Damn ... I've REALLY been neglecting to update this thread.
Okay, far as I can recall, here's what all has taken place over the past 3 months:
1. Swapped out the power steering pump with a used one. It leaked. Changed the O-rings. It still leaks ... not as much, but just enough to piss me off. Flushed out all the old nasty power steering fluid and refilled with Type F fluid - pump is much quieter now after a couple of weeks of driving has worked all the air bubbles out;
2. Swapped in a 3G alternator with 4 gauge cables and grounds;
3. Installed a 12-volt accessory plug under the radio so I could use my plug-in voltmeter to verify that the 3G is working properly (it is) and because the car never came with a power outlet/cigarette lighter (need to be able to use my cell phone's plug-in charger for emergencies);
4. Installed a new washer fluid reservoir and moved the overflow coolant tank over to where the stock overflow and reservoir were originally located in stock form (driver's side front corner);
5. Swapped the ol' turbine rims and stupid-looking undersized tires back on because the tires on my 10-holes have almost ZERO tread left and I don't wanna be driving through Monsoon Season rains with that, plus those Fuzion tires on the 10-holes were getting so out-of-balance that it had an annoying vibration above 55 MPH. While they're old and rock-hard and the speedo reads wrong with them (and one has a slow air leak), at least the tires on the turbines have plenty of tread left and they ride really smooth up to 70 MPH. I'll just have to live with 'em until I can get around to putting another set of tires on the 10-holes;
6. Installed a dead pedal;
7. Took a gamble and decided to put in a couple cans of 134a to see if the A/C system could be resurrected from the dead. Lo and behold, I now have WORKING AIR CONDITIONING THAT BLOWS COLD AIR!
8. After playing with the A/C in town, I found that my wimpy little 2-core radiator is woefully inadequate to support functional A/C in 112*F temperatures without letting the engine get warmer than it should. I also realized that all this time, I didn't have an airdam under the radiator support like I should, and that for some reason it's never been an issue at all until now. Bolted one up underneath there and now it stays perfectly cool on the highway with the A/C cranked, although it does still creep up pretty quickly while sitting in stop-and-go-traffic. (Fan clutch and fan are good, so it's likely still due to the wimpy 2-core radiator. I soooooo need a 3-core in this thing.);
9. Fixed more vacuum leaks and "deleted" (bypassed) the idle compensator and choke from the CFI unit - even with the A/C working, they've proven entirely unnecessary and useless, and they were leaking vacuum while connected (blown diaphragms), so ... yeah. Bye-bye junk parts. No longer have the freaky idle-hunting problem at start-up, and my hot idle in Park is about 200 RPM lower than before (now sits at 1,000 RPM instead of 1,200 RPM), although I do have to give it just a hair of steady throttle input for the first 30 seconds after a cold start - basically, *I* am the idle compensator now, so it's a manual affair rather than an automatic detail. Oh well.
10. Installed new lower ball joints - car doesn't wander all over the freakin' road now, although it's still just a hair loose and so it probably needs new tie rod ends;
11. FINALLY put in a decent steering wheel, from an '89 four-banger notch - perfectly good condition, but it has cruise buttons and my '84 isn't equipped with it. Also, the steering shaft sticks up about 1/8" too far, so I can't quite get the horn button 100% into place on the wheel when it's snugged down - can only push the horn button on slightly to one side or the other, can't get both pegs all the way pushed in. Oh well, it's perfectly functional, and you can't really see the fitment problem, and the horn button stays put, so ... meh. And this wheel not only feels 10x better than the crappy one I took off, it only weighs about 1/3 as much - it's mostly foam instead of hard rubber/plastic - so it makes the steering effort seem lighter, too.
Latest to-do list:
1. Buy/install 2.5" muffler and tailpipe (one of these years, dammit);
2. New tires for the 10-holes;
3. New water pump gasket and jury-rig a fix for the broken timing cover (missing a chunk where someone somehow broke off the "ear" for the the top bolt hole) to either seal or at least slow down my latest coolant leak;
4. Install electric fan (maybe);
5. Tie rod ends and alignment (maybe);