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[6166 Junkyard Dog]

I did get that 61 uni-body all squared away , So I will have that truck in the yard in Vegas when I get out there next Friday and see what it's like , from what I have seen bumper looks perfectly straight,, Tom

[My wife's nightmare]

Cool!! Hopefully its a decent truck. I'll get with you in a week or so. Thank you again!

[My wife's nightmare]

Not any huge progress being made this week but lots of little things getting sorted out. Talked to the muffler shop not far from the house and he said he would be willing to run exhaust for me if I bring him just the chassis. Hoping that can happen real soon. So this week I made the throttle linkage out of a piece of 1/4" SS tubing and a couple rod ends, don't have a picture mainly because it's just a straight piece of tubing tapped on each end with rod ends threaded in. Worked out really well so that means something is going to pop up sooner or later! Finished tubing and mounting the reservoir for the clutch master cylinder. Thanks Jeff for letting me borrow your awesome flaring tool! I've not been happy with all of the extra wires that have been added to the "Run" post on the ignition switch, so I picked up a small fuse block to correct some of that. It got installed late last night, not wired yet, and didn't get any photos yet. Planning to wire it today if I have time after church. Put the inner fenders and radiator support back on and checked where the heater hoses and fuel line will need clamps/brackets but haven't made those yet. (Pondering them in my head ) The engine is buttoned up and started running radiator hoses but I knew that would require some modifications. I'm running a crossflow style with the inlet on the passenger side and outlet on the driver side. This is good because Fox body Mustang hoses are the same orientation and I had a set of silicon hoses for a Mustang. However they were too short so I've been trying to find aluminum connectors but none that were long enough. So I bought a tube bead roller and a couple feet of tubing and made it all work. I am impressed with the tool that came from Amazon and I can see it getting used for many other projects.



This is the upper hose which is 1 1/2" and 10" long. The lower hose is 1 3/4" x 5". need to get some more clamps and another small obstacle conquered!

Hope y'all stay healthy and find plenty of time to enjoy your families and friends and also sneak in a bit for your favorite Slick!!

[JeffinMooresville]

Looks good Doug, 1 step closer. On Blue truck, I probably spent a couple hundred bucks buying the wrong rad hose, trying to find one that will fit. Haven’t thought about rad on black truck.

[My wife's nightmare]

No big update, just getting little things done here and there. Did cut a whole in the floor for the shifter, now to make a handle for it. Finally welded a new crossmember in the rear, behind the gas tank. Took awhile to determine where it needed to be and still have room to get to the bumper bracket bolts and the rearmost bed bolts. Looks like it's going to work out ok. Speaking of the rear bumper brackets, they have fairly legible casting numbers still on them, after blasting ALOT of rust off them. I found it interesting the numbers are 62 (C2) numbers.

This shot is prior to completely blasting one side:



Here is a closeup of the casting numbers:

picture sharing

Hopefully next post will have some more pictures of the "little" things I've been doing. Y'all take care out there!

[SteveCanup]

It's the "little things" that add up to be "big things" lol

[My wife's nightmare]

Yes the little things add up to big things, just usually not a "good" big thing for me

[9Fingers]

I've been watching your build. Good looking truck. I really like the light green paint.

[My wife's nightmare]

Hey Jeff, didn't mean to ignore your post about buying all those hoses for the 63. Look at it this way, now you have plenty of samples for the 65!!

A couple weeks ago, I took the rear bumper to my buddy with the white Fairlane's house and he let me use him and his press to try straightening out the damage to it. (I do have a press but its up against the wall and I also knew it'd be easier with two sets of hands!) I will get this photographic documentation thing down one of these days but I did not get a before picture of the bumper. Took about an hour and it came out really nice! Didn't have to get the torch out but did have to get fairly creative with some of the blocking at times. My buddy won't be able to split any firewood cause his wedge didn't survive the entire straightening process I spent what time I had yesterday mounting the "new" rear bumper. Took a few tries and did get the torch out to tweak the passenger side brackets, but I think it is where it is supposed to be. We'll see what it looks like if the bed ever gets finished. You can also see the rear crossmember that was installed behind the gas tank. So far, all of the holes look like they'll be accessible and usable,



closest diesel gas station to my location

[My wife's nightmare]

Ok finally got the stars to line up and took the chassis to a local muffler shop. I really hoped they could figure a way to run full exhaust with tailpipes but he didn't want to try without the bed on it and he didn't see a clean way of getting around the shocks/springs and gas tank. So I got turndowns just before the rear axle, which I'm totally happy with. I really want to hear what it sounds like but not ready to break-in the engine yet. I was waiting to do the exhaust in case I needed to add a crossmember or something for hangers but only had to add on to the coilover crossmember. Here is a shot of it the day of the install.

