Building a dually my way....

[74 C-30]

nice truck, i really like tucked the duallys, some day i'd like to do what to my old cab and chassis, good luck with your build

Today was shorts, tee shirt, and Nike shoes.

damn i wish it was that warm here!

[67_C-30]

Originally Posted by Tx Firefighter

And, by the way, 67 C30, I can't help but notice that your build thread has fallen pretty far off the front page. You're not sitting on the couch watching TV lately are you ? We need a progress fix !

Well, kind of. I've been spending a lot of my weekends watching the Tide on TV and in Tuscaloosa several times (I still can't believe we lost to Utah! )Now that football season is over, I can get back on it!

[72freak]

67 C-30 helped me out with some rims and Craigs list and ebay did the rest for the brand new tires and simulators. I ended up with about $550 in everything.

Oh yea...I forgot about the front wheel spacers......so add a little bit more for those!

[68K20 x Drill]

Let me be first to say
That's Hot!

[Zumo]

Are you going to add widend wheel wells/fenders?

[Tx Firefighter]

Andy, I haven't figured that out for sure yet. I have a deal offer from Shane right now for a set of stepside fenders to have in case I decide to do it that way.

I feel bad that I'm not posting more progress on this build lately.

I fell into a bit of unexpected money by selling a motorcycle last week. I used the money to pay my house taxes and to order some new stuff.

I got a nice blasting cabinet and powder coat rig. These require me to plumb my shop properly for air with wall mounted pipe and moisture seperators and drains to keep my air supply dry.

Plus, the powdercoating requires me to get a stove in the shop for curing.

These things are taking up my efforts right now. The upside is, once accomplished, my progress from here forward sould be much higher quality with blasted and powdercoated parts instead or wire brush and painted stuff.

All in all, the final product will be much nicer, just slower getting there.

Don't worry though, I'm working on it every single day and will post pictures as it happens.

[Tx Firefighter]

Well fellas, baby steps, but I'm grinding along.

Like I said last post, I fell into some extra money by selling an old Harley I had laying around. I used it to pay my taxes on my rent house, buy mama new Michelins for her Explorer, and get set up to do powdercoating.

Like everything, I went way too deep into it. I went beyond hobbiest level and closer to job shop level. I bought a ton of powder, a real decent blast cabinet, an oven, and I'm about to start building a big oven to do core supports, rear axle housings, bumpers, and motorcycle frames.

So today's progress was powdercoating some parts for the project.

Member BigblockBurris on here hooked me up on the dually lug nut plates I needed, so they fell under the gun first. The powder color is called silver vein. I absolutely love this color. It's intended to be textured.



Then, I stripped my front calipers off the 84 dually frame stub I bought and coated them, again in the silver vein color.




I went down to O Reillys and ordered the two rebuild kits I need for the calipers. Some folks swear you can coat an assembled caliper and no damage is done, but I went ahead and stripped the caliper apart so I could get it truly clean before coating. Besides, these calipers are 25 years old now, so new seals and boots are a good idea. The kits run about 6 dollars per side. The pistons and bores look great, so I expect them to work out well.

After that, I began the most dreaded task of this build, the wheels.

Before:



Now, Bright white powder and a metric buttload of work stripping and prepping the wheel. There is a lot of surface area on one of these things, and I wanted it perfect :


With one of the lugnut plates set into place:


I also scored a really nice set of chrome dually wheel center caps on the ebay. They finally arrived after two weeks waiting. They are the ones that use the plastic lugnuts that screw down onto the steel lugnuts. I will get pictures of them next time I'm out in the shop.

[toomanytoyz]

Powder coat looking Great, How did you set up your spray Station Area? Here are a Few Links on Coating.................

Rick

YouTube - Powder Coating Home Setup

YouTube - Spraying Powder Coat

YouTube - Powder Coating Spraying Ready to Bake

[Tx Firefighter]

Well, I went out to the shop and tried to get some pics of the center caps.

The lighting in my shop runs somewhere between cavelike and too damn dark for Stevie Wonder. Pictures suck, sorry.

