Builds Putting the rust demon at bay (1 Viewer)

[archie73]

Here’s a good illustration of why people say to strip the paint before you start patching stuff. I knew the over lapping brace had compromised the bottom edge of the bib. It’s a pretty classic spot for rust and this rig is from the north east so...

But take look at the circled area here. You can just start to see some bubbling. Not to bad...

Then you get it back from the blaster

All in all, I can’t complain that was the only spot I saw on my quick inspection that I didn’t already know about already. So far I’m stoked on the dustless blasting. It cost a little more than I hoped. He said it was because he didn’t realize I was going to bring a pile of parts. I guess most people bring the whole car assembled. In the long run though they were able to get 99% of the paint and rust off, largely due to the fact that I cut the rear tub off and you really see in behind the dash. The bright side is it really did show me everything that I had to work on and how good much of really is.

My real dilemma is I have a brand new Gozzard fiberglass bib that never made it on a different rig. This is no car show queen and it would save me a ton of time to simply swap in that unit. Part of me loves the idea of more original body parts, but I left the purist fork in road behind with the Aqualu 3/4 tub. While the passenger fender didn’t have any surprises, it needs some work and once again I have a Gozzard fender skin that never made it on the other project. I’ll sit on these repairs for a bit and think about it while I patch the floorboards and driver fender. On the bright spot the windshield was in great shape and I was worried from all the photos I’ve seen on mud after people having them stripped.

 

[archie73]

No big progress, but things are happening nonetheless. Front and rear seals are replaced. Had to drop some coin on the alignment tools, but it seemed like cheap insurance-I really didn’t want to spring another rear main seal leak.
So last time I had picture of the flywheel up it looked like this

I wasn’t sure if I had the wrong flywheel or starter. I was wondering if I could swap the ring gear to the other side of the flywheel, but google didn’t shed on a light on the subject. Well it turns out the starter was more expensive than the flywheel. So I bought a new flywheel (NFW1050) and it looks like a better fit( no pics).
I found confusing advice on the RTV vs Loctitie on the front for the flywheel/crankshaft bolts. So I did both.

. There was a casualty to the seal replacements though...

I thought I had the harmonic balancer bolt backed out a bit to allow the puller to do its job- Turns out it wasn’t!! Valuable lesson learned, to the tune of $75 for a new pulley.
This leads me to a question about pulleys: this is what I have

and the circled idler is what I need.

I can’t seem to find the right search word fir that though. Anybody have a lead on what it’s called?

 

[Seoirse]

I thought that was red loctite for a second and kinda freaked

 

[White Stripe]

That's an idler pulley.

 

[Pirate323i]

Or a belt tensioner?

 

[archie73]

Yes, the accessories kit I bought had that idler but it’s really sloppy on the bolt. So maybe it needs sleeve or bushing ?

 

[archie73]

So here’s the cancer at the bottom of the Apillar. As you can see the attachment to the outer skin is gone along with a good portion to of the body channel. The floor board above the body mount was also roached.

This is my plan of attack I’ll cut just below the hinges on the diagonal line and the line at the top of the diagonal and around the back of the pillar. The floorboard and outer skin will be replaced with 16 guage.

This is what I will replacing the lower portion of the A pillar with- it‘s total overkill, but its what I have. I‘ll trim the body channel back to meet and attach to the new A pillar. This will also be the attachment point for the Aqualu 3/4 tub, giving the bolt(s) something to really grab. I‘ll bring the new A pillar down to the bottom edge of the cowl, giving the Aqualu tub another attachment point. I’ll open up the square tube of this lower portion do in can access the the body mount on the channel.

So before I start welding this weekend, is there anything i’m missing?

 

[waiting for time]

You are going to weld thick new metal to old metal 25% of the thickness, that is not an ideal situation.
you will burn through the old metal and get little to no penetration in the new piece.

I would drill out the support, cut out and replace the bad (thin) parts of it. Repair the A pillar with slightly thicker steel and weld the support back in. If you use a spot weld drill you can reposition the support exactly in the same position as it came out.

 

[steffan]

I don’t see the problem with the heavy gauge metal And welding... if you focus the arc primarily on the heavy piece you can balance the penatration appropriately. Plus with the big steel, less chance of distortion

 

[archie73]

You are going to weld thick new metal to old metal 25% of the thickness, that is not an ideal situation.
you will burn through the old metal and get little to no penetration in the new piece.

I had considered thin old metal/new thick metal, but this is what I have at the moment. My location dictates what I have on hand unfortunately and I’m not planning to go in to “town” anytime soon. I’ll check the scrap bin at work, but I’m doubtful. I have cut back to solid metal(not pictured). I think I’ll try this ouy with @steffan advice. If I don’t like it, I’ll have to put it on the back burner until I make the trip to town. Thanks for the feedback.

