I haven’t done much writing about my C6 Corvette, mainly because it has really been a great car (still is) even with the technology glitches.
However, as you might have gathered from the title there is an issue that I thought I’d jot down along with some possible causes and some preventive measures.
I recently had the problem with my gas gauge flopping round and kicking off the low fuel warning. Interesting enough it only happened immediately after filling up. It is an immediate reaction when I turn the car on. During this most recent incident the gauge remained flat-lined for what seemed a bit longer then it has in the past. I’m talking 20 miles or more with 3 stops full and shut down. It was accompanied by the engine light, which remained on after the gauge went back to normal and the low fuel warning stopped.
The Vette ran perfectly during the event so I’m not too worried , but still you don’t want to have to call the flatbed.
So I dropped a note on my corvette clubs site ACE (Arizona Corvette Enthusiasts) http://www.arizonacorvetteenthusiasts.net and to see what they thought.
Most swear by Chevron gas with its Techron cleaning agent and some were thinking it might be a sending unit and some said it is a common problem with C5 ( the previous generation of Corvettes).
Here are some comments:
—“Use some Seafoam (Autozone, Checker etc.) per directions on the bottle. Techron works also.” My NOTE: Seafoam is tough stuff, you have to be sure to change your fuel filter shortly there after.
—“Same thing would happen to me with Roxxane II (c5). It would show empty when I filled her up. I would use 2 bottles of Techron and then one bottle at every fill up for the next 4 tanks. Problem went away for a while. Then I would use one bottle every 2 tanks and that kept the demon away.”
This one was exteremly helpful……”Well, stop putting gas in it, maybe the problem goes away.”
—“It’s a level sender issue for sure. If Techron doesn’t solve it, you’ll either have to learn to live with it, or replace the faulty sensor. Do you have any way to check the codes to see which sensor is unhappy?” ( I don’t so if it acts up again, I’ll have to take it in.)
—“Two possibilities…. sulphur build up on the sending unit or the sending unit going out. I understand they are a biotch to change.”
—“My C5 had the problem unless I ran Chevron gas in it. About the second tank of non Chevron the gauge would go crazy. I would switch back and the problem went away.”
—“This was a common occurrence on the ‘early’ C5’s. It usually happened when high sulphur content fuel was put in. Some of the fixes were switching gas to adding a bottle of Techron every once in a while. The real ‘fix’ was a reflash at the dealer. Apparently the sender was a bit too sensitive, so they slowed it down.
I had the issue occasionally on my 99, but when I put a 2002 Z06 operating system into the computer, it went away.
Since you have a C6, I would expect that the issue isn’t a reflash. My guess would be that maybe you got some high sulphur content fuel or your sender is acting up in some way, maybe a poor or intermittent connection somewhere along the line.
—“You could try a treatment with Techron and see if that ‘cleans’ it up. ”
—“I was using the Techron trick in my C5. I switched to Gumout Regane Fuel System Cleaner. I t seems to help, although my gauge still jumps to E at times when below 1/3 of a tank. Good luck. It sucks to not really know how much fuel is in your tank. Although a Vette is light in comparison to other cars, I just can’t see myself pushing it into the gas station.”
So there you have a round of discussion on the topic.
Now the fuel leveling sensor is used because the C6 had two tanks and this keeps the tanks level. Which is important especially if you are running auto cross. Here is area a couple of graphics from http://www.corvetteactioncenter.com:
So you can see that it would a chore to replace. So I’m going to try the Techron and hope it works. I’ve been cautioned that I need the Fuel System Cleaner – not the injector cleaner. Here’s a pic:
Get the Fuel System Cleaner.
I’ve used my first 12 oz can and I’m currently at half a tank. I’ll fill it up again in a couple of days (Yes..when you normally drive it like you just stole it you tend to have to fill up – now and again..mostly..again!) and I’ll try to capture the event on my trusty Android.
Stay tuned (up). {someone please say they get that}
I was reading the other day and I came across a car manufacturer that I hadn’t heard of prior and yes it was an American car maker. The maker was Velie.
1911 Velie passenger car
Like some car manufacturers Velie started out as a carriage maker (as in horse and carriage). The owner was Willard Velie and we received his funding from this mother who was the wife of John Deer. Yes that John Deer. It’s not exactly clear if John Deer was is father, but we’ll assume it was so.
Willard created Velie Motor Vehicles Co. in 1908 and produced their first car in 1909. It was a 4 cylinder and sold 1000 units and were sold though John Deer dealerships. The 1909 and 1910 models primarily used existing engine but in 1911 build their own. In that same year the Velie car participated in the Indianapolis 500 and finished 17th out of 46.
1911 Racer
That helped keep car production was at 3,500 vehicles a year. By 1914 Velie added a six-cylinder side-valve Continental engine to the mix of power plants. and by 1918 only offered six cylinders. The car became so popular and reliable that a few folks in Louisiana name a town after the car.
