Sweet!!!! Andria is going to be gone this weekend but I have it off. I was planning on going to Detroit one of the days, if you're going to have a thrash what day are you planning on it? I have Fri-Sun off. Maybe I can get some of those old guys to tag along
I'm thinking Saturday. I'll get all of the brake stuff and make a pile. I want to swap the rotors, calipers, drums, etc. with new and run new lines. Anybody got a good line bender and a clue as to how to run them? We can pop the bed off quickly enough. On top of that, I need to get intake, exhaust, and valve cover gaskets to button up the block. I'll put a different post up as soon as I have a clue! Dan
Yeah, get a post up as soon as possible to let everyone know about it. I've got a tubing bender plus I still have all of Frank's brake bending/flaring equipment. I've got a set of cork valve cover gaskets hanging on the wall if your boy wants them I'll grab them.
Cool. Bring 'em. I'll put up a post and location. Need to determine the date. I'll try that today. Got the ignition switch you sent so I'll get moving on that as well. Great on the tubing flaring and stuff. Tell me what I need to buy and I'll get it coming quickly.
Great response so far. I'll plan to get rolling at about 8 am with Von Rigg Fink. We'll pull the front sheet metal and the bed off so it is easier to get to the frame rails. I'm calling Ann Arbor Drive Shaft today about getting the DS shortened. Sounds like they do good, quick work (didn't say cheap, now did I?) I've got some of the brake parts in the truckster so I'll stop and pick up calipers, pads, and rotors for the front. I've got to see if I've still got some decent dust shields because what I have isn't even solid enough to be called swiss cheese. Rears are another story. I've got to get backing plates and drums and all the rest!
Spent last night measuring up a few things. Driveshaft will be done tomorrow by Ann Arbor Drive Shaft and we've made the running board mounts. Hope to get them drilled and mounted to the frame so we can have them on as well. Sitting at 7 1/2" to the rear of the front fender with the engine and trans. Shouldn't go too much further down! I now work for my company's jack division so I have a few scissors jacks as test samples. They work well for mounting stuff and adjusting heigths as you can see!
Thanks to all that made it out to the thrash today. It was fun. I took a few pictures but not many. Made a difference on the truck, sorry I wasn't better prepared with all of the parts. I'll do better next time!!
Thanks to Lucky77, Von Rigg Fink, Dan Boehm, Courtland, Enjenjo, Eli, Hippie6! Got the rear end swapped, disc brakes swapped in the front, brake lines all run, P/S set up mocked up, and the intake figured out. Still a ways to go for the first fire but we'll do it again next month if we have to!! Dan checking for a heart beat. The rest of the medical team purses their lips in anticipation of a verdict!
OK, I'll fix the sizes later. They are a bit large but I was slamming them up at lunch and well, that's what I got...
I wondered how things went. Glad to hear you got some things marked off the list. Don't you use photobucket? It is the solution. No more resizing, it does all the work for you!
Better sizes now! I’ll start off saying I need to take more pictures. Just got busy and forgot. The day started with me driving down to Toledo to pick up chips, buns, snacks, and pop for the thrash feast. I made it to the burb of Sylvania, through Kroger for $44, and home in about 35 minutes. Not bad for a 12 mile drive and it is amazing how few people are in the grocery at 7 am on a Sunday. I called Von Rigg Fink (Randy) on the way out and he met me at my place at 8 am. He followed me down to Grandma Shirley’s place and we commenced to working. A little over a week ago, the truck looked like this:
Now we just needed to get the rear end swapped out so we used the hoist to pick up the rear of the frame. And then we had the man of the hour start breaking loose the U bolts.
Notice the 'cheater slicks!' They are for Cheating Death! They were on a '53 Chevy I bought from DirtyT and sold to Punkabilly1306! Power steering car that no one ever had the front end aligned on. Before getting too high off the ground, we had him get the lug nuts loose, too! We figured it would be better to put the wheels on the new axle and roll it into place so we picked up the old rear and set it on the frame to get it out of the way. Randy supervised as long as he could and then jumped in to get the other side put back together.
