Slick 60's

I like your philosophy Jon. Everything is well thought out....I'm sure you will find a home for the washer tank, maybe put it under the driver's seat, lol....

SteveCanup wrote:I like your philosophy Jon. Everything is well thought out....I'm sure you will find a home for the washer tank, maybe put it under the driver's seat, lol....

Actually.... I did find a place for it that I'll show you guys next week, I thought about mounting it to the firewall (there is room) but my wife wouldn't be able to reach it without standing on something so that was out, I look at every vehicle that comes through the shop anymore, always looking at those type of items to get from salvage, but it's not just items like the washer tank it's just about everything under the hood that looks like it could be scavenged and used...lol I really look at vehicles from a totally different perspective now, it use to be I looked to see how hard a given job like a water pump might be on that vehicle, now it's what could be harvested for a build.

You were joking I know but on the '62 I was thinking about mounting one in the bed under the false floor at one point, it's not a have-to-have item but this time of the year you really appreciate being able to clean the windshield from the comfort of your vehicle. lol

BTW those little hood sprayers are damn expensive for what they are....

Jon

Final Assembly (part 2)

Monday after the inner fenders and core support were sorted out it was time to hang the front fenders, yeah they will have to come off at least one more time for paint but we need to get the alignment correct and get them bolted down to the radiator support and inner fenders then the fenders can come on and off at any point and as many times as is necessary after the core support and inner fenders are cinched down.

So hanging both front fenders they need to be shimmed out to fit the cowl couture, about 3/8's of a inch on the driver's side and about 1/4" on the passenger side, the front fenders while not in really bad shape (no rust holes) have had a pretty hard life, they are fine for what we are building but would have been thrown away in a full on restoration, actually the fenders that came with the other '62 step side are in better shape and we may swap them before paint.





While I'm working on the fenders my wife is priming the front of the bed and back of the cab, Sunday she primed the dash and sanded it back down then primed it again, today she also painted the dash and I'll save pictures of that for a later post when we talk about paint.




After a hour or so of messing with the front fenders, moving the radiator support back and forth I finally get to a happy medium, I had to elongate the hole in the frame on the driver's side about a 1/4" more so the support would move far enough to the driver's side and I called it good enough.

With this part taken care of we tightened the core support bolts down for the last time (hopefully), we used a level on the fenders to check that they are flat front to back while tightening the support bolts we just wanted to keep a eye on them in case we needed to shim the mounts to keep them flat...they were fine in the end, all I need to do now is shim the inner fenders at the firewall and tighten them down.

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With this portion basically finished next weekend I plan on doing the interior wiring harness, the wife has already painted the steering column and brake pedal assembly so they are ready to install once I get the harness thinned and installed, I'm guessing, but if it's like the CV was I'll spend a couple days thinning circuits out of the harness before I can install it.



We have talked about power door locks, and briefly looked around to see if anyone has done that mod to a slick, we see kits but really no homebrew solution like the power windows using the Saturn motors, since we have the circuits and a fob I thought it might be a cool feature to have power door locks so I may leave those circuits for the front doors and remove it along with the rest of the rear door wiring. If anyone has any info on putting power door locks in a slick I'd be interested in learning more.

But anyway that is the next project, after the interior harness is reinstalled hopefully it will fire back up....we'll see. There isn't as many circuits in the RM harness as the CV P71 had so it should go a little quicker, but I'll have to run the rear ABS, fuel pump, taillight wiring before the bed goes back on, and the fuses panel mounts to the firewall, on the CV it was mounted under the dash but to the dash not the firewall.

There are a few boxes I'll have to find a home for but will be removing the air bag module and I'll leave the VATS module and use the Painless delete box we bought after it runs again, since we are reusing the RM steering column it should start right back up..... I hope. lol

So worst possible case we should be a couple weeks before it moves under its own power once again which should be the last big hurdle to jump, still lots to do but getting it running again signals we are getting close to the end of the big aspects of the build and really are about right on track to where I thought we should be time-wise.

The list of things yet to do is rather long, it will of course need all the normal rebuild of the window felts, rubbers, and anti-rattlers, all the sound deadening, insulation has to be done to the interior, power window conversion, all the lighting, headliner, console and audio, seating (still planning on recovering the RM seat and installing it in the Uni and putting that seat in the '65), door locks, roll pan, bed floor, etc , etc, like I said the list is still long and I didn't even mention paint or the ageing/weathering of the paint, but like I said above making it run and move under its own power is my main goal at this point.

