Captainkirk's Duster project


...."and now for something completely different"

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGK8IC-bGnU"]Monty Python - "And Now For Something Completely Different" - YouTube[/ame]

Just when I thought I had it figured out.

For those of you following, the fog that stole in last night on little cat feet (thank you, Carl Sandburg) stayed. In fact, the more I thought about it, the better it sounded.
I tend to be a 'ponderer'. Not important, life-things, like the meaning of life, or how many light-years away the next galaxy is, but the little things that affect me, like what color to paint a room, or how to go about constructing a shelf, or....how to build an engine.
I have to ponder these things, you see. To make sure they "sit right" (drives my wife nuts, lemme tell ya...) The decision has to 'feel right' to sit right in my mind. Maybe that's crazy-talk to some of you, but that's the way it is and you can't do nuttin' about it.
Sometimes, I use a little help.
The best helper in the world, I find, is a wee little nip of Jameson's. Not a lot, mind you....that leads to not really thinking about much at all. No, just maybe a finger's worth in the bottom of a tumbler, slowly sipped over an hour or so.....
It leads to some very profound thoughts, I tell you.
Last night was one of those nights.
By the end of the evening, it was all sorted out in my mind.
We are moving forward, kiddies.
I called Tony today and we cemented the deal; I will be dropping off the '69 340 block sometime soon. It will be getting dipped, new freeze plugs and cam bearings, then bored (how much depends on the worst cylinder) and possibly zero-decked, then fitted for Speed Pro L-2316F forged pistons with a CR of 10:1. Heads, we have not decided yet...first things first. I have no qualms whatsoever about boring a block that...well, needs to be bored.
Having put this thing to bed, I feel a HUGE sense of relief; like some decisions have been made that I really had to think about. I did, and I feel really good about the outcome.
I knew, deep down inside, that I shouldn't, I COULDN'T, use those pistons again on a street motor. That ship has sailed with the HMS Leadbottom back in around 1982 or so, when the last local Shell station dropped leaded premium from the lineup. I always hoped to rebuilt that legendary motor, pistons and all. But you can't go back home, they say. And unless Mr. Peabody shows up on my front porch with the Wayback Machine, I'm not going back to the Seventies.
No, we'll build a New Motor for a New Millennium. The target is 400 HP on pump gas. What sort of cam and other stuff might be involved to achieve this, we'll have to see. It's kind of like spending months getting ready to go on vacation to, say...the Bahamas, and as you board the airplane, they tell you no...you're going to the Great North Woods. You can till have a good time, if you can stop from bitching about it and wrap your head around it. That's where I am today....head-wrapping. And actually feeling a little excited.
I never, in a million years, thought I would be shoehorning that old '69 340 back into The Duke. That was never the plan. It was always, in my mind, based around the motor and the memories from the Li'l Red Minx. But the times, they are a-changin'.
I wonder what The Duke is gonna have to say about this when I tell him?
So, now...like another much-less famous and lesser-known Captain Kirk said, It's time for me to go boldly where no man has gone before.

"Kirk Out"