Just after we got the rear bolted to the springs Hippie6 (Brad) came in with donuts and work ceased. After we got our fill of grease we got back into the grease by connecting springs to the rear end. Note to self, learn to measure bolts BEFORE you buy them. I get to do this again with 1” SHORTER bolts this week. Enjenjo (Frank), Lucky77 (Scott), Dan Boehm (Dan Boehm), and Eli (Court’s little brother) came in over the next little while all with parts and tools. Dan and Scott worked frantically to get the stupid ABS controller off of the brake bracket. Who makes the decision to put steel bolts into aluminum blocks when they are a service item anyway? Enjenjo ran all of the brake lines in the rear and then came up front where Courtland and Hippie were giving the rotors and calipers a swap of their own. Court learned the fantastic truth in having the right tools for the job from Brad who is a ASE Certified Maniac and brought his Racecort wagon loaded with stuff like thread chasers (get a set!) and grease packers.
While Scott, Eli, and I ran a parts run to 2 NAPA stores (don’t ya just love those ‘hard to find parts’ that they stock, er… to get simple things like brake lines and new hose holder nuts (those stupid stamped steel ones that neither NAPA store stocked) there was some kind of educational experience between the guys. I walked in on Frank teaching Courtland about girls and that his first car should be a windowless F350 dually van and something about candy and following school busses. After Court finished up the last caliper it was explained that he wasn’t getting the brake lines tight enough because he didn’t have his pinky fingy out. Hence, the new pose that I get to see EVERY TIME Court or Eli look at me and uproarious giggling.
The truck didn’t fire this weekend but with the guys’ help and the parts left behind and the shopping list I have, it won’t be long! Wasn’t long ago…
It was great to meet all the HAMBers that came. Looks like that garage warmed up a bit more later in the day. Dam it was cold when we started at 8 am. Hippie6 came along with that propane heater and life started to improve. Wish I could have stayed past noon, but thats life. There will be other days Dan. Let me know if theres anything more i can do for you and Court.
I will. Thanks for your help. Yeah, I forgot to mention that Mr Heater or whatever that was that Hippie brought. All of the sudden the lights came on! All but one but we figured out that when we moved the hoist, we hit it and unplugged it from the ceiling box! Actually got warm enough around 3 that they shut it off. Snow melted and the sun came out. Dang Michigan spring. Snow, mud, snow, mud, snow, mud, flowers, mud.
no doubt mud mud and more mud, Hell when Court and i went to get those U joint strap bolts out of they rear diff. you had, and your torch set at your Farm I think i gained 50 pounds of mud on my boots. or was that goat shit?
Easy way to tell, turn you heater up on your truck as you drive home. If it starts to smell like a Porta John, you've hit the jack POT!
I'm going to run up to Howard's in Dundee to measure the cross member and area of the rear frame on that Blazer for the gas tank and get the intake stuff from enjenjo. I might be gone next week and the first weekend in May but I want this to run so bad I can taste it. I think it will happen again around the 24th or so of May if anyone is interested. I want it plated and driving by Memorial Day! Then we do your A!
Court and I went down this evening and swapped his rims over to the Keystones from DirtyT and the super WWW from Fat Hack via Von Rigg Fink (thanks again Randy). Hippie got them mounted up together as a decent set of rollers. They are L78-15 so they are much taller than the previous G78s but what the heck. Anyway, we did that and we bled the brakes. They did OK and we'll do it again when we get the truckster home tomorrow afternoon. Going to score some spacers I found on Craigslist in Toledo to move the wheels out a bit (2") so the tires clear everything. Measured the rear of the frame to run to DT&T (again) and see about the Blazer gas tank and cross member. Enjenjo says he can hook us up with a schematic to use the electric pump so we'll be checking in with him before the weekend is over.
Well, she's getting there! Picked up the spacers. 2" was perfect with the Keystones in the rear. Haven't put them on the front, yet. Got the engine/trans moved forward 1". Still got to mock up the radiator. Went to Dundee Truck & Trim and they'd scrapped the frame I wanted but they have more, got to wait for the weekend to get to one but I'm going to beg for a loaner tank to do some trial work on. Top of frame is 24" from the ground with these rims and tires. The older neighbors (he turned 81 yesterday) love the WWW. 'I haven't seen those in 30 years!' 1 running board mounted, 1 to go! I am loving this stuff!!
I'm sitting here at work, dreaming of being home with my boys and working on this truck. I posted the pictures and noticed that over 3900 views on here. I'll assume, I'm 200 of those so that means over 3700 hits to see my kid's truck. So, on top of those that have donated time, parts, and support, I just wanted to add my thanks to those that have checked these pages out. If Billetproof doesn't like the rims, the '50 Olds caps we have will go right on. They aren't as rusty. Now I've got to get glass and GOOD tires. These are pretty dry rotted!
The Jalopy Journal
