Fruits of the Day

OK, so our gas saving Metro has officially been in the shop for more time than it has been 'on the road' since we bought it, but today, I made some pretty significant progress that I have to brag on a bit.  

First, I finally got the seal for the transmission that goes around the CV shaft and got that installed (This is the third seal I have brought home with high hopes that it would actually fit - dern parts store guys!)  Then Sterling and I buttoned the front end back up and got the wheel installed.  Here's what Sterling did next:

Look closely - he lined up a bunch of bolts (some standing on end) to make a "person" out of them.  By the way, I love that 'bolt box.'  Whenever I am in need of a bolt for something (quite often) it can always be found in the bolt box.  It rarely let's me down and every time I find a bolt, it means one less trip to the hardware store to search for one.

Back on topic: the second thing I accomplished on the metro is something I am really proud of.  I not only wired up a couple relays to control the headlights (they were subjected to the most redneck hack re-wire job ever prior to our ownership of the vehicle and the wires literally smoked when the headlights were on) but I actually was able to track down the factory control wires to tap into so that now, our headlights will be controlled by the regular controller thingy instead of having to mess around with two separate switches that were crappily mounted under the dash.  Screwing up wiring is (apparently) very easy, but resurrecting it from the factory wiring harness is very difficult, so even though it took the better part of the day to get it figured out, it feels great to have it done.  Coincidentally, for those who will ever rewire a metro, it turns out that the factory controls for the headlights actually complete the circuit to ground instead of completeing the circuit to the battery.  That part took me a while to figure out.