Projects New Shop Truck

Next Steering:

So the super groovy deal on these things is to do the tie rod flip and use new modern style tie rod ends rather than the old ball and cup shit. Plus the tie rod will be perfect with regards to clearance under the leaf spring. I'm thankful this deal came with one!!!! But the kicker is that you need to get the damn balls out of the old steering arms. Hmmmm.....

Here We Go!!!!

Line this shit up in the old drill press and start small. I drilled like a 3/16" pilot hole down the center. You're in luck because the end of the ball has a center pop in it from the factory. Just make sure the whole thing is lined up right and drill it out. Then step up to a larger drill and hog the bitch out. I zoomed the bottom of this with a grinder to remove the old material that was peened over from the factory. Next I hit the end with a countersink just to remove a touch more material. Then get hot with the old punch and hammer! Outski!!! Done.

Repeat other arm.

Now the new tie rod will bolt right in!

Kodaks...

 

Looks like it is going to be a sweet ride.

 

My goodness this is coming together quickly. Excellent attention to detail, and I love the wheel/tire combo!

Keep up the good work. I want to see this thing finished.

 

And more steering... I need to contend with the drag link to make sure it's parallel to the frame and this will in turn help me to avoid bump steer. Well thanks to another super cool HAMB'er I was tipped off to SID's Dropped Axles and the drag link modification he does. I ordered one of his multi piece units for this as well that will allow me to center the steering wheel once I'm done. Very nice Guy with really nice stuff!

However the trick is that you need to reverse the taper in the steering arm.

TORCH TIME....

First we need something to make the taper. Well that comes from the old drag link. I busted out the hand held BandSaw and did a little slice and dice. Out comes the perfect thing to forge the new taper.

Next I wrapped my head around what I needed to do and set things up on the welding bench.

Then light the GAS WRENCH and heat it up. Not like a MAD MAN but ever so slowly. No Crackle on the metal. Just a good red hot.

Cross your fingers

Drop the pin in the hole and WAIL on it with the sledge until the taper goes all the way in. This took a few reheats as the taper is really big on this one. Much different than doing a set of Ford Spindles. Those always seemed to be done in one shot but this took me 3 heats.

So that's it for now, but once I grab a beer I will paint these and install everything tonight. That will pretty much wrap up the front end.

It's been a solid day....

Kodaks.

 

Note: The picture in the last post shows the Drag Link in the stock config. It's really running up hill and thats the bad part. I will show pics of the new unit here in a few hours after my round of Cocktails.

Cheers,

Robert M.

 

DUDE.... I can't believe this all got done today... Shit Howdy......

So here we go with the final installment for the day. The steering arms are all gucci'ed out and painted as well as the drag link and tie rod. Flipping the drag link around was just the ticket. It will be perfectly level with the frame once the weight gets on the front end. I need to put new zerk fittings in here and there as well as cotter pins in the various locations but otherwise all other bolts are torqued properly and ths part of the truck is put to bed!!!!!!

Time for drinks.

Cheers,

Robert M.

 

You sir are a maniac and an inspiration! You get more done in a weekend than I can manage in a month. Keep up the killer work!

 

just read the stuff about the draglink, very cool, never thought of heating the taper like that. Did you have to quinch the former in between heats? Enjoyable writeup style as well, very readable.

 

I use either Auto Trans Fluid or Marvell Mystery Oil to aid in cleaning the motor internals. It really acts as a lifting agent and helps get the shit out of the porous metal. Like on a cylinder bore the dirty stuff is actually trapped down it the hone scratches. The ATF will pluck it right outta there!

Hope that helps?

 

Yesterday was a barn burner for sure.... Today will be random shit. Probably nothing major? I need to wrap my head around the rear end and the mounting pads for the springs plus I'm still thinking about the routing of the brake lines. When I start to think the progress slows down.

We'll see.... It's early and the coffee is on.

 

No Quenching at all.... Just re heat for each time and then walk away once its finished to let it naturally cool. I'm pretty sure a quench would induce a crack. Either visible or worse off invisible. The drag link really was a slick process that I owe "Dave K" a big thanks for leading me to it. He followed this path on his '59 and had all thumbs up for the finished product.

And thanks for the good words on the write up! I'm happy to share my doings with you guys!

More news soon,

Robert M.

 

Thanks truck keeps looking better and better! I can't wait to see the finished product.

 

You are putting this together nicely! More updates on this build thread in a day than most of the other threads on the HAMB. Keep it up!!

 

So the first half of the day was spent on a little motor work like inspecting and installing the oil pump etc... Still waiting for my lifters... Hopefully they will show Monday or Tuesday.

The real kicker today was dealing with the rear end. I thought the pads that were on it were going to work but not the case. They were off by about 4 degrees and we all know thats too much! I could have put 4 degree shims in but....

So out comes the Gas Wrench and we torched em off!

Then lots of grinding and cleaning as I would like the thing too look nice! BTW, I hate grinding.... I also scabbed off the little tab that carried the brake line T. I will doctor this up and re-weld it on in the new proper location.

After it was cleaned and prepped I took a look at the new saddles. Well they are slightly crude and come with a hole about a 1/4" too big for proper location on the center bolt. So I took a few washers that looked close and then opened the hole just a touch too match. Assembled all this onto the spring and then jacked the rear end in place.

Time for Kodaks...

 

So just to be sure.... I tossed a block into the frame with the proper mounts... The tech line folks that sold me the Mono-Leafs were very casual about the pad angle on the rear end and said yeah stock is fine etc etc... Well they were right, as they should be but this didn't take too much time to do and I feel a shit load better now that its been checked.

