47-55.1 Hey you all, how the heck you doing? I'm working on my truck again!!!

[MARTINSR]

My 5 minute a day plan makes me touch the truck EVERY SINGLE DAY. Sometimes, 5 minutes, putting in a few bolts, what ever. Most of the time, an hour at least. But it's touched every single day and it's moving along! WHOOO HOOOOOO!

Brian

[leegreen]

I agree, 1157 is brighter than the relatively expensive LEDs I bought. Plus 1157 will never partially fail or start blinking randomly. Painting the inside of my light buckets white also made them a lot brighter. I saved reflectors from a couple flashlights and plan to cut them down to fit as the next upgrade.

Keep plugging away!

[MARTINSR]

You want to hear a super crazy thing from this world we live in now? How about the LED tail lights on a late model GM car. It the "bulb" "burns out" on one of these LED lights, the LED can't be changed!!!!!!
Not making this up, saw it a few times, the WHOLE tail light assembly had to be changed. Yep, and it was $800 for the light!

Yep, give me an 1156 and an 1157 and they can be put in any car for decades! And trailers, and everything. Yep, times have changed.

That's why I like the older cars. My daily driver is a 2005 Pontiac Sunfire. My wife has a 9 year old Subaru CrossCrek because I want her to have all wheel drive in the snow and to be as comfy as possible. But that SunFire does everything I need.

And it cost me about what a valve cover gasket change would cost on my wife's Subaru at the dealer.

Give me them old cars!

Brian

[mr48chev]

A 2357 directly replaces a 1157 and is a lot brighter. I have those on my 48 and my 71 and they really make a difference on the 71 after I painted the inside of the housing bright white.

That said, painting the inside of your taillight housing bright white helps a lot and that alone with a 1157 makes a huge difference as does taking the lenses off and cleaning things up every once in a while.

[MARTINSR]

I didn't know that info about the 2357, thanks!

Brian

[mr48chev]

I put them in the 71 after I got pulled over by the state patrol for a "your tail lights are too dim" stop and got up the next morning and ran to O"Reilly's and picked up a pair and a can of white paint and did the clean the dirt out, paint the reflectors and change the bulb thing. After I got home after getting stopped I left the lights on and walked out the driveway (400 ft driveway) and from about 250 ft they were real dim. The next night when I got home they looked nice and bright from out on the road 400 ft away.

[MARTINSR]

Awesome!

Brian

[mr48chev]

Quick question, How much space do you have between the radiator and hood after you sectioned the hood? Did you change anything on the radiator for clearance?

[MARTINSR]

I'm sorry, the radiator isn't in there so I can't tell you how far. I was during the sectioning and as I remember there was a few inches still.

Brian

[mr48chev]

That should work then. I might do some measuring before I take mine apart to see how much room I have to play with.

[mr48chev]

The light bulb just came on, I can check real easy after I lift the nose off the old chassis and set the radiator in it and set the hood back on.

[MARTINSR]

I got a little more done on my tail lights and got this rear bumper filler trail fit and modified. Ohhhhhhhh OHHHHHHH I am loving this thing! I had ZERO plans of using one. I didn't like the big round ends they had on it, made no sense to me. I saw them on trucks at shows and just couldn't figure out why they put those big round ends on it under the bottom of the tail gate hinges going to the rear fenders. Then one day looking at one it hit me, geeez, I could cut them off! It did hit me before I did that in my garage that why they were there, they matched the running board aprons. Ok, that makes no sense at all to me. So, cutting them off totally changed the look and I LOVE IT!!! I made pieces of metal to fill those areas that you can barely see to the right of that yellow masking tape. I am seriously digging the look! The license plate will go there and I have gotten 1950 Be Lair license plate lights to put on each side of the plate.

WHOOOOO HOOOOOOO!

Brian

[MARTINSR]

Got my mods all done on the bumper filler panel and my license plate and lights mounted. The lights are from a 1950 Chevy car. And no that isn't a plate number that is in use.

