46 pickemup in NJ "the Rebuild"

[paintman]

here ya go Chizz! I just had to do it

[old yelr]

I'm in!
I've been watching project moonshine so I'll be watching this one too

[paintman]

Ok lets get er done! So anyway about 3 years ago now I took what i thought would be a harmless ride over to our local Tractor Supply Store on a Sunday afternoon. At that time being the owner of any kind of custom truck was the furthest thing from my mind. However I must admit that its always been something that i wished I had.

So as I was just about ready to leave the parking lot, in rolled this really cool looking truck. Not knowing that it was for sale at the time, I waited for the owner to go into the store so I could walk over and take a closer look. After doing a couple of walk a rounds I noticed on the tail gate in very small letters "for sale". Now me being the idiot that I am my next move was to walk inside and track down the owner and ask how much. Well after hearing the price I went home and pondered it for a few days. After about a week of trying to talk myself out of buying the truck, this is what came home one Thursday afternoon.



Now at the time I thought the only thing I would really do to the truck was take care of a few visible things I had seen that was wrong, and just use the truck as a coffee or breakfast runner on Sundays with the wife for a year or two. Then the plan was to do a semi- resto to clean the truck up enough so I could paint it similar to my work truck (I'm a self employed house painter) take it to the local Friday night cruises and advertise my business.......

[paintman]

So as I was saying.......I drove the truck around for about 2 or 3 months and on each occasion I noticed or felt a few things that just didn't suit me or down right scared me (no sense in going into detail but lets just say ...nah never mind). LOL.
So a little more detail about the truck. The guy I bought the truck off of is not the original builder. The truck had a 350/350 tranny combo when I bought it. Unfortunately the motor had as much oil spewing from it as Saudi Arabia because the previous owners did not believe in a PCV valve. They were both WAAAAY to old school. The other issue the truck had was a worn out AMC Pacer front end in it. So I new up front the truck had some issues.
so fast forward to November of 2011. this is when I decide to take the ole girl off the road and begin what I thought would be a 1-3 year make over.

Time to put her away for awhile and give her a face lift

[old yelr]

Awesome truck! Love the Art Deco trucks. I wish I could have found one that was complete and driving. I have a 40' like Chizzler's truck that I bought as just a cab on a chassis and a few misc parts. I'm collecting parts and getting there but it's slow going.
Looking forward to see what you have planned for the old stovebolt!
Lot's of pictures

[paintman]

Ok so the first order of business was to strip the nose off and see just what was going on underneath the hood. At this point I was not really planning on getting to involved with something like a frame off rest, but as we follow the bouncing ball you will see that it is somewhat necessary.
Everything looks kind of normal right????????????? NOT

One of the first things I had to investigate was the fact that when ever i reved up the motor it seemed to twist a little bit more then what I had ever seen in other V8's. Upon closer review I found that out of the 4 bolts that held the front motor plate (Hurst style) on.....2 bolts were broken off in the block.....1 bolt was missing .....and the last one was being SUPER BOLT!!!!!!!!
Here's the bolt that was missing (look for the screw
driver tip)
Here are the 2 bolts that were broken (they look pretty good at first don't they)?

NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[paintman]

Now I know what you guys are thinking.....He broke thos 2 bolts when he went to take them out. Nope! Not a chance! It still amazes me to this day that the tops of the bolts rode around in the motor mount for who knows how long. It doesn't surprise though as they were not even hardened. Now after that little surprise I believe I went inside and had quite a few cold ones if you know what I mean
After killing the initial pain of the broken bolts it was back out to the garage to take a look at a few more things. I figured why not pull the valve covers and spark plugs.
Well that looks pretty normal for a motor from the late 60's

Next the plugs...That didn't look pretty normal for a late 60's engine!


And you guys wonder why I drink

[paintman]

opps here's the plugs

[paintman]

Those plugs will be indicative of what this truck has had thrown at it in its past life as we will all go on to see in my future posts.None of this really bothered me all that much due to the fact once I had the nose off the truck the plan was to have the engine rebuilt anyway.

Now that the motor was out I could take a better look at how the Pacer front end was installed.