In 1918 Velie won the race at Pikes Peak which helped increase production to 9000 a year cars by 1920.
In 1928 they introduced the an 8 cylinder engine a Continental straight eight and were a roll so to speak. (Not to mention their little side business for producing air planes.) However that was not to be, Willard died in late 1928 and Willard Jr. died a few months in 1929 later. That ended the Velie Motor Vehicle Co.
John Deer company bought the plant and well they sold a few tractors now and then.
I love auto history, and one of the areas I enjoy learning about is what car companies made to help support war efforts. So this series will be a small snapshot of the vehicles and some surprising other items. As a note, most of the makers didn’t just volunteer to stop producing cars, although most complied with the restrictions on materials – like not using chrome for the brightwork, which created the very collectible attribute for wartime cars – the blacked-out version.
First up, American Bantam. “Who?” you might be saying. Ok fine. Do these ring a bell:
The company started out as the American Austin Car company In 1930 and in 1934 became associated with the British Austin Car Company and then filed for bankruptcy. In 1935 it was revived as the American Bantam Car Company. They are credited with the first jeep prototype. (So any guesses as two one of their contributions during WWII?). The company stopped doing business in 1941.
Reach search show 3 main contributions for the American Bantam Company.
First up and one of the most important military vehicles.
As if that wasn’t enough the also produced two trailers for pulling behind the jeep.
1939 Bantam Pumper Trailer for use with the Jeep.
Impressive.
amphibious Trailer
And there you have it. American Bantam’s extremely important contributions to the World War II effort and tahe beginnings of one of the most versatile military vehicles…the Jeep!!
It is 1922 and the car industry is moving right along. Small start-up car companies pop up here and there in the 1920’s.
Here is how they stacked up for 1922.
Top spot was Ford producing 1,147,028 cars.
Dodge was a very distant second with 152,653 car rolling off their assembly line.
Chevrolet ran in third place with 138,932 cars made.
And finish up the list were Buick with 123,152; Studebaker with 105,005; Williys-Overland with 95,410; Durant with 55,300 and finally Maxwell/Chalmers 44,811.
Total passenger cars produced were 2,274,185 with 269,991 truck being made.
Rickenbacker was a new upstart beginning production in 1922.
Durant produce a car priced at $319 . Ford reduced prices to $298.
Balloon tires were introduced.
Hey fuel gauges began being installed in dash in 1922.
1922 Durant Star - An attempt to undercut Ford's prices
As I’m sure you’ve heard or witnessed first-hand, Hurricane Irene threw her wrath against the eastern seaboard with initial landfall in North Carolina as a Category 1. Although predicted to be a Category 3 at landfall, this storm was still nothing less than a monster. This major hurricane realeased havoc from Myrtle Beach up to Maine as it churned along leaving major paths of destruction behind and massive amounts of rainfall. Power outages became widespread up the east coast, (includes my family in Pennsylvania at this current moment). Streams and creeks became raging rivers taking out roads, bridges, one being a 156-year-old hand-hewn bridge in upstate New York. It destroyed houses and stranded people in or away from their homes. Evacuated people are now stranded wondering the fate of their homes and personal belongings. Washed-out roads and bridges have left complete towns stranded without a way to get to or out like these towns in Vermont that have over 260 roads closed.
This storm has caused massive destruction and that has effected some of our own Mustang enthusiasts. Member, RobTRoma from PA, joked about getting a photo of his car next to a hurricane in our Mustang game thread. Featured above, what looks like a very nice ROUSH S-197 Mustang is sinking in a Subway parking lot in North Carolina during Irene’s throw-down. It almost has an ambience of Jaws coming out of the water before Roy Sheider exploded it.
I bumped in to Bill Holtzclaw from Cartersville, Georgia, virtually (Facebook) and he shared a few pics and some detail on his restoration of a 1967 Olds F-85.
Bill's F85
“I am doing a full, frame-off restoration on this 1967 F-85 Club Coupe. It has a convertible frame, 442 suspension, steel crank 330, .030 over with W-31 cam and 2” intake valves, close ratio Muncie 4 speed and heavy duty 3.91 posi rear. It is a radio delete, heater delete, carpet delete car with the factory cloth and vinyl interior. The drive train is built and the chassis is being assembled. The interior is done, the chrome and bright work is done. Next, we’ll pull the body and put it on a rotisserie. It will be two-tone Crystal and Midnight Blue.”
