[darkpuppet]

To say that not much got done on the car yesterday is an understatement. I'm hoping some folks here can provide insight to some questions I have, and bear with me on my little rant... I'll get to the questions first.

firstly
I have the pages printed out from the shop manual for the thermostat replacement, but I have to be honest, they are not clear on how to attack this thing. There are 3 possible screws or bolts to remove.. and if you look at the area of the tstat, there are 2 possible routes to take.

my question is this... do I go for the torx screws on the front (#1), or go for the bolts on the side (#2)? Any thoughts. I wasn't about to start pulling s**t off if I wasn't sure.. last thing I needed was a bigger mess on my hands (see below about the mess)

secondly
what's a good vacuum line to tap from? can I select from the ones I believe are in this picture?
<a href='http://img78.photobucket.com/albums/v246/darkpuppet/vacuum_line.jpg'>
thoughts? I couldn't find a 1/8&quot; adapter to use on a t-fitting, so I bought some extra nylon tubing and will ghetto fab an adapter with teflon/electrical tape and zip ties.

Now onto my little rant.. how not to install you gauges :P
I should have checked sooner, so I accept full responsibility for this mistake... checking to make sure they sent you the right gauge pod:


actually, a non-flash picture shows what I mean a little better:
<a href='http://img78.photobucket.com/albums/v246/darkpuppet/gauge_pod2.jpg'>
Here's what it looks like if I fix up the histogram:

so that's a pisser... can anyone confirm if my squarer a-pillars are indeed 2002 model year? because I asked for 2002 quage pod, but my car has a lot of things that seem really 2001 on it (like the hood insulation). I'll need to call Steeda and see how quickly they can get me a new pod. (did I mention this sucks?)

so after bailing on the tstat and gauge pods, I thought it would be a good time to sort out some of the wiring under the hood.... and what I found can be summed up in this pic:
<a href='http://img78.photobucket.com/albums/v246/darkpuppet/rats_nest.jpg'>
you may notice the hood release cable that's been chaffed nearly to the core... it looks like it was caught with a grinder.. and considering the amount of senseless grinding those guys did, I almost expect that to be the case... should have inspected everything a bit closer before.

But there's a serious problem with pretty much all of the looming and hoses that pass that area.. some are zip-tied to the frame, but they're chaffing pretty badly and with the way everything is stacked, stuffed, and tied to each other, there's a lot of chaffing going on, and I'm surprised my car hasn't gone pre-recall flameside up on me yet...

So I stepped back... I'm going to have to attack this sht in the evenings and try to sort it out.. but right now, it looks like I may be renting a car for my travels to TBay... good lesson here kids.

don't wait to the last minute to do these things!

d'oh!