Found a screw that the previous owner lost in my boxer 6 engine

[SpatiallyAware]

About 10 years ago I restored a 1964 Corvair Monza.. Actually, my Grandfather had 3 and told me I could have one if I could it get it running from the other 2. Fun little car.. I ended up getting 1 finished except for a paintjob and another running (albeit needing a lot of work) and left them both with him. He still drives one of them..

The only thing I thought was.... crazy... was that you have to remove the carbs to get one of the sparkplugs out.. does that sound right? I may be getting mixed up with a 914..


...and btw - IMO the main reason they were unsafe is that for the first 4-5 years Chevrolet didn't stress the extreme importance of the tire pressure. Chevrolet also didn't properly train dealers of the importance. If used in a high speed maneuver situation (or spirited driving) they are much more prone to swinging the back end out and/or flipping..

 

[SpatiallyAware]

And as the OP said - parts are fairly easy to find. I had to rebuild the carbs, replace the belt, replace a bunch of electrical, some body work, a ton of seals, misc knobs and junk for 2 early model vairs and really didn't have much trouble - and this was really before ebay was popular.

 

[DietDrThunder]

The only thing I thought was.... crazy... was that you have to remove the carbs to get one of the sparkplugs out.. does that sound right? I may be getting mixed up with a 914..

The carb is kind of in the way, but you can still remove the spark plug without removing the carb. I use a universal joint type adapter on the socket and it isn't too bad. It is a heck of a lot better than when I changed the plugs on my dads 1981 Chevy Monte Carlo V6. You had to remove the front tires and remove them from the wheel well.

and btw - IMO the main reason they were unsafe is that for the first 4-5 years Chevrolet didn't stress the extreme importance of the tire pressure. Chevrolet also didn't properly train dealers of the importance. If used in a high speed maneuver situation (or spirited driving) they are much more prone to swinging the back end out and/or flipping..

Try telling this to a tire dealer today like Discount Tire. I told them twice to put 10 lbs less air pressure in the front than in the back and they still didn't. About 8 blocks from the tire store I had to release the air pressure in the front tires because the steering felt all squirelly.

 

[DietDrThunder]

Check out this blown Corvair:

http://i423.photobucket.com/al...Corvair/blown_vair.jpg

http://i423.photobucket.com/al...orvair/blown_vair2.jpg

 

[Zenmervolt]

Originally posted by: Thump553
It's popular in certain circles to dump on Ralph Nader for exposing the problems with the Covair, but those problems were very real in the early years of production.

The "problems" with the Corvair were no more severe than the "problems" with any number of contemporary vehicles from the VW Beetle to the Mercedes 300SL Gullwing. Nader singled out the Corvair and led many people who were wholly unfamiliar with automobiles to assume that the Corvair was somehow worse than its contemporaries when the fact is that the Corvair was significantly better than most cars on the road at the time.

ZV

 

[Zenmervolt]

Originally posted by: SpatiallyAware
The only thing I thought was.... crazy... was that you have to remove the carbs to get one of the sparkplugs out.. does that sound right? I may be getting mixed up with a 914..

You're definitely not mixing it up with a 4-cylinder 914. No 4-cylinder 914 ever came from the factory with carbs; they were all EFI. You do need to remove the airbox to get a good working space, but that's a single hose clamp.

The sixes did have carbs, but there aren't a whole heck of a lot of those around.

ZV