Typical deal of which everyone knows... Match the angles and your good! But because this is a leaf spring deal I did set the pinion about 1 degree down from the motor to allow for a slight twist during normal running down the road. Checked and Checked and Checked.... Measured the side to side and then marked everything really good. I'm going to remove this to do my tacking as I cannot get the welder out to this point in the driveway. But I used dykem and scribed it good so I shouldn't have issue repeating what's here.

More news later on....

 

Fella's...

Well I kinda slowed down this afternoon and didn't get too much wrapped up but I did check the measurements about 500 more times and then buzzed the pads onto the housing. There was was some ultra nasty torch work done to the bottom side of the rear end when the first fella did whatever the hell he did... Needless to say he cut thru the God Damn housing and then tried to fill it with Brazing rod. Neat... So I tried to buzz it up with Silicon Bronze. I think I just about got 'er licked but I decided to quit and make a nice Pork Roast dinner. Drink some Chardonnay and Say "I'm Out" for the night. I'll be back on all 4's by Friday of this week.

What a BITCHIN weekend.... I'm super stoked my friends had fun down at Dragfest and that all the Dude's that participated in the Pasadena Deal had a killer time as well... It was a great HotRod'ish weekend.

Progress will slow this week but I will still knock a bunch of stuff out.

Best Regards,

Robert M.

 

Decision has been made on the wiring as well.... Old Harness comes out tonight! New Rebel Harness has been ordered and should go in sometime mid or late next week. I called a fellow HAMB'er "glenn33" and he set me up! I will be much more relaxed now with that system vs. trying to debug the old shit....

 

Well tonight licked ass... I started running brake lines. I really don't care for that activity. I started the first one running it along the front cross member and it was going so slick that I knew it was wrong.... Sure nuf... Fucked...

So then I thought the new route would be cool of going back towards the tranny cross member, i.e bell housing cross member, and connecting up on that side. Well that one was Kinda OK but when I made the final cut and re-flare on the end I broke my flaring tool and torqued the end of the tube... So thankfully brake tubing is cheap.

Start over tomorrow and see what we get.... Now I know what and where I want these to run.

Here's a pic of the new route...

 

That was one of the first things I did. Well worth it, the "stock" wiring (read: owner modified 40,1100 times over 50 years) was a death trap. It would catch on fire if you looked at it cross ways. I ended up using a stock type replacement harness. It took a while, but was super easy as it had all the connectors (didn't have to crimp anything), it was already cut to length and pre-routed, and already taped up. One of these days, I'll add a factory type fuse box. Since it was an optional accessory, mine didn't have one.

Keep up the good work!

 

Interesting thinking here - I like it! I occasionally have thought about this caster thing on mine too. I looked at my shop manual and from the factory they come with 1.5 degrees !! So there's definitely some room for improvement. I've driven some trucks with less than desirable caster and woo boy - hang on and be ready to react VERY quickly. I think this will affect over-all handling and get us a little closer to what we are use to today in our modern cars. Looks like you are on the right track given tire combo and over-all rake will affect this too. But it IS an old truck and that's part of having one! Good thread!

 

This is an awesome build thread, I am stoked with all of the detail you put into everything.

 

Ah, I didn't see the 1.5 degrees anywhere in my books... But that's good to know. I think that these shims will help a ton on the finished product.

Cheers,

Robert M.

 

Go man go!!!! Awsome job, great truck!! I can't wait to see it done!

 

Thanks a bunch Guys! Once I get over this brake line hurdle over the next day or so we should get to see good solid progress again. I just hate running brake lines but this is the stage I need to deal with them.

I went out for my morning visit with the truck today and starting eyeing the inside.... I will be crunched for time on this thing once I get to that point so I need to plan my moves in there really well. I will probably glean out the old harness tonight and maybe remove the seat. This way I can have a clear view of the entire inside of the truck... I find it much easier to nail a task when you have had several days to think about what you are really going to do. Then when the time comes to work on that phase you are just rock'n it out and get'n shit done vs. going 2 steps then stopping to think again...

Film at 11:00

~Robert

 

Great build cant wait to see it finished, probably not as much as you though

 

I love this build. Good pictures and detail. So how many days left do you have on your limit?

 

I think the 45 day deal looks more like 60 days total to me. More realistic ya know... I didn't plan on going to this level of work on this project but once you get roll'n????

I think the next few weeks look like this:

Now thru the 7th. Brake Lines, Finish Suspension items, bleed brakes, and get the truck back on all 4's.

May 8th thru 14th is Finish Motor and install into chassis. Prep and paint the cab floor and dash top, and kill the majority of wiring on the truck.

May 15th thru the 21st will be prepping and painting the inner fender wells then installing the front clip back on, installing the bed back on, Firing the Engine and breaking in.

May 22nd thru until the Reliability Run, will be running the final exhaust and debugging. Plus dicking around with little stuff like final paint polish and massaging the emblems before putting them back on..

May 29th drive to Hollister... Drink Beer....

May 31st, sell Toyota.... Drink Beer...

 

I just looked back for dates...

I exchanged money for it on the 26th of March But I didn't bring it home until April 1st.

So I think April 1 marks the first official day of the build.

Oh BOY!!!

 

man i'm kinda in the same spot as you, of course you are doing all of your painting and touchup on the frame first. I am just trying to get mine running and driving then I'll make it look nice. Great job so far. Looking forward to seeing the actual stance of the truck once you get it on the ground again. Are you blasting the cab at all? I know mine is rustastic so I will have to... will you post some cab shots soon? any major body work that you are planning on as far as upgrades?

 

I envy you. Finding a truck like that is this part of the country is dam near impossible. They are usually rust boxs. I parked beside a 55/56 Big window yesterday at lunch but guy wouldn't talk to me and the rust was everywhere. You are one lucky dude.