Category: Video
Weekly Update, 5.21
Here’s the update from this past week, mainly focusing on dashboard removal, with a detour to the blasting cabinet on a rainy Saturday to pretty up a set of valve covers. I’m about 3/4 of the way done getting this thing out of the truck. I had to disconnect the mechanical linkages to the heat/defrost controls, which was easy with the radio missing, and then I had to trace the two knobs in the center of the dashboard down. The smaller knob was pretty simple, just a cable running to a mechanical choke on the carburetor. And now that I’m thinking more clearly, I’ll bet that when I run the truck up again next time and open the choke up, the truck will run a lot smoother than it has the last couple of times. I’m betting I left it closed up, making the mixture richer and idle rougher, thus fouling the plugs. You can tell I’m spoiled by the fancy electric choke on the Thermoquad in the Scout.
The second knob has been a mystery for as long as I’ve owned the truck. Even when pulling on it with the strength of a gorilla, it never moved. I traced the cable through the engine bay and down the passenger rail to a greasy lump hanging off the side of the transmission: the NX98 Power Take Off unit listed at the bottom of the lineset ticket (for which I can find no online documentation). After attempting to get the knob out of the dashboard I realized the only way to remove it is to cut the knob off the cable. I thought about it for a couple of hours and then used the death wheel to cut the cable in the engine bay. I cleaned the grease off the PTO to reveal shiny red paint, and moved the linkage back and forth—it works! I’m going to leave it on and mess with it later.
The dash is free and clear on the passenger side but there are still a couple of things holding on behind the gauge panel, so I have to keep plugging away at the last couple of linkages. I disconnected the plugs on the engine side of the firewall but next I’ve got to gingerly push the connectors through to the passenger side, which I think will free up the dashboard even more. I suspect there are a couple of connections on the steering column and I have to get an impact driver on the high-beam switch mounted on the floor. The new harness is sitting on the bench seat ready to go in, and from all that I can tell, the connectors match up perfectly.
Weekly Roundup, 5.12
Here’s a video containing most of the updates from last weekend, when the green truck was towed away, to yesterday afternoon, when I swapped out the hardtop for the soft top on the Scout.
I put the nutmeg snap top on the truck for now; it’s in the best shape of the three and will definitely seal up better than the others. Everything went on smoothly and I think I had the whole thing wrapped up in about two hours. When that was done I made some adjustments to the rearview mirror on the driver’s windshield frame. because of where it’s positioned, when I open the door beyond a certain distance it moves the mirror outwards, messing up the alignment. I was thinking I was going to move it upwards on the frame, but there isn’t enough room to go much higher than it already is. So I adjusted the bar further outwards and bent the mirror mount inwards, and that pushed the arm further outside the door’s arc.
The next thing I did was replace the gasket on the door of the IH fridge, which was sweating out the sides last summer. I sourced a new gasket from a freezer parts company and paid more for shipping than I did for the gasket. It went on pretty easily, and it seems to seal tightly, so I’m counting that as an easy win.
Finally, I did a bunch of finish sanding on the driver’s fender to the red truck, getting the curve of the fender lip to feather out into the flat section much better than I had before. I sanded it first with 320 and then with 600 grit before shooting it with some IH implement red out of a rattle can. I have to clean up some of the edges on the front before I go to wet sanding everything, but it’s getting closer to being done.
Disassembly Recap
Here’s a recap of the last two weeks:
Video Update
This is an update of the second half of last week—roughly Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday, where I’m continuing to fight the steering box and column until I got it off, and stripping other parts off the engine and interior.
4-Day Weekend Recap
I’ll follow up with a written wrap-up later, but here’s the video.
Video Update
Here’s a recap of last week’s work. I’m testing out equipment and trying to plan out the shoots a little more so that it’s not so jumpy—the pros on YouTube certainly make it look a lot easier than it actually is.
Parts is Parts, Week One
I had a day of beautiful weather I wanted to take advantage of on Saturday, so I woke up early, walked the dog, and got my chores done early so I could get outside.
A lot of the highlights are covered in the video, but I’ll bullet-point them here:
- The three spare wheels I’ve been storing under the back porch for ten years, and often considered hauling off to the trash, came in super-handy for the Travelall: they’re the same bolt pattern and they all hold air, so I swapped out the shredded flats on the truck and got it off the ground. There’s still one that’s flat but I’m going to put the one good tire that came with the truck on there and shoot it with some stop-leak. This means that the wheels won’t fit the red Travelall and I can toss them all out when it’s time to get rid of this truck. The green truck now looks 6% less redneck.
- Jacking up the truck in back to swap said tires, I found that the top leaf in the driver’s spring pack was cracked in half. I may still try to pull those off to have re-arched at some point, but I have to measure them all first to see if they’ll fit the Red Bus.
- I tore the carpet off the floors front and rear, and found lots of rust underneath. There are two huge sections under the front seats that are completely gone, and giant patches of rust in the back. My tub is definitely in much better shape here.
