Author: bill

Weekend Updates, 3 Days Later

I got the steel wheel back from the repair shop yesterday, and it looks much better than it did before. I put it on the front hub and spun it to see how straight it looked, and while there’s just a little side-to-side variation it’s not as huge as it was before. This morning I took her out for a test spin, and when I got up to 55mph I did feel a shake—but not as bad as it was before. At 60-65mph it smoothed out and ran like a champ—the engine was happy at that speed and she felt stable and true. So I think I might swap the newly repaired tire to the front, put a camera on both wheels and see if I notice any vibration at speed. If there’s another wheel that looks bad, I’ll get that one repaired as well. And if I need extra balancing, I’m going to take it to a tire shop and have them add balance beads to each wheel.

Three years ago, after I’d pulled all of the carpet off the interior of the truck, I was left with a bunch of adhesive all over the bare metal. Later on I used a rubber-brush wheel on a drill to knock all of that residue off—the ancient adhesive resisted acetone, and I didn’t want to use anything stronger than that—which left a dull finish on the metal. I did a test run with the cutting compound and found that it brought the shine right back, so I spent Sunday afternoon going around the perimeter of the interior and cleaning up the metal, including the doorframes. It looks a million times better inside.

I also pulled the original steering wheel off and replaced it with the one I refinished a year ago. I had to clean up the threads on the new wheel and sand paint off the copper horn ring, but it went on with no complaints and the horn works fine. Interestingly, there is a turn signal cancelling mechanism in there, but one of the contacts was broken years ago. After a test drive with the new wheel, I found that the left turn signal will now cancel, but the right side won’t. I’m going to see if I can source a new mechanism at Nats.

The outside paint is…better than it was, but nothing short of a full sanding job is going to get it to look any better. The cutting compound knocked all of the oxidization back, but the patchy nature of the original paint, remainder of the clearcoat, my bodywork, and rattle-can IH red gives it a true farm-implement look. Thankfully, the fresh paint on the roof and wheels plus four shiny hubcaps make up for a lot of these sins.

On Tuesday a replacement fuel sender showed up, and I started testing it. Using a multimeter, I tested the new sender to make sure it was working (using the Ohm setting, put test leads on the body of the sender and the contact point, and move the float arm. The reading should rise and fall based on where the arm is) and then working backwards from the tank, tried to isolate where the signal was dropping. It got dark very quickly so I wasn’t able to get very far, but I’ve got a plan for how to proceed.

SendCutSend tells me I’m going to have two modified cupholders in hand Thursday, which I’ll weld up for Nats. The goal there is to show them to Light Line vendors to see if they’ll distribute them for me. I’ve done some basic math, and I figure I can make some decent money producing these in volume if I get enough interest.

At Harbor Freight on Saturday, I happened to spy a speed controller box designed for a router. Essentially a potentiometer wired in between power from the wall and the tool, it’s meant to slow the router speed down. This is exactly what I need for a circular saw cutting steel or aluminum, so I grabbed it and a 10″ aluminum blade for the DeWalt miter saw my brother-in-law sent me home with last Christmas. I gave it a test run with some of the aluminum channel I bought last fall, and it does work as advertised, although it pops the 8V fuse on the back of the box. I’ve got to see what the draw from the saw is, but I can’t imagine it’s any more than a router would be—the Porter-Cable unit I’ve got is a monster. I’ve got a box full of glass fuses for the Scout so I can mix-and-match until I get something comfortably between constant tripping and nuclear meltdown.

The test cuts I did worked pretty well. My idea is to do a carpentry-style set of pie cuts to allow for gentle 90˚ rounded corners, which would then get welded solid after they’re bent. I’m going to need to be surgically precise on these, as well as find a way to lay things as flat as possible for the straightest joins. I bought extra aluminum to practice with, but I figure this is going to take some time to do correctly.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Weekend Updates, 3 Days Later  |  Posted in Future Plans, Repairs, Travelall

Lineset

I got a nice email from a lady named Sally in Wisconsin this afternoon asking me for patience, as she’s a one-woman band handling all of the lineset requests from the Historical Society. I sent her my payment with a nice note and was immediately rewarded with a pair of lineset scans for the 800.

