T-Bone's Tiny (Temporary?) Truck Thread.

[user 9328330]

Its always amazing how these jobs just keep growing. If your not careful you'll use up all of your slow time on the truck that was suppose to help you fix the other truck so you can make money to fix the first truck.

You're right, there is no light at the end of the tunnel right now. That V10 truck is like having my own personal junkyard -- everything that could possibly be wrong with the good truck, I'm checking, and if the parts are better on the junk truck I'm swapping them over. So far I've got the service body, the differential, the coolant overflow bottle, the driveshaft, and the transmission extension housing. Before it's all done I'll have the bench seat, too. Even if it is a different color.

Right now it looks like instead of having the International ready by Spring, I'll have the F350 ready by Spring. But will also have ended up with a long-term backup truck which is worth something. The tough part is deciding whether to immediately pull the Int'l off the road as soon as the F350 is done, or wait until next winter. Not sure what I'm going to do on that yet. Part of me wants to get 'er done as they say, and part of me would like a break from working on these trucks. Starting to forget what having other hobbies was like....

[user 9328330]

More progress recently. Got the new leaf springs installed, not without a minor hitch.



The front bushings in both springs were off-center by about 1/8". Checked the original springs, they're centered up perfectly. I wasn't able to find an outer bushing that I could press on where the rubber met the spring eye, almost looked like the rubber was cast in place. Either way, I fixed this by taking a measurement, finding a 16mm washer of appropriate thickness, shaving the thickness of the washer off the 'thick' side, then mounting the spring with the washer on the 'thin' side. So the springs are centered, which hopefully means the truck will go straight down the road.



Got the leaf springs hung, then mounted the differential housing. Greased and installed the V10 driveshaft which fit perfectly thanks to the new transmission extension housing. Installed the Hellwig Big Wig anti-sway bar and the rear Bilstein shocks, and finally set the rear end back down on its own two feet.



So I started on the front....have a set of 5000 lb coil springs, Bilstein shocks, and a Hellwig sway bar for up there, too. Easy as pie to work on this 2wd front end. Basically you jack it up and support the frame. I'm using the front tow hooks as convenient jack stand points. Then pull the wheels, put a jack under the lower control arm (or whatever you want to call it), and unbolt the shock which is holding the whole assembly in the 'up' position. Pull the little bolt and keeper which are holding the top coil of the spring to the spring tower. Let the jack down a little and the coil spring comes off its upper seat. Let it down enough to where you can get your socket and extension onto the big nut and washer holding the coil to the lower control arm / beam / whatever you call it. Pull that washer and nut and the coil spring comes off. No taking ball joints, etc apart for this job despite what I've read on other forums.

At this point you're ready to put it back together unless you find this....sorry, no close-ups as I haven't cut it off the frame yet so you won't be able to see it well until then:



That front coil spring / shock tower is nearly rusted through at the top where the coil spring nests into it. The ones on my V10 don't look much better, so I called around and it turns out Ford sells these separately. They're riveted to the frame with several rivets each, which I'll replace with bolts. So I ordered both of these towers although the left one isn't so bad. The two together were just over $200. Jury is out yet on whether I'll replace that left one right now or not, but the right one is shot. Since brake lines go through them as well, I decided to take this opportunity and replace all the rubber lines on the truck too. There are five of them, 2 at front calipers, 2 at rear calipers, and 1 from differential to frame. So they're on order, too. And I'm going to be replacing the hard line that runs to the rear diff as that one looks bad near the fuel tank -- already have that line and flaring tool for it in hand.

[M J D]

Sounds like your pretty much committed to keeping this ride now. This is the best time to do all these things since it always seems to be less of a priority once its on the road.

[user 9328330]

Sounds like your pretty much committed to keeping this ride now. This is the best time to do all these things since it always seems to be less of a priority once its on the road.