“I’ve had a lot of interest in this project from some of the leading Oldsmobile collectors in the country. It is my version of what would have been a 1967 W-31, which was introduced in 1968. All of the parts to build this car back in the day were available as either RPO options or over-the-counter upgrades. The W-30 package was available as an over-the-counter package in 1967. The W-30 cam and the W-31 cam are one in the same, and the OIA kit will work for both small block and big block cars. So, it was a possibility! ”
The upholstery turned out awesome! He used NOS fabric for the seat inserts. The car was a factory carpet delete car with a near-perfect vinyl floor covering. “I cleaned it and had it dyed the color blue (same as dash pad) that I wanted. It looks absolutely brand new! I had seat belts custom made to stock appearance, and the standard steering wheel came out nice, too.”
Check out the vinyl floor covering
“I had the gauges restored by R&M restorations in Greenville, SC. The odometer was re-set to zero.” The dash bezel was restored by Chrome Tech USA. They repaired the 44 year-old plastic, re-chromed it and then detail painted it. The radio and heater delete plates were purchased from Red Venom Enterprises. “They only make the radio plate, so I purchased two and trimmed one to fit the heater control panel and the PRNDL panel. ”
Bill did the polishing himself
He installed a Sunpro Mini Tach in place of the factory clock. Looks like it came from the factory that way!
Great Job - Bill!!
Final Product
Bill is also the owner of a 1967 Oldsmobile F-85 Town Sedan with “Police Apprehender” package. It has the HiPo 330/320 hp, Heavy Duty Jetaway and 442 suspension upgrades.
Nice!!!
Might be why he’s known as OldsMoBill. “I am also known as the “Oldsmobile Police”!” Bill states.
Bill, I hope you check back with your status from time to time and thank you for sharing.
Of course I spend a lot of time reading and again a lot of that is two or three-dimensional, although my wife says it’s a single dimension. She sees just “CARS” I see muscle cars, sedans (that I want to turn in to muscle cars), exotic cars and even some European cars. That’s multi-dimensional, don’t you think? I gained a little interest in them when I was a kid and my Dad surprised my Mother with a 60’ish MGB – mainly I learned that unless you wanted to fix ’em a lot…stay a way!!!
I gained a little more familiarization with another brand when I was in college. I had my license suspended….you can figure out why…so don’t make me say ‘too many speeding tickets”, ok? Thanks. So it was only about a mile or so walk to the campus from where I stayed, but if you are from one of the colder States, like northern New York, then you’d know that a morning jaunt on a Dec. morning is ‘nippy” to say the least. So I would catch a ride with a friend. He drove the one of the coolest cars I had ridden. It was a Citroen. Similar to this one:
It had the coolest suspension that would raise when you started it and lower when you turned it off.
My point being that there is another dimension to my reading – European cars. But I am in no way any kind of expert with any of them – although when I lived in Germany, I drove a very old European Ford Escort. That car was horrible!!!! However, it got me round, even when the upper part of the seat frame broke and the only way to drive it was by holding yourself forward using the steering wheel else the seat back, because it leaned so much, should dump you in the back seat. Last year I signed up for..please kneel…”HEMMINGS”… thank you….you may relax now… SPORTS & EXOTIC CAR magazine – some great articles and I enjoy Mike’s and Richard’s writings. Geezze, this is a long way around to the point that I picked up a copy of Classic & Sports Car magazine – UK produced – the other day.
In this was a series of articles that pitted 4 pair of cars against each other. One car in each pair was an expensive classic brand/model and the other was relatively inexpensive newer brand/model. Two things dawned on me, one was,”Hey, I’ve never heard of a Reliant Scimitar SS1 or a Panther Kallista.” The second thing was, “Hey, have never heard of any of these cars!” Normally if I have just one of these realizations – I won’t read the article… nope not interested…. but this time I did.
And now I need to know a little about these cars and I know you do to….all three of my readers!!! So we’ll take a look at the Panther Kallista and the Caterham Seven and the TVR S3 and the Reliant Scimitar SS1.
First up is the Reliant Scimitar SS1.
This car (at about 3000 British Pounds – $6000 USD) was being compared to the Lotus Elan (at 16000 British Pounds or about $32,000 USD). Here is what it looks like:
Reliant Scimitar SS1
Not bad-looking!!!!
These cars were made from 1986 to 1990, however the Scimitar actually arrived on the scene in 1964 with a Ford straight 6 cylinder as the power plant. These more recent models had a spaceframe chassis and fiberglass body, an iron block, alloy heads, SOHC 1809 cc, 8 valve 4. It also sported a Garrett T2 Turbo with electronic multi-port fuel injection system. This allowed it to lay out 140 HP and 141 lb ft of torque and reach a top speed of 128 mph and it only weighted 1969 lbs.
They sported a 5 speed manual transmission, rack and pinion steering, double wishbone independent suspension and disks breaks.
Just to give you some closure, it was compared to the Lotus Elan where it scored 2 points less than the Lotus (38 to 40) in Driving, Practicality, Character, Value and Usability.
Any one out there have one of these? Know anyone that has one? If so drop a comment and pic.
