Builds Putting the rust demon at bay

[White Stripe]

So I wish I could say I've gotten more done but life is getting in the way. Fortunately, I continue to spend money, lots of little stuff. Recent purchase though got my son excited and the seal of approval from the wife- just need to do something about the color:

View attachment 1265376

View attachment 1265377

Careful with mounting the rear seats like that. If u put the ambulance doors and hardtop on likely you'll find the rear occupants head will be going through the ambulance door windows. I ended up moving my seats forward quite a bit to allow more head room at the expense of leg room.

 

[gator25]

Man, that tub looked ruff. You saved yourself a lot of time and money.

 

[archie73]

I haven't actually mounted the seats yet, but I'll keep your advice in mind. The only real reasons they're in there:
1) get them out of the way.
2) my 5 year old loves sitting in them.
You make a good point tho, so I'll put the cage and top in place before I mount them.

 

[archie73]

Ok progress has restarted. I loaded it up on a trailer and took it to work where lll have more time to work on it.

Fj80 power steering box.

The box and scab plates are in place. A friend is going to burn them in for me tomorrow. This is the mock up. I'll take a fender to work tomorrow to see how it fits. I had to trim relocate the shock tower and flip the shock bolt. They are kinda tight to the box right now, but it cycles thru the suspension with room to spare. This won't be a 4+ trail ride. Does anyone see anything glaring, before it get welded

 

[White Stripe]

I don't see any issues with it.

 

[archie73]

So the plan now is to order a set of fj80 TRE's and a reamer for the mini truck steering arms. A set of custom drag and tie rods will be ordered next. Do I need a custom tie rod? Has anyone got thoughts on this? This'll be my first attempt at something like this.

 

[White Stripe]

The passenger side fj60 tre has a hole for a drag link. So I would use fj60 tre's. For the drag link you could use either fj60 or 80 drag link ends. Remember that drag link ends are different than tre's. Drag link ends have more flex in the joint and a different size joint. Tre's have very little flex and won't work as a substitute for drag link ends.

 

[Burbot]

The passenger side fj60 tre has a hole for a drag link. So I would use fj60 tre's. For the drag link you could use either fj60 or 80 drag link ends. Remember that drag link ends are different than tre's. Drag link ends have more flex in the joint and a different size joint. Tre's have very little flex and won't work as a substitute for drag link ends.

Never ceases to amaze me at the knowledge on Ih8mud. Good on ya !

 

[archie73]

Ok, that matches up to what mace said earlier in the thread. I got keep on this build, so I can keep track of the advice people are giving me.

Had an exciting day today. The steering box and shock mount are ready for welding. But better than that we got the engine fired up!!! It was cool to see it run after sitting all these years. Of course, sitting that long had some effects:
Fuel pump isn't working.
Freeze plug fell out when we filling it with water.
Water pump weep hole is dripping
Quadrajet is leaking out the side when pour the gas in.

 

[archie73]

This is a side track, but I'm thinking about the rollcage I want. I really like the idea of the metal tech full profile, but that leaves me with two questions:
1)has any one modified the rear corner gussets on an aqualu tub? If I buy the family cage fully welded, the rear legs interfere with the gusset. I'm also waiting for aqualu to respond on this item.

2) When tying the cage to the frame, do people have any type of rubber insulator between the cage and the tie in? Similar to body mount. I'm concerned about fatiguing the aluminum, but maybe I shouldn't...

 

[White Stripe]

If that motor has been sitting a long time, it may be a good idea to yank it and replace all the seals and gaskets including valve seals. When things sit the seals tend to dry out. Once you drive it a bit it will start leaking. It is a good idea to put rubber in between the aluminum and the cage. I used raptor liner on the inside and underside of mine so that acts as my gasket or insulator. My stock rear tubes do not hit the gussets on my aqualu. As long as whatever cage you are using ties into the stock position of the rear bars of the factory roll bar on a 76 and up cruiser, you are good.

 

[archie73]

Progress is happening!!!
Steering box and shock tower are in place and waiting for a buddy to finish the welding. It would be fine for street as is.
Ebrake is in along with front driveshaft. This means I can put it in gear to keep it from rolling. I need to find someone lengthen the drive shafts though.
With an electric fuel pump I was able to run the engine. Sounded nice. Gotta figure out the exhaust. Is flux wire ok to weld exhaust?
Talked to a professional welder about installing the redline family cage. Waiting for estimate.
Should be ordering steering links and ends this week. Tires and rims, so I can put the calipers on.

 

[Burbot]

Soon it will move under it's own power to. Nice to make milestones. Flux will work if that's what you have. MIG is p usual tool though. Recently saw a cruiser with total roll cage made out of exhaust tube. Mounted to tub not frame. Get it done right if you expect to ever need it or else what's the point.

 

[archie73]

-I have a spool of flux wire to burn up and a buddy bought out a fab shops exhaust pipe when they went out of business. So hopefully, that'll be the route I go for exhaust.
-The rollcage, I'm subbing it out completely. Redline cruisers family cage and a local pro welder for the assembly. Safety is the only concern, so I'll pay up on this one.
- And yes it was good to hear the engine roar and then settle into an even idle. I didn't run it long enough to warm up, but that was a good feeling.

