'62 F100 Uni - yes another Crown Vic swap

[Blanger]

Interior (part 3)

Busy weekend, but we got more accomplished on the truck, seat is covered and installed.



The seat cover fit nice, a little tight on the seat (butt portion) since we added foam over the springs...lol

We got our arm rests.



These are not bad parts for only being a little less than $20 each, they are of course molded over a piece of flat metal that provides a mounting area that should be strong, I figured out where we wanted them mounted, marked the location then drilled the holes, I used 1/4-20 machine screws and fairly large flat washers (thin thickness) with nylon locking nuts on the inside of the door, they mounted fine and I chose a area right below the door latch arm (runs from door handle to the latch), it was about the only area that was basically flat and wasn't too high on the door, so they provide a little support for your elbow while driving.



This basically leaves only the headliner to do, the wife found a pattern on the interwebs that is to scale for the headliner and the small piece that goes around the top of the cab sides that is screwed to the top of the door openings and rear of the cab, this piece on our truck just fell apart when we disassembled the truck and there wasn't enough to make a pattern off of it, so now we can reproduce that piece and cover the headliner and install it after I get a dome light mounted and wired.

I'm trying to decide which dome light to use, the original truck dome light was trash from the mice that were living above it, but I do have the OEM CV dome light and a couple of the cop interior lights that are installed by police departments, I'm kinda' leaning towards the cop light since it's large and might look and work better.




It's funny the OEM CV unit has red evidence tape someone put on the inside of the lens to make it dim (our CV was a detective car), the tape is translucent so it's going to put off light with a red cast, not really what I'm looking for, the regular cop light I think just uses a 1156 bulb so putting a LED bulb in it will be easy and it would provide a lot of light and I'm leaning in that direction.

Tomorrow I'll finish up the power window post.

Jon

[Blanger]

Power Windows (part 2)

Wiring for the power window motors is pretty straight forward, you just need a 20a circuit that is fused (or a circuit breaker), a source for ground, and the connectors. The single switches we used have 5 connections, two window motor connections, one power connection, and two ground connections, to run the motors up and down all you are basically doing is changing the polarity between the power and ground feeding the motor, in one position it runs the motor in the up position in the other it goes down...simple.

All of this is done by the switches so it's important to get your connections correct to avoid a short between the power and ground. The connectors for the GM switches we used look like this.



The pigtail connectors are sold through several companies but appear to only be made by AC Delco and they are not cheap costing more than the PW motors each, so I have more money invested in the connectors than the actual motors, but it is the only game in town that we could find, I even bought the connector for the dual switch (drivers side) so I have options for later date and you never know just how long things like these will be manufactured since they are no longer put in new cars, if you have a source and your doing a conversion like this it is probably worth the trip to a salvage yard to cut them out of a harness, just be careful removing them from the switches the plastic becomes brittle over the years and brakes easily.



The connector for the dual switch even though came in a BWD (Borg Warner) box is just a repackage of the AC Delco part having the very same gray wiring and same plastic connector but of course is 6 conductor instead of 5 for the single switches.

Like I said wiring is pretty straightforward but you need to study the connector well, the wire connections are off-set so it's not always evident which wire is going to which terminal, but what your looking to do is attach the PW motor to the two center (or middle) terminals, the power goes to the corner opposite the blank space in the connector, and the last two corner wires are grounds which are opposite each other and can be just tied together with the ground attached.

It's a good idea to test the switches for orientation before installing them so up is up and down is down...lol

The first one I did went off without a hitch, but the second one I got the power and ground shorted and blew a couple fuses before getting it right (study the connector), I hadn't installed the circuit beaker at that point and was down to my last fuse when I got it right...finally..lol

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On a related topic, if your following my build you might remember when I rebuilt the door window channels, anti-rattlers, wing windows, that I mentioned the rollers for the window that is on the end of the lift arm and runs in the window lift channel, I mentioned how they were only a few dollars each and that it would be a good idea to replace them. (which I didn't do) Ours were in good shape for their age.... Well I should have replaced them because I broke the passenger side roller.

Let me back up, when I did all the sheet metal as in floor pans, cab steps and risers months ago I did the passenger side first since it was in the worst shape, to replace the lower door hinge pocket I of course removed the passenger door, I did mark it's location and left the hinges intact on the door never moving them but I didn't do the drill a reference hole like people who do this stuff all the time recommend to do so it's easier to line everything back up.

