OK, so this is going to be my novice attempt at a 'tinker' thread... No building here. So first things first, I bought an '84 F150 4x4 300 I6 with a 4 speed manual transmission.

These are the pics that I saw before buying it:







It belonged to a church in Edisto, SC, and I bought it from a wheeler dealer, living in Myrtle Beach, who was selling it for the church. Hence the name Eddy Myrtle...

Supposedly it has 76000 original miles on it... Unable to verify due to the 5 figure odo.

But the interior is still in very good condition:









No A/C though, luckily summer is over, but next year could be a bit uncomfortable, especially down here in SC.

The engine has numerous leaks around the gaskets, nothing serious though. The transmission is leaking too, only saw that when I started tinkering with the truck. The rear brake line was leaking too, saw that on the drive home, while filling up.





I had no tools or mechanical experience when I bought Eddy 3 weeks ago... I have some tools now...

I paid $2800 for the truck and since I've been on this forum I have come to the conclusion that I probably overpaid by at least a grand! But honestly there are very few good running trucks for under 2k around here. And I had no idea what I would be able to fix...

 

So first I had to buy some tools. Researched online and split the purchases between Pep Boys and AutoZone. I know now I should probably have tried HaborFreight. I then did numerous trips to AZ to get the correct length brake line. I also replaced the rear shocks and master cylinder.

Shocking shocks:


New brake line and shocks


Getting the wheels off to check the brakes was an epic whole day of sweating and swearing! It took 2 whole canisters of Freeze Off! The brakes were as expected, rusted, but not in bad shape.

OK, very badly rusted!


And the pitted rotor is responsible for the mild vibration under normal braking - no vibration under hard braking. Opinions?


Taking off the old master cylinder was a bit of a drama too, stripped a nut and had to file it down... Managed it OK in the end. Bleeding the brakes were easy too with a 'one man' kit.


That's it for now, RedZone kicking off!

 

Congratulations on your buy!!
I think you'll get your moneys worth.

Sure you have A/C......just open that sliding window wide!!!!!

The brake vibration sounds more like a warped rotor....as it goes around it makes diff levels of contact. Observe it as you turn it around or put something up next to the rotor so you can watch the gap.

 

Nice looking truck, you might want to check out the brake hoses too for cracks/dry rot.

Wanna trade places? I loved Myrtle Beach the one time I was there.

 

Thanks, yeah I'm not losing sleep over what I paid. I intend on keeping it a long time.

I'll check the rotors again, but I'm going to replace all the brakes anyway, except maybe the calipers, as soon as I have the cash. Plus the front suspension. And then all the gaskets on the motor...

I've heard somewhere about the 460 AC, 4 windows open going 60 on the highway... So far it's not too bad.

 

I'm actually in Charleston, but yeah, Myrtle looked nice enough, obviously a holiday destination.

 

Here's a few more pics of some more 'tinkering'...

Cleaning the cab, getting the seat out was harder than it's suppose to be as I don't have a tool to remove the seatbelts. This pic is after a vac... I then scrubbed too.


The bench is still in really good condition, but I might want to put in buckets somewhere down the line...


I took the dash cover off to vac behind it and cut out the speaker grill which was nasty, now looking for an aftermarket cover. Found the odd one on eBay and Amazon, but not a lot of options. I need at least 6x9, but 7x10 would be ideal, any advice??


Next was this...


Did someone throw mud in there??



Of course that didn't go smoothly either! The drain plug is completely plugged with gunk or rust and is useless, so I had to remove the bottom hose to drain the radiator. And of course it went everywhere! I was going to change the radiator and got as far as actually putting it in when I realised the plastic tanks on an aluminium, sorry aluminum core radiator is about half an inch wider and therefore does not fit! So I've stuck with the original for a bit longer. Got the radiator from O'Reillys, but PBs and AZ have got the brass/copper one that fits. On the wish list it goes.

 

OK, last post with anything new for awhile as I'm out of cash at the moment. So the exhaust was full of holes and had a rattle. I got a quote from Midas for from the clamp behind the cat back... $550. OK, so I asked how much of that was parts? $280, so you're charging me $270 for labor!?

That completely defeats the point of buying an old truck and trying my hand at tinkering! So since I don't have that I decided to take the radiator money and get the parts and just do it myself. I initially didn't want to as the connection behind the cat is welded. And I don't have a welder, but thought I would just improvise...

So this resulted in...


this...


All the clamps were completely seized and rusted to hell. So I had to take a hacksaw to them. After the first one I realized that the pipes were seized together and I had to just saw the whole pipe off! Not easy with a little hand saw...

Fitting went a lot easier. And the parts only cost about $80!