Archaeology on trucks this old can always be a bit of a toss-up, so I worked with the most obvious visual reference: the body color. A little digging decodes the last full line on the list to 4353YL, or Tahitian Yellow according to the paint chart I’ve got here. The second bit of info confirms it: This truck was ordered by Allied Equipment Co. in Madera, CA on September 1, 1966.

Using some helpful lists to decode the rest of the info, I learned it was built with a IH 196 V4 Canada Export Low Compression engine, T90 Borg Warner 3sp transmission, DANA 27 Power-Lok front axle, Dana 44 Power-Lok rear axle, 10″ clutch, Dana 20 transfer case, cab top, cigar lighter, left armrest, and floor mats. And that was it! This truck was optioned even simpler than the Travelall was.

This also makes my tribulations with starting the engine begin to make a little more sense; if it was designed with low compression to start and Dan blew out the rings, this thing is going to be lots of fun to get (and keep) running.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Lineset  |  Posted in Helpful Info, Scout 800

Slow Progress

I’m currently waiting on a local shop to straighten out the new (to me) steel wheel, so I put the 15″ wheel that came with the truck back on to putter around the neighborhood. While I’m waiting I took care of some small stuff in the driveway.

All four of the cargo tiedowns are countersunk into the rear floor and mounted securely with a steel plate underneath, which means I have two mounts for seatbelts and two for cargo in the rear of the truck. The 800 came to me with four removable seatbelts, so I pulled one of the female seatbelt sides out, soaked it in detergent, and scrubbed the lichen and dirt out of the webbing with a toothbrush. That will make the final pair complete, and I can belt in four people safely.

I’ve spent a number of hours with a buffing wheel and cutting compound, trying to bring the original paint back. It’s been hit or miss, because the paint is in such lousy shape across the truck, from clearcoat to bare metal with about five layers in between. I can’t get the paint to polish evenly, which has been very frustrating, and I may just give up on it.

Last weekend I bought a sheet of 4×8′ lightly textured plastic meant for use in bathrooms to try out as headliner and cut it down to fit over the driver’s seat back to the second bow. Unfortunately it’s not quite the size I need: It’s 50″ between the border lip above the sunvisors to the middle of the second headliner bow and I’ve only got 48″ so the edge doesn’t hide neatly, and the material is too saggy in any case. I’m on the hunt for some kind of fiberboard that would be malleable enough to bend on the sides without breaking, but I haven’t found the right stuff yet.

And, I measured and ordered a set of CocoMats for the Travelall. I’m really happy with the ones I bought for the Scout, and I figure any sound abatement/heat insulation in the cab will help this summer, at least until I can get air conditioning installed. Hopefully they will arrive before our trip to Nats.

Here’s the Nationals to-do list, if I get the Travelall sorted out:

  • Fix the driver’s headlight, which has stopped working. I think it’s because the battery has landed on the connector one too many times.
  • Sort out the wheel situation. I’m going to see if someone local will add balancing beads to the tires, and maybe that will help at speed.
  •  Order and weld up two adjusted cupholders from SendCutSend. I’m shortening the arm by 1″ to pull them away from the shift lever so that shifting into second gear doesn’t slam into my coffee cup. With that, I’ll be ready to show them to some of the Light Line vendors at Nats and maybe set up a distribution channel.
  • Swap the clean passenger fender on to the truck. I’ve been running the original, which had some crude bodywork done, but the spare in the garage is in really good shape, so I think it’s time to re-hang it.
    • For that matter, the fenders need to get bolted on more permanently, at least for the drive to Ohio.
  • Swap the new steering wheel on. That’ll clean up the interior even more.
  • Fix the damn fuel gauge. As I’ve mentioned before, it did work at one point, so I have to chase down the issue with either the wiring behind the dash or the sending unit itself.
  • Check all the fluids.

And if I take the Scout:

  • Replace the temp sender, which has stopped working. I’ve got a spare ready to go in.
  • Check all fluids
Posted on   |   by bill   |   2 Comments on Slow Progress  |  Posted in Future Plans, To-Do List, Travelall

Parts Department, Bill Speaking

My friend from Michigan stopped by yesterday to pick up parts and talk trucks, and we spent about two hours in the driveway looking things over as he picked my brain. It was real nice meeting him in person, and I answered as many of his questions as I could. He’s working on a ’68 4WD with his kids, and he’s almost got it on the road, which is great news. I was able to send him off with the Travelall tailgate, the Ford bumper I bought before I came into the green truck, a steering wheel, a good grille emblem, and two door handles. I also sent him home with the arctic heater core from the green truck, which I have no use for. He then headed back to Frederick to pick up the white Travelall before heading home.