I'd really like to get the '62 step side cab moved into the shop in the next few weeks, we will need to pull the windshield out of it to put in the '65, we already have the new rubber gasket and I'm looking for advice from any of you that have replaced the windshield in your slick, it's something I've never done and I'm a little leery of breaking the windshield. ...so any advice, tips, or tricks would be appreciated.

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A couple notes: First is that last weekend I decided to use a second camera to take a few pictures, I normally use our Cannon DSLR with a 10-22 wide angle lens, it's a great camera that I have used for years, but I also have a small 20 mega-pixel Olympus camera that I use at work sometimes to take pictures of things and email to customers. The small camera had a dead battery the other day, I charged it and thought I'd take a few pictures with it since it gets used very little (cell phone cameras are just as good and a lot simpler to send pictures now-a-days), anyway I didn't change the default settings because of the dead battery and the pictures were just crap, I changed the settings and will try it again next weekend. The reason to use this camera is it has a auto flash and is small and compact, it normally takes great pictures and would be easier to capture some things... we will see how it works.

Second item is that one of our members River City (Matt) is going to do another unibody truck and post the videos on YouTube, I'll leave this video here so anyone who is interested or followed his other build can take a look, if you like what he is doing subscribe to his channel I'm sure he would appreciate it.



Matt and his channel was one of the influences on me that kinda' shoved me in the direction we went on the '62 uni which gave me the confidence to do the '65 on a Roadmaster chassis, text and pictures are nice and a reasonable way to tell a story but seeing videos leaves nothing to the imagination, you can get so much more information from a video and Matt is a good story teller, if you have a interest in slicks and chassis swaps his channel is one of the few on YouTube.

Like I said before we thought about doing videos during the build of the '65 and posting them on YouTube, I even dug out our HD camera and charged the battery packs up, but the sad fact is that if I would have done that we wouldn't be half as far as we are now, the time it takes to edit raw video into something that is enjoyable and informative to watch is measured in hours per video, as much as I'd like to produce the videos I just refuse to devote the time. I do have a YouTube channel that I've had for years, it is monetized so I could make a little money from producing the videos and I'm sure they would be a better way to tell the story...but I just can't devote the time and maintain a decent build schedule, the money aspect isn't important (it would be nice...but) I basically would have to give up a whole day every week to do nothing but edit video.... that just isn't going to happen.

So support Matt if you can, not only is he sharing his experiences he is taking the time to produce the videos while doing a build, working to make a living, and spending time with his family, it's a lot on his plate and I appreciate his efforts.

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Last item is we are going Saturday (if it's still available) to look at a '09 CV P71 with less than 90k on it that is wrecked, if it turns out to be what the guy says it is we might buy it for the '62 step side build, it's cheap enough and the body damage will have no effect on what we would do with it, my only concern is if the frame is hurt because it's hit in the right rear quarter but is drivable so the guy sez. If that works out we will be saving two vehicles from the scrapper (well at least the '62 step side)...lol

Jon

Keep it up, Jon. Next thing you know...you and your wife will have your own show like "Overhaulin" or "Gas Monkey" lol....you're doing great work and it helps when your wife is involved with the build. I am lucky to have my wife's moral support...and sometimes she will come out and help bleed brakes or hold a wrench, etc. She's waiting for me to find a 302 with an automatic to put into my '64 so she can drive it. She can't drive a manual to save her life, lol. Also thanks for the video, Matt does great work and I have subscribed...

SteveCanup wrote: Next thing you know...you and your wife will have your own show like "Overhaulin" or "Gas Monkey"

I'm not photogenic enough, who wants to look at a over the hill old white dude working in his garage....oh wait! lol

SteveCanup wrote: it helps when your wife is involved with the build. I am lucky to have my wife's moral support.