Yes, one thing I've found with the International is that it's incredibly hard to significantly modify a truck that is in service. So I've decided to let things ride on the Int'l for the time being until I get this one done. Once the front end and brake system are finished, there isn't that much more to do. I think I'm going to figure out a way to paint / rust-proof the frame....hopefully in a halfway professional-looking way although I don't have much patience for painting. Have some minor cleanup and painting to do on the body mounts, too. Bolt the body down and finish the floor in it. Decide how much / if any of the RR lights I want to leave on it and whether I want to migrate the whole relay box and switch box from the V10 truck to this one to power them. Design and build a small but functional rear work deck / bumper and mount a 4" Reed vise that I have to it. Load the tools and I'm ready to go.....theoretically.

If I like the truck enough, eventually I'll also consider switching tires and wheels from 16" to 19.5". Not because they'd let me haul more, but because they'd let me run at full GVW with more safety margin in the tires' load capacity.

By the time it's done I'll have more than the truck is "worth" in it, by a good bit. But it should be a reliable vehicle that'll give me enough years of service that it'll be well worth the effort.

[vettelvr75]

I think I'm going to figure out a way to paint / rust-proof the frame....hopefully in a halfway professional-looking way although I don't have much patience for painting.

One suggestion I would have for a semi fast solution for the paint, is a product called POR-15. It is an incredibly hard enamel that you brush or roll on, but it can be painted directly over rust. It is extremely hard and flexible, and I have used it with great success. It seems like it would be something that would be perfect for your situation, and it would last many many years to come and you wouldnt have to go back and do it over again in a year or so. Anyway, check it out and see if it is something that you could fit into your "patience for painting" requirements.

[M J D]

I know exactly what you mean about working on something that's being used. I heard good things about the POR -15.

[user 9328330]

Some more progress on the truck -- enough that I'm going to break this into two posts to fit the pictures.

Started on the right front coil spring tower rivets - cut their heads off but they were swelled good enough that you weren't just going to drive them back through. Ended up centerpunching and drilling 3/16" holes through them, then heating them red hot and letting them cool....they drove out easily then. There are four of them in the vertical face of the frame and two more on the underside.

So here's the old tower at the coil spring perch:



And here's the new tower, same location:



Primed and painted behind the tower, then attached it with 7/16" x 1-1/4" NC bolts, flat washers, and nylock nuts.



Put the new 5000-lb rated coil spring and Bilstein shock on. Also replaced the brake hose while I was there.



The left side tower looked OK with just some surface rust, so I left it alone and just replaced the brake hose, spring, and shock. Last item on the front end was to get the Hellwig front sway bar mounted - it uses your original bar's end links. Pretty big difference in bar size:



Let the truck down so the front end would be weighted and torqued the sway bar end links down. So I took some measurements before I started the suspension work and then after....the rear end now sits 1" higher and the front end is 2" higher. Of course it'll all get lower when the body goes on it, will be interesting to see how much. Sure is a lot easier to roll around under it on a creeper now.

[user 9328330]

So the next item of business was to replace the rusted steel brake line that feeds the rear brakes. This line is a trouble spot for Super Duties and it usually fails with a pinhole somewhere between the fuel tank and the frame rail. This one hadn't failed yet but it was pitted badly and only a matter of time.

This guy is about 10' long and 1/4" diameter...runs from just back of the ABS block (near the steering box at the front of the engine) all the way to where the single rubber line meets it at the rear diff. There's about 18 bends in it as it clears different stuff and clips in here and there along the inside of the frame rail. The biggest pain about it is that the fuel tank is totally in the way of replacing it, especially if you have a bed on the truck. So I figured now was the time. Incidentally this line is no longer available from Ford.

My fuel tank was dang near full so I didn't want to fully remove it. Looked like there was enough room to slightly lower it and slide it inboard to the driveshaft, then jack it back up to hold it still. To do that, there are two evap vent hoses that need to be removed from the tank and one electrical connection. I ended up replacing the evap hoses because they looked pretty bad.

Picked up about 25' of NiCopp brake tubing (about 90 percent copper, 10 percent nickel -- DOT legal, corrosion-proof, and easy to bend and flare unlike SS), bent it on the shop floor using the original as a template, then broke out my new toy, a Mastercool flaring tool. Didn't take a picture of the tool, but pics are all over the interwebz. This thing made double flares so easy that it felt like cheating. Which was a good thing, because I screwed up the first line by accidentally crimping it during installation, so I had to use the rest of my tubing roll and the flaring tool again to make a second one.

