Technical 32 Model B pickup - Need Help

I also agree with going back to drums. Either 40-48 Ford, 48-56 F1/F100, or some of the new reproduction Lincoln's. Fixing the plumbing should also help the brakes. Keep at it!

 

I like 16 inch bent spoke Kelsey wheels or stock wire wheels. This would eliminate 48-56 F1/F100 from this list of possible choices.

Charlie Stephens

 

Where to start? If I were in your shoes I would start with the brakes and steering so your friend can drive the car. If you have any 1940-48 brakes around (I prefer the 1946-48) I would use them. I would also use the ’39-’48 master cylinder but I am sure that many people will insist that you need a dual master cylinder. If you don’t have anything check out the price on the Lincoln brakes from MT Car Products (mtcarproducts.com). Richard Lacy is a good source of information on the MT Car Products hardware and a dealer for them. Are you lucky enough that the shop did a good job with the master cylinder mount (how about some pictures?)? I would go back to the original wishbone, axle and spindles. Do you still have the ’32 rear end and what brakes are on it? Have your friend drive another ’32 with good steering (or maybe the truck after the brakes have been fixed) and see if he can accept it, if not go to an early fifties type truck steering. With grease coming out the bottom of your steering box I am sure it is ready for a rebuild. Did you ever find out what the shop did with the steering? I think I would get rid of the disc wheels and go back to either the stock wire wheels or bent spoke Kelsey wire wheels (note you need adapters to use wire wheels with ’40-’48 Ford or early Lincoln brakes). I think they look better and would probably improve the steering. Once the car is running I am sure other things will come up. It may turn out that the stock Model B engine is enough for your friend but we can face that problem later. By all means plan what you are going to do and post your plan for comments.


Charlie Stephens

 

Ok. Thanks. I have a lot to talk about with him today. Going to start with the brakes first and then move into steering. I dont want to overwhelm him too much. I will keep the forum posted as to what we are planning to do.

 

Here are a few pics I took earlier of the brakes. Will try to get better ones later. Hope you can see them.

 

Wtf is that?

I see two pics of masters with less piping, nice!

But what is the last pic of?

 

Looking at this last group of pictures, I would take a very hard look at everything that shop did. Sloppy looking work indicates lack of pride in what they do, and that brake setup looks like someone with little to no prior knowledge. A " can do" attitude is great, only if it involves a willingness to get the right info before wrecking a guys 32 and risking his life.


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That last pic is of the break pedal where he welded a "stick" on the end to engage the brake light switch. Not real happy with that. It will be changing you can be sure. That is another item down the road. it works for now but drives me nuts.

 

It is hard to tell for sure from the pictures and maybe this is all a fabrication in my mind but my guess is that the last picture is a '39 pedal assembly. Some or all of the leg of the K member has been removed (I hope it is still around somewhere) and the master cylinder is mounted against the K member. I will keep this picture in case I ever need to show someone an example of a "bird shit weld" (sometimes it is difficult to describe one and this picture is sure worth a thousand words). There should be the end of the clutch rod showing in the hole, wonder what is wrong there? I am afraid that the master cylinder mount is another "throw it away and start over". People always talk about how dangerous mechanical brakes are, I would definitely trust my life to mechanical brakes before trusting them to this mess. I wonder how these guys stay in business (are they an actual business or do they just work out of their back yard) and if they have killed or injured anyone yet?

Charlie Stephens

 

I'm with you there Charlie Stephens, that look like big bird took a dump on a welding, when still hot! That is a textbook horror show. I'm happy for man kind it ain't the brake pedal that is welded that bad! But the sits assemble welded to the brake pedal.

Tottaly agree on the redo in plan!

Because not only is that a weird photo, even look upside down, or taken from ground up, but something is "welded" to the aseembly, that is looking like a tie rod end from a mid sixty GDR-build IFA dump truck.

Got any pics of that reversed handbrake locking up front wheels up?

 

Whats the deal lately with these...."Shops".... unable to do basic and I do mean basic brake and chassis work??
Taking gobs of money and using unnecessary and overly complicated components...Yes ....actually fixing stuff...NO.
It's almost like a racket.

 

If the original center crossmember or "k member" has not been too heavily modified, Industrial Chassis in Phoenix makes and sells a complete pedal assembly for juice brakes. This bolts into the original holes in the crossmember and provides the correct ratio for master cylinder operation. The kit includes both pedals, bracket for master cal. etc. and is reasonably priced. If you have the original pedals MEC makes two styles of bolt on master cyl. kits.

 

I used google to find Industrial Chassis. Their unit looks good. I am familiar with MEC but checked google to see if it could be found. Nothing showed up. For those looking for MEC you can find them at (330) 644-3450, modelengineeringco.com. MEC is a good little company for '32 Fords that doesn't advertise much.