It makes a huge difference, the moral support is enough (beats the constant bitchin' and naggin' some women seem to like to do, (No offense to anyone just basing that statement from my past experiences)), but a extra hand and opinion is always welcome. My wife is really atypical compared to most women I've been around, she has a female side but spent most of her life growing up in a garage (her dad had is own business) so she knows just about as much as most guys when it comes to fixing things which is a nice, in some ways she has too much confidence and takes on projects that are more involved than she might have originally thought but always sticks to the task and completes it which is admirable. Just the fact that she wanted the truck we are building should give you a idea about her, most women wouldn't want to ride in a old truck much less have it as a daily driver unless it was really sharp looking.

SteveCanup wrote:Matt does great work and I have subscribed...

No problem, just trying to help out a fellow member of the forum, I'm sure Matt will appreciate the sub.

So how much snow did you get?

Jon

Jon...we got 4-5 inches plus it was icy here....everyone is staying in until Friday...still frigid here today.

SteveCanup wrote:Jon...we got 4-5 inches plus it was icy here....everyone is staying in until Friday...still frigid here today.

Steve,

I had someone PM me about image hosting, can you post which one you use?

TIA

Jon

Jon - I'm new to this forum, found it by accident while searching Google for anything Unibody related. I have a 62 Uni that used to be my shop truck 30+ years ago when I owned a body shop. I always thought it would be nice to restore it. I have a low mileage chev 454 big block with a turbo400 trans sitting in the corner of the garage that I thought I would put in it. Even thought about calling it a "SS454ord". Then I saw the feature article in the Oct 2014 issue of Classic Trucks of the uni that was on a Buick Roadmaster frame. The conversion was done by Drew Brothers Customs in Chandler Arizona. That really got me excited. So now I have acquired a 1995 Roadmaster wagon with all the bells and whistles, trailer tow package, load leveling rear suspension, dual exhaust etc. I started searching Google again looking for info on Uni/Roadmaster frame swaps but there isn't much out there. Then I found this post. Thank you for all the details and photo's. It's like having a step by step instruction manual. I also spoke with Rob at Drew Brothers Customs. He was kind enough to send me a few photos of Uni projects in progress. They do their swaps using the RM firewall/cowl and part of the floor and removing part of the Uni firewall and floor. This is what I've decided to do since my floor and front body mounts are very rusted away. I know it will require a bit of fabrication to join the two together, but that's the fun part !! I would be glad to post those photo's if anyone is interested, but I will need to have someone tell me how to post photo's. Thanks again for the terrific post. Looking forward to following this one and any of your future projects.

Tim

snoracer wrote: I'm new to this forum, found it by accident while searching Google for anything Unibody related.

Welcome Tim,

snoracer wrote: So now I have acquired a 1995 Roadmaster wagon with all the bells and whistles

Cool, that will make a great donor vehicle, I had the same problem with finding info on doing a swap on a Roadmaster, there just isn't any info out there which is why I'm posting our build here, since you're new to the forum you might not know that last year we built a '62 unibody on a '98 CV P71 (cop car) and it has been my daily driver since September.

It's funny the very same article you referred to Steve (forum member) sent to me when we were talking about using a RM for our '65 build, it would seem other than one YouTube video I found to be the only source of info on this type of swap.

So do you plan on putting the big block in the truck or keep the LT1?

I'm a die hard Chevy fan (have been all my life) but have a soft spot for slicks especially Unibodys, they are so unique and different.

If you have any questions feel free to ask I'll be glad to help in anyway I can with your build.

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If you noticed above I asked Steve about the image hosting he is using, he'll post the info and I'm sure would be glad to help you if you have any questions or problems with it.

Again Welcome to Slick60's we are glad to have you aboard.

Jon

Thanks Jon for the welcome. I too am a Chevy guy, always have been, but I have always liked the slicks ever since my dad bought a 1964 back in the day. Funny, being a chevy guy I have a yard full of non chevy projects.
I will stick with the entire RM drivetrain since it only has 137,00 miles on it and it runs great. I plan on retaining and using as much of the RM wiring harness as possible. Maybe even try to adapt the power windows and locks from the RM into the uni. I imagine that at some point the computer will need a reflash to eliminate the air bags and anything else that isn't needed anymore. Any idea where I can find a wiring schematic for the RM? I'm still in the parts and info gathering mode yet, so this project will have to wait a bit. I have a 1951 Packard that is waiting for a 6 to 12 volt conversion and a tranny swap. Putting a 700r4 in her to replace the tired old 2 speed. It's our current vintage ride. Drove it to the Goodguys event in Des Moines last year and realized that the trany upgrade is badly needed.

