Well the weather warmed up just enough to get some things done. First I used a soda blasting conversion kit on my sand blaster. It worked okay for a cheap kit. It used much less media than the sand blaster. I soda blasted the rear axle housing it turned out petty good. I had to use my wire wheel to clean a few spots. The blasting cabinet is great I have used it a lot. I started cleaning all of the brake parts and other small parts. I epoxied all of the u-bolts and pedals and parts I cleaned. I also got to put color on the frame! So now hopefully next week I can color sand the frame. I also took the third member out of the rear end and took it to a local shop to have them set the rear ring gear. I should have the rear end back together next week. Then I will start painting the rear end and small parts. My brother in-law came over and helped me a little last week. He helped me replace the input shaft housing on my transmission. The old housing was wore out it had grooves where it shouldn't and was sticking. He mostly helped me clean beer out of the fridge. But who am I to argue help is help.

Sandblasting cabinet!

Well I started out building a sandblasting cabinet and this is what I came up with.

  

I gave up trying to build a cabinet. So I bought one. I needed to get things going. (aka I got impatient.) So now I am sorting out all of my small chassis parts for blasting. The light was a little weak in the cabinet so I took a LED shop light I had bought for my dads shop and placed it on top. I took my brake cables off and I am getting them ready to ship to a company to remake them. The old cables are worn out the wires are frayed and the casings are coming undone. I am still a bit nervous to send them across the country to the east coast. But it is the only place I have found that still will work with these old cables.

It has been to cold to paint. So I have been on a short hiatus. Ebay has been good to me lately, I have found a spare carb. and International hood side plates. The carb was a great buy when I got it home I opened it up to find out it had been rebuilt, the out side of the carb looked like it had been sitting in a dirt pile for 20 years. After a bit of  cleaning I realized the dirt and nastiness was dust covered cosmoline, so it is a brand new carb just needs a bath.The hood side plates looked ten times better than the beat up sets I have and they were cheaper than the set I found in Australia. So win win. A few weeks ago my son and I went to the American Truck Historical Society in Kansas city Mo. We went to join the group and to see what type and kind of info they had for my truck. They had a lot more than I expected. They have a whole book on farm and service truck beds and bed designs (no measurements just pictures). They also have a wonderful staff. They were more than helpful finding what I was looking for and they took a liking to my son. I think my sons ego grew five times from visit he is still talking about  wanting to go get cheeseburgers with the girls at ATHS. We had a wonderful time I can't wait to go back and do more research. There library is unbelievably large and a great place to visit. Big thanks to www.aths.org! 

chassis almost there!

It warmed up enough to finish sanding the body filler and get a few coats of polyester primer on top of the frame. You can really see the how ruff it was before I started.  Now I will do a little finish sanding and if the weather holds up I will paint the chassis red. I plan to get the rear end over to my house and clean it up for paint. I was going to have it sand blasted but with all the rain and cold weather it will be hard to keep it from rusting before I can get paint on it. I might wait till spring to finish the rear end. But I get impatient and want to keep things moving. So in the next few weeks I will decide what to do. So soon I will have to start sorting all my chassis and brake parts to get prepped to paint. I also found a set of 1933 license plates at a flea market in Illinois called the pink elephant.

creating dust!

 I have been working on getting the chassis all strait and smooth for paint. I have been using filler on top of the Epoxy to level out all the pits in the top of the frame and a few dings. I know this is a little more work but I think it will pay off in the long run in looks and keeping it from gathering water on the top of the frame. My kids came out to help me sand on the frame too. Soon I will take the front wheels and hubs down to Hoods Machine to have them turned for new bearings. I don't want to do this but the original bearing size is hard to find or gone. So the easiest way to solve the problem is widen the hub by .075 to fit a slightly bigger race. With that done the bearings will be on the shelf at most parts stores.

So I have got my frame back from Owens sand blasting in Lebanon Mo. Every thing look great. So I got it home put it in the shop and what does it do, start raining! I rearranged the shop and put up plastic spay booth. So after a few days of rain it cleared up enough to get epoxy on the frame. Now I am going to put a skim coat of body filler on the frame and slick it up a bit. I also got started on my blasting cabinet. I cut a 55gal drum long ways in half. And I am working on how to finish it out.

Frame Work

 I bought rivets to reinstall the front leaf spring hangers. And made a rivet hammer. After the brackets were reinstalled, I took the frame to the sand blasters. I will have it back next week and will start painting it next week. I am going build a paint booth for the frame in my dad's shop. I took the front end completely apart took the spindles off, and the brakes apart. We had a little trouble taking the rear u-bolts off the New Mexico truck. No! they were not rusted the had been put on tight!!. So with the help of my Dad and 6ft cheater bar we managed to remove them with out braking any thing. I also found a place to buy cut to fit rubber to replace my motor and transmission mounts. The mounts are really simple all 1/4inch sheet rubber. So here soon looks like I will be painting the frame and getting it ready to put the motor back in. I got an 55gal drum to build my self a sand blasting cabinet. So I will also post how I build my blast cabinet too. I am going to sand blast all the small stuff my self and save a little money and give me a lot to do this winter. I have plenty of things to keep me busy for a while. Just not as much fun as I had rebuilding the engine and trans. I am also in the process of looking for a company to rebuild the brake cables. I have been told about a place in Massachusetts which is fine, but I was going to try and find something more local.