The Long Overdue RastaRig Buildup

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression - Downtube

Makin' grooves and becoming one with the Metal as things whirrr & hummm...

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression - Downtube

I gotta say, though, with a project with all these moving pieces you have to think about, prep for, I mean the whole darn transplant thing and not even knowing you have to deal with somethings until you're standing over it going, "Man, this isn't going to work... "

THAT'S when you find these little "wins" really help keep your attitude to push through some of the stuff.... & keep going.

Looks like the clamp will fit just fine over these two pieces. This piece I just made will get welded into the downtube I make. Geez, that should be fun!

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression... THE PROBLEM

So in moving forward with progress you have to always make sure you throw in a challenge or two and go backwards once and awhile, right? Turns out since I didn't have the AC compressor when I put the engine in I was a little off in placing the engine. The distance to the right side rail was too close and the engine was too far forward to front of rig frame....

The 6BT block I have was intercooled and so the AC mounts up directly to a cast piece already bolted onto side of block on left side:

This is about as far as I could get pump in:

View from top of radiator as it *tries* to fit in---note the bottom exit and the crank damper:

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression... THE PROBLEM

The bummer is that at this point I just don't have the means to do a proper intercooled arrangement here. The rig needs to move and I won't be able to justify going through the trouble of locating and buying the I/C pieces I would need. And, really, the bigger issue is that putting an intercooler in this rig would require slamming the 6BT as close to firewall as possible. This causes other driveline and shifter/tranny/transfer case issues that I don't care to think about right now! There is one guy here on the site I recently found who I think HAS done this. I'm sure his patience and planning, however, far exceeds mine....

So, things as they stand is that NO WAY an intercooler possible, heck lookee here, I'm just hoping for room for the darn radiator to fit:

And, the copper tubing to route from out of the radiator exit to the inlet at based of 6BT block:

Oh, yeah, the last progress I made was to make and install the front driveline. Well, that has to be changed of course. And, the back one too....

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression... pulling Fenders Off is easy

Well, pulling fenders off is easy once you've done it enough times and figure out the 40 or so bolts you took off last time when you were figuring it out, really don't all need to come off.

So this must be pulled back off. A couple of weekends before discovering The Problem, I had carefully gone through an put all those bolts back in and secured. Now they must come out---but just the few that allows me to lift the fenders AND wheelwell's out together.

Oh well, it's just a small step back...

Helps to know which bolts to remove and which to leave

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression... pulling Fenders Off is easy

This looks way to familiar....

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression... Tranny Mount

The net result is the whole engine and tranny have to move over 2-1/2in toward the DRIVER/LEFT side rail. Also, it has to move BACK at least 1in but because of how the transfer case/TC mounts, I'll be moving it back a total of 1-5/8in.

So here is the sequence:

1. Unbolt/support tranny and remove TC mount to allow modifying the mount to accommodate moving BACK by the 1-5/8in.

2. Re-mount and bolt the modified mount to the TC and clamp ends to rail using visegrips.

3. Support engine and cut mounts.

4. Slide back the whole engine/tranny/TC thingamajig BACK and and re-align previous bolt holes used to secure the TC mount to the "L" brackets previously welded onto the rail. This will set the exact distance front/back allowing....

5. Re-welding the front engine mounts to rail.

------------------------------------------

TC mount off and measuring off new hole placement. Only one (1) hole, that's nice:

Small section of "C" channel is cut and will be welded to TC mount side to extend surface for the new hole:

Net *stub* welded to existing mount and nice little cut made for what Cumminscruiser calls Esthetically Sensible People. Oh, wait, I said that.

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression... Tranny Mount

Not bad...
right?? Oh, yeah, forgot to take picture after I cut the whole on that beveled stub thingy there. It's there now. Just not here:

Rastaforte · Mar 18, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression...

I refuse to take apart these fender/wheelwell things again. They are just TOO hard to realign together once apart. Here they lay and here
they stay until the engine is moved and resecured....

cumminscruiser · Mar 22, 2011

A Prelude to A Small Regression...