Needless to say I've been fighting the door alignment ever since, so fast forward to last weekend and I'm doing some final tweaking on the passenger door so it doesn't have to be slammed hard to get it to latch, in the process of slamming the door and adjusting the striker plate in and out I slam the door and the window glass slides down it's channel....oops this ain't good at all!

So I took the door apart and of course the plastic roller broke at the clip that holds it on the arm, I got it put back together and it'll hold the window up but I'm sure rolling it up and down a few times it'll pop back out, of course I had to order a couple of them which would have been much cheaper while ordering other things to cover the shipping.....just another lesson learned.

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Observation on the above topic, if you can do body work on your slick without removing the 200 pound doors I'd not remove them especially if you don't have help to reinstalling them because it's more then a one person job hanging the doors, if you must remove them do the recommended marking and drilling to make putting them back in the same location easier. When I did the drivers side I didn't remove that door and was still able to replace the rotted metal and the door lines up and closes like it's suppose to.

This is probably stupid to you guys that have had the doors on and off your slick and didn't have a problem getting them lined back up, but when you have 12 bolts holding a door your first clue should be that it's going to be a problem getting all of that back in place unless your well versed in doing the job which I'm not.



Jon

[Blanger]

When I made the post about the front exterior lighting I don't think I posted a picture of what the front wiring looked like, I took the grill out the other day to put the FORD lettering back in the upper valance while it was out I snapped this picture.



I also started on the front bumper mounts, we are using a '67 front bumper on the truck for a couple different reasons, one being that it was cheap and not chrome, there really is no good reason to put a nice new shiny chrome front bumper on our slick given how the rest of the exterior looks it just wouldn't fit, so there are differences in the mountings (bumper brackets) between the '62 and the '67 which I'm modifying to fit the '67 bumper.




I'll have to fabricate the mounts going to the CV frame rails which I have worked out in my head but need to just put it all together, we had originally thought about cutting the bumper on each side removing a little length then welding it back together which would bring it up against the front fenders for a little more of a custom look, but my wife came up with a different idea that actually may work out better, when all completed the bumper will be painted and aged to match the grill, at least as close as we can match the color.

So that is the next major project...

Jon

[ryanjay11]

This build is awesome! There are ton of finishing steps that you have done, that most folks wouldn't have even thought of.

[Blanger]

This build is awesome! There are ton of finishing steps that you have done, that most folks wouldn't have even thought of.

Thanks Ryan,

I guess it's easier for us to come up with the extra details (or think of them) since we didn't focus on the exterior very much other than to try to make the truck kinda' flow in a cohesive way, the only nice chrome on the truck is the outside mirrors and they are so small that they get lost while looking at the truck, a big chrome front bumper would be impossible to miss. Being my daily driver means it has to have some things that might seem small but are features I want, need, and will use, the radio - back up camera is one of those things, along with the lighting from the LED lights to the halogen headlights just make the truck much more drive-able on a daily basis. Yeah the halos in the headlights are a cool feature that is really only seen on new vehicles, power windows were not a necessity but just worked out to be more convenient along with the drivers outside door lock. I could have went whole-hog and did power door locks with a remote but that is just being lazy...lol

Since this isn't my first project vehicle and hopefully won't be my last we have kinda' developed things over different builds that work for us and have proven to be worth the investment like the LED lighting, if you have ever owned a old vehicle you know that lighting over the years is something that degrades, the bulb sockets get weak, the wiring gets brittle, grounding goes away and it's a constant battle to keep bulbs lit, when we did our Camaro we replaced almost every bulb socket for the exterior lighting because they were just shot.

I guess my point is that over different builds - vehicles you figure out what works and is worth the effort and investment to do that will have the best bang for the buck, I plan on driving this truck for a long time so spending time, effort, and a little extra money isn't really a big deal, I really hate to do things twice and while I'm not intimidated by the wiring I'm OCD enough that every connection is soldered and has heat shrink over the connection and if I have doubts it has tape over that then wire tied into a bundle, I don't mind the wiring but I don't want to have to go back later and try to find a problem I might have caused from making a poor connection.

