Cab Clean Out

I took the night off from mechanical work while waiting for the new header bolt removal tools to arrive in the mail.  There is a promising Craigslist deal brewing for some body parts and a bench seat in the near future, so I decided to clean out the cab.  It was full of miscellaneous debris like rust flakes, cassette tapes, a carburetor, rust chips, paint chips, rubber gasket material, rust powder, screws, etc.  The floorboard is in decent shape despite the otherwise horrible condition of the sheet metal on the exterior.  I also wiped down the dash and it looks decent.  Except for the tape player.

The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men Go Oft Awry

It was a good plan.

Spray down the header bolts for ~48 hours with penetrating oil and they would just spin right out.  Of of the 16 bolts needing removal, I broke the first one off, successfully removed the next two, then broke the 4th one off.  After rounding off the heads of a few others, I admitted partial defeat and decided that the header pipes needed to come out so I could have better access to the remaining bolts.  Destroying something with the saws-all provided some temporary relief from the thought of what lies ahead now that "bolt extraction" is on the agenda.

 Broken off bolt.  Not fun.

 The header was in there so tight, I had to cut it in two places to get it out.  Not fun.

 Too bad I just can't run it like this. LOL.

One of each.  In this corroded and weakened condition, they are no match for my Herculean upper body strength.

I ordered a few specialty tools from Amazon tonight, so hopefully I can rectify this situation without having to remove the heads, machining, etc...

While We Wait

I have been soaking the exhaust header bolts in PB Blaster penetrating oil for the past two days because I am terrified of breaking one off in the block.  If that happens, I'd probably have to pull the motor out of the truck to extract them.  So, while we wait for the oil to do its job, I decided to attack the back half of the frame with a wire wheel and apply two coats of Rustoleum.

Before:

After Primer:

After Top Coat:

All we need now are some body parts to bolt on!  :o)

Nuts!

One of the fun things about fixing old machines is that every once in a while you get a surprise.  Have you ever seen pecan shells in an exhaust pipe?  You have now!

I got curious as to how the shells ended up all the way at the front of the exhaust system and started looking around.  The holes in the header pipes near the engine were not big enough for a squirrel to get through, so I went around to the back of the truck.  I found a few more pecan shells up against the back wall of the garage where they had apparently blown out of the tail pipe.  I hope the little guy made it out alive!  :o)

Woe is My Exhaust

Surprisingly, the soda can exhaust patch job on the driver's side header dramatically lowered the volume and intensity of the explosive hot gas leak.  Success!  This achievement made it possible to enjoy for the first time a tremendously loud racket coming from the other side of the engine compartment.  Feeling brave, I abandoned my post at the ignition switch and walked around the front of the truck to find somewhat of a small mystery.  The engine sounded like it was running without a muffler, but the header was clearly attached and there were no obvious holes as on the other side.  I shut it down and did some feeling around after everything cooled off to find that there were large holes in each header pipe on the engine side where they were hidden from view.  I sat back and made the easy decision to scrap and replace them.

Replacing exhaust components on a modified vehicle can be tricky since they are usually manufactured to fit specific vehicle configurations.  So, I set about the task of "looking at them really well" to improve my chances of buying the right ones online later.  I had mixed feelings about what I observed:

The exhaust headers are literally touching everything except the starter on their way down the side of the engine.  The heat transfer to the steering gearbox housing is likely the cause of the massive leak coming out of that thing.  Oh, by the way, there is a massive power steering fluid leak coming out of the input shaft of the steering gearbox.  The good news is that it makes the decision to pull the existing headers even easier.  The bad news is that I now have to find a very specific set of pipes that will fit in there better than the old ones.  ...and I need a new steering gearbox.

Oops!

After hearing the engine run for the first time, it became obvious that I could no longer ignore the gaping hole in one of the exhaust header pipes.

I saw it before I bought the truck and thought, "that's a problem for future me to solve."  Well, the right-now me isn't liking hot exhaust gas blowing up and burning a nearby spark plug wire and my face.  So, I did the sensible thing and got out my Lincoln welder and proceeded to fix that puppy good.

Oh yeah!  That did the trick.  Now I have a more uniform nozzle for the explosively hot exhaust gas to exit the pipe.  Seriously though, I turned my welder down to the lowest setting and barely kissed the pipe with an arch and whole entire thing almost turned to dust.  I think the surface rust on both sides of the pipe is actually what is holding it together.  Well, the welder obviously wasn't going to fix my problem here, so I had to dig a little deeper into my repertoire.

Ten minutes, a used aluminium can, and some stainless hose clamps were all I needed to get back in action.  Aluminum melts at 1,200 degrees F, so we should be good, right?

Yeah Baby!

"The world class cinematography and artistic vision realized in this short film set a new standard for excellence.  Truly historic."
             - Washington Post

I love the smell of WD-40 in the morning!

I think the engine in the truck i a 351 Cleveland.  Or 351M.  Or a 400.  I removed all of the plugs and applied liberal amounts of PB Blaster penetrating oil and WD-40 to the cylinders.  The engine was not seized, but that's about the only good news.  There was a little water in the oil pan and the aforementioned stupid louvered hood and years of neglect guaranteed that everything in the engine compartment was badly deteriorated.  The valve covers and air cleaner were rusted through, so they were the first things to get pulled and replaced.  Summary of efforts after ~15 trips to the auto parts store:

• Replaced valve covers
• Replaced air cleaner
• Replaced dead battery
• Replaced rotting positive and negative battery leads
• Replaced dead ignition coil
• Replaced ignition condenser 
• Replaced spark plugs
• Replaced seized alternator
• Replaced rotted alternator belt
• Replaced section of damaged fuel line
• Replaced the super cool Holley 750 CFM double pumper that came on the truck because it was spewing gas out of every orifice and created an alarming pool of flammable gasoline under the front end of the truck during initial starting "experiments."  Also, it turned out to be a marine carburetor, which was the final coffin nail for that thing.  A guy I know named Craigslist came through in a pinch and I got a more appropriately sized 600 CFM Holley carb for $50.
• Installed new vacuum fitting on the intake manifold to facilitate connection of the break booster
• Changed oil and filter 

Braaaainns...

Triage

The truck is in a state of disrepair.  It has been sitting for too long with a stupid louvered hood and other "custom" features that ultimately make it look like the Marlboro man with a sun burn in the desert after the bombs go off.  Rough.  Rusted out valve covers, doors with holes so big you can put your arm through them, etc.  The two redeeming qualities of this vehicle are that it has a custom hot rod square tubing chassis and that it has an original big window cab.

Features of the chassis include independent front and rear suspension, a jaguar rear end with inboard disc breaks, and power steering.  Features of the big window cab include tetanus, despair, and general decay.  Seriously, it is the automobile equivalent of an undead zombie corpse.  Not quite dead, but not exactly alive either.  Truly a moral conundrum...

Begun, it has.

Howdy all,

I decided to jump in and get my dream truck.  A 1956 Ford F100.  There she is in all of her glory.  Well, she is actually a rusted up piece of junk, but she has potential.

Old football coach quote:  "You have lots of potential son.  Do you know what that means?"

"No Sir!"

"It means that it hasn't happened yet!"

His helmet is stifling and his shield is heavy.

Hello, this is a test.  I have never had a Blog before, so this is my first time.

Fair Warning: