Seeing as the sedan has spent some time on the Bonneville Salt Flats.....how much salt did you find in the hidden corners of the body and chassis? They say the only way to get rid of the Bonneville salt is to take a car completely apart. Just wondering if that was true. I like the way you are detailing this neat old hot rod!
Thanks for the kind words, I really appriciate your feedback! There was quite some salt caught in the space between the tank and the rear floor, there was no way the salt water could have drained out and this area was the most rusted one. The floorboards had rust scaling on them in that place, everywhere else there was just a little surface rust. Fabian did a very good job sealing all the little gaps where the floor tubing attaches to the sheetmetal with plastic sealant. I removed all of it, flushed all the gaps with a pressure washer and after it had dried off I flushed it again with a rust converter called Fertan. A few of the tubes in the floor had to be replaced. Surprisingly the frame and rockers were very solid and only rusty on the surface, if at all. I replaced the outer rockers because of a couple of bullet holes and some thin spots... new rockers were like 129$ a pair from Macs, so I thought , while I´m at it I can just change them instead of patching the old ones and ending up with more work and less quality. The frame itself didn´t have any thin spots and there is no sign that salty water has been trapped inside the frame, just bare metal inside. I will probably spray the inside of the rockers and the frame with cavity wax before final assembly.... I just don´t want to worry about rust when I hit some rain, which can happen over here from time to time... I think , if a car has good paint and a sealed floor , lots of drain holes, an occasional trip to the salt will not be too bad.Salt does bad thing to bare metal, I would at least put it on a lift after being on the salt, and give it a very good wash with a pressure washer from underneath. We have not salt flats around here, so I won´t run into this issue on a daily basis, hahahahahaha
The old Bonneville trick to remove salt is to park your car over a sprinkler for a few days. It surprisingly does a great job.
Friend of mine ran a '27 roadster on the salt in the '70s, used to roll it over the sprinklers when he got home. He'd leave it there for 2-3 hours, flushing it. I razzed him about the water bath..."Think that'll make it grow into a '29?" He laughed, but not loud... Baumi...Your English is quite perceptible, it's like reading some of our more 'literate' guys' posts here! The pics, the operations, the tools; It's just like you're doing this in Austin, L.A., or like our buds in Pennsylvania. Amazing.
You have to make a decision regarding driving your hot rod on the Salt. Do it and you have joined an elite group and will have done something that will stick in your mind forever. Don't do it and preserve your ride. Driving on the Salt is different year over year. Sometimes it is somewhat dry, other years there are literally lakes you have to drive through. This will affect your experience regarding rust. I drove my 55 F100 on the salt in 98. We used the "quarter" car wash to do the best job we could and then got underneath it when we got home. The truck is still rust free. Drove my 29 coupster through the "lake" at the end of the road in 2006(?). When we disassembled it for a redo, there was salt everywhere, including between the spring leafs. The West Wendover High School has a car washing service in one of the casino parking lots. They do a very good job, but you still have to check when you get home. Inspection is crucial. I will not challenge those who have success using a lawn sprinkler for hours under their car. I do wonder if a sprinkler hitting the same spots over and over is effective if areas are missed by the spray. You have to look and see.
Mike, thanks for the compliment! I had to google what `perceptible` means, and I finally got it, hahahaha I wish I was wrenching somewhere in the US, it would be great to hang out with you folks in person more often, not only on the web. The sprinkler-under -the -car- method probably works great, as the water dillutes the salt and finally washes its out of all the tight spots... Anyway, I ´ll try to keep the 34 out of alty conditions in the future.... hahaha
Yes it is! I knew there was a photoshop like that, but the train and car were going in the other direction and the plane was missing.... thanks for sharing! This is the one I was aware of! Very cool!
Well, it ´s time for another update.This means a lot to me because I wasn´t able to work on the 34 for quite a while now. I had to face that I´m getting old. I fell of a skateboard, which is not a big thing usually, I have been doing that since I was a kid, but now that I´m getting 40, falling hurts more than some years ago... I broke my shoulder and had a surgery 4 weeks ago. So today I was able to finish the frame , give it one more coat of epoxy and hopefully it will be painted in one or two days, depends on long I can sand at a time tomorrow. One little step ahead after weeks of waiting...
Nice work. Hope you heal up quick. I never got into skating but I was big into freestyle bmx bikes in the 80's. I found out myself that you don't heal as fast now. Dropping in on a 15' half pipe is scary at 43, lol. Now I just collect them and ride around with my kids.
Hahaha, good idea! I 'm glad I can move enough now to get some stuff done,it´s obviously better for our health to leave the stunts to the younger crowd.
After a couple coats of epoxy primer , a lot of sanding, even more coats of paint , and even more wet sanding and a final coat of paint, the frame was finally nice enough for my "shade tree mechanic eye" to call it a day and start assembling. Everything looks better with a little chrome on it, so I started with the frontend.All it needed was a good cleaning, I washed the tie rod ends in solvent , put in some fresh grease and gave them a shot of clear coat and fresh dust boots. There´s something about assembling the first fresh painted parts, from now on it´s going uphill. I also started to assemble the rearend, got it painted and hop to get it in the frame tonight... maybe I´ll have a rolling chassis today.
The rearend is about ready to go in aswell... Just need to wait for a helping hand to lower the frame on the axle. That would be too heavy for my shoulder.
What are you guys using for leaf spring wrap? Cotton? I have put some grease between the individual leafes for a hopefully smooth operation. I´d like to keep dirt and moisture out.
I have used friction tape before. I think the rolling bones crew uses electrical tape. At least that is what it looks like.
I also had this query be discussed recently. I wanted the vintage wrap look. I've been told Gaffers tape. I had thought it was just some sort of old school cloth electricians tape.
Ok,thanks! I will go shopping tomorrow and see what kind of tape I can come up with... I always thought the wrappin was some kind of cloth based tape. Gaffer´s tape around here is more plastic based like duct tape. A little progress, got the rearend in today...that´s all I got done tonight because my buddy called and asked what I would do if I had a binding wrist pin...don´t know either, but it was worth discussing for a while before I decided it´s better to ask the fellow HAMBers
Today I started to check the mechanicals. The Y- block was supposed to be rebuilt not to long ago, which I think is correct. It has very good oil pressure , goes like stink, has no noises of any kind and everything is nice and clean, oil looks like honey and the spark plugs are all equally clean. It´ll just get a new paintjob and new gaskets. The transmission was a different story , the internal hard parts are pretty good aswell. The synchros needed to be replaced. The 1-2 shift and 2-3-shift had a lot of music. The clutch linkage wasn´t adjusted right when I got the car and the clutch wouldn´t open completely.So I ordered a rebuild kit with all the shims , bearings, synchros and springs and I was very afraid to mix something up because this was my first manual trans rebuild. But the rebuild was pretty much straight forward and the shifts are playless,nice and smooth.
´nother little update: Got the transmission buttoned up a few weeks ago and so it was time to tear into the engine. All clearences were in spec ( crank was already .010 under) but some of the bearings had some copper shining through, so it was a good time to replace all of them. The bores were in spec ( .030 over) and ridgeless, I just broke the glance with a slight hone and replaced the rings. I was doubting the quality of the now availible replacement bearings which are probably made in China or so--- so I found a set of NORS TRW main and rod bearings on ebay here in Europe for 50 bucks! What a steal and the bearings were perfect! I was glad to see "made in USA" on the new sealed power timing chain and piston rings! The NOS steel shim head gaskets came from Wisconsin I think. I was glad I found them, I don´really want to loose any compression to the thick multi layer head gaskets. There was a lot of gunk in the water jackets, after all I´m glad I pulled the trigger and opened the engine although it ran like a champ. But it´s always easier to see what´s going on while it is already out of the car instead of overheating and loosing oil pressure on the first hot day next year... I think all the parts to rebuild the engine and trans were less than 500 Euros including shipping , so that is cheap insurance. Right now I´m at car shows almost every weekend, so it ´ll take another few weeks until I have the time to finish the engine . The cam, crank, pistons are back in now ande the rest will follow when I find the time.And then it is time get the body ready for paint. But car show season is coming to an end faster than we think and there will be plenty of time to get things done...I hope to be driving this baby by spring...
Another few update pics. The engine is almost back togetheragain and chassis is rolling . I´m gonna start plumbing the brakes as soon as I get the new wheel cylinders through the customs.I also spent some time cleaning and reorganizing the shop... Last weekend I got a deal on 3 complete 327s and 5 TH400s plus a ton of small stuff, so it was time to re-arrange a few things...I love 283s and 327s, and whenever I come across a deal I can´t say no... I think a have six 327s and five 283s sitting in the shop right now... Oh, and one nice 283 in the living room, hahaha... maybe I have a problem there... So that´s all for now.
Gonzo, that must be a Mass. thing with the 34 Sedans. Last October we were visting a friend in Carver,MA who has one too, maybe you even know him.
That's Jay Arrow. Dudes been buying and selling cars and parts around here for years! In fact that's where the carcas of my 3 window came from.
Pete, that's right! That is him on Savery Ave in Carver. The first split lane highway in the US.Jay has been driving and building 34s for most of his life. We had lots of fun with him and great bench racing sessions every night. We went down to Wildwood for TROG and asked him to join us. He didn't like the idea of racing old Fords on the salty beaches as he had spent most of his life fixing rust on them, hahahaaaaa
The Jalopy Journal