I really don't think we have done anything special, we are just building the truck our way with the features we want, if other people notice the extra details we put into the truck that's fine some people do notice and others do not but the thing that really gets me is people thinking it's too hard or difficult to do, there isn't one aspect of our build that has been difficult and in my opinion all you need is a basic mechanical skill set to do any of it......of course a little common sense does help! lol

Thanks again for the kind words, I wish we had a truck as nice as yours to start with our build but would feel guilty cutting it up to do the CV frame swap, I really like the direction you are going with it.... I hope when I get my gauges they turn out as nice as your look. BTW if you get a chance sometime can you post a picture of the inside of your doors either side, since it's a custom cab I'm curious how they are laid out, we thought about adding the door panels like custom cab has and may still do that. Thanks.

(sorry for the wall of words - work is a little slow and I'm a little bored today)

Jon

[ryanjay11]

Good call on the LED Lighting. My Truck-Lite headlights showed up tonight. Although the price is ridiculous, I'm probably to go with these for my taillights: http://www.easyperformance.com/products ... Disclaimer

After that, I'm going to go through the rest and make the necessary updates.

This is the photo you requested of my doors. I have the standard steel panel covers, unfortunately with holes for speakers, and the common cracked white plastic upper panels that I need to replace.

[Blanger]

This is the photo you requested of my doors. I have the standard steel panel covers, unfortunately with holes for speakers, and the common cracked white plastic upper panels that I need to replace.

Thank you for the picture, so the door panels are molded plastic, I would have thought they were made of the same fiber board the headliner was made of, and the arm rest is about in the same location as I mounted ours but has a different shape and look deeper where you grab them, ours are for a Mustang or Fairlane and are shallower, the way yours are shaped would give more arm area which is better.

Man I love those sequential tail lights, that is pretty cool and will get the attention of the idiots behind you. The speakers aren't a really big deal if you chose to cover that panel like we did, I understand why people used the panels for putting speakers in....it's quick, easy, and about the only option other than some form of surface mount speakers that they use to make back in the day.

Thanks again the picture helps us a lot.

Jon

[Blanger]

Week five update.

Well it's Friday and another week has passed which is another week in the log book for our truck, and another week of daily driving...lol

Not a lot to report, as I stated before the truck is rock solid with no issues, everything works as it should and nothing leaks, I have a lot more confidence driving the truck and that builds with every passing day we have put about 150 miles on it in 5 weeks which is not a lot of mileage but is a good test of it's drive-ability, and reliability with not a single issue.

With adjusting the passenger door last weekend I think I've finally got rid of the last rattle the truck had, slowly I've been chasing them down one by one and the passenger door area was the last one, after driving across town twice this morning on a lot of different roads and streets I didn't hear one rattle. I think most everything that was apart and put back together has settled into it's new location or position, the front end sheet metal has stopped it's squeaking and looking at all the body mounts I built the rubber looks like it's doing it's job supporting the body.

I did notice working under the front end last weekend that the radiator support has settled quite a bit and I'm going to have to add a spacer on the drivers side to raise it back up to the correct height, I had shimmed the passenger side to get the right height when we hung the sheet metal and it looks like it's still fine but the drivers side is going to need a little, this isn't really unexpected since I reused rubber mounts from the CV on the bottom of the support because they were still in good shape and the proper size.

I still have a little tire rub in the front that only happens when turning into a driveway that has a uneven surface, it's nothing like the very first trip around the block before I pulled the top of the fender wheel openings out, and again this isn't unexpected since the body sits so low, I just want to keep a eye on the tires to make sure I'm not causing damage to them. In normal driving there isn't any rubbing at all no matter what you do or how sharp you turn it's just the entering a driveway that isn't level with the street. I really don't see how people put big 22" rims on a vehicle and air bags and drive it around without massive tire rub, sure it looks cool but it can't be that piratical.

Yesterday a friend of mine stopped by to look at the truck, he hadn't seen it since we had just set the body on the CV frame and were figuring out the ride height we wanted, he is one of those detail oriented types of people who notices things most people miss, and he's a good enough friend that he would speak his opinion without fear of hurting your feelings...lol the only thing he could criticize was the distance the steering wheel was away from the driver unless tilted down, and this is a issue I'm totally aware of since I drive it everyday, about the only fix is a different steering wheel with more dish in it, what is on the truck is only 1.5" dish and it could easily use a 3" dish wheel which it will get in the future. The thing that caused this is that even though most people who do a CV frame swap use a 28" steering column, because our CV was a '98 and didn't have rack and pinion I could have used a 30" column which would have moved the steering wheel two inches closer to the driver.

