sure of how some other things were going to attach to the engine. Should be easy enough to figure out the exact length needed and finish it later though. (Pics when finished).

I also decided to fill the power steering system with fluid to see if it would leak. Seemed to be okay at first, but later I did see some fluid on the floor near where the lines connected to the steering rack. Not a terrible leak, but too much to leave, especially if I ever want to take this car to a racetrack. Can't have leaks then. In this next picture, you can see where a few drops have hit the little newspaper I put down.

In time, the paper would be pretty soaked, so today I spent several hours tearing it all apart, including where the steering rack mounts to the frame. I did not see any hairline cracks in the housing, so I cleaned out the fittings, retorqued everything and have my fingers crossed.

Finally, I have spent some time figuring out how to lift the transmission into place. I bought some chains and figured out a way to use the engine lift to get the job done. I have also done some more little cleaning on it, and determined I had a problem with the way the previous owner had cut the transmission oil cooler lines for uninstalling. Not a big deal, but it took some time to figure out how to proceed. I have also been researching how to hook everything up, and trying to figure out what shifter I want to get. I will probably go ahead in the next few days and fill the torque converter up with fluid and try connecting the main pieces. I may not be able to leave everything in place though as there may not be enough room to easily connect the linkages (which I do not have yet) to the shifter and the carburetor that are necessary to make it work. And since everything is so heavy, I may need a second pair of hands to help manipulate things into place, even with the engine hoist solution I have come up with.

Whew.