{"id":4672,"date":"2024-07-26T18:11:05","date_gmt":"2024-07-27T02:11:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/?p=4672"},"modified":"2024-07-27T04:09:54","modified_gmt":"2024-07-27T12:09:54","slug":"preparations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/2024\/07\/26\/preparations\/","title":{"rendered":"Preparations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We&#8217;re <a href=\"https:\/\/maps.app.goo.gl\/2bPZEGungo5fhsXV6\">headed west into the heart of America next week<\/a> in a truck only slightly younger than me, which means I have to pack just as many tools and medications for it as I do myself. I did a quick inventory today and made a list of stuff I&#8217;ll need:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A gallon of 50\/50 coolant, and a gallon of distilled water<\/li>\n<li>A gallon jug of 15\/40 Rotella diesel oil, which is uniquely formulated to be nice to older flat-tappet engines like mine<\/li>\n<li>Two spare fan belts (ordered via NAPA)<\/li>\n<li>Power steering fluid<\/li>\n<li>Brake fluid<\/li>\n<li>Air filter<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/B0BLTDLCRK\">An Element fire extinguisher<\/a> to supplement the bottle unit I have bolted to the seat base<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In the ammo can, I&#8217;ve already got a bunch of other spare parts and tools\u2014a fuel pump, coil, points and condenser, plug wire, bulbs, fuses, and electrical gear, plugs, assorted fasteners and zip ties. She&#8217;s running well right now, so the goal will be to get her cleaned up inside and top off the fluids to be ready to hit the road on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>I saw some trick floor mats on a build thread a few weeks ago and decided to pull the trigger on a set, figuring they would come in handy for heat abatement on this trip. They&#8217;re called CocoMats and they&#8217;re handmade and heavy-duty for cars like Porsches, but what I saw in the thread really impressed me. I ordered a set and they sent me a set of paper templates to lay in the truck and form to my specifications, which I did the night I got the package.<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-4673\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0620.jpeg?resize=1170%2C658\" alt=\"\" width=\"1170\" height=\"658\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0620.jpeg?w=1778&amp;ssl=1 1778w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0620.jpeg?resize=500%2C281&amp;ssl=1 500w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0620.jpeg?resize=1024%2C576&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0620.jpeg?resize=768%2C432&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0620.jpeg?resize=1536%2C864&amp;ssl=1 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1170px) 100vw, 1170px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-4674\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0625.jpeg?resize=1170%2C658\" alt=\"\" width=\"1170\" height=\"658\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0625.jpeg?w=1778&amp;ssl=1 1778w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0625.jpeg?resize=500%2C281&amp;ssl=1 500w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0625.jpeg?resize=1024%2C576&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0625.jpeg?resize=768%2C432&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0625.jpeg?resize=1536%2C864&amp;ssl=1 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1170px) 100vw, 1170px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Looking for maximum coverage, I added material to the sides and brought them up to the edge of the vertical part of the firewall, and made a notch for the ramp under the gas pedal. The sample they sent is thick and beefy and the rubber on the bottom is covered in 1\/8&#8243; nubs that should keep it up off the metal where moisture collects. I sent the patterns back with a note and a sticker, and they&#8217;ve been super communicative with me the whole time. (The day after I placed the order I noticed they&#8217;d put an ad in my Hagerty magazine with a discount code, so I emailed them to ask if it was too late to apply that. They cheerfully sent an affirmative reply in less than an hour and refunded me the 10%. That&#8217;s some great customer service).<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, they won&#8217;t be here in time for the trip, so we&#8217;ll just have to sweat it out like we normally do.<\/p>\n<p>The other thing I did was take one of the spare horns from the green &#8217;67 and swap it into the Scout in place of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/2020\/01\/12\/horns-and-parts\/\">the Mercedes horn I put in a couple of years ago<\/a>. I just didn&#8217;t like the half American\/European sound of the two horns together and wanted to get the truck back to a true &#8216;Murican sound. Much better now. (<em>fun fact:<\/em> many cars use two horns tuned slightly differently, because the dissonance of two frequencies is easier to hear in high ambient noise situations).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We&#8217;re headed west into the heart of America next week in a truck only slightly younger than me, which means I have to pack just as many tools and medications for it as I do myself. I did a quick inventory today and made a list of stuff I&#8217;ll need: A gallon of 50\/50 coolant, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[12,56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-purchasing","category-to-do-list"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p58Ac2-1dm","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4672"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4672\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4679,"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4672\/revisions\/4679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billdugan.com\/scout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}