All of this isn't a big deal, but is caused by following what others have done before you, that's a great idea in most cases but there are some things like the steering column that I would do differently now that I know what I know, I should have spent more time mocking things up and taking measurements which isn't that easy to do once the truck is taken apart and in hundreds of pieces. So just a word of caution about following guides or pictures of what others have done in their build and that is that it's good to get a base line or starting point but not always will your experience follow theirs unless you are using the exact same vehicles and mounting things in the exact same place.

But all in all he had nothing but good things to say about the truck and noticed things that other people missed like the motel key tag I use for the truck (I didn't steal this idea from River City, but thought it was funny to see him using a motel key tag from his honeymoon...mine was from a vacation in Canada way back in the early eighties that I have hung onto all of these years...lol), he also understands that the truck while I'm driving it everyday isn't finished and is still a work-in-progress and gave me a few good ideas on the exterior to add age to the patina while keeping the blue paint. It's also a good sign when someone spends more than a few minuets looking at your truck before opening their mouth and voicing their opinion which he did and in the end I got a two thumbs up which is nice since I value this guys opinion.

I'm about ready to put fuel in the truck again and will try to keep track to see what kind of mileage it's getting the '98 CV was suppose to get 16/22 and it does seem to sip fuel, at 16 mpg city that would be probably be a little less then double what my GMC 4x4 gets which is probably around 8-10 in the city.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.



Jon

[Blanger]

Dome Light

So I went with the cop light for the dome light using a 1156 LED bulb.



Running the wiring was pretty easy, I ran the wire through the A Pillar on the passenger side which is hollow, using a nut tied to the end of the wire provided enough weight for gravity to help the wire fall down the inside, it then exited out the fender upper mount hole that is in the bottom of the pillar, I used small 18g wire since it's no current load at all on the circuit, then ran the wire along with a power wire to one of the toggle switches in the console...used the light this morning and it's plenty of light, has a different kind of hue since the lens cover is white and the LED is white or clear hard to say actually what color the LED is but it reminds you of a florescent kitchen light...lol.



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Window lift roller

I got the new rollers for the window channel, wound up buying 4 so I'd have a couple spares just-in-case.



Nothing hard about replacing it, just lower the window, pull the clip that holds the roller while supporting the window, the arm will pop out and the old roller will just slide out the end of the track, slide the new one in, pop it on the arm and reinstall the clip, if you hadn't before now is a really good time to grease the channel the roller runs in, some form of light grease would be best even WD-40 would be better than nothing but probably wouldn't last very long.



While we had the panel off the door it was also a good time to replace the clips and screws that hold the panel on, we bought black #8 screws to replace most of the interior screws including the headliner when we install it.



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Another thing we did was to replace the drivers door gasket, I've had new door gaskets for a month or longer but didn't want to replace them until I was finished adjusting the passenger door, since the drivers door shut fine and the passenger door is now close to being right it was time, I got the drivers gasket on but used all the weatherstrip adhesive I had so I need to get more before doing the passenger side.



It wasn't a bad job, lots of prep work getting the old gasket off that was brittle and cleaning the surface of old adhesive, if you've never done this on your slick the bottom of the door has push pins that go into holes in the bottom of the door, most of the outside of the door is just held in place by two clips and weatherstrip adhesive, the top is all adhesive with maybe one clip, the inside (hinge side) is the trick bag side because the gaskets ends in the middle of the door (from top to bottom) right on top of a clip that holds each end of the gasket.

The clips are screwed to the door and will probably have to be bent back open before installing the new gasket, best advice I can give is to start at the bottom working your way up both sides slowly using some form of clamps to hold the gasket as the adhesive drys, once rounding both bottom corners I concentrated on going up the outside of the door first since the gasket has a molded area that has to fit the body line shown in the picture above. Just work slowly and clamp the area how ever you can and let the gasket adhesive cure for 10 minuets or so before moving on to the next area, once around to the back side of the door it gets much harder to do because of the close area to work in and the hinges being in the way, at the end I cut probably 2 inches off one end of the gasket to make it fit up with the other end in the clip.

Of course the door now takes more effort to close but should return to close to normal when the gasket gets compressed and finds it's new home.

Jon

[Blanger]

Front bumper (part one)

We got our front bumper mounts made and the bumper hung...... first let me apologize to the purists in the group for what I did and am doing to the bumper, just try to keep in mind what we are building, the theme and shape of the truck, and the fact that it can't be economically restored and that we basically saved this truck from going to the scrap yard and being crushed, yes we have come a long way and the truck has lots of potential today compared to what it was just 6 months ago, and yes to the casual viewer it at this point might appear that the truck is in good shape or better shape than it was and it is in fact much better. But it's still the same body with all it's flaws and in our opinion what we are doing is what is best for the truck to keep it on the road and be utilized as a daily driver which it does extremely well.