I'll watch for Steve's post on how to attach photo's. Thanks in advance for the help.

Tim

snoracer wrote: I have a 62 Uni that used to be my shop truck 30+ years ago when I owned a body shop

Tim,

A couple things while I'm thinking about it......

For the most general purposes there is really no difference between using a CV (Crown Vic) or a RM (Roadmaster), having said that any guide you find about mounting the body on a donor chassis in general terms it is the same because the chassis are very similar. One area you will want to be aware of is the interior cab steps, if you plan on using the RM floor then it doesn't matter but if you plan on using the slicks floor depending on the ride height or stance your looking for there are things you will have to do. If you look at our '62 on the CV chassis everything I had to do to mount it would be the same on the RM chassis, both donors use what is called a perimeter frame and being in the body business I'm sure you know what that is.

On our '62 we wanted a lowered stance so the unibody is sat right on the frame then raised the height of the rubber body mounts, we kept the slicks floor and had to cut the riser area of the inner steps to clear the frame rails, this would be the same on the RM chassis, if you are looking for that type of lowered stance do not waste your time repairing or replacing the front cab mounts on the '62 because you will wind up cutting them out to clear the RM frame rails. If your not going for that lowered stance then you may be able to replace the sheet metal mount and fabricate a frame mount to connect it to, but be aware that the higher you raise the slicks body off the frame rails the more of the actual RM frame you will be able to see looking at the vehicle from the side, if that doesn't bother you...it's not a big deal.

Then the torque box in the rear, just cut it out, you will have to fabricate a mount in that area to support the back of the cab and the front of the bed, you can look at either of my build threads to see what we did to reinforce the back of the cab and to mount the body to the chassis.

Here's a pic of the uni that might give you a idea of what we did to eliminate the torque box and mount the cab.



As I said before if you have any questions just ask I'll try to help.

Jon

snoracer wrote:I plan on retaining and using as much of the RM wiring harness as possible. Maybe even try to adapt the power windows and locks from the RM into the uni. I imagine that at some point the computer will need a reflash to eliminate the air bags and anything else that isn't needed anymore. Any idea where I can find a wiring schematic for the RM?

Well your just in time because that is my weekend project thinning the interior wiring harness...lol

As for as schematics just about every circuit you can find on the internet through a google search, just type in what your looking for and then switch to images at the top of the google search, scroll through till you find what your looking for and in a lot of cases can print them out to take to the vehicle, I had to buy a Ford factory CD to do the CV but the RM seems most everything is at your finger tips through a search, a tip, if you can't find it under roadmaster use impala or caprice and you should find what you need.

This link might help you...

http://www.goldsswagon.com/diagrams/wiringindex.htm

As far as a reflash, yeah you might want to do that but it depends on what you choose to use for a instrument cluster, the RM is OBD2 compliant so you could use OBD2 gauges but if your going to reuse the RM cluster you will probably either want to invest in a tuner that can flash the ECM or pull the bulbs for the air bag, and anything else monitored you might delete, on our '62 I kept most everything except the air bags and have no CEL (check engine light) on but do have a air bag light on and the ABS works just like it should....there are lots of options when you get to that point in the build.

Jon

I was using Photobucket...then they pirated everyone's pics (actually, held them ransom for money). Anyway, April Reid mentioned www.postimage.org and I went there and set up an account and moved (most) of my pics there. It works great for what we want to do on here and it's easier to use than photobucket ever was....

Welcome to the forum Tim. We want to see pics of your truck!

Blanger wrote: As for as schematics just about every circuit you can find on the internet through a google searchThis link might help you...

http://www.goldsswagon.com/diagrams/wiringindex.htm

Jon - thanks for the link. It looks like it has plenty of info.

SteveCanup wrote:I was using Photobucket...then they pirated everyone's pics (actually, held them ransom for money). Anyway, April Reid mentioned http://www.postimage.org and I went there and set up an account and moved (most) of my pics there. It works great for what we want to do on here and it's easier to use than photobucket ever was....

Steve - Thanks for the welcome and the photo link. I'll try it. Can I PM you if I have trouble figuring it out ?