Brian

[MARTINSR]

I got close to keeping my "5 minute a day plan" underway even though I was 500 miles from my truck while in Oregon for my daughters birthday. I brought an original quarter panel section off a 1953 Corvette where the tail light mounts to show my grandsons. Along with the lights I made and pieces of fiberglass cloth and mat to show them how it was done. They made the patterns for the tail light mounting bracket on a piece of paper that I have used when I got home to mark out on the metal I will cut them out of.
When I get this truck done this will be one of the things they did to take part in it's construction.
Another of the "5 minute a day plan" we did was to go to a hardware store and get the nut's and bolts to hold these brackets onto the tail lights.
A little while later I went into Calvin's room (the youngest) and saw he had put a diecast 53 Corvette out on display!

Brian

[MARTINSR]

My "five minute a day plan" is going along great. Got this tail lamp mounting done yesterday. It kicked my butt, made a few mistakes I had to correct so the other one today should take 10% of the time this one did. LOL

Brian

[dsraven]

nice job. you better be carefull or you could start a business selling them

[nvrdone]

Ok, I'm confused. Where are you mounting the lights?

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by nvrdone

Ok, I'm confused. Where are you mounting the lights?

Rear of bed under the side rail at the top.

Brian

[mr48chev]

That should put them up where they can be seen.

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by mr48chev

That should put them up where they can be seen.

Yeah, honestly, I wasn't planning on putting them up so high. But then it hit me, first off, that IS where they are on a 53 Vette but also relating to your comment, people will be able to see them!

It blows my ever loving mind how close people pull up behind you now.

I am tossing around ideas on a third brake light.

Brian

[MARTINSR]

I saw this Buick yesterday at a car show with a pretty nice 3rd brake light. I want a "stock" looking one so it's kinda hard. Thinking if I do it, it's got to have a chrome trim.

Brian

[MARTINSR]

My 5 minute a day plan is so much better than mental health meds from a doctor. Ohhhh am I feeling good everyday. Got the modified rear bumper filler primed and fit. The license plate lights repaired and primed.
I am so happy with how it’s moving along.

Brian

[MARTINSR]

Fixing a mistake I made 45 years ago. In the first photo of the grill on my truck you can barely see a mistake until you see it, then you can't UNSEE it. LOL There are 5 bars in the grill and every one is a different length getting longer as you go down to the bottom one. They are numbered 1,2,3,4,5. You can see that number 3 and 4 are too short! Well, they aren't a number 3 or 4, they are number 2's! Yep, from the second down, the number 2 you can see that it's the same as the next two! Geeeez, it's drove me nuts for years. I remember one person spotting it at a show, other than that who knows who ever even noticed but it has driven me crazy.
I had done that back then because the numbers 3 and 4 are right up above the bumper and are OFTEN damaged after someone hits another cars bumper. Finding that nice old grill at Don's Antique auto parts where I bought parts 50 years ago the last time it was open after Don passed away about 10 years ago was a treasure find!
The next photo is of a grill with the bars removed and you can see notches cut in it, a row of 3 and the one below it a row of 4. Then the next photo is of the grill bars and you can see those same notches! Yep, when the grill was installed at the factory they matched the notches to put the correct ones.
I am repairing some damage on the number 3 and 4 that I removed from the extra grill I had and will be swapping them out with the wrong ones on my grill when I get them all chromed in the future.
No kidding, I felt the man who installed those rivets that held those bars on feeding his family and putting a roof over their head as I removed the bars that hadn't been removed since the grill was made 75 years ago.

Brian

[dsraven]

good idea to fab up a 3rd brake light. personally I would say make it big enough to count otherwise it's an exercise in metalwork. maybe try to use a 3rd light from a newer vehicle or a very common light from an aftermarket supplier so you will be able to purchase one if it gets broken or whatever after a few years. I have seen a few old trucks with a 3rd light mounted low inside the rear cab at the bottom of the window glass. that works as long as you don't plan to haul anything that would block it from view. another thing to think about is where would the average person, who is driving behind you and is not a car enthusiast, be looking for a 3rd brake light. I have seen a few customised vehicles where the lights have been moved to a rear fender or frenched into a lower valance. I always wonder how good they can be seen unless the person looking is directly behind the vehicle.

[MARTINSR]

The higher the better that's for sure!

It is crazy how close people drive behind cars today, CRAZY. You will see people literally one car length behind a car driving 60 mph down the freeway!

Brian