Welp was getting the gasket surfaces nice and clean because fedex should be delivering my new water pump, thermostat housing and thermostat today along with some new spark plug wires. Which is a good thing I ordered some new ones. Didn't like the generic length of all of them and when I went to take them off... Somehow 4/8 were hand loose... Hindsight is 20/20 but man that's one thing I didn't think to check before my cross country road trip lol. Sometimes this truck makes me feel real dumb. I assumed truck ran good, they should be tight but I'm lucky I didn't blow a plug! Will get some pics once the new parts are on

 

Between traveling for work and visiting family with the wife, time just hasn't been free to work on the truck. While it's been siting torn down, I still had a coolant leak from somewhere on the back side... The only place I can think of is the intake manifold gasket. Figured since most my parts weren't back on yet I might as well replace the gaskets while I'm here. So other day while on the road I got tired of waitin so I went ahead and ordered the last of the parts I need, intake manifold gasket, valve cover gasket, and new water pump gaskets.

I also was able to score some non-dented valve covers from grinnergetter so those will be going on this time. Probably will paint them but not sure how I'll feel about the hodgepodge of painted and non painted parts.

Had to take the water pump back off, was able to get the valve covers off no problem and then learned the pushrods go THRU my intake... Didn't know they would be that cruel to someone lol. Tonight I took the rockers and push rods out. Going to clean the rods but they look pretty clean for 42 years old! Also took the intake manifold out, boy that 80lbs sure is heavy lol

Tomorrow I plan to clean the intake manifold and at least get that and the valve covers back on tomorrow or Wednesday. Sorry for the long post, enjoy some pictures below

 

So it's clearly been a minute since I updated this, progress wasn't what I wanted so I never posted updates. I've cleaned up and painted my intake manifold, air cleaner, valve covers, core support, and radiator. Everything but the last two parts are on. Eventually I plan to paint the powered by Ford in either silver or gray on the valve covers. This week I hope to get the core support and radiator installed and fire the truck up again! It's been way too long. Here are pictures of progress/final paint

 

Also in the midst of all that I picked up a new shotgun rider

 

progress is progress....keep at it!


I can't imagine removing an iron FE intake and actually putting it back on...just too heavy to mess with...LOL

 

Thanks! right now it's a budget build, so Im just doing necessary maintenance on the engine. Going from Texas to Indiana over the winter wasn't kind to seals, gaskets, and rubber hoses lol. I just replaced the gaskets and back together she went, hopefully the next time I have to take the intake off, I'll have some spare money for a new intake that doesn't weight 80lbs lol

 

Ya if you replace the intake with an aluminum one, you,ll need a lift kit for the back cause the front will come up 2". That's a joke son.

 

I thought the same thing when I found a 110 household plug on my truck... turns out it went to red rope lights under the bed.

 

Great story. That is a long drive. Takes forever just to get out of Texas doesn't it?

 

...dang I'm glad all that stuff is under your truck!

 

Yes it does! But it was a very scenic drive and mid 60° weather in January we had the windows down and the radio up the entire time!

Lol and that's just the stuff I can't find a place for... its 2 boxes deep in the truck

lol it sure seems like it weighs that much

 

Made some progress today, tossed the core support back in!

 

Alright so when I last left off I was a happy camper! I had my revived core support painted, reassembled and looking good! I then put the carb and air cleaner back on





I put the radiator hoses back on, filled er up and she started! Thats the last time I remember enjoyment in this truck for the last 4 months . Bought a timing gun, got the engine timed just right, fired her up and she ran decent for having been torn apart for so long... then I noticed a small gas leak from the carb, so decided what the heck, time to teach myself how to rebuild a carb. After some youtube videos and chats with friends, I ran down to the local autozone and they actually had a rebuild kit in stock... doesn't look like they sell them too often the manager told me he hadnt sold one of those in 5 years! You can see the dust on it lol





I also am a huge advocate of pinesol to clean carbs. Here are my before and after pics. All I did was soak in pinesol then lightly scrubbed with a toothbrush dont have any pics of the varnish on the inside but it disintegrated that stuff! plus my garage smelled good afterwards and the wife liked it better than the used gear oil smell.