Thanks again,
Tim

snoracer wrote:Steve - Thanks for the welcome and the photo link. I'll try it. Can I PM you if I have trouble figuring it out ?

Sure Tim...anything that I can do to help out. Besides, we want to see some pics of your truck. Start a build thread on here when you start it.

Final Assembly (Part 3)

Interior Wiring Harness

Any of you who followed the '62 uni thread will remember that I joined the forum about mid-stream of that build and was doing the interior wiring when I started that thread, the CV interior harness was loaded with extra P71 or "Cop circuits" that Ford added to the normal harness to facilitate police departments adding the extra devices they needed to outfit the cars for duty. A lot of that was kept in the '62 build because they provided good electrical access points for other devices that I installed, but a lot of it was removed also, the whole process of thinning the CV harness took me several days to complete and required a factory wiring diagram to identify each and every circuit.

The Roadmaster wasn't like that at all, in fact from start to finish took about 4 hours to remove the unneeded circuits and prep the harness for installation. I don't like to make comparisons where I pick on manufactures for things they did in my opinion wrong but I do think it needs to be pointed out that there were major differences in how the wiring harnesses were originally constructed, on the CV P71 everything was "hard wired" which eliminates potential failure points, GM on the other hand chose to use plugs in locations to gang smaller groups of wiring into a larger harness, these plugs made it very simple to remove wiring like all the door circuits in one action....just unplug it from the rest of the harness, too simple.

About the only "hard wired" circuits I had to cut from the harness were the airbag module - bag wiring, HVAC, and radio - speaker, these circuits were easy to identify since we tagged every connection when we disassembled the RM, working backwards from those plugs it was a easy task once the black tape was removed from the harness to follow the wires back to a major junction or bulkhead connector and just cut them out. So in the end I removed everything door related from all 4 doors by just unplugging that portion of the harness, and cut out the rest of the unneeded circuits.



There is still a lot of interior harness to deal with, probably over 50 times the amount of wires that the original slick wiring had but there is a whole lot more going on that wasn't happening with the slick. lol

Some of you may remember when we did the power windows on the '62 that we had to buy wiring pigtails for the power window switches, in the roadmaster there were 4 of those connectors (one per door) that we can harvest for the '65 and any future builds.



In the end this is the pile of wire I removed....



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With the harness thinned, on Sunday I started laying it out in the '65, because of how it routed around the bundle of wires that has to go to the rear and out of the cab really fell in the center of the cab floor, the RM like the CV used plastic conduits to run wires under the carpet but unlike the CV these were made to run on the side of the foot-wells along the depression in the floor that would be on the interior side of the rocker panels, they are tall instead of being flat like the CVs was so I couldn't reuse them at all.

So to get the wire bundle out of the cab I cut a 3" hole in the floor behind the seat (in front of the rear cab mount area - brace) and used one of the RM rubber door wiring conduits (goes between the A pillar and the door) to make a grommet for the wire bundle to exit the cab.




Running the wire bundle down the center of the cab is really a better place for it since it will get covered with a console and be well protected from any foot traffic, once the sound deaden-er is installed on the floor there shouldn't be any noticeable hump in the floor mat, either way it is in a low traffic area that should keep it safe.

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The wire bundle that went from the interior harness back through the drivers side of the firewall worked out fine, it has a molded rubber boot that fit a hole I cut in the firewall during the mock up using a pattern cut from the original RM firewall, this harness powers part of the front lighting, brake proportioning valve (failure light),front air bag sensor (deleted), left front ABS sensor, and the windshield washer pump and low fluid indicator....all went right back into it's place with no modification although the washer tank connections will have to be lengthen to get to the new location of the tank.



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The passenger side bulkhead wiring connection fit prefect with the location we cut in the slicks firewall under the heater box, this is the main connection between the engine harness, power distribution box and the interior harness.



Here's a couple pictures of the air bag module, VATS module and the drivers side connection of the interior harness.





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The rear harness was wrapped in convoluted tubing and ran along the drivers side of the frame to the rear, there is one ground connection that has to be made for the fuel pump and rear lighting in this harness.





With the rear harness ran, I took the time to relocate the EVAP canister to the passenger side of the frame behind the cab, I'll plumb it back up later but I want to reuse it so the fuel tank is vented correctly.



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With all of that complete we are ready to install the bed which is where I'll pick this up tomorrow....

