Restoring DeLorean shift linkages for manual transmission

I recently went through all of the extra DeLorean parts that I have accumulated over the years and put them into multiple categories: stuff I could dispose of, parts I should sell, and parts that I should put on my car.

One of the items that I put in the "put on my car" category was a new set of shift linkage bushings, including new pivot bolts. I had the transmission out of my car a few years ago and bought this set at the time, but only replaced the easily accessible linkages near the transmission. The others remained untouched.

I had much of the interior out of the car while doing other projects, and the car was already on jack stands, so I decided to give this a go.

I first discovered a very dirty and crusty looking trans bellcrank assembly near the fuel accumulator, so I removed it for sandblasting and paint. 

I replaced the pivot bolt and nut with new ones I had in my parts stash, replaced the bushings and sleeves as well, and put it all back in the car. These are parts that nobody will ever see but me, but they are like new and should last the life of the car. It's my hope that this will help keep the linkages nice and tight.

There was one pivot bolt that I didn't replace, and that is the one on the bottom of the gearchange assembly. I didn't want to take this all apart when the current bolt and bushings seemed to still be working fine. The gearchange assembly was super dirty on the top though, so I tried to clean it up a bit before putting some of the interior back together.

The pivot bolt and extra bushings will go back in my parts stash and will be replaced should I ever have a need to remove this assembly in the future.

Solving a mystery with my DeLorean's interior

 Under the center console on my Delorean, there's a plastic panel and I had no idea why it was there, or if it was supposed to be there. 

 

My first thought was that a previous owner needed access to something under the fiberglass underbody and this plastic panel covered up a cutout. My curiosity got the best of me and I pried it off to reveal this:

Under all that dirt and dust is the metal fuel line. This access panel is right above the fuel accumulator and provides access to these junctions, if needed. I learned that this was done at the factory and that many DeLoreans have this. It was nice to learn all of this, but then I had to get the panel back in place. 

First, I cleaned up the area as best as I could given the limited access and cleaned up the foam material that was adhered around the edges.

 

 

The plastic panel had foam that I had to remove, and I did so with the assistance of a razor.

 

 

 

I cut out a new piece of foam that I had leftover from when I restored the A/C unit assembly and it was the perfect thickness. I used some gasket maker to adhere everything together and put the panel back into the car. All that effort just to answer the question of what was behind the cover!

Dealing with spinning rivnuts on DeLorean washer fluid cover

 While tracing wires for the fuel pump to fix a fuel pump issue that I'll write about in another post, I had to gain access to the fuel pump wiring that goes through the windshield washer cover in the left front corner underneath the DeLorean. I had previously replaced several bolts holding on the cover in an effort to cosmetically improve everything on the car, but three of the bolts holding on the cover spun the rivnuts and wouldn't come out. I didn't worry about them at the time, but now I needed access and they had to come out.

I brought out a dremel for the hard-to-reach bolts and drilled them out, but brought out the grinder with a cutoff wheel for those with easy access. 

After getting those three bolts drilled out, I removed the washer fluid cover for the first time. It had a bit of debris in the cover, but it wasn't too bad, which surprised me as it likely hadn't been removed since new. Here's a look into the cover:

 

 

I cleaned up the cover, removed the washer bottle reservoir for a drain and cleaning, then put it back in the car with some new washer fluid and replaced the cover with new stainless steel bolts and washers.

 

 

While tackling these old rivnuts, I decided now was the perfect time to deal with the terrible rivnut situation for both the fuel pump cover and the fuel filler closing panel. Both panels only had about half of the rivnuts that could still hold screws. Several were missing. Several appeared to have been drilled out at some point and the factory screws were too small to grab any threads. I decided to remove any that were in bad shape so all original screw locations would be functional once again. Here's a look at some of the before:

Here is the after of the fuel pump cover rivnuts all functional and working.

DeLorean steering rack removal, restoration, and installation

While doing some work on the front end of the DeLorean, I discovered that the steering rack boot on the passenger side was leaking. I also found a lot of evidence of leaking in the area where the steering shaft meets the steering rack. 

 

 

I was just going to replace the boots and potentially replace some seals and other wearable parts myself, I followed the advice of several DeLorean owners and shipped it off to PJ Grady for a professional rebuild. He was quick to start working on it and it was on its way back to me about a week after it arrived.

But before I could ship it out to Grady, I had to get the rack out of my car, which is pretty straightforward.

