Builds Rutherford Clappy III and Associated Ramblings... (2 Viewers)

[ARJMN]

After heading back to Marana, I dropped off my dog for a play day, and I headed to the house for some serious focus time in the garage. If I have never said before, or it wasn't clear from previous posts, my garage is my happy place. The dream is a barndominium (I'm from the south and they are much more common there) with equal parts living space and shop. I actually have plans drawn for a 50x90 bardo with 16" side walls that gives 2100sqft of living and 2000 of shop space. That's enough for all my activities with some room for getting all my(current) rigs out of the elements. The purchase of the 2 acres I had planned to put it on fell through, but I still have the dream simmering on the back burner. Anyway, moving on.

My goal for the day was to get the frame modifications done and thus be ready to start the final dry fit of all the powertrain elements. That includes the installation of the intercooler pass through tubes and the relocation of the pan hard bar crossmember. While that is only two items, I was prepared for a long "grind". The first order of business was to get the engine/XMSN out and pushed aside. When you are dealer with power pack the weighs in at 1XXXlbs, it can be a bit of a bear flying solo. I have spent a good number of years figuring out how to get stuff done on my own, but sometimes its just nice to have some extra hands. This was reinforced when trying to jostle it all out, I smashed one of the connectors on the water separator. Do'h! Not a biggies though, might as well replace it with new anyway, right? Add it to the build sheet...

Small casualty.

Once I got that out and rolled the chassis back for some room, I started laying out and double checking the fit up of the intercooler and piping. I did not get any pics of the process of cutting the holes in the forward-most crossmember, but you will get the idea. The intercooler, or ATACC if you are steeped in the power equipment world, mounts on top of the front body mounts with a sleeved iso-mount.

 

[ARJMN]

It was my pleasure. We both came out with something in our favor. I went to Ace Hardware got the proper hardware, finger crossed it is long enough.


What were you able to get done in the garage?

Good deal on the hardware. You know that as soon as you get it installed, I am going to find the missing bag of hardware.....

As for the rest of the day, I am typing it up now.

 

[OffRoadScott]

After heading back to Marana, I dropped off my dog for a play day, and I headed to the house for some serious focus time in the garage. If I have never said before, or it wasn't clear from previous posts, my garage is my happy place. The dream is a barndominium (I'm from the south and they are much more common there) with equal parts living space and shop. I actually have plans drawn for a 50x90 bardo with 16" side walls that gives 2100sqft of living and 2000 of shop space. That's enough for all my activities with some room for getting all my(current) rigs out of the elements. The purchase of the 2 acres I had planned to put it on fell through, but I still have the dream simmering on the back burner. Anyway, moving on.

My goal for the day

Good deal on the hardware. You know that as soon as you get it installed, I am going to find the missing bag of hardware.....

As for the rest of the day, I am typing it up now.

Maybe that isn't why you haven't found the hole saw yet, because I haven't installed the snorkel yet... LOL!!!

 

[GeoRoss]

After heading back to Marana, I dropped off my dog for a play day, and I headed to the house for some serious focus time in the garage. If I have never said before, or it wasn't clear from previous posts, my garage is my happy place. The dream is a barndominium (I'm from the south and they are much more common there) with equal parts living space and shop. I actually have plans drawn for a 50x90 bardo with 16" side walls that gives 2100sqft of living and 2000 of shop space. That's enough for all my activities with some room for getting all my(current) rigs out of the elements. The purchase of the 2 acres I had planned to put it on fell through, but I still have the dream simmering on the back burner. Anyway, moving on.

My goal for the day

Good deal on the hardware. You know that as soon as you get it installed, I am going to find the missing bag of hardware.....

As for the rest of the day, I am typing it up now.

@D_Web and I talked about the need for shop space yesterday. It seems feasible, we are just out of our element finding a place and how industrial property operates under different rules.

 

[ARJMN]

Before welding the tubes in place, I gave them a coat of weld-through primer. This stuff is expensive, but it is great when it comes to protecting bare metal that you may have to weld to. I will be giving the frame a respray after all the mods are done, so this just gives me extra insurance it'll all stick.

Here are the tubes all fitted and the frame hand finished to have a tight fit up with minimal gaps.

RH side.

LH side.

 

[ARJMN]

Maybe that isn't why you haven't found the hole saw yet, because I haven't installed the snorkel yet... LOL!!!

That thing is off in the Ether!

 

[ARJMN]

After I was convinced that the fit up was good and there would be no issues, I got out the metal caulk and prepped myself. For reference, the frame rails and crossmembers are closest to being 10ga sheet. I used the recommended setting backed down just a bit because I am really freaking rusty on laying down angry pixie metal glue. A smarter person would have taken the time to find some scrap and practice a bit. That was not me. I laid into to by starting with the most visible side first, and well....the rusty hand didn't disappoint. My first few welds were boogery and not the finest displays of skill, but by the time I got to the backside of the work, my hand had steadied and the settings were fine tuned. Funny thing is the backside was much harder to access and yet I had better welds there.