Jon

Final Assembly (part 4)

Bed Install....

With the rear portion of the wiring ran along the frame we could take the time to install the bed, Saturday while I was working on the interior harness my wife was painting the back of the cab and the front of the bed, we have decided to two tone the truck, it will get aged and weathered into a fake patina and so to avoid removing the bed again these two areas had to be prepped and painted.



A brief note to the painters and body men out there that might be reading this, we are rattle can painting the truck, our end objective here is to have cohesive color on the truck that we will age, it's not to have a slick glossy flawless paint job because we are going to age and weather it into a patina, we actually want rust, I mean our slogan is "In Rust We Trust" lol so if you're looking for flawless bodywork and paint this isn't going to be it..... and if you think this is bad it's not as bad a body as the uni was which is way better than the cab for the step side, all in all this truck with all its flaws is 100% better than the unibody and 500% better than the step side cab, in almost every case or build we are saving a truck from being scraped and while the '65 was savable the uni and the step side were destined to be scrapped because better trucks could be had to start a project or build with it's not like slicks are that rare.

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So we dropped the bed on the chassis, I had to shim both sides of the front bed mounts to get the cab and bed body lines where they needed to be (we did this during mock up also), bolted down the front of the bed and went around to the back. My wife had bought a roll pan for the bed that was made of sheet metal and has a indent for the license plate. This is a really nice piece made by a company called Mar-K that is a trim to fit, the couture was great, metal thickness was great, packaging was great, the part was sprayed with what looks to be weld through primer, the license indent was formed from separate sheets of steel and spot welded, all in all a really nice piece for around $160....it does not have provisions for a license plate light so I'll have to see what I can come up for that.




I spent a little time mocking up the roll pan and marked the location of the receiver for the trailer hitch, marked its location and cut that out with the plasma cutter and a straight edge.. then proceed with more mocking up, I had to trim the driver's side just a small amount (that side of the bed is beat up pretty bad) to get it flush where I could weld it, ground off the bed area where it gets welded and tacked it in one place on each side then opened the tail gate to check clearance...it's good.

I then welded it in place basically spot welding it along the two edges on each side, I did have to use a body hammer in a couple spots so it maintained the contour of the bed but it was just basically closing up the gap as it expanded from welding. It is made to either plug weld to the rear of the bed floor, or comes with sheet metal screws if you want to just screw it in place. I used the flip up (or down) license plate holder from the RM locating the bolt holes so I had enough clearance to flip it up, marked the holes and drilled through the roll pan and the bed brace behind then used two bolts to fasten the license plate holder and roll pan to the brace. At some point I'll have to remove the tail gate and when I do I'll use the sheet metal screws to fasten the rest of the top of the roll pan to the bed.





The finished product is really nice and cleans up the rear of the truck, there is plenty of room with the license plate flipped up to install the receiver which we prolly won't ever use, I also installed the air fitting for the air shocks in the area behind the license plate so it is hidden.

After all of this was done I installed the rear mount bolts and tightened them down, the fuel filler is going to be interesting on this build we have tossed around several ideas but I think we have settled on a filler in the false bed floor that is a marine application (boat) but we haven't ordered anything yet...still looking really, for the time being I just put the old filler back on the tank so next week we can put fuel in it and see if it fires back up.



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Jon

Fantastic! "Nuff Said....

SteveCanup wrote:Fantastic! "Nuff Said....

Thank you Steve....it's getting there.

I wanted to tell you that we read your post about your truck carpet ($20 Wally World Rug) and my wife is going to try that in the '65 at least look around to see what we can find that might work, I also wanted to ask you about the trim you used at the thresholds, is that something you made, original to the truck, or bought?

Hopefully the '65 will be running this weekend, I have just a few more things to do and we'll see what happens.

Take care,

Jon

Jon - I like the idea of a hidden hitch. Here's something you could use for license lights: last summer I bought a pair of license retainer bolts that have little LED's built in. Found them at one of the vendors at the Goodguys show in Des Moines. I just did a quick Google search and found that amazon has them also.
I'm hoping to use my uni to pull a vintage travel trailer to out of town car shows. Saves on motel room costs. Right now we're having to drive two vehicles to shows. I pull the travel trailer with my super duty, and my wife drives the Packard.

Tim,