So feeling good about all I had accomplished, I put everything back together and went to fire her up again. Had the wife come out with a fire extinguisher (just in case) and she laughed like am I really doing anything? Well fired her up and success!... until she yelled to shut it down as there was gas spewing everywhere well now she at least knows why I had her out there lol.

So ruined my intake manifold paint job (actually forgot about that until just now and it still stings a bit) the blue is ruined but luckily the primer is still in perfect shape. Got to investigating what could be leaking and as I went back thru the pics of the carb I took I noticed something....something I should have caught but chalk it up to being new I didn't pay attention. Anybody notice whats wrong?





Yep thats a problem! Right where the fuel filter screws in, theres a nice little crack... that isn't so small once I put the fuel filter back on. So I believe grinnergetter helped me once again and sent me a carb, used some pinesol... and little more elbow grease and bam back in business. I still need to tune the carb a bit, but she runs and idles pretty good. Heres a video, my exhaust is cut under the cab (I may or may not have explained that earlier but i cut off the crappy exhaust and haven't fixed it, and probably wont until other things are fixed.) Also in later pics you'll see it cut by the TC


So once again feeling accomplished I moved onto the next project... putting the front end back together, after all I can't drive her looking like this!







Well I didn't get too far into this one when yet again more problems! (see why I haven't had fun lately lol) Somethings not aligning right causing my hood latch to be too far forward




After a few phone calls and measurements from grinnergetter, I still couldnt figure out why things werent lining up, and I did not want to reshim every panel on the front of the truck.. at least not yet anyway. So I took the nice new core support back out and compared to my old one. Sure enough you can tell the drivers side lower portion is bent, and I'm still not sure why the entire support leaned further out than the old one but since part of it is bent I just assumed there are other "straightness" issues with the one I cleaned up. (also at some point I hung up my Trucks flag in the garage)








So frustration at an all time high, and night setting in, heres how she sat for a few more weeks. looks like I made no progress at all!




Decided the best thing to do was put the old one back in to see if that solved my issues. (this would let me know if I moved something to knock everything out of whack) but maaaannnn doesn't the painted one just look so good in there?!




So im sure you guessed it; the old one fit perfectly, no issues.




Took it back out, sprayed rustoleum rust converter on it and put it back in for now... ill look for another one later... someday

A few days later I found some more motivation and put the front clip back together and she now looks whole again (minus front bumper)






Alright, thats a good place to break while I grab a beer and hit save before I lose all this progress Stay tuned to part II of this massive long overdue update.

 

Part II
So this little goober convinced me to take him on a walk before I got to the fridge. So now that you've had a chance to read that novel, here goes another




So the truck sat for a little bit. It was back together and I was not going to touch it for fear of breaking something once again! After a while I got tired of seeing no progress so I began to tinker with some things. One day I was tinkering and I happened to look up from under the hood just in time to see a neighbor on his phone running over the back half of my cat (Tod) in his truck

Well i ran after Tod but he scurried off quicker than all get out into the woods behind our house. So I proceeded to jump in my truck and chase down the a-hole that didnt even bother stopping. Im pretty sure anger boosted my trucks hp by about 50 as I was able to spin my tires all the way from my house to his! boy was I fuming. Once confronted all he said was "what, I didn't see nuthin" ... well of course you didnt you ***** you were on your phone. I told him hes lucky that wasn't a kid and he better start paying attention before he kills someone. Never did apologize, and funny enough his truck is some sort of conservation/fire truck. Well My wife and I were about a week away from a family trip to Disney with her family... that was a long week. Enter destruction mode.... Just waited all day every day for him to come back so put my time and frustration outside to use and tore into my interior; dang did I uncover some rust.










Well took out the bench seat. shifter cover, took off the door (which the bottom set of bolts are snapped off and the plate is rusted so dont know how thats gunna go back on) The rust really hit me, as thats why I went to texas to avoid it! This was hiding under many layers of floor liner. Some thick rubber adhesive was the bottom layer, almost looks like it was there from the facotry, next was two layers of red flooring, then 2 sets of floor mats. Oh well guess Im going to learn to weld and weld in some patch panels. I luckily already have one piece (once again from grinnergetter lol) and heres how my truck ended that day and sat up until earlier this week.








