Projects New shop truck showed up this afternoon

Great project, jealous? ...Maybe a little.... Okay alot! Can't wait, get to work.

 

Cool project. Good move getting rid of that tandem too. Rockwell axles with gearsets numerically higher than about 6 to 1 have gears that tend to be a lot weaker than the ones with a lower ratio because they have to keep on reducing the number of pinion teeth and jacking up the number of ring gear teeth. The result is gears with a form that even looks weird to the eye if you're used to looking at heavy truck gearsets. We had a couple gas engine tandems with 7.14 Rockwell axles, and a ring and pinion was about $1700 20 yrs ago. When one of them goes, it'll take out enough other parts that you're looking at at least $2500 in parts for the best case, or, in the worst case, a broken piece passes between the ring and pinion and busts the pinion nose bearing casting of the housing and everything is junk. And no, later 3rd members don't swap into the old housings. Those axles were nostalgia you didin't need.

I couldn't tell from the pics what type of front wheels are on the truck, but a lot of the ones from that era were the type that comes apart at the center of the rim for mounting tires. If that's what it has, that type wheel is deadly dangerous and needs to be replaced with later wheels. For tube type tires, wheels with a side ring and lock ring are a lot safer. Or single piece wheels for tubeless tires, which will save you lots of flat tire headaches, would be another way to go. Most heavy tire shops won't mount a tire on one of the wheels that comes apart at the middle because of their reputation for blowing apart and killing someone during or after inflation. Overall, tubeless is the way to go since they're more trouble free and cheaper too due to the much smaller number of tube type truck tires produced today.

 

Dragged my nephew Chris out early this morning and we got the front axle we'll be using. This is off the same bus I got the rear from, so a low mileage piece that we should be able to hook up and go (although it will need some sectioning). This had leaf springs in the front, so I'll get the air ride suspension off the older bus (the flat nosed one above) and adapt to this axle and the truck....





With modern air brakes front and back the old F7 should stop on a dime.....

 

Cool Build!

 

this build is getting really interesting ,cant wait for some more of the story

 

awesome build and nice to see another HAMBer down in SoMD!

 

being a school bus mechanic currently I can only advise you to check everything to make sure its assembled correctly. You'd be suprised what we see on brand new busses everyday. I think it will work out great for your project just dont assume something is correct and then put it on the truck. just a heads up... negative energy spent that truck is pretty kick ass. i personally like the look of the tandems and it would be cool to work the ramp around tandems. what ever you have to do to keep the budget in check and make sure this project actually has a chance of being finished. I cant wait to see it with a equally as kick ass HAMB car on the flatbed. keep up the good work and good luck

 

Thanks for the comments.

One of the issues I'm facing, the front axle is too wide to fit, will need to be sectioned 16" to match the original F7 axle's width. I plan to cut 16 out of the top center, and 8" from both ends at the bottom. Chamfer the cuts, slide together, and weld it up. Any thoughts?

 

with out a heavy load it should be good

 

im with ^

as long as you dont throw a bunch of excess weight at it i'd say go for it

 

Cool!
Are you planning to move your entire shop all at one time?
lol