Here is what it looks like as of today:

It is amazing that it all came apart in less than three evenings. Took three years to get it the first picture!! Now to find time to finish some welds, fill some holes I didn't need, sandblast it and get it in epoxy. I have quite a bit of work to do where I filled all of the original holes in the frame by tapping the hole, welding a bolt in it, and cutting the bolt off as close to flush as I could. It will look like it had a bad case of chicken pox if I don't address all of those. But that's a ways off, lots of things going on at the house and work is busy as well.

Hey Tom, I haven't forgotten to call you, just trying to plan a time to come visit!

[JeffinMooresville]

Man that shop looks clean. All of the work on that frame is going to payoff and look great when it gets in paint.

Jeff

[My wife's nightmare]

Well believe it or not, I'm still alive and actually working on the truck! Since my last post I bought a 1990 Mustang LX 5.0 with 67,000 actual miles. It had a lot of little things that needed attention so spent a month or so on it, still need to fix the A/C but the windows go up and down so I'm good We also got a puppy the 14th of June. He's a mini Schnauzer, my wife (April) is allergic to dogs and he's "hypo-allergenic". We had a female that had to be put to sleep February and April was ready for some furry feet in the house again. His name is Max, 3.1 pounds:

Since my last update, got all the suspension parts in paint. Its a dark GM metallic gray with clearcoat. Still need to reassemble the front control arms but there in a safe place for now:


I'm very happy with the rear end housing. Lots of coats of high build and sanding to cover up all of the pitting. Too bad nobody will ever see it, but I know its slick!
Did get the rear axle put back together. Replaced the pinion seal and checked the bearings and all the clearances in the center section. This truck must not have had many miles on it, everything looked really good. We'll see how loud it is when it's under power. There was a "14" chalk marked on the center section so I tried to put that back:


Took the frame to the blaster last week. Got it back Wednesday afternoon. Huge thanks to April for helping me get it back on the rotisserie and helping haul it outside for some epoxy before it got dark


Shot the first coat of polyester primer on it Thursday. Looks like there will be several gallons of that going on it before its smooth enough for some paint (plus all the weeks of sanding!!) I just thought the rearend was rough! At least all of the rust is gone


Almost finished with the initial sanding, going to try to fix some of the worst areas with body filler and/or All-Metal. Then more primer and sore fingers!
Hope y'all are staying healthy and I am still keeping up with everything on here.

[shipwrecked]

Congrats on the Mini pup. I have three now. Rescued the latest Kaiser about two months ago.
Hilda and Diesel are working on accepting him.

[My wife's nightmare]

April, I knew you were a Schnauzer mom and congrats on number 3!!! We tried really hard to adopt/rescue one but it was a terrible experience. No return calls, send references so they can do background checks, etc, etc! But we're tickled with the pup, almost 10 pounds on his 4 month birthday. Hopefully all of yours are getting along fine. Nothing to post on the truck except still spreading body filler on the pitted frame and sanding when I get a few free minutes

[My wife's nightmare]

Not much to update except hopefully the frame is ready for some high build primer this weekend and then some blocking. MY wife and I have been cleaning out my momma and daddy's house and outbuildings for the last several months. They've both passed away and we're renting it beginning October 1. Rented a 14 yard rolloff last Thursday and had it full Saturday afternoon. The dumpster people picked it up Sunday morning at 9:00, left an empty, and we had it full by 1:30 Sunday afternoon. So that's where I've been spending my truck time but should befreed up for a little while, still have to clean out the attic but waiting for cooler weather!

[grump]

I know what you're going through, about 6 years ago we had to clean out my parents farm. 52 years accumulation and it took my brother and me all summer to get it done. Your work on your truck looks good, keep it up.

[My wife's nightmare]

Well thanks to my lovely assistant (my wife April) who drove the tractor so we could pull the frame and rotisserie out in the yard, and the beautiful weather the Lord blessed us with Saturday, I was able to get a coat of high build primer applied. Its been curing in the shop and hopefully sanding will commence shortly. Believe it or not this is a new picture from Saturday evening not a repost!!

Looks like this will take care of all of the pitting. No estimate on a date for color

[My wife's nightmare]

Sorry Grump, I got ahead of myself. My daddy actually passed in 2007 but due to some family issues, his garages were never sorted out and since then my mom decided to "store" lots of things on top of his things so......., and we moved there in December 1976, so a very similar story. I'm sorry y'all had to go through the same thing. It is fun to find a little surprise here and there though

[My wife's nightmare]

Same ol story here, still sanding but an inch or so a day means I'm forecasting being paint-ready sometime around...........................................(I really have no dadgum idea!!)

[My wife's nightmare]

So time for a real update:
Had a friend of mine finally paint the frame. He suggested I get another quart of base just in case. Took the original quart to the paint store and the counter man looks at the label and says we mixed this in February 2019!! (Price by the way was almost triple)
Here it is when it came back home:


And with a little help from Max:

Here it is as of this afternoon:


Also since my last post, I picked up a 60 model bed. Its in really good shape even if it is a long bed. It will have an appointment with a cutoff wheel and a welder one of these days. Thanks Jeff for sending the info to me and riding down to look at it!
Happy Thanksgiving to all of y'all!!