Date:         Thu, 12 Sep 2002 18:00:49 -0700
Reply-To:     DaveC <voicebox@DNAI.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         DaveC <voicebox@DNAI.COM>
Subject:      "On the cheap" tune-up
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

I was tired of buying $70 distributor caps for one of my cars, so I
decided to experiment by cleaning up one of them.

I hauled out my Dremel drill and put on a sanding drum. I then took
off the distributor cap and cleaned up the carbon deposits on each of
the brass contacts inside using the Dremel/drum. (I didn't touch the
center contact -- it's carbon, or something, and it looks brittle and
doesn't have any deposits to clean up anyway.)

I touched up the rotor by hand with just some sandpaper. The Dremel
technique would be a bit overkill.

You have to be careful how you go at the contacts; the brass is soft,
and the drill is fast. It is very easy to take off a lot of brass if
you're not careful. I used the slowest speed on the drill.

Results? It felt like I'd installed new parts. The idle smoothed out
and there was a bit more power. Very nice. All for 5 minutes work and
no extra cost (above the cost of owning the Dremel).

I have no idea if the interval between "touch-ups" is equivalent to
the interval between replacing the cap and rotor with new components.
Perhaps it is a bit less, I'll let you know.

I wonder how many "touch-ups" I can get out of one distributor cap?

Dave
--
Dave Carpenter

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from
magic." -- Arthur C. Clarke