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If you are following along with our build you'll remember we bought a new '67 panted bumper to put on our '62, it is basically the same bumper with different mounting holes that don't match up with the '62 bumper mounts, since it's not a chrome bumper it's like any other piece of steel being that you can cut and weld, grind and paint pretty well without changing the shape, so first item of business was to fill in the holes in the bumper we would not use and make new holes where we needed them.






It was easy enough to make new holes in the bumper with a plasma cutter and use a step drill to bring them out to the proper size, then since we want to age the bumper to look like the rest of the truck it had to be sanded and painted, we used two different colors trying to get closer to the faded color of the grill which was white and over the years has turned to a cream color.




Then ground several places to bare metal as shown in the pictures above, these areas will get a rust treatment to try to age the bumper, since it's right below the grill it needs to look like it has been on the truck since day one and aged along with everything else.

When test fitting the bumper to make the frame mounts I found that if I cut about a inch off the center of the lower valance I could shove the bumper back closer to the body which makes it hug the valance and fenders so I cut it out and mocked everything up, then welded everything to the CV frame rails.





We then hung the bumper and started to try to age it....lol



Yes it's upside down...... which I'd guess some of you might not get the idea of why we did that, but the basic idea is that what is now the top of the bumper sits right at the fenders without cutting the bumper length removing material, and welding the ends back on which is how most people would suck the bumper into the body, I'm curious how many people will even notice that it's upside down, my guess is that not too many will, but we will see. lol

So after it was mounted I used a wire wheel in a drill to remove paint to simulate scratches and wear, then using a mixture of vinegar, hydrogen peroxide and salt made up a solution to make the bumper rust.



I've come to the conclusion that it's easier to make something new (like the bumper) look nice than to make it look like crap, I spent several hours spraying the noxious mixture and light sanding, it rusted right away and the liquid rust would run down the bumper (this of course has to be done with the bumper mounted so it looks real) giving the aging patina I was trying for but the paint is way too bright even after being sanded several times, I even tried pouring coffee on a rag and rubbing that in which had a mixed result but still not the effect I was looking for.

I have two more chemicals and another process to try before I just let mother nature take over and I'll save a finished picture till then to post, if I had it to do over again I would have removed the black paint that the bumper was painted in (front side only) when we got it, this might have made things a little easier and would have removed the black paint from the mix as far as dealing with it or seeing it when the white paint is removed. You would think that this would be easy but it has proven to be more difficult than I thought it was going to be....lol

Jon

[Blanger]

Wiring 101

I thought I might make a related post to address wiring and maybe help some of you that don't really understand how some components work in your electrical system, one of the most common items found on electrical systems is relays and they come in all types and applications, on a slick there are relays that the casual observer might not even be aware of, of course you have obvious things like the horn relay, but items like the voltage regulator if it's not a solid state unit is also a relay that opens and closes a set of contacts to charge the battery.

The newer the vehicle the more relays you will find and their basic role is to take a high amperage load off of a switch say like a headlight or wiper switch and use that switch to only energize the relay and the contacts in the relay then handle the high current load instead of the switch....as dumb as it sounds it's a switch being controlled by another switch it's just that the actual switch you control is a low amperage circuit and the relay control a high amperage circuit. This removes a lot of heat and premature failure from the actual switch the user manipulates to turn the item off and on.

By using relays the vehicle manufacturer is able to combine lots of different controls into one unit like the multi-function switch that most modern vehicles use to control turn signals, wipers, headlight dimmer, windshield washer, and maybe even the cruse control although most have that mounted in the steering wheel now. But relays are the work horse of moving electricity around in a vehicle, they come in lots of different shapes, styles, and rated amperage load.

When adding modern systems to a older vehicle relays can make the instillation not only safer by moving the high amperage load out of the interior of the vehicle simplifying that end of the wiring but can also make these system actually last longer and be safer to wire, a good example would be a electric cooling fan for the radiator. In this example the most basic wiring would be just a toggle switch to turn the fan motor off and on, but a better wiring solution would be to use a relay under the hood to control the fan power and use that toggle switch to turn the relay on and off.