My trusty Millermatic 251. These old transformer welders flat get it done. I love this old thing despite it needing a little TLC.

Front right side was the first one, and my hand was shaky and the heat was set a bit too low.

Getting better, but not quite pretty.

More heat, more wire, and a steadier hand for the rear right.

Same here on the rear left.

 

[ARJMN]

I got that done and my apprehension of cutting on the frame seemed to evaporate. I figured I might as well forge ahead. I had originally planned to order in some roll cage couplers and make the panhard bar crossmember, here forward know as the PBCM, removable in the event I wanted to remove the oil pan from the motor, but you gotta make progress while you can. I have enjoyed being home in February, but travel resumes for me in March and I will be gone most the month. After mocking up several different tools to make the cut including 5" angle grinder, 7" angle grinder, portable band saw, hacksaw, and the like, I settled in on the trusty DeWalt Sawsall. I know Sawsall is a trade name, but at this point its like asking if you want a coke. Its a generic term now, so put away your keyboards you warrior folk!

I'd be lying if I said that stuff like this doesn't still give me butterflys. The RH side gets cut all the way through.

The LH side gets cut about 80%.

Then you bend it down to be level.

 

[ARJMN]

Next op was to prep and chamfer the PBCM for welding. I had to remove about a 10mm section on the tube to clear for the weld in bracket and gusset.

Drop plate and gusset prepped and ready to be tacked in.

 

[ARJMN]

As a general sharing of knowledge, the PBCM is about 1.25" on OD with a wall thickness of about .180". If you wanted to do roll cage couplers here, Trail Gear makes 1.25"x .160" wall couplers.

SAE

Metric

 

[Funner]

 

[ARJMN]

I hit the turbo button at this point and failed to take incremental pics along the way. In short, I got it all tacked, double checked, and finish welded. Once done there, I took some time to smooth and blend the welds before spraying a layer of primer.

light coat of primer to ward off flash rust.

Drop plate and gusset welded in place. Still a bit rusty on the welder.

Plenty of clearance now, and I am not so sure I can't still get the pan out.

 

[ARJMN]

The day concluded with a refit of the powertrain to the chassis. This was necessary because I needed to fit the freshly rebuilt/re-geared transfer case in order to check for clearances, and because I am working my small garage and have to Tetris my way through these jobs. I do have to make some XMSN mount modifications to give adequate clearances to account for shakes and vibrations. Stay tuned, that's all for now, but much more coming your way.

 

[OffRoadScott]

@ARJMN all your builds have a massive attention to detail. I should have you do my LS if I so choose.

I have a running list of questions for you as far as doing an LS swap but will text that to you.

 

[ARJMN]

@ARJMN all your builds have a massive attention to detail. I should have you do my LS if I so choose.

I have a running list of questions for you as far as doing an LS swap but will text that to you.

Thanks for that vote of confidence. I am always happy to share lessons learned from my projects.

I am actually gunna be dragging my buddies '95 back from Arkansas when I am done with my diesel swap. He is doing almost the same swap as my LX450, but is using a 3rd Gen 6.0 and a 6L90e. I will post up that work as well.

 

[ARJMN]

Today was a much lighter day on the progress scale, but the ball did move down field a bit. I started this work a few days ago, and finished it up today. The stock Dodge Ram XMSN mount also serves as one of the exhaust supports. That portion of the unit had to be removed.

You can see here where i removed the exhaust hanger and already clearanced the mount assembly. I ended up coming back and massaging it a bit more to give a tick more.

THis is a more zoomed out view of the portion I milled off and the holes that I slotted to get it into the right position on the XMSN crossmember.

Here she is with a healthy coat of gloss black.

 

[ARJMN]

The finished product.

 

[ARJMN]

@-Spike- asked me a good question today and it made me double check a few things. The question was related to the PBCM mod, or specifically if I had checked to ensure there were no interferences in suspension when bottoming. The short answer is yes, if left stock. I happened to have a set of Slee 2" front bump stop spacers that I put away a long time ago. After installing the extensions, I lowered the rig down on to them and double checks all the key points. Thankfully, no issues with clearance.

 

[ARJMN]

In looking into the question deeper, I got out some of the pics I was sent for examples of the mod to the PBCM. What I found is that in my drive to make it level and give more room in the even I need to remove the pan, I ended up dropping mine a bit further than others have. I am not too worried about it, but I will be watching this and checking for cracks quite often in the shakedown period. As an additional bit of insurance, I may further gusset the RH side of the bar mount.

Reference pic #1

Reference pic #2

I think I will further gusset this to ensure it is fully supported.

 

[-Spike-]

I think I will further gusset this to ensure it is fully supported.

There are some kits on the (Australian) market to reinforce both ends of the PBCM and the steering box mount area; you could take a look at some of those and maybe get some ideas about what fails and what to do about it, if it's a concern for you. Especially with that extra 291.311 pounds on there...