 

[archie73]

It hasn’t always been straight forward, but I have had some progress:
1)the harmonic balancer is installed!!!!! I don’t know why this took so long, but I am the only one to blame. I didn’t back the bolt out enough when I was pulling it and broke one of the ears off. Ordered a new one and waited. Get it and the installation tool from the part store came apart leaving the adapter piece in the crank. Took a couple tries to get it out and then realized my torque wrench only goes to 100 ft/#. Get one from work that goes to 11. Find time to go down to the garage more days pass. Honestly, I think it took 3 weeks to get it back on.
2) I had removed the glove box so the blaster could get inside to expose all the potential rust. Not sure it was needed, but now it’s spotless in there now. I got this put back together.

3)Driver side A pillar rust repair is making good progress- 2 steps forward, 1 back. Got the lower pillar, body mount channel, floor board and outside patch in place.
As I stood over it( patting myself on the back), I realized I forgot to tack the channel to the firewall brace. Sure enough, there was a nice gap i between the brace and the channel. Colorful language flowed at this point. I tried bending the channel/floorboard down to match. Nope. I cut the weld to the pillar. Nope. I’m going to have to back cut the footboard patch weld in order to make the channel come in contact with the rib. Most of my welding (middling at best) will have to be redone.

Tomorrow is a new day!!!

 

[archie73]

Well that’s fixed. It needed one more cut on the A pillar and it went into place. Securely tacked to the firewall rib(brace?) And ready to move on to the otherside.

found a better way to align my pillar patch. after getting the figment right, I shot it with weld thru primer.

While that was drying my A.D.D. kicked in....

Or maybe I should say I fixed a previous bout of A.D.D. Back when I converted to the FJ80 steering box I plated both sides of the frame, but I neglected to sleeve the bolts. I got distracted by some other part of getting it ready to roll again. Now seems like a good time to to remedy this, I tacked them for now before I was called up to make dinner.

I’ll leave with this note- as good as a blasting is, it can’t get everywhere. This is between the A pillar and body panel. I coated it with POR15 as best I could.

 

[archie73]

Well this felt like a win, even if it’s not permanent.

Nothing bolted down, just resting on the frame. I’m happy with the slip fit. I used C-clamps to hold it together and see how everything looked. Good news is the Aqualu tub covers up my pigeon poop welding. Since this a trail rig I’m not going to spend to much more time trying to smooth them out. I will go back and smooth the welds on the inside of the body panels so they don’t fill with mud and water.

The other reason I wanted to put the two pieces together was so I could move the shifter holes around for the SM465 alignment. In the past I was using the Aqualu tunnel, but I don’t like the look of it. I find it to square and not matching up to the general cruiser look. (This will take more time than I realized) So I used a trick I saw on ‘Mud some time ago- I’d love to give credit, but I don‘t remember who posted this trick. Basically you cut out a shape that can be flipped around and welded back in place with the shifter hole where you want it.

This worked pretty well, with the exception of my transmission placement needed a bigger hole than the stock one. The back of the hole worked really well, but the front had to be notched more. Not a big deal, just more fitting. Once the transmission hole was sorted I moved on to the transfer hole. I thought I could simply move the whole forward, but stock cut out didn’t really work well with the 2Lo position. This represents what I ultimately came up with. About this time my Lincoln 110 stopped feeding wire and the Packers lost another chance at the Superbowl, so I decided to quit while I was ahead.

I hadn't really seen the area circled in red as a problem, until I did this mock up. The stock tub must have bumped up here and Aqualu didn't feel the need to replicate the bump. The other side has a foot or so of what I'd call classic rust issue that needs to be repaired and I need to move on to that next. This really threw me for a loop when I realized I needed to customize this too. I guess I'll cut it out and weld it flush to the floor, unless some one else has a better idea. More practice I suppose.

 

[archie73]

So here’s the rust repair on the drivers side. It’s not the prettiest and the purists will notice the bump out for the pto(?) is missing. Sorry that’ll no longer be necessary.

Notice the gap on the top side of the patch piece(s) is a bit big to stitch weld. Also a bit nightmarish to make a proper patch. Plan here is to get the current bottom piece in place and then cut out a nice straight hole to patch rather than the jagged mess that is currently needed.
I had tried setting this patch up out of the vehicle and got a little happy with the cutoff wheel. Good news is the higher I go, the thicker the metal gets.


As I was making dinner tonight, I glanced at the frig and saw this picture. Five years ago I still had the (rusty) steel body. This guy is nine now.

He made me a cruiser today with a 3D printing pen...

Sadly, I’m starting think the welding gene isn’t real strong in our family. I’ve got lots of welding to do this weekend to work on it though.