So here's the new tube installed, with the fuel tank still out of the way:



Went ahead then and replaced all of the rubber lines at the rear end while I had the brake system apart. I had ordered just the rubber lines from Ford, but they also had the intermediate metal lines attached to them when they arrived. I gravity bled all the calipers in order to get some pedal back so I could move the truck outside for the next step.

So at the suggestion of vettelvr75 and M J D, I bought some POR-15 paint and their Degreaser and Metal Prep products. There are no pics of the cleaning or painting process because I was rushing to try and get it all done while it was warm out. I had already gone over the worst of the rust with a needle scaler, so the first thing I did was pressure wash the frame to get rid of the mud and junk that was all over it. Then dried it off with my blower and the sun. Then sprayed the degreaser solution on it (cut it 50/50 with hot water like recommended) and pressure washed that off. Then dried it off with blower and sun again. Next, sprayed it with the metal prep solution which is supposed to etch the rust. You keep that stuff on the frame and wet for about 20 mins. Finally, pressure wash it off yet AGAIN and use the blower and sun to dry it out one last time.

Once it's bone dry you paint the POR-15 on. I just used a 1-1/2" wide paint brush I had around. Takes a fair amount of time considering how many doo-dads are on the frame when the truck's completely assembled. Guess I should mention I was only doing the back half of the frame because I'm trying to get the body on the truck and the truck to work. It took exactly one pint of the POR-15 to do the back half of the frame....still have another pint for the front half, later. (I was advised to buy this stuff in pints rather than qts as it goes bad once exposed to air).

So here are a couple pics of the truck with a newly black rear frame:





There are some parts of the frame that you just can't get a paintbrush to when it's assembled, like behind the fuel tank for example. I chose not to take pictures of this area so you wouldn't be disappointed.

There were a couple of areas on the service body at the front mount and on some crossmembers that had bubbling paint, so I needle-scaled and wire-brushed them, hit them with the blower, skipped the other steps, and painted some POR-15 on them too.

Last thing I got done was to back the still-wet truck into the shop and under the body, then lower the body down enough to attach the two harness plugs together to see if the body lights worked. This was a crap shoot because even though Ford very nicely provides you a pigtail for hooking a service body harness up to, the intelligent previous owners of the truck had ignored the pigtail (probably didn't know what it was) and cut / spliced / back fed power from the trailer receptacle to power the body lights.

So I consider myself lucky that the factory pigtail was only missing running light power, and I easily found that wire for fixing later. Raised the body back up and shut the door for the day.

[M J D]

Looks good, I can bet that doing the brake lines and prepping and painting ranks pretty high on the "suck" scale. It should make rinsing all the dirt and crap off a lot easier.

[farmshop]

Brake lines always suck might as well plan on going from one end to the other especially in the rust belt. With a long roll of tubing I would have been tempted to take the path of least resistance. Looking good. be interesting to see how the paint holds up

[DSW]

Interesting. I just noticed that the gas box on the body is on the drivers side. Almost every one I can think of is usually on the passenger side.


Truck is looking good.

[Ypop]

For the break lines I would go with stainless may cost more but never have to do them again! get a good double flaring kit to do it with or if it uses metric bubble flares a good that tool for that (or borrow or rent them)! my 2 cents worth.
Ypop

[user 9328330]

Thanks for the comments, guys, and sorry for the late reply.

MJD, yes, I don't enjoy painting or brake line work but between the two, I prefer brakes hands down. I HATE painting.

farmshop, I checked out all of the metal brake lines on the truck, and the only one that had issues was the one I replaced. The hoses I replaced strictly due to age - there was no dry rot or any other visible problem with any of them.

DSW, you're right about the torch box being on the 'wrong' side. I'm used to working off the passenger's side for just that reason, so I guess everything'll be backwards with this one. I might add a rear hose exit to this compartment like I built on the International, just so if I have to do torch work along a road I won't have a door hanging open into traffic.