Charlie Stephens

 

Off topic, but what's up with the fence ? That looks wheelie solid. Nice truck.

 

Ok everyone sorry for not posting in a while. I travel alot for my job so posting can be difficult.

I have to keep reminding myself that my friend is a tinkerer at heart and wants to explore every option he can before settling on the final outcome. Since it is his truck and money I am letting him tinker unless it is a major safety issue. He likes to try things people think cant be done even if he knows there is a strong chance it wont work. He has proven me wrong on so many occasions so i have learned there is nothing he cant try and fix.

Here is what we have found out.
Brakes: he wants to try to make the disc brakes work if possible. He wants to try that before going to the early drums. He did tell me that he had 46 ford drums on the front that went with the rear drums on there now. He had the shop trade them off for some other parts he needed. Wish I would have been involved in the beginning. We would still have those brakes on the truck. We are going to remove the line connecting the front and rear reservoirs to see what that does to the brakes. The parking brake situation is still a mystery that we will be working on at the same time.

There was no k brace in the truck when he bought it so it must have been removed prior to 1961 when he purchased it. He is willing to entertain getting a repro if it is needed. Looking to the forum for direction on this.

He is wants to put the original wheels back on with new tires. We know we will have some hub issues that we will be working out. Such as disc clearance with the hub, bolt pattern with new hub etc. Will be looking closer at this after the brakes are sorted out.

Steering is last on the list to tackle. (Even though everything is interrelated). Thanks to the technical bulletin Charles pointed to in another thread on the earlyford forum, we discovered that the original steering box was a B-3503-B which could be used on frames with or without the elongated mounted holes in the frame. Our frame does not have the elongated holes. The box from ezsteer used the B-3503-A steering box which requires the elongated holes in the frame. Apparently this helped compensate for a slightly different steering angle between the commercial and passenger cars so they could mfr one box for both. They forced the ezsteer box into the original holes without elongating them. I believe this is causing some additional binding in the steering along with the tires and scrub steer, making it nearly impossible to steer. We have the original box we are going to put back in to see what difference it makes just to test out my theroy. Wont cost us anything but time.

That is all at the moment. I am currently out of town on vacation and will get back to the truck next week.

 

Ok I feel real stupid. The k brace is there but possibly has been modified. I was thinking of a completly different framing member. Sorry. i am still learning about the truck.

 

Remember that you need to use adapters to run the wire wheels on the '46 drums. You can bolt the wire wheels onto the drums and they will appear to work but there is not enough support and they will eventually crack. See http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/40-ford-wheels-on-a-model-a.750368/#post-8330045
for what I am talking about. You will also have to address this two level mounting situation for your front rotors.

I think I am beginning to understand your steering box. You mean that you have an original box that was rebuilt by the EZ Steer company and not that you had a box that was manufactured completely by EZ Steer, big difference? Going back to your steering box shown in post 27, that grease should not be coming out the bottom of the box. First they probably left a part out at the bottom of the box but it is easy to add without taking very much apart. Second, the box should be lubricated with gear lubricant per Ford (the same as used in the transmission and rear end). I have heard that the grease will push away from the gears causing them to run dry and wear (fix it soon). My guess is that they left the part out and when it leaked (assuming they put the gear lubricant in first) they just filled it with grease so it would stop leaking.

Although it was mentioned before you might read the following build thread: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/1932-pickup-rebuild-thread.970252/ Pay particular attention to the brakes. The family, whose family business was antique Fords, ran the truck with the B engine and '46-'48 brakes for years and then went to the reproduction Lincoln brakes from MT products when they upgraded the truck. I think your friend would be better off driving and enjoying the truck and stop worrying about disc brakes but it is definitely his decision.

Charlie Stephens

 

You are correct on the steering box issue. They purchased a rebuilt box from him. Still have issues with it.

 

You may get lucky on the steering. Assuming it was properly rebuilt and not damaged during the current installation you should be able to slot the holes in the frame as shown in the November 1932 Service Bulletin from Ford. You may be able to accomplish this without removing the steering completely from the truck but I am not sure. The problem of the grease coming out the end could probably be solved by replacing/adding the tube and plate using the one from your other steering box. An illustration on this part may be found at http://www.brattons.com/prodtype.as...ageHistory=cat&strKeywords=&strSearchCriteria= part number 05280. Note that the illustration is an equivalent Model A part and may not work in the ’32. Remember that the steering box is designed to use gear lube and not grease. Of course the problems due to the oversize tires, wrong rims and steering geometry will still need to be addressed but this would be a first step.


Charlie Stephens

 

yea what he said ! kingpins!!!!

 

Well I think the brake issue is temporarily fixed until get some new brake line. I crimped the line between the two T fittings just to see if that did anything. Well it worked. The front and rear brakes operate completely independently from one another now. The e brake actually seems a bit stiffer to pull back and it locks up the rear pretty well. Havent taken it for a drive yet. I want to get the lines redone and the steering worked out.l before that happens.

The front brakes still seemed to drag a bit when I spun the wheel. After accidentally catching my sleeve on the brake pedal inside the cab I noticed the pedulal came up another 1/4 inch or so. Sure enough the wheels were now free wheeling. Upon closer inspection of the wood floor the pedal was rubbing on the floor and not releasing all of the way. So i broke out a trusty wood rasp and carefully whittled away at the area it was rubbing on. Now it has completely free motion for the full length of travel. Wow what a nightmare. But no matter what i have to do to it I am still falling in love with the truck even if it is not mine. I Love working on it.

Will post pics when i get home.

 

Man I hate to type on my phone. Sorry for so many spelling issues.

 

Those trucks are easy to like

 

OK here are some of the photos. Sorry for the quality.

Here is the temporarily crimped line. This will completely come out when I get some new brake line and fittings.
Here is the pedal assembly that has been hacked to pieces. This was while I was whittling away at the wood floor for clearance of the brake pedal.

Another shot from inside the truck.

Not sure I like this setup at all but it works for now.

Here is a pic of the disc brake setup. Will get into that later.

This forum has helped me understand this truck better as I get into fixing the problems someone else created. The knowledge on here is fantastic. Thank you for trying to keep me on track with getting this truck safely back on the road.

 

Really glad you are getting some of the gremlins out, and the more you do, the happier I am that your friend isn't on the road trying to drive it as it was. Seeing your pics of the details, like the one showing the scrap steel off cuts around the rubber, continues to shake my head at the "workmanship" of that shop. The fact that they could look at a guy and give an invoice for that kind of quality is astonishing to me.


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I'm not getting my bearings, so maybe you can straighten something out for me. What is the length of the long side of that brake pedal? From the pivot shaft to the pad. I mean the actual length, not the length of the two portion with the bend in the middle. In your photos it looks really short, but maybe it's just that glob of weld on there that's making it look weird.

 

Hello HAMB forum. I am back.

My apologies for the long absence. My friend had a medical emergency that really scared us all, so the truck sat on the back burner for a while. Thought we were going to lose him for a while there. I feared if we did lose him, the the truck would end up never getting done. But God had other plans so we are back in business.

Now that he is out of the hospital and still somewhat recovering, he and I sat down and made a plan on what he wants to happen with the truck. So here is what we are doing to get the truck safely back on the road.

1. We went ahead and rebuilt the original steering box and installed it back in the truck. We used the thread from Dennis on his rebuild for this. Following his instructions made the rebuild so simple and it works so much better. THANK YOU DENNIS!!
2. Remove the front discs and install new drums. Using Dennis' thread again I think I am ready to tackle this. Charlie mentioned MTcarproducts a while back for the Lincoln drum brakes and I think this the way we want to go. I am just not sure about all of the parts I need to buy so I am looking to you all for help.
3. Redo the brake lines from the front drums all of the way back to the master cylinder.
4. The original wheels are in remarkably good shape. We are going to go back to them with new rubber all of the way around. I am trying to talk him into having them media blasted and repainted black. He thinks they are in good enough shape we should be able to prime paint them as is. I don't think they are if we want a lasting finish. Not sure where to find new tires for this application. Will need to look at that while doing the brakes.

So to start with the brakes I removed the disc brakes, calipers, mounting hardware, etc. Then I took a picture of the existing spindle. My question here is, I am assuming the black ring on the spindle is the rear bearing race for the disc brakes. Is there an easy way to get this off if you do not have a puller that will fit? The one I have is about an inch too short. I am assuming that it needs to come off to install the backing plates. Any suggestions?

?

 

Awesome! Glad your friend's OK.
Sounds like the truck is on the right track now

Glad to see an update!

 

That is an adaptor sleeve for the disc brakes. That looks like an F100 spindle.

Get some 32-34 original spindles! Then put on the proper drum brakes.

Or cut the spacer off and get some 48 F100 brakes.

 

I agree with the get some original spindles idea. If you decide on the early Ford brakes there is a kit for about $25 that will adapt them to the original spindles. Be sure to get a quality kit, there is some real junk out there. MT Products probably sells them. If you go with the MT Products brakes I believe they have a backing plate designed for the original spindles and I assume they sell a spacer to put the bearing in the correct location. Call MT Products and tell them what you are doing and they will know what you need. Be sure to tell them you are running original spindles (they take a slightly different backing plate). I think you will have a major fit problem with the F100 brakes and the original wire wheel. I am glad to hear you fiend is on the downhill side of the medical issues.

Charlie Stephens