 

[White Stripe]

Well this felt like a win, even if it’s not permanent. View attachment 2564232Nothing bolted down, just resting on the frame. I’m happy with the slip fit. I used C-clamps to hold it together and see how everything looked. Good news is the Aqualu tub covers up my pigeon poop welding. Since this a trail rig I’m not going to spend to much more time trying to smooth them out. I will go back and smooth the welds on the inside of the body panels so they don’t fill with mud and water. View attachment 2564235The other reason I wanted to put the two pieces together was so I could move the shifter holes around for the SM465 alignment. In the past I was using the Aqualu tunnel, but I don’t like the look of it. I find it to square and not matching up to the general cruiser look. (This will take more time than I realized) So I used a trick I saw on ‘Mud some time ago- I’d love to give credit, but I don‘t remember who posted this trick. Basically you cut out a shape that can be flipped around and welded back in place with the shifter hole where you want it.View attachment 2564233 This worked pretty well, with the exception of my transmission placement needed a bigger hole than the stock one. The back of the hole worked really well, but the front had to be notched more. Not a big deal, just more fitting. Once the transmission hole was sorted I moved on to the transfer hole. I thought I could simply move the whole forward, but stock cut out didn’t really work well with the 2Lo position. This represents what I ultimately came up with. About this time my Lincoln 110 stopped feeding wire and the Packers lost another chance at the Superbowl, so I decided to quit while I was ahead. View attachment 2564234I hadn't really seen the area circled in red as a problem, until I did this mock up. The stock tub must have bumped up here and Aqualu didn't feel the need to replicate the bump. The other side has a foot or so of what I'd call classic rust issue that needs to be repaired and I need to move on to that next. This really threw me for a loop when I realized I needed to customize this too. I guess I'll cut it out and weld it flush to the floor, unless some one else has a better idea. More practice I suppose.

Yeah I flattened that area of the hump for mine. Thin cardboard is your friend in making templates. I also narrowed the driver side of the tunnel for more gas pedal foot clearance. The stock tunnel looks better I think.

 

[waiting for time]

If you have access to a shrinker/stretcher you can easily form the edge a bit more fluent and fill in the rest after.

 

[archie73]

Yeah I flattened that area of the hump for mine. Thin cardboard is your friend in making templates. I also narrowed the driver side of the tunnel for more gas pedal foot clearance. The stock tunnel looks better I think.

I have a picture from your thread on my phone as reference. Looks simple enough, just one more thing as I try and push through this process so I can get back to the new engine. I tried getting the drivers side fitted on the bench and then realized my mistake, so more cardboard this weekend.

 

[archie73]

If you have access to a shrinker/stretcher you can easily form the edge a bit more fluent and fill in the rest after.

I'm familiar with the term, but never seen one(let alone know how to use it). Tool budget is already over(Wife has been understanding so far), so I'll muddle through with what I have on hand. thanks for the input though.

 

[archie73]

@macdaddy59 here's is the picture of the pump installed.

I bought this 95mm hole saw and it was close to working. I had to open the hole up a little more for it to fit. Maybe if you found a 100mm saw. My chosen location is above the output tube in the sump. The blue tape with the black lines is the baffles- you'll need to avoid those and the pump has prefilter that sticks out ~2". The top only sits an inch or so above the tank, so I shouldn’t have any interference with the seat. I’m currently waiting on a mounting ring and gasket from Tanks Inc. For the hold down ring I'm going to try a ring made out of Plexiglass strap I had laying around. My other choses for material on hand is sheet 16 guage or 1/4" strap- to flexy or to beef. Not the prettiest, but it should hold the pump down and in place with out rusting. I'll have to wait for the mounting ring before I can finish that.
For those that have noticed I cut open a used tank. Yes, but not without a ton of research. This tank had not seen gas for three years. This past summer I did and acid etch to remove any remaining gas residual, then it sat with air allowed to escape for another 5-6 months while I got a plan together. I didn't die and I was confident in my steps. I will say anyone else thinking of doing this- do your research there seems to be a lot trepidation(justifiably) on this type of maneuver.
Now I have a question: The reason stopped using this tank was that the output tube is so clogged it won't allow the passage of gas. Now I don't need it, but I do to need to seal it up. I thought I heard JB Weld was no good with gas and that was my first thought. Presumably, I could weld it shut, but I'm leery of that solution for obvious reasons. Removing the tube is possible, but I was thinking there has to be a better solution. Vacuum plugs never seem to last that long. What is the best option?

 

[archie73]

This is just a better pic of the pump orientation for anyone thinking about this mod. Due to the shape of the shape of the sump, location of the baffles and wanting to keep the stick level sensor this was the only place the pump would fit.
moots of clean up on the tank to go...