The Cal-look Lounge

Another story from my tenure @ Buggy House.... ::)

About 6 months before I moved on from my 10 year stay there, a younger guy came on board to work the counter....I'll just say his name was MM. Anyway, MM was a seemingly good kid, early 20's, had a nice Bug (started out as an Empi-Wagen resto cal trinket car, but after my friends and I beat him up enough times he took all the shit off and decided to build a 48IDA motor), and got engrossed with Cal Look stuff and Keith's book, etc...
So while I was still employed there, MM started collecting stuff for his stroker monster, heads from Crawford, all sorts of cams, then a crank, rods....and so on, the pile of stuff got bigger. But all sat in boxes, basically because he knew and I knew I was gonna get recruited to build the thing, and I was busy with graduating with a degree, work, moving and my own car.
About 5-6 months after I quit, we finally sit down and start talking about the motor, which was going to be a 2276 with all the usual trimmings. MM scored a set of NOS Italian 48's from Ray Schubert that were just drop dead gorgeous. 42mm venturies and all, they were awesome.

So we get the longblock done, and he gets it dressed with tin and header and all that and then he shows up with these carbs and wants me to set floats up and screw jets in them. I tell him, "go buy 170 mains and 200 airs and 60 idle jets from Buggy House, we can get it running and close with those..." He says OK and takes off.
Few days later, and the kid is back......carbs in big box and with a plastic box rattling around in his other hand. I ask him...."you get the jets I told you to buy" and he looks at me and grins and says, "yeah I got 'em"...
Now remember, I'm, thinking this kid is a good All American Nice Guy, worked hard to build this motor, paid his mom back for the dough she lent him...etc....etc...and then he proudly opens the "jet box".....and inside is just about every fricking Weber jet you could buy. Not only did he have every idle jet available for the 48IDA, and the air holders.....he also had idle jets for DCOE and IDFs too. Every fricking emulsion tube I have ever heard of F2, F7, F4, F9, F11, F24...on and on and on.......main jets from 115 to 185, air jets from 120 to 240, needle valves, accelerator pump jets, banjos, I mean this kid had it all. !!!!
I asked him, "What the f- do you need all this for?!!! half this crap doesn't even fit a 48! Where did you get all this shit?!!"
He still maintianed his proud smug look and the look on his face told me right away this kid was about as honest as a used car salesman. There was no way this kid came up with the $5000.00 needed to put this kind of Weber inventory into his jet box. It was pretty clear what was going on.

Anyway, to show you karma catches up with you.....this kid got brave one day when big 2276 was running, stuffed his foot into it, lost control and tied car up pretty bad and wrecked another car and even hurt some people in the other car.The Bug was a total write off....all that work smashed into a ball in seconds....
 

About ten years ago, I was attending a British Auto Jumble (swap meet) called Beaulieu, which is just the best... but not for VW parts. Anyhow, I was walking around with another VW guy from California, name withheld, and he saw this 12x12x12 box with some venturis on top. He got there first, and inside, it was FULL of Weber parts; tons and tons of brass, jets, e-tubes, venturis, springs, shafts, stacks, and on and on. I would guess it weighted about 20 lbs., plus! All new, most of it was in OEM packs. Lots of IDA and IDF parts, and I don't think I have ever seen that many main and air jets in my life. Bought the lot for about $80 U.S. !

You mean "MP"? ;D The car is actually being rebuilt. My friend bought the car dirt cheap and has already clipped the front. He said there was so much half A$$ $hit done to the car it freightened him, like the fuel pump grounded to the gas tank and so on. Karma is a bitch, ask my ex wife.

I remember hearing about him stuffing the car into somebody.  Something about a stuck throttle.  Always wondered what happened to the remains.

Roger Crawford @ Heads Performance has a friend named Al Cadrobi (not sure of the spelling). Al built Porsche 904 motors and dynoed them @ our place. He raced and won @ LaMans during the 60's when Porsche was winning everything there (by the way, he won as a privateer) For winning there, Al got a leather embossed case with "LaMans" across the front. In that box was every piece of brass ever produced for a Weber. How many people have seen a F34 emulsion tube? Al has forgot more about tuning Webers than any of us will ever know. Once @ lunch he showed me a Weber Tech Article about the idle circut. He told me that the idle mixture screw wasn't really for adjusting the mixture. It is for testing to see what size idle jet and or holder you need to run, by how many turns you have it out. Just one of the nuggets of info in his brain. The problem with Al was he is suffering from Parkingson's disease. I think he is pretty much totally diabled living in an oldfolks home.... Total bummer!! Anyways, just a little story about Webers and a "Box of jets"...

                                                                         Anthony   Heads Up Performance