I stumbled upon some good advice while perusing the Binder Planet this afternoon: an inexpensive alternative to Dynamat, called Peel & Seal. The commenter claims it’s only about $20 at the Home Depot. I’ll have to pick some of this up next time I’m there.
I got a little window of time this afternoon between the blizzard and Finn’s nap to pick up a pair of metal shears. While she was down, I hurried to the basement and trimmed one side of the steel I’d bought, then laid it flat on the edge of my workbench. I bought a length of predrilled strap in order to make a hard edge to bend on. The object was adding a bend at the top 1/2″.
Once I’d bent the top to my satisfaction (I don’t have a metal brake, but a block of wood and a hammer work pretty well) I measured and drilled a pair of holes for the top mounting bolts. I’ve got a spare radiator that I dragged into the basement for test fitting:
Next, I drilled a series of holes to make a long adjustable vertical channel for the shroud and set that in place to test out the height. It turns out there’s a total of 3″ of lift on this truck based on the shroud mounting.
Then I assembled the whole thing to see how it all fit together. I used hex bolts with two flat washers on each side, as well as a lock washer to hold the entire thing in place. Outside on the Scout, it turned out that I was about a quarter-inch two low, so the top of the fanblades were hitting the fiberglas. I brought it back inside, extended the channels upwards, filed everything down, and did another test fit: perfect.
The steel extended down below the open area of the shroud, so I measured an area and cut out a section to allow for maximum airflow.
And once I’d tested it out on the Scout, I pulled everything back off so that I can prime and paint the steel this evening. Tomorrow, hopefully, I can get the bottom mounts made quickly and have the entire thing put back together. Then I’ve got to see if she’ll start. It sure would be nice to have her back on the road.
So our local friend K. is selling off his stash of parts and moving northward, sadly diminishing our local ranks. Two Bs drove north from Columbia to my doorstep with the intention of forming a posse to pick over the goods; while we waited for a return call, we (well, mostly they) tore the water pipe down off of my rig and cleaned it up in preparation for a new thermostat. The gaskets were pretty toasted, so we cleaned them off with a razor blade and ran out to get some RTV. At the parts counter we got a call from K, who told us to stop on over.
He’s got quite a stash in his basement to pick over, but I showed good judgement and only walked away with two parts I need and one I couldn’t pass up. The first are a set of bucket seat bases in much better shape than the ones salvaged from Chewbacca. My plan is to sand, clean, and paint them up, refurbish the tracks, and remount the original green seats (I’ve got those too) to replace the hillbilly buckets that are mounted right now.
The third item is worth celebrating: when I got the truck, it sported a hideous aftermarket dashpad abomination that came out two weeks after we got it running. Because the metal of the dash is painted purple, the green stock replacement I put in looks, shall we say, odd, especially when paired with the red windshield frame and yellow hood. K. sold me a pristine black dashpad for a song, and it will be installed as soon as the weather warms up.
Back in the garage, the new thermostat went in quickly and without a fuss; we even got the upper hose reinstalled with two shiny new hose clamps. Next up is the fan shroud issue; we didn’t have time to tackle it this weekend.
I got a couple of small packages in the mail this week, one of which contains an OEM Robertshaw 180° thermostat and gasket. Along with some other small chores, my aim is to get it installed on Saturday and try to get the fan shroud mounted in order to run up the engine and test out the cooling system. The thermostat should be a quick job, but the fan shroud is still problematic for a guy who doesn’t have access to a metal shop. I’m going to have to buy some materials at the Home Depot and hope I can make them work.
My local friend Karl is selling his Scout in preparation for a move north into Pennsylvania, so I’m also stopping over to pick through his stash and see if there’s anything I’m interested in besides two clean seat bases—which will replace the ones I currently have installed. The plan is to clean these up, mount the old seats from Chewbacca, and replace the strange aftermarket seats it came with.
And a good song too. Trippy video. Wait until about 2:16.
I ordered a new 180° thermostat and 7 lb. radiator cap from Super Scout Specialists this afternoon, in the hopes that I can get a day over 40° to install it. Then the fan shroud, and then we cross our fingers to see if she stays cool.
This is only peripherally related to my engine (I have a different carb setup) but the writeup is good so far: This gentleman is swapping a Holley 2100 for a new 2300 350CFM unit, which is the one I’d like to eventually have on my Scout.
Here’s a great article on a heater box rebuild from the Binder Planet.
Santa was very, very good to me this year: He sent me a brand-new Tuffy console for the Scout to replace the odd metal/wood stock unit that doesn’t lock. Once I get this installed, I’ll have someplace safe and secure to lock down tools, radio, and other important gear.
The excellent Mr. Clean and Brian H. stopped in this Sunday, despite two inches of snow, to help motivate me enough to tear down the coolant system on Peer Pressure and see what’s what. One of the things holding me back has been my inexperience with this particular section of the engine, and my fear that I’d get it pulled apart without knowing how to get it back together again.
With three sets of hands, we made short work of the pulleys and hoses, and had the water pump separated from the engine within an hour. What we found was confounding: there was no gasket on it at all—just a hint of RTV. The impellers were still shiny gold. Could this be the reason for the intermittent leaks?
The consensus was that if it’s not the water pump gasket, the next thing to check will be the thermostat, which means tearing down the top coolant hose and outlet. New thermostats are inexpensive, so that’s not as daunting a job as the water pump is.
While we had the fan off, we figured we’d put the fan shroud on in order to get it ready for fabricating a new mount, which went well. We pulled the clutch portion of the fan off, after remounting the pump, and carefully eased everything back in place. I think that a few carefully cut sections of steel will tie things up perfectly.
So, while she’s not ready for the road, she’s closer than before. Thanks guys!
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