[VA72C10]

AWESOME

Those look great! I'll be following along on the build

[texanidiot25]

Originally Posted by 67_C-30

When you get the factory rotors off your truck, let us know if the spindles are the same. I have been told by 2 people that you can just put 1 ton rotors on '71 - '87 3/4 ton spindles, but I don't know that for fact. They say you can just swap rotors and go, and I'm curious if they that is true. Thanks!

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=317654

Here you go, this will help the both of you.

[Tx Firefighter]

Originally Posted by texanidiot25

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=317654

Here you go, this will help the both of you.

I had been following that thread. I know how the 5 and 6 lug rotors interchange and how to use 73-87 parts and all of that. What we're talking about is removing a 3/4 ton rotor and replacing it with a 1 ton rotor on the same spindle. Some guys say it can be done, but no one has ever proven it one way or the other.

As you can see here, the 1 ton dually rotor is truly massive compared to any other rotor.

[texanidiot25]

What's the size of the 1 ton rotor? My CPP six lugger is 12" in diameter, and 1.25" wide if I recall right. Some heavy duty rotors. Can't tell the size from pics.

I can give you the number to my local junk yard, if you talk to Red, he knows what does and doesn't swap easily. Though he's more on the bare bones sort of swap, citing that we didn't need a disk brake MC/Prop. valve to my 20 year ASE Master Tech dad.... Argues it strongly... But he does know what will fit what.

Springtown is near the houston area?

[LuckyHenriksen]

That looks sweet! I like the look of the dually with fleetside bed, especially the blue one with the small plastic fender flare.

[Tx Firefighter]

I've been ASE Master Certified since 1991, and I will argue that a disc swap does require a different master cylinder and prop valve than a drum truck used. I've done at least 10 plus drum to disc conversions, so I speak from experience. I learned about using 73-87 stuff years ago through first hand experience. I know about the 1 inch and 1.25 inch rotors used through the years and the corresponding spindles and ball joints.

This truck is different though. Duallys are a different breed. I'm using 84 donor because it has bigger brakes than earlier duallys used. In 1975, GM upgraded all 1 ton truck brakes to much larger than 71-74 trucks had. I could have possibly swapped the earlier, smaller dually brake rotors onto my existing spindles, but I went this way to get the biggest brakes possible. This is a towing truck, so monster brakes are a priority to me.

I have all of the details planned out on this conversion. I'm just going slow to make it pretty and perfect.

Springtown is west of Ft Worth.

[texanidiot25]

He was good about prices (about 55 per side with spindles and calipers), so my dad didn't argue him there on the spot, were just gonna grab them else where..

At any rate, he would probably know about the duallies. I dunno.

Good luck mayne!

[LuckyHenriksen]

And your clean shiny parts are making me want to powder coat.....

[my67chevytruck]

looking good TX....

[cable666guy]

Hey TX,
Nice work so far. Those wheels came out beautifully!! Lots of luck to tou, and I'll be checking back.

[primered_junk]

Looks good!

[Tx Firefighter]

Small update while I eat my lunch:

I've been grinding along on this thing all I can lately.

First, I disassembled the brake calipers and cleaned them up. I powdercoated them in a color I really like, called "Silver Vein". It is a textured finish that doesn't show casting flaws.

After the coating cured, I used rebuild kits from O Reilly Auto Parts (6 dollars per side) to make them as good as new.






Then, I started working on cleaning the spindles up. I can't tell you in words how much crud and grease was on these things. After I got one of them cleaned up really well, I went ahead and coated it in the same Silver Vein finish just for a morale booster.




A close up shot to show the vein texture:



Well, I am off the computer now and back to working on it.

[vk_chevy]

That powder coating looks really good,
Are you planning on keeping the existing bed or will you go with some flatbed?

[Tx Firefighter]

I just got finished powdering the lug nut plates. Same silver vein as everything else, except I put a coat of clear over the top of them.

The pictures are kind of wonky. The actual part doesn't look like a bass boat like the pictures make you think they do.

[toomanytoyz]

Really like that coating, Where did u get it from?

Thanks, Rick

[Tx Firefighter]

It's from Powder by the Pound.