Some people are intimidated by relays because they have more than two terminals and it's not readily apparent what each terminal does but I'll fill you guys in on a secret almost every relay made has a legend or schematic molded or printed on it (if it doesn't throw it in the trash) and it's pretty easy looking at it to tell what is what, then to make it even easier most of the terminals are numbered right next to it to avoid confusion.



It might be a little hard to see in the picture above but just grab a relay sometime and look, everything you need to know to wire it is right on the unit, you should be able to see the schematic on the side of the relay and even if you don't understand what it is showing you it's pretty easy to figure out which is that terminal #85 and #86 are what energizes the relay and that would be the control side that you would use a switch sending 12v through to pull the relay in to do it's job, terminals #87 and #30 are the load side, the relay gives you two circuits one normally open (current passes through the relay on these contacts when the relay isn't energized) or normally closed which kills the normally open set of contacts and sends power on those contacts and this would be where you would hook up your device that you are controlling. Most relays can not handle much of a load on the normally open circuit it might be used to show the ECM (computer) what state the relay is in (open would have voltage, closed would not) or might be used as a protection circuit to keep something on until the relay is in the closed position, in some cases the open position might be used just to power a light showing the circuit is off.

But the closed position is going to be the contacts in the relay that are able to handle whatever the rated amperage load it was designed for and that is the side that the user controls turning off and on, relays can be automated like in the example of a radiator cooling fan instead of a switch for you to turn off and on by adding a temperature switch to the mix that senses coolant temperature and is mounted in your intake manifold or upper tank of the radiator, these types of switches are calibrated to a certain temperature like 180 degrees and will close the circuit when the coolant reaches that temp turning the fan on until the coolant cools to a little below that temp and the switch will open turning the fan off....but again the relay is doing all the heavy lifting.

Of course when doing any type of wiring be sure to use fuses of the proper size to protect it and of course use wire that is the proper gauge to handle the amperage or current draw the device will need, as a example the control side of the toggle switch or temperature sensor switch a 10 or 15a fuse and 14g wire is all that should be needed but on the device side the wire and fuse size combination should match the manufacture recommendations which could be as high as 40-50a fuse and 10g wire, it's never a good idea to use wire that is too small to handle the current load because it will get hot and could at the least cause the device to fail prematurely and at the worst case could cause a electrical fire.....which would be embarrassing.

Hopefully this has helped some of us that is intimidated by wiring, if you'd like me to post more stuff like this pertaining to wiring just let me know..

Jon

[Blanger]

Week 6

It's Friday! and the end of another week.

A couple things to report, first the bumper agings is coming along I'll post a picture next week of what it looks like and what I've done to get it to the state it's in..lol I've got a new rattle that showed up on the passenger side, it takes a pretty severe pot hole (that's unavoidable hitting) to make it happen so it is going to be a little hard to track down but we'll dig around and see if we can figure it out. Power windows work flawlessly, this a really a easy conversion that is worth the cost and effort to do, I actually saw a picture the other day of another slick that had the PW conversion and like I thought the location they installed a set of PW switches in the drivers door was right above the access cover, it looked ok but is really low on the door making it a reach to get to the switches, not a big deal but it was also the only location I could find that would work when I decided to just put them in the console.

Before we did all the bumper stuff last weekend I took a look at the core support rubber mounts, I had mentioned in a previous post that the drivers side was compressing and was going to have to be shimmed to bring it back up to the proper height, after looking at both sides I took the bolts out and used a floor jack to lift the support back into position and pulled the drivers side rubber mount out, turns out I had forgot to put the steel sleeve in the rubber bushing so it's no wonder the rubber was highly compressed. I decided to replace both core support bushings, I grabbed a couple of the left over CV mounts that are two piece, found a couple sleeves that were the proper length and slapped one in each side, the passenger side was fine with the large flat washers, but the drivers side I had to add two of the thick flat washers to make up the difference. The taller bushings of course required longer bolts that I had to dig up, but now the core support is back at the proper height which makes the body line coming from the back to the front following the tops of the fenders look correct, it was noticeably dipping towards the ground on the driver-side front corner, now is straight and flat along the length of the body as it's should be.

