I figured it was time for a daily driver update. The biggest headache was getting the car through Atlanta emissions, which I finally accomplished. After sitting for 15 years, a bunch of little things just weren't quite right and took a lot of time to sort, some by the PO and some by me - injectors, plugs, coil packs, vacuum leaks, O2 sensors, cleaning the TB, adjusting the TPS and resetting idle, and probably a bunch of other things. It all boiled down to a PASS, finally. And that's the last time I'll have to do it, since next year it will be 25 years old and exempt.
The O2 sensors are the most recent replacement, and besides helping emissions, made a big difference in fuel economy. This morning on my normal morning commute (5 miles back roads, 17 miles freeway) I averaged almost 22mpg. That's a 5mpg improvement over what I had been seeing, which is really welcome.
Then there's the clutch. I had to drive to the airport last week, and only got about 2 miles from my house when the clutch went to the floor. At 5am this isn't something you want to happen. I made it back home with a combination of creeping up to stoplights praying for green, and then simple brutality when I was forced to stop. Not a good morning. But this weekend with the help of my wife on the pedal, I cleaned out 25 years of black sludge from the reservoir and lines, ran a whole bottle of DOT4 through it, and now it's higher and tighter than it has ever been. I'm keeping an eye on it because I suspect I might still have an internal leak, which will mean rebuilding the slave.
In the meantime, it sure is running and driving beautifully. Yesterday was gorgeous and we took the top off and went for a drive, meeting some friends for dinner. I think my wife might finally be warming up to the Z.
