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When I finished the wiring today it was 3pm @102 I started early so I could leave before it got to 105.
How do I explain this in words even a Canadian would understand.... If you only did things on days where it was above freezing you wouldn't get anything done all year.
I think at those temperatures, I'd like, go from sashimi to fish jerky.
General house flipping / renting stuff. Currently he backs up what he needs for every job from a staging area in his back yard, this way all that mess will be in the trailer and he can just hook it up and go.
Finally installed the lights I'll rarely use. The pictures before were some OG KC daylighters. I was going to put led's in them, but I found that they were the very first model that didn't have the rubber dampers and weren't compatible with the led inserts.
So I bought new set. I also had a cheap set of pro comp floods I threw on as long as I was drilling holes in things.
I also bought this pre wired relay/ fuse box a while ago, It's kind of a poor man's spod. It does the same thing, but because it's just wires and relays I feel like it's not an issue to fix of something goes wrong. I have a lot of reservations about needing a soc to control simple relays, but mostly I'm just cheap. You can find these things pre wired for 100 bucks almost anywhere.
Made a bracket because this is built not bought! (would have totally bought a bracket if they were available instead of hitting this piece of steel like an ape for 40 minutes)
Mounted
Low & fog
plus Flood
+ spot
Then I replaced the lower control arms, radiator, hoses, idlers, and belt. Going on a trip Thursday. Traditionally I do all major maintenance 24-48 hours before hitting the road.
I told you that in confidence!
I made a mailbox stand and set it a giant flower pot for my mom. In doing so I cheated the city mailbox code just a bit to make it easier to get to from the curb. Turns out there is a reason for some building codes.
80 dollars to a wrecking yard later. It even has one of those 9 dollar pep boys circle mirror add-on things. Talk about a value.
Luckily that is one of the pathfinder/xterra/frontier parts so it was easy to find. Actually you can put titan towing mirrors on it too, but then it kinda looks like a dog that never grew into it's ears.
I meant to keep working on my ford, but got side tracked.
Picking up where I left off. The sidesteps themselves are very rough, the metal is starting to crack and there is quite a bit of pitting and holes from rust that were there before the previous owner did the paint job in the 80's. I will replace these eventually, but right now I would rather spend the money on the painting the cab and finishing the bed. I can revisit these at any time and hopefully I can save on the 200 dollars freight shipping by working their pickup into a trip.
With that in mind I decided I couldn't make them any worse by hitting them with a hammer and got some okay progress
Rust and cracks
This pitting was under a aluminum tread that the previous owner removed. This was a 80's hot rod, not a show car.
The blue line is where the old crease was. At some point somebody must have taken a turn too short and smashed it in. During the last resto they banged it out a bit, but it left the section in the middle completely flat from the tread to the bottom of the panel, always bothered the heck out of me when cleaning it. Also notice the dip in the treads. These step sides barely have any support between the fender and the cab, the drivers side was worse but came out ok. I kind want to keep these old ones so I don't get too precious about them being straight and start yelling at kids at car shows for stepping on a running board.
After hitting it a bunch, I kind of have the line back where it should be, still needs quite a bit of work.
Baby steps. It's getting there. I don't know where I am or what the address is, but I think I'm going in the general direction
Uglier but better follows the lines
Smoothed out, I filed a dolly down to better planish on that radius.
Context. You can see the front of the step is pretty bent out of shape as well. I'm going to spend a little bit of time up there, but I don't think I'm doing to re do the whole thing this way. Good 'nuff then I'll buy some nice straight step rails at another date.
I had mentioned before that I had not shown all of my hammers, so, MORE HAMMERS, and dollies, and slappers.
The old fiso, basically I reached stopping point after I made that 3d print to get the clutch slave in place. At the point the slave was hooped, as was the master. All bolts rusted in place. I gave my uncle the money and asked if it would be okay if I left the truck there till I could fiddle with it. He's happy to have a car in the driveway when he's not home so... what was that, three years ago? 2020 didn't count so I'll say 2. He's still okay with it there, but I want to make use of the now new old stock tires.
The last two weeks went like this
I replaced the clutch master, slave, and line together after bleeding the whole assembly on a bench
Put some new gas in it
Great I can finally start it... 3 year old battery cranks (it's been on a solar tender), no start. Check spark and fuel... no fuel. Crank it with thumb over carb side fuel line... no pressure. Check the oil, despite leaking like the old exon valdez it's got a quart more than it should and reeks of gasoline.
Change the fuel pump, the hard lines are rusted solid. Cut the line back, flare it, and replace with hose (I'll have to make a hard line later). Change the oil for something less flammable.
It starts up after 5 seconds of cranking! At least it doesn't leak water... that doesn't sound right. There is no coolant.
Change the heater hoses with 10 year old silicone I have lying around. Flush the system (this is not a gm car and red is the wrong color, she's rusty). Ignore that and go for a test drive.
It's way faster than I remember. Maybe that fuel pump was already on the outs, spun the tires in the dirt and shift to 2nd. Oh, the brakes are gone, the brakes don't exist. Use the compound towing gear to get back into the driveway.
Time to bleed the brakes, no I know better than that at this point. Time to replace the master cylinder. Yup it was bypassing out the back. Someone with eyes could have told you that without taking it off. Add front caliper to the list. The bleeder is rusted shut, but I have a pedal now. It drives like a dream.
Anyway It's back and road bound. Just need to wait for about 900 dollars in parts to come in so I can trust it. The 50 dollars of electrical connectors and hours of wiring are going to be first. Every wire I come across has the insulation shrunken back leaving 4 inches of bare conductor and not one connector is held in with anything more than hope. In the mean time send your thoughts and prayers to that one 300i6 freeze plug above where the coolant was. If that is rusted out the transmission and flywheel need to be pulled.