Other than being somewhat ugly it served its purpose to a point however, When I had the few opportunities to drive the truck, the steering wheel never wanted to come back straight by itself after going around a corner, indicating that there was some kind of alignment issue. Now remember this initially was just going to be a clean-up resto of sorts.
A couple of months after I bought the truck I had a chance to buy a complete rebuild kit for the Pacer front end on the cheap. So My first thought was rebuild it, align it, and the just drive the sucker. After more drinking and further consideration I realized I may have a more serious issue with the steering. Perhaps the whole front cross member was put in wrong the truck would never steer correctly even after the rebuild. so another decision had to be made.

Well you guessed it.. After measuring, measuring some more, and then marking the center line of the wheel hubs on the frame, it was out with the old ......



And in with the new with a call to Scottshotrods.com

[paintman]

Now before I go any further let me just say that if anyone reading this thread is considering a new IFS for there project, although I had some issues with my front end, I would highly recommend Justin and the gang at Scottshotrods!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The quality of the fabrication is immaculate, and the customer service is second to none.
So I'm not going to bore you guys with all the details of an IFS instal. theres hundred of threads covering this. But I will say this when you get a cross member from Justin, .....It fits almost perfect with hardly any trimming.

Now here's where one of the problems occurred. Fro whatever reason the frames are slightly different on the 46' as they take a nose dive just after the cross member. this caused problems with the sway bar as I didn't have enough room for the mounting blocks and it put the bar to low in realationship to the pick up points on the lower A arms.

[paintman]

After a call to Justin, I had a new off set sway bar in my driveway in 2 days.

that got me closer but I was still short on frame length.
So we just decided to add a piece to the front of the frame.

Obviuosly I will need to trim off the excess and re work the front bumper mounts. but I will have to wait until i can re hang the bumpers to see where its at. Now I'm going to ski[p over one very large issue I had while installing the front end. But lets just say it was a stupid rookie mistake and according to Justin I am not the only one to have done it. In fact after talking to Justin and hearing some other stories I don't feel all that stupid as some other are. For now I am going to let you guys stew on that, and lets Hope Justin doesn't spill the beans but lets just say A WHOLE LOT OF DRINKING WAS DONE THAT DAY!
but anyways after a lot of hard work and frustration here's what I have.

[CHIZZLER]

truck looks great.i would like to hear more about the rookie mistake but all in good time.i do remember reading a kinda heated argument about the color of your truck and you wanting to paint it to show your skills and i agree 100% percent.if i could show off my plumbing skills i would bolt a toilet to my hood and let everyone see the kinda work i do.looking forward to following your build.

[paintman]

Originally Posted by CHIZZLER

truck looks great.i would like to hear more about the rookie mistake but all in good time.i do remember reading a kinda heated argument about the color of your truck and you wanting to paint it to show your skills and i agree 100% percent.if i could show off my plumbing skills i would bolt a toilet to my hood and let everyone see the kinda work i do.looking forward to following your build.

LOL I remember that heated argument too, for some reason (especially nowadays) people think that anyone who owns a business has an unfair advantage. Its been about 3 years since I have bought this truck and to this day I have not written off a dime on my business for a tax break nor do I ever intend to. its not worth the risk.

[CHIZZLER]

i agree.i feel the advantage to owning your own business is that you can provide a quality product to customers on a personal level.i am also a owner/operator.

[Tx Firefighter]

Bout damn time you started a build thread. After that dogpile on the HAMB, I've been waiting on you to do this over here. I don't imagine there will be any hate or discontent in your thread over here.

Like I said before, both here and the HAMB, I like the hell out of that truck. I wish I owned it.

[paintman]

Originally Posted by Tx Firefighter

Bout damn time you started a build thread. After that dogpile on the HAMB, I've been waiting on you to do this over here. I don't imagine there will be any hate or discontent in your thread over here.

Like I said before, both here and the HAMB, I like the hell out of that truck. I wish I owned it.

Hey Tx! I see my thread over on the HAMB got shut down. O well it was fun while it lasted. The guys over here are much cooler!
By the way I got my rear and springs out of the truck. going to take the springs tomorrow to get a price for a re work.

[Tx Firefighter]

My local spring shop works cheap. It seems to be a trend in that business. They charge me 6 bucks per bushing to replace, and that includes the price of the bushing.

125 to 150 gets me a full rebuild with de-arch (to lower) with all four new bushings. New center pin bolts, clamps and everything. They also make new u bolts for 7.50 each. Just take you old one in there for a pattern for them. If you have them de-arch yours to lower it and do away with the lowering blocks, they will need to make you new u-bolts that are shorter to do away with the lowering blocks added thickness.

