Restoring Rusty

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by green72s

I tried working with JB Weld on my control arms before having them powder coated and it wasn't easy. Hang in there Gregski, you'll get it!

love you man, strength in numbers, ha ha

[Gregski]

it was a little chilly this evening for Nor Cal so I decided to put on my big boy long johns and GIT ER DONE!

of note is that with one loop cut off the stock front coil spring is still a bit longer than the McGauphys 2" shorter coil spring

[Gregski]

it's amazing what you can git done if you don't have to play Chauffeur after work for two hours taking yer kids to this and that

[thank you honey for driving them tonight - the forum says thanks too, ha ha]

it was dark but I took some measurements and pics afterwards of the first side with the cut coil spring and low and behold a perfect 2" drop

Before 31 1/4

After 29 1/4

[Gregski]

do I have enuff left in the tank to git the other side done today (lemme check the fridge, ha ha)

[enaberif]

Cold?! You don't know cold. Look at the temps where I am up here in Calgary, AB

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by enaberif

Cold?! You don't know cold. Look at the temps where I am up here in Calgary, AB

I'm skierd to.

[Gregski]

the other patient on the surgery table

[Gregski]

and another successful amputation

[Gregski]

and so we got both sides done tonight, but we're too tired to clean up the garage and shuffle the cars in the driveway to take Rusty for a test drive, so we'll do that tomorrow morning and report on how it handles - looks pretty good though

[Gregski]

thank you to all our veterans for serving and their sacrifice

the goal for today is to remove the leaf spring hangers held on with 4 rivets each (I think it's early so my math may be off, correct me if I is wrong) I know there be 4 that you can see from the side of the frame and I don't remember if there's any hiding below the frame rail, I don't think so

here are some pictures of the hangers that I took when the bed was off, man would that have been a nice time to grind or drill these out, I could have done that and bolted them back on with nuts and bolts even if I didn't have the budget for the new taller ones I just bought (hind sight, but it may be a suggestion for you the reader, ha ha)

and now you know why I didn't bother painting them when I POR15ed the frame

[enaberif]

For the side with the tank do the two outside and the top one then you should be able to rotate the hangar with some force and get the last one without removing the tank.

Just make 100% damn sure that your tank is covered up if you do ANY grinding lol.

[Gregski]

ok, so here is what the truck looks like lowered 2 inches in the front with one loop cut off the stock coil springs, and lowered 2 inches in the rear with aftermarket 2" drop shackles

there is a bit of a rake to it, with the rear being higher than the front, that's where the 2" drop hangers come in, stay tuned...

[Gregski]

updates, updates, updates...

the day started off with a field trip to Harbor Freight to buy some 6 Ton car jack stands, they happened to be on sale plus they let me use one of their 20% OFF coupons, so for $35 bucks out the door, you can't beat that

and now we have some stands that actually reach the rear half of the frame

[Gregski]

first a special shout out to my buddy GTO Mike who came over and did half the work, thank you bud

the day consisted of pretty much a lot of drilling and grinding, as we tried to use both techniques to get the hangers off, I think drilling a 1/8th pilot hole all the way through the rivet helped punch it out, my buddy Mike believes grinding off all four heads off the rivets than hammering the bracket off first than tapping out the rivets is the key, just some ideas for you

[Gregski]

Mike worked on the driver side and I worked on the passenger side, the danger side by the tank, I made sure all vents were plugged and put a wet cloth towel on top of it to catch the sparks

I could only get to the first two on the gas tank side with the tank still attached

[Gregski]

we were making sparks all day long

[Gregski]

Mike got the driver side off first, here are the two hangers side by side, we wire wheeled the area behind it and dabbed it with some left over POR15 to match the rest of the painted frame rail

this time of the year (late fall) this is gonna have to dry for a couple of days

[enaberif]

Whacking the hangar off before the rivets is the easiest and best way and what I did as well.

[Gregski]

and so the gas tank had to come out on the passenger side to get to the other two rivets, just so you know it is impossible to get at them from the inside of the frame rail because they are tucked in between the cross member, which is also riveted in

do you all think I can clean this tank up with a wire wheel in order to paint it, or will I blow myself up?

[Gregski]

with the fuel tank out of the way we were able to grind down the other two rivets and get that hanger off too

[Gregski]

after we cleaned this frame rail behind the hanger and where the fuel tank used to be, we went further and discovered this stamped number on the frame

12-12-73

Is that a born on date? Is Rusty's Birthday coming up?

[Gregski]

I swear these rivets look like bullet slugs, don't they?

[Gregski]

and some parting shots of our Support Cast (get it support?) I recon bigger trucks maybe 3/4 ton or 1 ton use all six rivet holes on these brackets but my 1/2 ton only used the top four?

also I noticed is that they are switchable / interchangeable left to right, which is such a smart design, ie there is no left one and no right one

[Gregski]

If I am reading this Bolt Grade Table properly than LMC Truck has included some Grade 5 (3 notches) bolts with the hangers, and perhaps Grade 2 Nuts and Washers

The Greg is not a fan of using Grade 5 hardware for suspension componentry!

[enaberif]

Grade 5 is perfectly fine but I would not use grade 2 at all.

I had to use a bunch of grade 5 on mine because trying to find a place open on the weekends that stock the appropriate quantities of grade 8 was impossible.

If you can use grade 8 do so.. if all you can find is grade 5 it will be ok as long as EVERYTHING is grade 5.

And yes you can wirewheel the tank if you want without blowing anything up.