- It always takes more time to get parts off a truck than you think. As long as I’ve been doing this, I’m always stupidly optimistic in terms of what I believe I can accomplish. Putting in a full day Saturday, I got all of the trim off, the roof rack removed, four aluminum sill plates, the visors and rearview mirror, the headlights, tail lights, and both front marker lights. And then I spent two hours getting the driver’s fender off. It’s in excellent shape and should clean up really well, so it was definitely worth it. I got about half the bolts off the passenger side before I had to pack things in; the most painful bolts need to soak in PBblaster for a week or so. Somehow I thought I’d have half the truck apart already.
- I’m going to have to hook a battery up to try and lower the rear window to get the gate open. The chances of this being successful are about 1000/1. When that doesn’t work, I’ll have to get a thick Phillips-head screwdriver on the 6-8 bolts at the bottom of the inside panel to get access to the motor. The chances of this being successful are 500/1. But the tailgate—and more importantly, the glass—are very much worth the effort. Jeff J. tells me the glass is curved and very hard to find.
- Jeff also tells me the power steering box on this truck won’t work on my truck; this truck (with IFS) has a boxed frame while mine is channeled, and there are differences in where the steering box goes and how it mounts. Rats.
- Also, the front grille assembly won’t fit my truck; the 1965+ trucks had a square opening in the sheet metal while mine is scalloped on the ends. Doesn’t matter, I’m taking it all off anyway.
- I pulled on the fan blade to see if the engine would turn, and it’s stuck tight. Once I can drain the radiator and pull that out, I’ll have room to see if I can get a socket on the crank bolt and put a breaker bar on it. Maybe I’ll pull the plugs and soak the cylinders in Marvel Mystery Oil; we’ll see.
- I wasn’t able to get the cowl cover off to put the borescope in to check out the vents down there, but judging by the rusted edges on each side and the pile of debris that fell out when I opened the driver’s vent, I’d guess they’re pretty well shot.
- I did a fair bit of ADHD scatterbrain picking before I settled down and focused on a few main items. I had actually written down a list based on a strategy of keeping the outer shell together to keep it looking respectable while I take all of the interior parts out, but hubris got the better of me. The driver’s fender is now hung with one bolt. I’m going to do the same with the passenger side, then work on the front clip. Inside the engine bay there are a lot of parts that will stay behind, and I’ll get as much as I can out of there before I start dismantling the interior.
So in rough order, here’s the basic plan:
- Get the passenger fender off
- Get the inner fenders ready to pull off
- Drain the coolant, and pull the radiator out
- Remove the heating box from inside the cab
- Pull the plugs and put some Marvel Mystery oil in the cylinders; see if the engine will turn
- Continue pulling the front cowl off
- Put a battery in and see if the rear window will go down
- If yes, then open the tailgate and get the glass out
- If no, then get a larger screwdriver and try to get the bolts off to open the access panel
- Remove the rear tailgate
- Pull the rear bumper off
- Remove the entire power steering assembly
- Pull the brake booster assembly
- Pull out the front bench and base
- Dismantle and remove the entire dashboard
- Pull the steering wheel out
- Pull out all internal trim
- Ceiling surround channel
- Extra ceiling hoops
- Armrests, other minor trim
- Pull the front bumper off
- Take the doors off
- Take the hood off
- Take the inner and outer fenders off
- Maybe pull the good leaf spring off?
February Update
I’ve had a bunch of shorter clips in the hopper for a while, and figured I’d collect them into something resembling an update.
On the project side of things, I used a heat gun to remove all of the old bondo on the driver’s side fender, then cut off the pop rivets used to hold a crappy patch in place installed Back in The Day.
When I had that out, I cut a larger square out to get things ready for a proper butt-welded patch. The other thing I had to do was to try and bend the rear edge of the fender outward and back into original position. At some point somebody really bashed it inwards so it never looked correct when it was hung on the truck. I was able to get it mostly back into place, and used my everyday hammer to do some dent removal. At this point I want to get an actual bodywork hammer and bag to pound out the larger dents instead of trying to hide sins with filler.
Once I had that cleaned up, I cut down a section of metal and tacked it into place. I’m going to have to finesse the bottom edge a little bit—or grind this off and re-orient it further down—but it looks like it’ll go in pretty easily.
Welding and Sanding
Here’s a quick breakdown of the repairs to my spare fender. I started with an order to SendCutSend for a set of new laser-cut steel donuts for the outside and inside edges, as well as three 1/2″ strips to bend for a flange to connect both. I welded the outer flange in first because it had a slight curve, then built an inside section and tacked that in place. When I saw that it would collect rain the way I’d built it, I used a second donut and strip to mount flush to the outside edge and tacked it all in place. Next was welding a small patch in at the bottom, where water and mud pool and rust the metal out from the inside.
While that was cooling I sanded the top layer of blue paint off the fender to reveal some past damage and Bondo, which was not unexpected. I skimmed some Bondo over the two welds and sanded everything down, but the fuel mount area is going to need a lot more attention. I’m looking around for alternatives to off-the-shelf Bondo and have found that Evercoat products seem to get good reviews, so I think I’ll buy a gallon of that in the springtime to continue bodywork projects.