The other day I posted a thread about having four nickles used as plugs for the unused fuel injector holes. I removed the home-made brackets the, intending to find a way to make the top of the engine look better by installing some kind of plugs in place of the coins.

Last night I drove the car to a car club (High Desert Roadrunners) meeting. When I came out of the meeting, I tried to start the car, but when it finally caught, it was running very poorly. I lifted the hood and sure enough, I had blown two nickles, reducing the value of the car from 20 cents to 10 cents.

I had surmised that being on the intake manifold, vacuum would hold the nickles in place until I got around to pulling the intake and carbs.

Apparently, there was some kind of minor backfire through the carbs, which popped two coins out, leaving me with an engine that could only run on two cylinders.

Naturally, I had cleaned out the spare junk from my travelling took kit, so the original brackets were at home, about two miles away.

I had two nickels, no problem there, just no way to secure them to the head.

I had to drive the car home on two cylinders, since my wife went to the meeting with me and wasn't available to come rescue me with her car.

Actually, once the car got up to a decent speed, it ran fine. A little low on power, but once rolling, it was fine.

Stop lights and other reasons to slow or stop would cause the engine to die, but we finally made it home OK.

To add to my goof-ups, I have been working to properly bundle the mess of underhood wiring to make all that look better, as well as soldering any connections. I thought I had it all together last night, but after we got to the meeting I discovered that the parking/tail lights were inop.

If it had just been the rear lights, the problem would have been inside the trunk, where the wiring joins the loom coming from the front of the car.

If it had just been the front lights, the problem would have been in the connectors on the left inner fender.

Since it's both, I suspect a problem in or near the fuse box. And yes, the fuses were the first thing I checked.

It's supposed to be nice again today - in the mid-70's and sunny - so I'm on my way outside to track down the electrical problem first. If that doesn't take too long I'll move on to pulling the intake manifold.

I have a lot of plans for that, so I'll get photos and post a new thread as things progress.

They don't call me 'Baron of Greymatter' for nothing!
Steve