weekly update
I live near a freeway and a well used set of train tracks and was getting small rust flecks on my paint due to rail dust embedding and then starting to rust. An effective way to get rid of them is to clay bar the paint so I spent a day last week cleaning up dora and cleaning off the paint. With the shot of warm weather we had I spent much needed time on the yard.
This week I got the mud flaps put back on. I could salvage the frame mounts but had to make new mounting bars for the flaps. I cut about 3" off of the flap length and welded them back on. Also got a full shot of the bumper. I liked how Weaklink's FJ60 rear protection turned out but if I mimick his I'll block my rear lights so I'm going over different ways to run some tube.
Rear frame rails are starting to get busy. I picked up some black paint and slapped on a coat later that day.
Here's a pic of a failing seal on a Bilstein 5150. I've decided to step up to Bilstein 7100s with stiffer valving that is rebuildable. I might have to do a little more clearancing to get the bigger shock body to fit, we'll see. Dora is getting bouncy so I need to get those ordered soon.
I should still have enough clearance on my low-profile steering joint I melted together.
Then I got side-tracked and bought a big-wheeled radio flyer at Harbor Freight for $40.
I'm turning it into my new welding cart. I shortened it by 8" and added some structural support tieing in the front and rear axles so it would better support the weight of the batteries. That unibody stuff was too floppy.
I stood in it and it held my weight and I weight more than two batteries. I plopped my batteries in there and yanked it around the yard.
I think I'm going to beef up the turning part of it by sacrificing a caster with ball bearings and replace the bolt that allows it to turn. I'm also going to lengthen the handle another couple of inches and build a rack for my mask, cords, welder, etc. It definitely rolls much easier over the grass now and makes it more portable on differing terrain. Now I can air down if I need more floatation.
The old cart got cut up for another project. The base was almost the same size as a set of metal shelves I pulled from the forest during our clean up. I took the shelves home, cleaned them up, made some longer legs and welded it to the base and now I have a little metal cart.
I'm feeling the crunch for getting things ready for rubithon. Looks like I'll be firing up the credit card for a few more items soon.