As for me, I’m happy to make new friends, move parts along to friends who can use them, to have some cash in hand, and especially to get rid of some stuff for room to work.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Parts Department, Bill Speaking  |  Posted in Friends

Weekend Update, 4 May

Saturday morning I had some time to get out to the driveway. The first thing to do was diagnose the wobble on the front wheel, so I jacked it off the ground and spun it. I immediately found the cause of the vibration above 50mph: the new wheel is out of true. There’s a wide variation in both diameter and depth as it spins, which explains the problem. So I swapped that wheel with the one on the back, and we’ll see if that makes any difference. If the back starts wobbling badly, I’ll swap the tire back on to the odd 16″ wheel until I can get a good set of 15″ wheels to replace these.

With the front wheel off, I started working on the tie rods. After cleaning the accumulated grease and dirt off the fittings, I heated and cooled each side until I was able to get it to spin. Counting the threads carefully, I pulled it off and threaded the new one on at exactly the same length. With the driver’s side fastened, I pulled the passenger wheel off and repeated the process. The steering tie rod ends were just as bad, but I couldn’t get both here at the same time, so I did some cross-site parts research and found a left-hand thread Moog unit on the jungle site that could be delivered Sunday.

Then I went out and swapped the Honda out for Peer Pressure at Brian’s place to bring it home. Stopping off at ACE for fresh grade 8 hardware, I installed the female sides of the lap belts on the rear bench in Darth—so now I’ve got one full lap belt back there until I can source another male belt with a quick-release. With that done, I routed and mounted the fourth tiedown on the driver’s side rear, so there’s one on each side to secure any cargo back there.

Meanwhile, I’ve been noticing the cord on the IH fridge has been getting more and more frayed, and some of the original plastic sheathing was ripped about halfway along its length. Fearing a fire hazard, I took a little time last night to splice in a replacement appliance cord with solder and four layers of shrink wrap to keep it as secure as possible.

Sunday I was multi-tasking on house and truck stuff, but the part did arrive, and after some initial confusion about whether or not it was correct, I threaded it on. The rear half of the steering link is an odd size: the rod section is about 8″ long, which I haven’t seen anywhere. I think my solution to this will be to find a replacement sleeve that’s longer to accept a normal off-the-shelf tie rod.

With three of the four tie rods replaced and the wobbly wheel on the back, I took her out for a test drive. Getting her up to speed on 195, I felt the rear wheel doing its dance, but the other three felt good—and most importantly, as I drove over the traffic calming speed bumps on the way to the highway, I felt and heard none of the loose clanking through the steering wheel  that was there before the tie rods went in. And the steering is still straight and true, which means I did it right.

Something positive to note: I got her up to 65mph with little difficulty, and I believe, once the wheels are sorted out, she’d do 70 with no problem.

Monday afternoon I’ve got an internet acquaintance stopping by to buy a bunch of parts: the Travelall liftgate, the Ford bumper, some doorhandles, and a badge off one of the ’68 grilles. It’ll be good to clear that stuff out and free up a litle cash for some other stuff. He’s picking up a Travelall from Tyler out in Frederick, and I was hoping to horse trade him for the original jack and windshield washer pump out of that truck; we’ll see if we can swing it.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Weekend Update, 4 May  |  Posted in Friends, Repairs, Travelall

Wheely Tired of This

I took the truck out on the highway with the intention of driving it to Frederick last weekend, and found that I had an extremely strong vibration coming from the front end over 55mph, which I strongly suspect are the tires. So I turned around and swapped it for the Honda. Doing more research, I’ve come to the unfortunate realization that the 16″ steel wheels I’ve currently got on the truck do not accept anything currently available other than the trailer tires I have currently mounted. These are made with less care than normal tires, and thus aren’t balanced for everyday use. Given that I’m not road-tripping this thing to Illinois and back every day, that’s not a huge deal, but I intend to take it to Ohio in a couple of months and would like to have proper tires mounted. So now I’m on the hunt for a set of 15″ 4.5×5″ steel wheels that will accept original IH dish hubcaps.

In the meantime I’m going to move the rear tires up front and see if that smooths out the ride, which will then tell me which tires are good and which are bad, or if it’s an issue related to the suspension (which I strongly doubt). I also have new right and left tie rod ends sitting on my desk waiting to be installed this weekend, which should help tighten up the steering linkages.

The other job to finish will be installing the female side of the rear seatbelts, which my truck never came with. I’ve seen a couple of different stock installations, one where the mount is on the wheel arch and one where the mount is on the flat step in front of the arch.

belts mounted to the flat step
Belt mounted to the wheel arch. This truck was the inspiration for the design of my seats.
Another mounted to the wheel arch. Note placement of the latch mechanism on the side of the seat

I think, having crawled under this truck a million times, that I’d rather have it on the flat step with a big fat g8 bolt going through the structural part of the truck, and a backing plate underneath.

Oh yeah, and I’ve got to fix the damn fuel gauge.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Wheely Tired of This  |  Posted in Travelall

Ruminating

The weather was kind of garbage this weekend, which put a literal damper on a lot of the things I wanted to accomplish. I was able to install a set of 6,000 lb. cargo hooks in the back of the Travelall to accept a set of seatbelts for the back seat, which I’ve been meaning to do for a while.

These hooks replace the original round IH cups that came with the Green truck (my truck never had these, falling outside the federal seatbelt mandate) which were very deep, and which I couldn’t come up with a method of attaching to anything solid.

The new hooks come with a stout metal plate that bolts underneath, so I don’t think they’re going to go anywhere. Now I have to add the female belts to the wheel wells, which will require a custom fabricated backing plate.

Meanwhile, a nice fellow in Michigan reached out to me several weeks ago after seeing the Travelall liftgate in one of my videos; we traded emails and a couple of calls, and made some plans for him to buy some parts. Then my local Travelall friend Tyler showed me a picture of a truck he picked up locally and asked me if anyone I knew was interested. I passed the word along to Bill, and he sounded very interested. So I wrapped two trips up into one on Sunday: I drove out Tyler’s way to buy a new (used) Mirra desk chair and then stopped at his place to look over the truck. After sharing the video and my opinion, Bill is going to buy it, which is a great deal for both people (and I don’t feel tempted to buy it myself and risk my marriage). My intention was to drive Darth, but after I got her out onto the Beltway and up to 60mph, the front of the truck started vibrating badly. So I think the plan will be to replace the tie rods and then find someone who can do an alignment for me.

I dragged the 800 back out of the garage, put some oil in the cylinders, and tried to fire it off again, but didn’t have any luck. I cleaned all the plugs and verified that I’ve got spark, but the #1 cylinder is still only making 75psi of pressure. I’m going to pull the carb off this week and clean it out, and I’ll give it another try maybe this coming weekend, but I’m beginning to think this truck will be a winter project—and I’m considering swapping it out with the Scout II at Brian’s place. I want to drive Peer Pressure this summer, and I’m still focused on making Darth Haul a runner, so the 800 is a distraction. Plus, nobody knows more about cranky engines that won’t start than my friend Brian, so there’s that added benefit. I’ve just got to get it over there.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Ruminating  |  Posted in Friends, Seat Belts, Travelall

Tires and Tasks

Having swapped one of the tires on to the new wheel I bought last week, one of the comments the guy at the tire store made got me thinking. I’d bought a set of 16″ tires for this truck when I first got it, but wasn’t aware they were only rated for trailers, and it was a fight to get them to balance it. I don’t want to be driving this truck on tires that are only meant for occasional use, so I think I’m going to have to buy a new set and have them swapped on. From what I understand, I can put a set of 195/75R16 tires on these wheels with no issues. An inexpensive set of van tires are only ~$400, and I can maybe sell the trailer tires on Marketplace for cheap.

Next up on the list:

  • Fix the fuel gauge. It was working a few years ago, and I’d sure like for it to work again.
  • Fix the exhaust hanger. At some point last week the rubber element in the replacement part I bought snapped, so I’ve got to fabricate a replacement.
  • Adjust the idle faster, just a touch.
  • Clean up the tie rods and measure for new ones. This will be critical for getting the truck ready for long-distance trips, along with researching other suspension repairs—bushings, greaseable fittings, and linkages.
  • Paint the other wheels. I have to wire-wheel, prep and paint the passenger side wheels.
  • Replace the steering wheel? I’ve been waiting to do this until after the power steering is done, but the hell with it, maybe I’ll just put the new wheel in to make it look better.