[paintman]

Originally Posted by Tx Firefighter

My local spring shop works cheap. It seems to be a trend in that business. They charge me 6 bucks per bushing to replace, and that includes the price of the bushing.

125 to 150 gets me a full rebuild with de-arch (to lower) with all four new bushings. New center pin bolts, clamps and everything. They also make new u bolts for 7.50 each. Just take you old one in there for a pattern for them. If you have them de-arch yours to lower it and do away with the lowering blocks, they will need to make you new u-bolts that are shorter to do away with the lowering blocks added thickness.

Not quite following you on the de arching of my springs. I mean I understand the concept of taking the arch ou to not have to use lowering blocks but my springs when they were in the truck with a load on them looked pretty flat already. sorry for sounding stupid but thats what i do best.

[Tx Firefighter]

Here's the skinny...

Your old blocks were what, 2 inches ?

Your options are to either build a new set of 2 inch blocks to replace those old junky ones and reuse your springs.

Or, you can have your shop de-arch the springs 2 inches and do away with the lowering blocks so the rearend sits directly onto the springs. This will need shorter u bolts of course.

Don't sweat the springs going into negative arch. It's very common really. Many custom cars run negative arch springs once lowered down. I've even paid big bucks for brand new street rod springs that were negative arch right out of the box.

The route you take is totally up to you. 6 on one hand, half dozen on the other kind of deal. You just need to talk to the spring guys about their opinion. For economy, you're way ahead to not dearch your springs and to re-use your old u-bolts. But, you'll have to go to the trouble of building new blocks. If you'd prefer to spend some coin, they will drop the springs for you and build shorter u bolts so it would be an easier (yet more expensive) job since you don't need to build any new blocks.

[paintman]

Originally Posted by Tx Firefighter

Here's the skinny...

Your old blocks were what, 2 inches ?

Your options are to either build a new set of 2 inch blocks to replace those old junky ones and reuse your springs.

Or, you can have your shop de-arch the springs 2 inches and do away with the lowering blocks so the rearend sits directly onto the springs. This will need shorter u bolts of course.

Don't sweat the springs going into negative arch. It's very common really. Many custom cars run negative arch springs once lowered down. I've even paid big bucks for brand new street rod springs that were negative arch right out of the box.

The route you take is totally up to you. 6 on one hand, half dozen on the other kind of deal. You just need to talk to the spring guys about their opinion. For economy, you're way ahead to not dearch your springs and to re-use your old u-bolts. But, you'll have to go to the trouble of building new blocks. If you'd prefer to spend some coin, they will drop the springs for you and build shorter u bolts so it would be an easier (yet more expensive) job since you don't need to build any new blocks.

Gotcha! I think at this point I am leaning towards just installing new lowering blocks, and keeping the springs the way they are. I'm sure the spring shop will tell me they can't guarantee they won't brake the springs when they de arch. And Knowing my luck....

[paintman]

Ok moving on, so lets see I finally got the scott's IFS finished up around august of this year and it was time to make a decision on what to do with the motor for this rig. Originally the plan was to stay with the 350/350 combo. I have an engine shop about 2 miles away that said they would love to rebuild it for me.

The only problem is that I tend to go against the grain sometimes, and after going to a few car show over the summer and seeing nothing but belly buttons with chrome on them, I knew I wanted something different. So I hearkened back to the good ole days when I was 21 and was able to buy my first brand new truck. It had a 250 inline 6 that I couldn't kill. Back then I was heavily involved with racing karts on the weekends and I drove the piss out of that truck driving all over the damn place to different tracks!!!! So off I went a search for an inline. I was lucky to come across an engine right in my back yard that was in a 71 Chevy Nova. the Kid who owned it wanted to put your typical V* chromer in it to impress the chicks. So after hearing it run for an hour, $250 later she sat in my drive way.

[paintman]

[Tx Firefighter]

I've had a bunch of those inline sixes and love them to death. But, I have three letters for you.... HEI. Best thing you can do for a six cylinder. Easier starting, smoother running and idle, better economy.

[paintman]

And of course it was time to put her in her new hole.

[CHIZZLER]

nice choice.gonna be sweet