A small observation........ the truck rides nice, the suspension of course is CV so it handles like and basically is a car for all piratical purposes, but reusing the slick's bench seat added a old truck element to the ride, modern cars and trucks use just a few springs and make up most of the cushion with molded foam which compresses with your weight and conforms to hold you in the seat, old vehicles didn't use foam but relied on springs to support the weight of the passengers, the springs had a distinctive "bounce" when hitting a bump or driving on uneven roads which even though we added foam to the seat above the springs it still has that bouncy feel. It's not a big deal to me and is one of the reasons I did install seat belts in the truck (to hold you in place) but it's something to consider if you plan on using the slicks seat, of course there are lots of other more modern seats that could be used that wouldn't bounce you around......just something to think about.

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Something I never mentioned about taking the CV apart was the amount of money we found in the car...... it was a pretty good stack of change amounting to a couple dollars.



Hope everyone has a great weekend!



Jon

[bruceandersson]

I want to know what piratical purposes you are up to.

[SteveCanup]

I had a 'rattle' in my '64 that drove me crazy...finally after crawling all over the underside and in the engine compartment I found a broken piece of heavy black "rubber"(? that's the best way to describe it) that held the bottom of the inner fender to the firewall. It had disintegrated and was letting the bottom of the inner fender 'rattle' against whatever was close to it. I was touching and pulling on everything I could to find that rattle.....they will drive you insane, lol...

And "piratical" purposes sounds like you are boarding sailing ships and stealing their gold....(Maybe that is how you are financing your build, lol)

[Blanger]

I want to know what piratical purposes you are up to.

Bruce,

LOL...... it's all "practical" in my warped mind, might have been a poor choice of words but it's really odd driving a vehicle that is a car on the bottom but is all truck on top, it doesn't drive like a truck at all (not even like a modern truck, although closer) but looking at it your mind sez TRUCK but driving your mind sez CAR which creates a mental conflict that I have to struggle with every day, maybe there are some meds to fix the mental issue?

Jon

[Blanger]

finally after crawling all over the underside and in the engine compartment I found a broken piece of heavy black "rubber"

Steve,

Actually that is a good call that I'll have to look at, I didn't install or reuse the rubber your talking about on our new inner fenders, and haven't really looked at just how close that end is to the firewall, I did make mounts connecting the inner fenders to the CV frame to support the inner fender close to that area but I know the end or side that had the rubber bolted to it I did nothing with and could be the cause.....thank you!

Jon

[Blanger]

Another thing I just thought about as far as the rattle is if you look at this picture you can see how bad the hood is tweaked......



When we got the truck the hood was off of it and I had to weld the inner bracing that the hinges bolt to back to the hood skin before installing it because it was separated almost all the way across the width of the hood.

I just walked out to see if it might be the hood rattling around and by pushing on it the passenger corner goes up and down but the drivers does not, I also have not replaced the rubber stops that go in the top of the fenders that the hood should rest on.....most of them are not there, so that is something to add to the list of things to get next order, I really don't think it's the source of the rattle since inside the cab it really sounds like the passenger side in the B pillar area so could still be the passenger door we'll see after I replace the door gasket on that side.

Jon

[unibody madness]

Similar problem with my LWB I am beginning to think my tailgate is causing the problem, makes you think its the passenger door or body mount, Try driving it with a piece of rubber wedged in the gate so it can not rattle. It does not do it on mine when I strap a load across the gate.

[Blanger]

Similar problem with my LWB I am beginning to think my tailgate is causing the problem, makes you think its the passenger door or body mount, Try driving it with a piece of rubber wedged in the gate so it can not rattle. It does not do it on mine when I strap a load across the gate.

Thanks for the idea......

Not sure though, my tailgate is very tight to open...it requires two hands and a considerable amount of effort to get it off the tabs, once off the tabs it works freely but it could be the arms rattling around that hold the tailgate when it's open but it sounds closer to the cab, it's odd because there is no noise hitting little bumps but a big bump is the only thing that makes it happen, it could also be the speaker box I built since it's only mounted to the cab floor and it's right up against the rear of the cab it could be moving at the top hitting the back of the cab.

Jon

[Angry]

gotta say, love your thread, some great information n tips .
Tnank you, found it most informative...

Im about to get into my 64 F100 here in Australia,..we hae very stringent registration regs,..any reasonable modifications must be signed off with an independent engineer.

Im building a crusier n driver, it will have a 86 Jaguar IFS ,..so itll steer n drive quite well...the rear will simply be leaves but lovered a reasonable amount, i'll be running a late model Aussie Falcon 302 EFI Roller motor n 4 speed Auto,,similar to your Mustangs,..the patina n bodywork will stay as is.

Ive gleaned some great tips n hints form your build, I look forward to reading more.

Al.