Two things I brought back from Brian’s are a whole stack of aluminum—two C-channels and a bunch of flat bar—which will eventually be formed into a proper roof rack. There was also a 4×4 sheet of 16 ga. steel, which will be formed into the patch for the driver’s floor. Those two projects may wind up being cold-weather pursuits; we’ll see how the summer shakes out.

On the 800, I’ve only got one major task in mind: I’m going to drag it out of the garage, dribble a little oil down the cylinders to build up compression, and get it running off the boat tank. Then I’m going to let it run for a good long while to see if I can knock the rings loose. I’m also going to dump some Seafoam down the carb and smoke out the neighborhood.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Tires and Tasks  |  Posted in Scout 800, To-Do List, Travelall

We May Have This Beat

I think I’ve got the brake situation on Darth Haul pretty much licked—but it’s going to take a little more adjustment before I’m happy. When I last wrote about this, I was waiting on a master cylinder from Rock Auto. I wound up installing that, and as I took the 2-year-old unit off the firewall, I found that the pushrod for the clutch fell inside the firewall, while the pushrod for the brakes stuck out into the engine bay by an inch or so. This pointed at the cylinder being pressurized as I hit the brakes, but not able to release all of the pressure when the pedal was let back out, thus building up over time as I drove and braked.

So I unscrewed the adjustable pushrod and lopped about 1″ of length off of it, and put it back in the truck. I found that I’d taken off way too much and that I wasn’t getting any brakes at all. So I measured the threaded side of the pushrod, then bought a couple of 7/16 bolts with 20 pitch thread and used an angle grinder to fabricate a new pushrod.

After spinning a jam nut down on the threads, I put it back in the truck and gave it a test, but found I wasn’t getting enough brake, and needed more length. So I fabricated a third pushrod and installed that one, and this time I got some stop in the pedal. It still needs some fine tuning—I’ve got to stand on the brakes to stop quickly—but after a 15-mile drive the wheels were cool to the touch and the truck wasn’t struggling against itself.

Now I’ve got to do some tightening up on the front suspension. The tie rods and bushings are all toast, so I have to order new hardware for all of that, as well as pick up a working grease gun (both of the units I have here, circa the repo agency from 1988,  seem to be broken) to lube all the important bits.

Brendan left me a couple of goodies up at Dan’s place a few weekends ago, so I made the most of the trip by hauling a load of broken concrete from our backyard up to the landfill on that side of town in the Scout. His place is right around the corner, so I quietly backed into the side field so as not to disturb his family. Brendan dropped a proper 16″ IH wheel in the driver’s seat of the blue 80 for the Travelall and told me to just take the rollbar out of that truck. I was able to get one of two bolts out with a wrench but had to resort to a portable cutoff wheel to get the other out. With that, the bar was free, and I hauled both parts back to Peer Pressure to head home.

The wheel is exactly what I needed. I’ve got three originals on the truck but the fourth is one I got from a guy on Marketplace, and while it fits the truck, the mounting boss is a different size than the others so I can’t mount a hubcap on it. I wire-wheeled the whole thing, sprayed the outside white, and mounted it on the truck.

With the hubcap on it really brings out the white in the top and makes the truck look sharp. I liked it so much I used the playing card trick to spray the rear wheel white as well. Something else to look into are different tires; the ones on the truck are technically for a trailer, and I’d like to have the right kind of rubber on the truck. It’s an odd size so it’s going to take some searching to find the right thing.

While I was at the Hobo Freight I picked up a bottle of cutting compound and a couple of orbital pads, and gave it a try on some of the red paint with the worst oxidization. It took some experimentation and practice, but after a little while I had the original paint as shiny as it’s going to get, punctuated with areas of rattle-can IH Implement red covering repairs I’ve made. I did the entire passenger rear quarter up to the point where my sheet-metal repair starts (and the spray paint is fading) and both doors, and it looks worlds better. It’s not going to save the peeling clear coat but it’s better than it was.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on We May Have This Beat  |  Posted in Brakes, Purchasing, Travelall