It's All Starting to Come Together

Except for one small glitch........the distributor was too big.  The first evidence of this was that the air cleaner Brian had bought would not clear the distributor unless it was installed so high the hood would not close.  These pictures show how the only way it would go on is if was installed sideways, which was not acceptable:

 

I found a air cleaner that looked like it would fit and sort of matched the scheme of the valve covers:

 

It still looked pretty tall, though, and before we could put the hood back on and find out for sure I discovered the deal breaker.  The return heater hose needed to connect to the intake manifold right at the distributor.  There was no way I could install the hose nipple without removing the distributor, and even then it looked like there would not be enough room for it:

 

Removing the distributor to (possibly) install the fitting would mean re-setting the ignition timing and since I had to do that we decided to just bite the bullet and get another distributor that would be smaller and lower profile.  The big distributor was an HEI unit with the coil built into it; that's one reason why it was so tall.  The new distributor would require a separate coil and mounting bracket, but still cost almost $100 less than the HEI. 

The new one cleared the heater hose fitting and the air cleaner, and looks like it will clear the hood, but it will be close:

 

 

Notice in the above two photos that both exhaust headers have been installed.  That had me worried because I had seen posts online from people who said they did not fit.  It was close, but they did fit. 

I also installed the clutch linkage, the sift lever, the speedometer cable, and the back-up light switch.  Brian was down over the past weekend and we put in a starter motor that I got him for Christmas as well as some chrome alternator brackets.  It was he and I working together that got the driver side exhaust header in.  We put the hood back on, but I haven't closed it on the new air cleaner set-up because I want to get some modeling clay or putty to set on top of the air cleaner and see what kind of clearance I have. 

There are only two parts from the original driveline that we have reused; the differential and axle, and the driveshaft.  The driveshaft had to have a lot of rust and grease scraped and sanded off:

 

And then primed:

And painted:

 

 New U-joints fitted:

 

 

 

And the drive shaft installed in the car:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Still lots to do, but I am entering into more familiar territory.  I have done a lot of the type of work coming up, and some of it on this very car.