So back to the cat; we were at the in-laws house, 2 days before we were to leave for Disney when our neighbor calls us that Tod is trying to get in our backyard (we had let our neighbors know we had to leave and to call us if they saw him; the wife was not happy to be leaving home without Tod back) So i hoped in the truck, drove 3hours to come pick him up. Couldn't believe he survived in the woods with coyotes, some torrential rain storms (x2) and some god awful heat and humidity, index was in the 100s for a WEEK. yes he survived for a week like that and it may not sound like too much but when he was hit by a car and ran off you just never know.. and consider this




yep thats right his femur was snapped in half and had retracted almost 50% of its length. so this little trooper survived all the above for a week with a snapped femur... I don't know many humans who could do that lol. and to top it all off he managed to drag himself back to our house; either he really loves us or decided we were his only way of getting help lol. Vet said he may have to have it amputated since it had been like that for over a week. Luckily surgery went well, hes got all four legs (I had a nickname for the other scenario tho, Tripod-Tod was going to be his name) we went to Disney on a good note and had a great time.

I had to take about a month off because I helped my sisters restore our JD 44 Styled B for 4H. The youngest entered it in Americana. Took a month of trips down home on the weekend to clean, prep, paint, restore, and fix all the issues that arise when you restore and mess with 70yr old parts lol Heres a before and after










Well that brings us up to the beginning of this week. Decided since it hasn't moved in months, and wasn't going to until this rust got taken care of, I bit the bulltet and ordered some Tabco replacement panels. Floor board, inner rocker, and inner lower rear corner. Ill need a rocker and some passenger parts eventually but this will get me going. Also figured it was a good time to tackle the NP205 installation. I believe I have some pictures back in here that show the shotty job the PO did by welding in a bar and dropping the TC and just shoving a 2wd shaft in there. Edit* found the pics, here they are












So took out the driveshaft, used an anglegrinder to cut off the welded plates and a flap disc to smooth the frame rails back down. Cleaned off the TC (was going to overhaul it but it works so thats another project for another day) bought some grade 8 hardware and went to install it. Didn't have a transmission jack so I used some good ole fashioned redneck engineering and used my floor jack and a ratchet strap.... hey its not a dumb idea if it works right?








I know i know, pics or it didnt happen; well heres proof the TC is up on its own with no assistance (and no cracked concrete floor either)




Then today I went to install the driveshafts I picked up about a year ago from a guy on CL who promised me they were out of his old 74 f250... well you guessed it; THEY DONT FIT. So im currently looking for all 3 driveshafts.

Moved onto finding what is leaking from my truck. I believe its my dipstick, currently researching on the proper way to fix/seal it. I've got a thread open feel free to drop some knowledge in there for me.





So other than waiting on the tabco patch panels to come in, thats pretty much it.

She runs, doesn't leak fuel, has the front reassembled minus the bumper, has the driver side front fender and door taken off, rust cut out of the driver side, interior torn apart, and in search of driveshafts. She may not be perfect, but she is still my dream truck.

Note* I tried to proof read as I typed, it's a novel, Im not going to read it again with a fine tooth comb so if there are any grammar errors, oh well get over it lol Thats time that could be used on the truck

Thanks for reading, I'll try to be better about updating this so its not novel after novel

 

Removed the oil pan after soaking the dipstick tube bolt in pb blaster... and learning you can't just drop the pan lol. Removed the exhaust instead of raising the engine because 1 I don't have an engine hoist and 2 my exhaust barely goes past the cab anyway. That gave me enough room to remove the pan. It looks like the oil pump isn't properly bolted so I'll fix that too. Currently waiting on the 1194 sealant to come in, oil pan gasket just arrived today and bought a rivet gun the other day. Still searching for driveshafts and tc linkage. Hoping to drive to a good junkyard next week in search of some driveshafts.

2/3 patch panels arrived the other day. Not sure how I feel about the floor pan but I'll see what I can do with it. The lower rear inner cab corner came with it. Still waiting on the inner rocker to come in.