Ok I'm making pretty good progress on the tear down. The frame is almost ready to be blasted and painted but I have a rear spring question first. On the front eye of the rear spring there is a brace in the way of knocking the pivot pin out. How have you removed the pin? I don't see any way to do it other than removing the brace, drilling an access hole or maybe attaching a slide hammer to the pin some how. Thanks in advance, this pic shows the brace.

 

here is the frame

 

I had to cut a hole with a hole saw, and punch it out from behind with a rod. Was'nt easy but with a little effort it will come out. Use a torch to heat the shackle if you have to, goodluck

 

My 56 frame has an oval hole in that brace...I assumed that all frames were that way.

 

Yes, i ran into the same thing on my 50 F3. I took a long piece of round stock, 3/8 i think, whatever fits in the hole. it was about 24 inches long and i slide it under that frame brace and it lined up perfect with the pin that i had to drive out. I saw someone else on here had to drill a hole in the brace to allow access, but i didn't. it took some hammering with a sledge but don't get discouraged, they do come out. on a tough one in the rear of the truck, i set a MAP torch under the bracket and let it heat it up to facilitate their release.

 

I just cut off the rivets and rebolted with grade 8's after...that way if there are any issues you can always take it off at a later time.

 

When I performed the same procedure several months ago on my 52 Panel, I didn't have the luxury of a bare frame. I ended up drilling a hole with a 1/2" drill bit and then enlarging the same hole with a cone-shaped drill bit (that enlarges holes). After the hole was made, I inserted a long (about 12") bolt and pounded the shackle pin out. One side came out easy, but the other didn't cooperate as well. I had to use map gas to help with the removal.



About a two weeks later, I performed the same procedure on another truck, but this time, I was working with a partially bare frame (the bed was removed).

 

All of the pins have come out without a fight thankfully, I just couldn't see a way to get to these. thanks for the GL

 

TJdad, I have a pretty good selection of punches (was an auto tech for many years) I tried one of my longer punches and it felt like it was not lining up correctly. I will give it another shot tomorrow and than drill the hole if that doesn't work.

Thanks to everyone for their replies

 

i just toke the shackle off to didn't wanna drill a big hole in the frame

 

There is no shackle on the front part of the rear spring and the support is riveted on as well so it either remove the rivets or drill a hole. If it comes down to it I will drill a hole as I don't want to mess with taking the rivets out.

 

Here's what I did and it worked well. I removed the zerk fitting from the outer end of the pin and screwed a piece of 3/8" all thread into the hole where the zerk was. If I remember right the all thread was NF thread form (24 TPI).
Then I got a 3/4 pipe nipple (appropriate size) (long enough for the pin to be extracted into) to use as a spacer and some washers and a nut.

I have included a picture of the extractor I put together for removing the bushings in the spring eye. A little different but I hope you can get the idea of what is supposed to take place here.

The threads of the pin are 1/8" NPT if I recall, not quite the same as 3/8 NF but close enough to work. Screw the all thread in securly and lubricate the threaded portion where the nut is to exert pressure. The tool will last longer.

 

Thanks I was heading that direction earlier today but could not find a bolt lying around but you tripped the light bulb in my head I should have the right size bolt in my steering wheel puller set

 

That's correct. I've done the same thing several times, but I cut new threads on the end of a bolt to fit the old pin's 1/8" NPT threads. Trashing threads probably doesn't matter since you're gonna install new pins and bushings anyway. It's easier than struggling to do it from the back side. Stu

 

sorry i meant the hanger and I'm glad i did i had a rust hole behind mine that i didn't see till i toke it off