Ace-Garageguy

Thank you sir. I really appreciate your interest and comment. I'm kinda thinking of dragging this one out, dusting it off, and showing it on the "primer" table at the upcoming ACME show at the end of October. Maybe get me motivated again...

Well...a lot of guys call them "pruned", and I'm pretty sure there were some cases that were cast in that configuration, probably aftermarket as far as I've been able to find. "Sneaky Pete" Robinson comes to mind as one of the suppliers, cast in magnesium. EDIT: Though I could have sworn there were OEM "oval case" GMC blower housings...because some that I've seen appear to be cast that way with no evidence of machine work or grinding marks, just areas that appeared to be as-cast...I haven't found any photos, and most people say "no, they all had the big lower mounting flange". There ARE, however, non-GMC Roots style blowers that came looking much like "pruned" GMCs. Anyway, "pruned" blowers were on everything from drag cars to rods, and were almost always used on the Potvin-style front-blown setups. Most frequent reasons cited for using them on a top-blown setup were for ease of valve cover clearance, especially on SBC engines, and superior manifold-to-blower sealing. An engine used in competition with a solid-lifter cam will require frequent valve-lash adjustments, so anything that cuts the time down to do that is a plus. And keep in mind that the OEM GMC blower was designed to scavenge the block of a two-stroke diesel, not to provide many extra PSI of supercharging pressure, so the revised mounting required with a "pruned" case, that moved the mount bolts inboard to surround the gasket flange, could be a huge improvement. I also seem to remember that some excessively weight-conscious drag racers who were looking for every ounce they could save would run "pruned" blower housings for that reason, so cast-that-way magnesium cases would be a natural. EDIT 2: Below is a magnesium 6-71 case cast pre-"pruned" in magnesium, by George Montgomery and Pete Robinson, probably used a "pruned" aluminum OEM GMC as a pattern, reputed to be one of about 200 made. More info here, including a copy of a contemporary Car Craft article that specifically states these things were indeed cast without the big OEM mounting flange. https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/how-is-a-pruned-blower-case-mounted.999144/page-3. I KNEW I'd seen 'em cast that way somewhere...

Surgery on yourself with a dull, rusty knife really separates the men from the wannabois

Egg salad is much more filling than word salad, and it won't lower your IQ while you listen to it.

More than likely that has to do with the type of "sizing" that was applied to the f'glass cloth or mat. Some materials that work with polyester resins don't wet out well with epoxy, which is why we have to be careful of that very thing when doing aircraft work. The extremely fine-weave glass cloth I use on models now, primarily, is made by Hexel IIRC. It's not very expensive and works very well with the MGS epoxy. I'll look up the numbers if you're interested, though how it will work with other epoxies, like the Bob Smith 30-minute stuff (which I need to experiment with), I don't know. EDIT: Because of the high-strength nature of the MGS resin, I can make body parts that are only .030" thick but are stronger than styrene injection-molded parts that are much thicker. The downside, besides having to be mixed on a gram scale, is that the MGS takes 24 hours for a full cure at room temperature, and to reach full aviation strength it needs to be post-cured at much higher temps. In general, the longer any epoxy takes to cure, the stronger it will be. The longest-curing stuff from Bob Smith and other hobby-grade epoxies I'm currently familiar with is 30 minutes (though that may be the "working time"), so I suspect that parts made from it won't approach the strength I get from MGS...but only testing will tell for sure.

"Bacon!!!" slobbered Homer..."mmmm...bacon"...again and again.

Didn't realize I had a huge colony of yellow jackets living under a trash can, comb and all. I rarely use the can, as I take a bag or two at a time to one of the shops' dumpsters. Sooooo...I figgered I'd clean 'em all out prior to the big pre-Thanksgiving tidy-up in the house, fill 'em and take a big load in the old GMC. Got stung several times before I realized what was happening, then soaked down the entrance with Hilco Lube. Left for a few hours, came back when it was raining, moved the can off the nest and soaked it as well. Activity is way down now but there are still a few visiting the nest, so soaking it again in oil just before I leave is the next thing. First time in over 12 years I've had paper wasp and yellow jacket nests at this place...and a whole lot of big garden spiders (that I usually leave alone to eat the pest bugs). Only bad sting reaction is my right calf, and it's swollen considerably, itches like the absolute devil. Never had that happen before either.

I had that happen on occasion when I had shops. Funny thing was that I always worked IN the shop as well as owing/running it, and usually looked like a "greasy dirty mouth-breathing knuckle-dragger" by noon, and when new clients came in, after I gave them a very rough estimate (with plenty of disclaimers about the difference between "book" recommended flat-rate and what problems might come up on older vehicles, etc.), they'd sometimes ask ME if I did side work, assuming I was just the hired help. "Well sir (or madam), I'm the owner here, and since the second thing you do when you come through my door is try to cheat me, take your problem on down the road." Never cost me a cent because I always had enough repeat and referral business to keep me booked solid.