Ypop, I guess you missed the part of my post where I was talking about why I chose NiCopp for line. I looked into SS for this project but in my opinion it offers no benefits to the copper-nickel line I used. Volvo's been using this stuff for decades now. Like SS, it doesn't corrode. Unlike SS, it's also easy to bend and flare. Also, if you re-read my post you'll see that I double-flared the line with the Mastercool hydraulic flaring tool that I own. It'll do multiple automotive flare types beyond double- and bubble-flares. A pretty cool tool if you've never used one....worth checking out.

Finally, today I spent a few minutes mounting the main relay box from the V10 truck behind the seat of the V8 truck. This has a relay board for control of 10 different electric gizmos, and one day I might want to hook it up and use it. I don't think it's in any of the pics but I'll try to get one of it. Pretty expensive looking widget with it's glassed-in front and LED's and all. From a headliner-mounted-switchbox it originally controlled the forward-and rearward-facing body work lights, a train air horn, a backup alarm, the track lights, a "wig-wag" (?), an electric high-idle RPM switch, and one or two other things I can't think of right now. Anyhow, the bolts for that relay box go through the back face of the cab so the time to install it was before the body was mounted.

Not much left to do now before I can mount the body.

[teh603]

The wigwag is probably the same one used in cop cars to make the headlights, turn signals, and taillights flash along with the rack on top. I've seen them in a few utility trucks, and also a couple of grade A-1 trolls who like making people think they're a cop and get out of their way in heavy traffic.

[user 9328330]

So another update is in order here. I've had the body on this truck for a few weeks. I slapped a piece of wood on it for a back bumper while I'm waiting for the time to build a rear work deck on it. Also I've swapped the tailgate with the other Reading body I have that I'm going to sell, so now I have a nice tailgate with a center latch instead of the old style with the chains and hooks. BTW, this is an easy swap but does require new holes to be drilled for the two sideplates.

Yesterday I put about 700 miles on it going to look at a welder that I ended up not buying. This was the first trip of any distance I've made in it, and things went fine. The combination of F550 front springs, dually rear springs, and an empty service body made for a stiff, but not objectionable, ride. The engine was as smooth as glass, transmission was trouble-free, no weird noises. But I realized I might spend the $$ to fix the A/C.

For the trip up I had a tank full of ethanol-free 87 gas in it, and got 16.4 mpg. This was running at 75 mph on Interstate for most of the way, and letting the truck's speed fall off to 70 mph on steep hills rather than force it to shift out of OD. I was able to verify that the speedometer and odometer were right with my GPS. The return trip had 10% ethanol gas, and I got 15.4 mpg running the same speeds. I was pleasantly surprised by the fuel mileage. (My prior around-town driving had averaged 13.8 mpg, also nothing I'm complaining about as that tank had some pretty old gas in it).

So anyhow, I realized there are no pics on here of the truck with the body on it. I just walked out and took a couple, sorry that it's in the old junky shed so you can't see it as well.

Attachment 1114241

Attachment 1114251

Attachment 1114261

[user 9328330]

So another step forward on this truck - picked up the welder for it late last night, got back here early this morning. Here's the thread for that little search, wherein I got a lot of good advice from fellow WW members:

http://weldingweb.com/vbb/showthread.php...zer-302-vs-325

Pictures of the Trailblazer 325 I ended up with are in that thread, but I also snapped 3 of the truck unencumbered by the junky shed above.

The second picture has a good view of the tailgate Reading is using in their top-of-the-line service bodies, which incidentally will bolt up to the older bodies like this one if you just drill a couple of new holes. I robbed it off another body I have that I'll be selling. That center latch is the bomb, as they say. I would never go back to those stupid chains and hooks.

Also in the second picture, please notice the carefully handcrafted bumper. Made of hardwood and gently cut to fit with a Sawzall and then painted muffler black, this bumper is the epitome of style and class. I will guarantee you I was the only vehicle with a wooden bumper passing near DC and Baltimore last night.

(I just got the plates for the work deck I'll be adding to the rear of this body, but haven't had time to start the build on that yet.)

[7A749]

That's a nice "little" truck T Bone.

You can take that old adhesive left from the prior lettering with some WD 40 and a rag

It won't harm the paint and works real good.

[user 9328330]

You can take that old adhesive left from the prior lettering with some WD 40 and a rag

It won't harm the paint and works real good.