I mean what is that. The red and black wires coming off the firewall? What do they do, where do they come from. What plugs into both the windshield wiper motor and the ignition coil?
Sitting really does kill cars. Keep in mind one guy owned this after he retired from 1985 to 2018 and it really did only go to the grocery store once a week. The guy lived close to church and walked. Just time, the Arizona sun, and a friend who moonlights as a mechanic.
Anyway, spent some time waxing some dents. Pretty sure anybody that drove by thought I was insane.
I also bent the hood back down. Pretty sure this is one overzealous slam from folding in two, I'll try to brace it before that happens, but it may be getting a donor hood (like 40 bucks).... which would mean a paint job (not 40 bucks). OH, and matching hubcaps from ebay. Junk yards basically give parts away for this 80's junk.
I don't think I've mentioned that I can only see out of 3 out of 6 windows. So I finally spent 2 hours scraping the old tint off the rear glass and the triangle vents.
That's not my yard btw, It's still in the driveway of the guy I bought it from... listen, I have a lot of pans in the fire over hear. He likes it took look like someone is home though so whatever.
Cleaned some of the old person grease off the interior. looking at getting a new dash pad, but I have some other money priorities coming up. I mean it's only like 500 bucks, which isn't bad, but it's also a 2k dollar truck.
it'll be worth more than that when you're done.
I like the patina on existing hood.
can you wet and dry vac and clean up that dash pad? or is it just too far gone from the UV?
I found simple green and/or goof off 2 to be excellent in conjunction with the blade for tint removal...
obviously parked in sun and heat gun helps soften it too.
Ohhh...I thought the badges came first and you got artwork.
Looks great...love the new badges on the old patina.
You live a life I wouldn't mind. Tinkering is my favorite.
An uncle of mine gave me a car... I mean okay my grandpa on my dad's side gave me a mercury marquis with no reverse big deal.
No, I've been bequeathed a 1960 corvette. 4 speed. It's the kind of car I never thought I would afford so I never really thought about them. The deal is I can't flip it. They go for 25-35k for a title and 30 milk crates full of parts.
This is kind of that, Likely 10 years down the road after I finish my bmw 2002 and sell it to pay for this. But hey, Corvette and one of the cool ones at that.
As it sat since 91, a bit mousey, and dusty, and general carport damage. It has most of it's bright work, Don't think that was a factory color, maybe a 70's estimate of Honduras Maroon.
It has an interior, lots of 1970's going on there, vinyl seat covers and door panels that someone did their level best on, Shag carpet. My cousin may have broken the grab bar, but it's also rotten anyway in the trunk. I'm not going to list everything wrong with it. Just know that you would do well replacing or refurbishing everything you touch. Not pictured are the mice in the convertible top storage.
Bias ply tires on later 60's wheel, I went to the southside and got some rollers for it. I don't even want to be next to these with 20psi in them.
Underneath looks kind of okay, everything is rusted solid. No brakes, only shifts into 1 and 2, but it could be way worse. The front right frame will need some work though. Somebody let the blind guy loose with the arc welder to put the body mount back together.
The engine is anybody's guess. It has a 58 intake and carb, but I think those are late 60's on heads. It could be a performance upgrade (smaller cc head on old 283) or it could just be some motor they pulled from a farm truck. I don't think the block has the pad for the chevy part number though which would mean it's also pre 1960. Maybe they blew the engine and found another 58 corvette engine? Again no telling.
You can start to see here, the front is just funky. I think it's going to need a whole clip. At least I think I would rather do that then try to piece this back together.
You can see here too, the front is trying to fall off. I think it took a hit on the front right and all the body work was done as a result. I felt behind the fender and non of the reinforcment strips are there. I mean I can't blame the guys who did it in the 70's. Either you specialized in steel cars or you... I don't know fixed opel gt's and corvettes. Probably not a lot of money in the later.
My uncle had planned to fix it when he retired, but things don't always work out. I hope my plans do.
Dude, that is a sexy sexy car.
Start a gofund me.
I love that car.
I kinda wish you'd just let it be an unclean example, vacuum and wash it
and just get it up and running as is.
But I know you're a perfectionist and I might not even frequent the forum anymore
by the time it's restored.
That looks amazing, it will be a great project and even more amazing when done. If you have to do this much work to it are you going to restomod?
Seeing as it's not original I will probably do some light restomod stuff. I always liked the idea of a high revving 283. I may not put factory wheels on it, but I'm definitely not doing that stupid 2000's giant boyd Coddington wheel look.
Originally Posted by rockstar143
Dude, that is a sexy sexy car.
Start a gofund me.
I love that car.
I kinda wish you'd just let it be an unclean example, vacuum and wash it
and just get it up and running as is.
But I know you're a perfectionist and I might not even frequent the forum anymore
by the time it's restored.
if it were original paint and all I would consider it, but I'm not a fan of the 70's refresh. It also needs to be gone through just to get it working. It's like really broken.
Just a couple more pictures before I cover it and bury it.
The badge on the trunk is super cool.
I also soaked all the hinges in oil. Everything is in mid seize up and I'm worried at some point I'll have to force things open (probably not good with screws in fiberglass)
Anyway I did the same to the canvas top and I was able to move it today (guess what, it needs a new one)! Also I vacuumed about 2 gallons of mouse turds. They seemed to have a nice home under the convertible cover. I think my aunt's house may be missing some insulation. Anyway now it doesn't feel like the hood will remain closed forever when I shut it.
Oh and if I were to do something silly, it would be make a homage to the BriggsCunningham cars that were the first corvettes to win their class at le mans.
That may be a bit much though. I just love the look without the bumper, and I'm already missing the trim.
