Getting closer!

Alright bearings in hand time to get some painting done. I taped and prepped the rear end housing and got it epoxied.  I had noticed the front springs had a couple broken springs so I traded them out for the ones on the Texas truck. I blasted and epoxied them too, and the drive shaft. Had a couple runs I need to fix.   well soon as they dry I will put a little Feather-Fill on the rear housing and smooth it up a little then for a coat of red, polish up a bit a put it back under the frame. I get to start putting it back together! I sent the brake cables To Gorge Martin in Lebanon PA to have them rebuilt. So far he is the only person in the United States that will still rebuild brake cables, he also had a NOS set of rear cables with brackets that were for my truck so instead of making new I will get NOS for the rear. So with all this coming together I need to get a move on and get the wheels done. I have till this summer ish  to hit my goal. The first year get motor done. (check) Second year chassis done (.....) Third year body? Well we will see. I have a lot of red to paint, and I am ready to get rolling.

Bearings!!!

 Okay I have been searching for bearings for at least six months or more and finally I am done! I can not take all of the credit. First Tom Underwood (Parts of The Past) is the best I can not say enough about him, he has provided me with more than I could ever Imagined. He had all front wheel bearings I don't know why I didn't try him first. We had hoped he still had a set of pinion bearings too but was all out. So my machine shop (Hoods machine in Bolivar  Mo) came up with a plan to find bearings that got us close to the same size then to ether shim or bore out to fit the bearings I was having trouble finding. Well I searched till I was calling bearing manufactures directly trying to find any thing. After a few calls I found my outer pinion bearing was still made by Temkin so one down one to go. Well the inner bearing was really hard the closest I could come was over a quarter inch less than the original. So I look up parts all day long at my job and one of the company's that I have run into a lot is http://www.locateballbearings.com/   Okay I thought couldn't hurt I will give them a try. It made me feel not so bad when it took them a week to hunt them down, but Eugene Carney took the time to look and he found them! I couldn't believe it we had a few conversations and shared some dimensions and a few ideas and boom three days later they are in my hand. So big thanks to Eugene Carney and to Tom Underwood I wouldn't be going any where with out them! So know I am off to have the pinion set.

Cleaning up the wheels.

I got the compressor hooked up and got it going. It is much quieter than the old single stage that we had. And airs up in a fraction of the time. I was missing a air filter on the compressor and the replacement was hard to get and a little expensive. So I came up with a temporary fix.  My kids got to come out and help too. They both enjoyed using the needle scalier to help me clean the wheel rims. A few friends of mine think I should paint my new compressor and spice it up a little, so I have been entertaining the thought of  using some of the hod rod paint I have and seeing what we come up with. Well we are still looking for pinion bearings and have been entertaining the  thought about turning the pinion housing to fit a larger bearing, just like what I have to do to the front wheels. The pinion sits in it's own carrier so it should not be a extreme thing to fix,

just time and money.

New compressor.

 So the new blasting cabinet and running the sandblaster was taxing my old compressor. I had been looking for a larger compressor to handle my sandblaster. I found a new compressor through the company I work for they have a used equipment department and they came up with a large compressor for sale. So with a little debate I ended up with a new compressor. It didn't even look used, but it was missing a intake filter. So here soon it I will hook it up and see how it works. It is a little bigger than I was wanting but I am not going to complain. It's big enough that I have to put in bigger wiring and a 50 amp beaker. With the new compressor I will start blasting the drive shaft and carrier.  I got a call from the shop I took my differential to and they had taken it all apart and were looking for pinon bearings, as soon as they find bearings I will be on my way to a running drive train.  I got the frame polished and it looks good. I still have a few spots to go back over. All of the prep work for the frame really paid off. So far I have used a little over a half a gallon of epoxy and a whole gallon of International red, so before I start painting again I need to get more paint.

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!