Now it's time to learn the ways of the mighty cutting torch, young grasshopper.

Rastaforte · Apr 1, 2011

cumminscruiser said:
Now it's time to learn the ways of the mighty cutting torch, young grasshopper.

Yeah, can you tell I'm not getting as much BIG progress achievements as I'd like?? LOL. I'm milking every damn little forward step here to keep the fires stoked..... besides, the more I have to learn, the more I feel I'm getting out of this whole Rehab Project

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

So someone, somewhere at some point in Time cautioned that in living your Life be careful that you end up on the right side of the ledger of Life when all is said and done and your Story is written down. That you, hopefully, end up on the Example side of the Ledger instead of the Warning side....

My Warning, or really the problem was that there was no room for the radiator exit plumbing to clear the crank damper....

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

...no room for that plumbing to wind its way around and back to the lower IN side of the block....

no room for the AC comp to land its mounting bolts into that block....

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

Really, just not enough room for the darn radiator

Also, while my vertical gap between the tie-rods and the bottom of the oil pan would have been improved once I brought some proper curve into the leaf springs....I really just need to get the engine higher with respect to the rails. I wanted the gap between the bottom timing cover and the top of steering box to be larger too.

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

...and so we pick up at that point where the tranny/TC/engine needed to be moved back to accommodate and nail the FORWARD/BACKWARD distance required to give us more room for the radiator. From before we had the whole engine and tranny moving over 2-1/2in toward the DRIVER/LEFT side rail..... and moving BACK a total of 1-5/8in. Being already concerned about tweaking the shifters in the cab too much to one side I decided to split the needed 2-1/2 in at the tranny mount so that my whole drivetrain is skewed slightly. Probably hardly a big deal considering the length that 1-1/4in is spread out over from front of engine to back of tranny.

So we did the tranny mod to set this all up from list on previous post:

1. (DONE) Unbolt/support tranny and remove TC mount to allow modifying the mount to accommodate moving BACK by the 1-5/8in.

2. (DONE) Re-mount and bolt the modified mount to the TC and clamp ends to rail using visegrips.

3. (DONE) Support engine and cut mounts.

4. (DONE) Slide back the whole engine/tranny/TC thingamajig BACK and and re-align previous bolt holes used to secure the TC mount to the "L" brackets previously welded onto the rail and thus....set the exact distance front/back allowing us to then get to ....

What's happened in last four weeks:

5. Re-welding the front engine mounts to rail.

That really meant to say Re-Make and then Re-Weld.....all of these kinds of things sort of start with simple, focused intentions ... then, you find things.... little things that didn't bother you before....they ... spin into something larger....being that my rig really hasn't had alot of Love in a long time....(in favor of, I might fondly & ironically add, my ... ex girlfriend)...

I found that simple things like just wiring the fuel shutoff solenoid to make the engine GO, spun off into larger sub-projects like ....yanking the whole dash and suddently realizing I couldn't stand the disgusting state of the heater/ac/blower components. There was, of course, that sweet scented elk leather top dash pad that now needed to be mated to something other than a brown instrument lower panel...

It happens. When to stop.... what to start on... One thing leads to another.
Anyway new positions, new mounts, more work as we try to get the forward steps to outnumber those accumulating in reverse.....

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

Re-make and Re-weld.

But first things first, got to fight dirt and re-unite the hoist with it's brethren to get the engine position true.... side to side, up and down, rotate CW/CCW...

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

Position nailed from engine to either rail and templates made for the engine mounts. They are drawn, cut and fitted ....LEFT and RIGHT distances from rails are roughed out so AC fits .... we set the LEFT side rail mounts first and then cut to get the height/angle right.

Rastaforte · May 5, 2011

Afterlude to a Small Regression... Some Forward Steps

Ah, yes, yes...you ask, starter... well that now becomes a "remove from bottom: down and out" sort of thing moving forward..... there's about 3/4 in gap there though

From here, get the rotation of the engine right, double-check the RIGHT side engine height and... AC gap to rail, again. Nail the LEFT side by blocking. This allows those rail mounts to be trimmed to fit the rail.