Heck yes, good to know! There are a few things about this truck that leave something to be desired, but that's the single thing that's been bothering me the most. I don't keep WD-40 here but will pick some up at my EARLIEST convenience. Thanks again.

[7A749]

No problem. It works great on gum stuck to stuff problems too. I've used it for years to take old decal residue off good panels I don't want to repaint after removing the worn decals with a heat gun. A Terry cloth rag provides some light abrasion action to break the sticky stuff up without scratching the paint. Solvents like lacquer thinner and acetone can dull the clear coat and remove it all together. I've had very good success with WD 40 myself. The gallon can goes a long ways. Once you get the sticky crap loosened up, it'll come right off.

It also works on tape residue. Sometimes, you can use a piece of tape to remove excess adhesive by sticking it to it. Then lifting up quickly. You may have to work a little at that adhesive on your truck, but it'll come off. Best off doing it in the shade, or later part of the day so the sun doesn't evaporate it when you put it on. Some mean green afterwards will remove the oil sheen left on the metal by the WD 40.

[user 9328330]

Very cool, man. I'll see if I can't get this done sooner rather than later.

[irish fixit]

It's one of the few things I like WD40 for.

Another trick is to use butter. It works about as well as anything I've tried.

[camjeep3]

That should be a great truck for you with all the work put in. It will be nice having a small and large rig. How or where are you planning on mounting the welder?

[user 9328330]

How or where are you planning on mounting the welder?

I think it's going to go in the bed facing rearward. I've had welders mounted like that in two other pickups and although it may not be "pipeliner" it has just always worked for me. I don't like them facing to one side because half the time the truck needs to be heading the wrong way for one reason or another. And I don't like them up high, especially on a single-rear-wheel truck. With the machine centered in the bed it has enough room for airflow around itself and it's easy to work on without pulling it off the truck. Still plenty of room to stack materials / stepladders / etc along the sides of the bed, and frankly if I need to haul a ton of materials I'll just use the International. Or maybe hook up a trailer if I decide to extend the current hitch underneath the 18" deep work deck I have planned.

I'm still thinking on attachment method. I like my machines to be bolted to a subframe which is quickly removable from the truck. Up until now I've used the same frame I made for my original Trailblazer, where I basically welded four 1-1/8" pins meant for a 3-point hitch into the bed of the truck and the frame sits down over top of those. Then I just use lynch pins (or padlocks) through the holes in the pins as a safety. I'd like to come up with a design that does away with the four pins permanently sticking up out of the bed even with the welder offloaded, but I also want to avoid crawling around under the truck hooking and unhooking as well as recessed areas that are going to collect dirt and rust if I don't keep them super clean.

The closest idea I've come up with so far is to have a frame bolted to the welder that has two square tubes on the underside running lengthwise with the welder, one on each side. These would fit into cutouts in the bed floor. On the underside of the bed would be welded matching square tubes in line with those of the welder frame. Then two long pins would be slid in from the rear of the truck, at underfloor height, which would pass through both the solid tubes welded to the underside of the truck floor and the tubes welded to the underside of the welder frame which are sticking through the cutouts in the floor. When those long pins were slid in all the way, their heads would line up with recessed brackets welded to the back face of the body and you could slip a lynch pin or padlock into them to lock them in place. No external parts to catch things on or trip over in the bed.

It would be a similar idea to the sliding-rod central locks on some utility bodies if you're familiar with those. Also similar to the European / Global attachment system used on larger farm loaders and industrial tool carriers. I think this is the direction I'll be going, but I have to flesh out the details a little better yet. And I need to buy a cover for this new welder to see how Miller has it attaching, whether with grommets or what, because if necessary I'll incorporate that into the welder mounting frame also, like I did with the cover I use on my TB 302 currently.

[camjeep3]

You started to lose me with your idea, but then I started thinking "maybe he means like the sliding rod for a service body?" then I kept reading… That would be a pretty cool setup for sure.

[Glassman]

Coleman fuel also works well for removing adhesive from paint without hurting anything. I have used it for years as an autoglass tech, even ok on fresh paint.





Randy