I prefer seasoned cast-iron to stainless or non-stick for frying, warming the pan first, then adding oil and bringing it up to temperature prior to introducing the meat. Done correctly, meat should release pretty well. If it's cooked sufficiently, the bond formed between the meat and the pan should break easily. Of course, the additional variables and technique required are the reason people went so hard for non-stick coatings...and ease of cleanup. But if you research the leaching of chemicals into food from non-sticks, you probably won't want to use them.

1970 was within the period when primary education still taught basic skills like reading, writing, and arithmetic, and the majority oh HS grads were reasonably proficient in all three.

Yes, I use epoxy for structural reinforcement and making almost-scale-thickness body parts and the molds to make them, specifically MGS 285 with 285 hardener. It's a very high strength real aircraft epoxy that I usually have on hand that's either out of date for use on aircraft, or close to it. I used to do a fair amount of general aircraft structural composite work. I still use the MGS stuff for high-strength, high temperature real car parts (it's good to around 250F once it's fully cured), which is why I still usually have some. At over $400 per gallon (including hardener), it's not really modeler-friendly...and it HAS to be mixed on a gram-scale. I've been getting around to seeing if I can get similar results with some lower cost, more forgiving alternatives. The white fill work on Thompson's LSR Challenger model in this thread (and the Challenger concept sportwagon from 2013 shown below) is a blend of West System 105 resin with 205 hardener and white microballoon, mixed to a carefully worked out weight ratio of epoxy-to-micro. While this particular material takes 12 hours before it can be sanded (it sands very easily after a full cure), it sticks much better than the polyester fillers I usually use, shrinks even less, and has enough strength and chip-resistance so that it can be scribed with lines very close together, as shown below. I haven't found any other filler that allows scribing lines this close together without chipping. West System epoxies are certified for some aircraft uses (mostly on full-scale real "kitplanes"), are very common in marine applications, don't require mixing on a gram scale, and are much less expensive than the ultra-high-strength MGS product...though I have NOT tested them for making almost-scale-thickness parts yet.

Thanks for your interest and comment. I did get a little "linguistically creative" when I first saw the poor thing, and later on when I found I'd let the very nice resin body (that I bought to pull molds from) get irreparably warped, but this can be a very emotion-evoking hobby.

Mash sum taters, stuff 'em on top o' split frankfurters, and cover the hole mess with melted Velveeter fer classic "lucky dogs".

Sandwich is the name of several islands and an earl, and is also the earl's namesake hand-food, originally made with two slices of bread with meat between them.

"Out of the frying pan and into the fire" is where I seem to be lately, which would be just dandy if I was bacon.

Holy s---, Batman.

Intention of the good kind is said to be one of the paving stones on the road to the hot place down below.

Nope, that's one fun glitch I haven't had to get all impotently angry about yet.

Shows that purport to be "reality" kinda make me wonder what the average IQ really is today.

Yeah, but that would have been the end of the series. They'd never let that happen.

Haven't had the problem today, but the oh so mo' better "two-step authentication" process is just a useless PITA as far as I'm concerned. Just a bell with a whistle attached to give the illusion of better "security". Then again, I'm not a fool whose security practices are just downright sloppy, like using the same password for everything, or letting Google or some other who-knows-who-has-access-to-it app "manage my passwords". Like, who is really that lazy and stupidly trusting enough to do that? Anyway, good luck with your problem. If it's site-wide, they'll fix it pretty quick. I find that PayPal overall works quite well, most of the time.

FWIW, my forecast above turned out to be dead-on accurate. NO thunderstorms, and a few minutes of light rain.

For that, my roly poly compatriots, is why we patronize "all you can eat" buffets anyway, isn't it?

I didn't read it that way, now deleted I see (though it's still there as a quote in my response...and why delete it if it wasn't intended as I took it?) because that info wouldn't have been "useless" had it been stated in the original post. Had the OP mentioned in his first post that he'd already purchased and tried the Iceman 3D printed setup I linked to and posted a photo of, I certainly wouldn't have wasted my own time searching for and posting it. I did provide a direct link to another kit-sourced A-arm setup, but the OP stated he'd tried every search imaginable on eBay and didn't find anything like it. How odd. Here's another one. https://www.ebay.com/itm/286518404371? Anyway, you don't narrow the track on an IFS vehicle by getting tiny little short control arms that can't possibly provide proper suspension geometry. It is often necessary to narrow the distance between control arm pickup points so as to work with aftermarket control arms that are based on something like the popular Mustang II geometry, and that sometimes requires the frame rails themselves to be narrowed. Aftermarket real-car frames or subframes often incorporate this requirement from the get-go. Aftermarket crossmembers that are set-up for tubular control arms (again, very often based on Mustang II geometry) will include a nominal track-width measurement with a particular wheel offset (if they're from any kind of competently-engineered source, anyway) so the car builder can determine in advance how much frame surgery, if any, might be required to allow full steering lock, etc. But at this point I think I may keep my useless information and apparent inability to read and comprehend English to myself in the future. Far be it for me to be the source of any additional internet discord. Everybody happy now?