Yesterday I did the speedometer, disassembling it to its basic parts and giving a thorough cleaning. And yes, it was chock-full of nasty old grease. I probably spent an hour feeling like a dentist, using tiny tools to scrape gunk out of odd corners, but a combination of acetone, WD-40, and white lithium grease brought it to a state in which I felt I could reassemble it with a fair degree of confidence.
Then to help matters along, I pulled the speedometer cable again (it's SO MUCH easier when there's a hole where the speedometer usually is), re-cleaned and re-lubed it with more lithium grease, and replaced it. I was going to get new light bulbs, but they're more than five bucks apiece, so I was struck with an attack of the deadly "If-It-Ain't-Broke-Don't-Fix-It" disease, and decided to call that particular replacement off. The only thing that remains is to put the speedometer back in the car and test it.
Today, instead of doing that, I replaced the front passenger wheel cylinder. If you recall, when I was bleeding the brakes, this one didn't bleed whatsoever. The new cylinder and a new brake hose came in yesterday, and so I tucked straight in. Removing the tire and brake drum was trivial, but during the course of the removal I discovered that my lug nuts had started working loose, so I went around the whole car and re-tightened them. Sure is convenient that I didn't remount the hubcaps yet!
With the brake drum removed, I tried to use my brake tool kit to remove the primary and secondary return springs, only to find that my brake spring pliers wasn't going to work like I thought it would. So I used a channel-lock pliers to firmly grip the springs, and leaned, using my body weight to help overcome the spring resistance. This worked, and off came the return springs. Next, using the same pliers, I eased out the push rods (don't you love perfectly descriptive names).
At this point, removing the wheel cylinder would've been straightforward if I knew what I was doing, but I didn't, so of course I went the long way around. I removed the two attachment bolts behind the backing plate, and very awkwardly unscrewed the wheel cylinder from the brake hose, which was barely long enough to give me the necessary clearance in front of the backing plate. The brake hose, in turn, was very stuck at its attachment point to the hard line, so I sprayed it with WD-40 and left it until this evening.
This evening, it did eventually yield, either to my prayers or mechanical persuasion, I'm not sure which. But I was totally unable to remove the clip holding the hose to the mount, so I solved the problem by removing the mount and attacking the clip with the aid of a bench vise. With the clip removed, I gave the mount a light cleaning and brushing, then remounted it, and installed the wheel cylinder and brake hose. I connected the hose in the wrong order at first, but the next time I do this I'll remember that you tighten the cylinder side first, then the hard line side. The only things left to do for tomorrow are pressure-testing, bleeding, reinstalling the clip, replacing the drum and bearing hardware, and finally remounting the tire. Easy!
Then I get to do it all over again with the rear passenger wheel. Should've timed myself and see how much quicker it goes! Photos below, pre-disassembly, mid-disassembly, and current state.
