[Re: OT :Mr Murphy]

[ralexander03@snet.net (Rick Alexander)]

Original message:

> Now fess up, I know the rest of you have done some "entertaining " things.

Ok, I'll fess up. Last week I ordered a bunch of heim joints with the intent
of building a positive, short, weighted shifter. It went together perfectly
and I was thinking of typing up a tech note on this so that others could do
it but I held off for some reason. Turns out there was good reason to wait.

Everything was right except the weight. I went to my metal supplier and said
that I needed a slug that was 4 7/8" long. "All I have is 2 1/2" in
diameter". "Ok" I say, knowing that I can always make another if for some
reason it doesn't work. I took it home and welded the 3/8x24x1 1/2" bolts on
to it to thread into the heim joints and the thing was almost 7 lbs. Way too
heavy I'm thinking but I'll try it. Well with that much weight you can't
feel the gates in the transmission and I believe this is hard as all get out
on the synchros but I get used to it in the first ten to twenty miles and
I'm grinning. That was yesterday, today Mr. Murphy caught up with me at the
auto cross. It seems that in that second gear hard right hand sweeper the
centrifugal force of that 7 lbs. would pull it into neutral every time. I
spent the rest of the day driving with one hand on the wheel and the other
on the shifter.

There are two morals to this story. First when they say around two lbs.
there is good reason for this. Second if you loose Mr. Murphy for a while
you can rest assured that he will catch up.

Modifications to be made then a tech note to be written.

Rick Alexander
http://www.brubakerbox.com
http://clubs.hemmings.com/hams/
http://clubs.hemmings.com/vwsrus/