I followed these steps:

1. Disconnect the tie rod ends from both driver and passenger side knuckles
2. Disconnect the steering shaft from the rack 
3. Remove the four bolts from the bottom of the frame that hold the brackets. Once the brackets are loose, you then fish out the rubber bushings that go inside the brackets and fish them out of the frame

One of the brackets snapped off when I went to remove the bolts, so I had to get a replacement. I also got new bushings so that everything would be refreshed after 40+ years. Once I got the steering rack back from PJ Grady, I went to install it right away. What I discovered was that it did not go together easily at all. It was a fight getting the new bushings correctly positioned in the brackets and the brackets in the right place. It took several hours to get it all lined up and tightened down. It's not a job that I would voluntarily do again. It sure looks good all cleaned up and refreshed:

DeLorean A/C unit & heater box removal and restoration

As part of the rabbit hole that I kept going deeper into when it came to getting my interior overhauled, I decided that since I had the dashboard out to get a new radio head unit installed, I might as well go all the way and remove the A/C unit and see what I could do to freshen it up. My heater always smelled a little ripe when I had it running, so it was always on my to-do list to look into it, so what better time than now?

I also knew that I wanted to replace my 40+ year old A/C lines, and the A/C system would need to be disconnected to get the A/C unit out of the car, so I ordered a new set of lines from DeLorean Industries in preparation for this project. 

 I followed the workshop manual instructions to take the unit out from under the dash. There are several online write ups that I found useful, so I won't recreate all of the steps here. Here are a couple of things I'd like to point out that were good things to remember:

1. Getting the accumulator/dryer removed from the lines coming off the evaporator were impossible to do on my car. I figured that I would be replacing the evaporator as the condition and age were uncertain, so I whipped out the Sawzall and cut off the connection on the dryer. 
2. You'll definitely want to lay down something, like a towel, on the passenger side floor when you go to pull out the A/C unit as coolant from the heater core will spill out, and you don't want to deal with that mess on your carpet.

 I had the early style dryer where the A/C line from the compressor connected on the bottom. I knew that I would be replacing this, so I had no reservations to cut off the connection to the evaporator when the connection wouldn't come loose:

After getting everything disconnected, I was ready to start pulling it out. Note the towels on the floor to catch the coolant:

 

 

You have to pull out the unit in a way for the lines going to the dryer to feed through the firewall:

 

Here is after I got it out from under the dash:

  

  

This is looking into the fresh air intake behind the firewall as I wanted to see how this area looked. Mine wasn't too dirty, so I left it alone:

I took several pictures of the unit after I got it out of the car and knowing that I'd want several reference points when it came time to put it all back together.

  

 

The door flaps were a bit crusty and had little to no original foam remaining. I knew I had to go further and disassemble the unit and get everything refreshed. 

 

Here's my first look at the evaporator. Come to find out, this was not the original evaporator. I have no records of this being replaced, but it's completely different and smaller than the original. 

 

 

 

 

  

 

Another weird thing I discovered was that the old evaporator didn't have an orifice tube. I don't know how the system ever worked without one, so that's more to the mystery. Looking into the tube, this is where I expected to find it:

 

 

Here's a side by side view of the new and old evaporator, as well as the new and original heater core:

 

 

 

 

The teardown continued and I decided to tear it completely down so I could sandblast, paint, and install new foam on all the flaps:

 

 

 

 

I replaced the foam with some thin foam I picked up at Michael's craft store. I cut them to size and used contact cement to adhere the foam to the flaps. For more guidance on which materials to use, I followed this write up: https://dmctalk.org/showthread.php?5860-Heater-and-Evaporator-Replacement-with-Heater-Box-Restore. It all came back together nicely and I am super happy with the actuation with all of the flaps having the rust removed and the pieces lubed up.

I sealed up the gap around the evaporator with A/C foam:

 

I went to put the heater hose cover back on and realized how difficult it is to get this piece back on. I fought with this thing for probably a good hour before I was satisfied that it was back on correctly.

 

 

I found that the only way to get the angles right, I had to work on it from below the car. I had the car on jack stands and the passenger tire was out of the way. I don't think it's possible to get this back into position if only working on this from above. Here is is finally back on:

Back on the A/C unit box, I made sure to install all new foam on all the connections before everything was put back together.

I got everything put back into the car and test fit the new dashboard. I'll see how everything works and smalls after I get the rest of the interior assembled and the car is back on the road.