 

[archie73]

Progress report:

1)I didn't take any pics, but the steering box plate is welded in place. I still need to make the tubes for the backside plate, but it should be streetable in current state. Just need to get pump and mounting brackets. I thought i saved the brackets off the donor truck(~1980 Blazer), but they don't make sense when I put them on the block. I'll google some pics.

2)Brakes are plumbed again. New lines going to the calipers(front) and along the frame(rear). Master didn't want to budge at first. I pushed it til it moved- I figured it was going to be OK or it wouldn't. It had sitting for 16 years with no fluid, so a rebuild/replacement wouldn't be to surprising. Made a bit of mess, I got a head of myself and filled the reservoir before I had lines going to the calipers. Oops. Last thing I did was roll it a foot or so, that way I can see if there are new leaks when I get back to it on tuesday. Once I have the driveshafts modded I can street test the brakes.

3)Aqualu finally responded on the issue with the Metaltech roll cage. They say that as long as you use a "full street roll cage" its ok to modify the rear gusset on the tub. In the mean time I had looked into a local fabricator, he talked a good game over the phone and claims to have built some dessert racing stuff. Unfortunately, he hasn't been great on getting back to me, so if I don't hear something soon I'll probably order the Metaltech.

 

[White Stripe]

With my rear seats facing forward, I can't install a rear or 3Rd hoop because the rear occupants' heads would hit it. The factory rear side hoops offer minimal protection, but for hard core obstacles where a roll is possible, I make the rear occupants get out until I clear the obstacle. If your rear seats are low enough to the floor then that won't be a issue. If you are running a hard top or soft top make sure the cage you install leaves room for the top to fit.

 

[archie73]

Thanks, thats good advice. This cruiser will see plenty of street with my son in the back, so thats more a concern than offroad. The rear seats(or the front for that matter) aren't mounted yet, because I didn't have the cage yet. I'm all ears on peoples thoughts on this as well.
I had assumed if the hardtop fit the cage, the Besttop would as well. Ill look into it.

 

[White Stripe]

If the cage clears the hard top and doors it probably will clear the soft top, but you want to make sure you have room for the soft top linkage to fold back if you want to pull the top down or up. I probably wouldn't mess with the aqualu rear gussets. My roll bar rear factory bar mounts about 2 inches from it. If the rear hoop is too far back it will interfere with the hard top. Another thing you could do is kind of copy the late model side bars but raise them up to the height of the main hoop and add long bars in triangles from the center of the main hoop to the corner of each side bar, which would give pretty decent protection but still give decent head clearance and strength.

 

[archie73]

I've been plugging along.
-I bought new tie rod and drag link. Screwed up the tie rod threads size tho, so I'm debating the the answer to that one. I have a temp set up that I can roll around the parking lot tho.
-Driveshafts are modded and installed.
-brakes are plumbed and working. Front section is losing fluid somewhere, need to trace this down.
- clutch slave cylinder is Jerry rigged, but ready for completion. It works, not bad for sitting for 15 years empty.
-Found some decent seats at the pick in pull along with some misc parts I needed.
-starter wouldn't work, so I pulled it. Cracked housing, turned it in at parts store. Put the new one in and the ignition stud snapped off. Took it back, they didn't have anymore in stock, so I took the original back to the shop. Installed it and it worked. We'll see how long, it's still cracked.
-Carb leaks pretty bad. Any thoughts on the qjets on rockauto.com.
-Made a google doc list a full page of single spaced text of major/minor stuff I need to fix. Encouraging because it's only one page!!!!! I know I'm deluding myself, but patronize me...

Best news though is I hooked up the fuel line to a temp tank and it fired up. Then I drove the damn thing for the first time in 15 years. I'm still smiling thinking about it! It was only 100 yards before I turned it off and couldn't restart it, but it moved under its own volition!!!
So what would cause this(probably a fuse!!!). It ran strong, until I turned the key off, then it would only run in the start position( seemed strong if I held the key on long enough). We dragged it back to its resting place, so I could get home to the family. I was out of time that day.

 

[archie73]

With my rear seats facing forward, I can't install a rear or 3Rd hoop because the rear occupants' heads would hit it. The factory rear side hoops offer minimal protection, but for hard core obstacles where a roll is possible, I make the rear occupants get out until I clear the obstacle. If your rear seats are low enough to the floor then that won't be a issue. If you are running a hard top or soft top make sure the cage you install leaves room for the top to fit.

If the cage clears the hard top and doors it probably will clear the soft top, but you want to make sure you have room for the soft top linkage to fold back if you want to pull the top down or up. I probably wouldn't mess with the aqualu rear gussets. My roll bar rear factory bar mounts about 2 inches from it. If the rear hoop is too far back it will interfere with the hard top. Another thing you could do is kind of copy the late model side bars but raise them up to the height of the main hoop and add long bars in triangles from the center of the main hoop to the corner of each side bar, which would give pretty decent protection but still give decent head clearance and strength.

I appreciate the advice. I'll be order the cage soon I hope. Local builder is supposed to be getting something together as we speak. If that falls through I'll order the metaltech full profile with seatcradle and frame tie in kit. Then I can figure out the seating positions, finally.