And that's that, no more tinkering for the foreseeable future.

 

I would like to ask for some opinions and advice.

1. Are these door panels salvageable? As in would they come out nice with sandpaper and paint? New ones on LMC go for a fortune and I can't imagine finding any in better condition at the junk yard!


2. Is this gap normal? I can see a gear through there... Also I'm not sure where all the oil is coming from, in fact I'm surprised there is still oil in the transmission!


It leaks from the back as well.


3. Lastly, is the TTB responsible for the tread wear, or is it just dodgy suspension or tire pressure?(they were under inflated) This is the passenger side, driver's side is not as bad.


Thank you for looking, I appreciate any replies.

 

How'd you get the dash cover off? Looks like the best way to evict a mouse from my defroster ~Bill

 

Just unscrew all the screws underneath the front edge, I think about 4 each side, 2 in the middle above the radio and then 4 on top, 2 in each air vent...

Hope that is helpful. I've seen a few more threads where guys have done a lot more, as in the whole dash off, and also gave direction. Sorry, I don't have the links.

 

Dodgy? How long have you spent in the UK or watching Are You Being Served, Keeping Up Appearances, or Fawlty Towers?

Anyway, nice looking truck. It looks like it is not only all there but in remarkably good shape.

As for the tire wear, it is probably the bushings in the suspension. They are usually in pretty poor shape after 30+ years, and the worst one is typically the ones on the radius arms - which are the arms that go rearward to the frame and their forward ends go into the lower control arm. When the bushings wear they allow the lower control arm to move fore and aft, which changes the direction of the tire. But, you should also check the other bushings, ball joints, tie rod ends, etc. And, by the way, if the steering box is found to be at fault don't bother trying to adjust it - all you can do is to make matters worse.

On the brakes, I'll vote for a warped rotor. And these rotors, and drums as well, came from the factory with lots of meat in them, so can be turned to take the warpage out. Most auto parts stores can do that, and it is usually inexpensive.

Re the gap, yes that is normal. The gear you see is the ring gear mounted on the flywheel, which is what the starter engages to spin the engine. The oil is probably coming from the rear main seal, which is what is supposed to keep oil in the engine where the crankshaft comes through and goes to the flywheel. And, there had better be oil in the tranny - there should be two plugs with square heads - one on the side and one on the bottom if I remember correctly. The bottom one is the drain and the one on the side is the fill. You can pull the fill plug and you should be able to touch oil by just barely reaching in with your pinkie.

As for the door panel, it is probably salvageable. I've done that with several and I do it by sanding them with something like 60 grit to start with to get all of the "dead" plastic off. And, I sand them wet as otherwise the paper loads up immediately. Once I have the dead stuff off I then start backing off on the grit, but I never get very smooth as it doesn't seem to be needed. However, the last few sandings I do by wetting things with ArmorAll, which seems to help the ArmorAll penetrate.

Hope that helps, but I'm sure you'll have more questions so fire away.

 

From what I have seen the aftermarket door panels don't really match the originals very well, either in appearance or quality. See this post for a picture.

However many people have restored some pretty awful looking door panels with good luck, as Gary has said. If you want to re-paint them the brand to use is SEM, which you can read plenty about if you search these forums.

Anyway you're doing great work so far. Something tells me you are not new to tinkering, even if you didn't have many tools to begin with.

I think your truck is a real nice one. You didn't pay too bad of a price for it. The version you have is the pretty much the perfect utility / beat-around truck in my opinion. A terrific engine (but I'm biased towards the inlines), stick shift, 1/2 ton suspension, 4x4, long bed, no frills, Ford, and bullnose. And it's baby blue! What could possibly be better?

 

If you order online from Advanced you can use code P20 and get 20 percent off all purchases online. Free shipping to your door if you spend over 50 bucks I think. Or you can usually pick it up in store.

 

I've never seen any of those shows and actually only heard of 'Fawlty', but yeah, I have spent the last 9 years in the UK... So I might use a few phrases that are unfamiliar, please point them out, because I'm actively trying not too.

Thanks for all the advice. I do plan on replacing all the bushings. I'm probably going to need a can or two of Freeze Off with the radius arm, everything so far has.

I might take the rotor somewhere to have it refurbished, it is still rather thick and the calipers and pads look fine... Would certainly save me a bundle!

I'll definitely check the trans oil level. Do I just use an adjustable spanner on the square heads or is there a dedicated tool? As for the leak, I'm trying to leave that for last as the transmission is the most daunting part for me to tinker with.

I think I'm definitely going to try and refurb the door panels. Even if it looks rubbish, I doubt I'll waste a lot of money.

I'm most certainly going to have many more questions so thanks for offering your expertise, much appreciated.