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Thread: Call me crazy - Ranchero's (again)

  1. #46
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Location
    Sequim
    Posts
    2,117
    Dang you are fast. Hope you didn't find too many surprises?? I think that might be the first gas tank I tried to powder coat? If it has JB weld by the sending unit hole it is. Soo the tank is powder coated. I must have missed that hole when I braised the other ones? Oooops.
    What are your plans this weekend? Do I need to have more blades ready for the sawzall? I think now that weather is looking better I will bring mine down to the shop and under coat it so I can start to put it back on the ground. I will do that Friday afternoon so Saturday I should be at the house. Let me know but no hurry the heaps of metal aren't going anywhere...

  2. #47
    I'm hoping the parts from NPD arrive so I can check fit. If I can repair the cowl like I'm thinking, I may not need to go to that extent. I did discover that one of the strut rods is mangled for some reason. See no other damage under there, so it makes no sense, but it is looking like I may want to pull those off that front-end -- plus get the remaining wire out of it. I will be splicing up a new harness of my own making for this car. The more I have of it the better.

    So I will work it in for the same-time, same station, on Saturday. Don't know if anyone else wants to come, but they are always welcome.

    I now wish I had your sand-blast booth. Would knock off hours and hours from this.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  3. #48
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Location
    Sequim
    Posts
    2,117
    I have a set of those strut rods laying on the floor so you can have those if you want them.
    Anytime you want to use the blast room let me know and you can clean whatever you want. Too bad it is so far away.
    Let me know if you drive the black truck over, Jake still wants to see it and is still very interested.
    (heard from Bill?) Later Steve.

  4. #49
    That would be great Steve. Those bloody things were so tight on the Ranchero and fought all the way to the end. Made me want to go get a 3/4 impact wrench on-the-spot. But no, I need to get my wrenching arms back. This computer work...

    I started up the black truck when I needed to play musical cars to get the wagon out - it was kind-of cold and humid that day - and it ran like crap for some reason. I thought it might be that I never put the heat tube on once John and I put the headers and new exhaust on it and the carb was icing. It was a perfect day for that. So I put that on, and it still ran like crap. Last time I drove it was out to Burien and back to get the V8 suspension and rear-end for the Ranchero - and it ran great. So I have been wanting to look at it more, but the weather has been crazy. We'll see. It might be that bloody Pertronix kit again.

    I'm slowly blasting things at work -- and I need to be less anal about the other stuff. But like I wrote in the newsletter: "I plan to make this car a driver, not a show car, but as some of you know, I rarely take my own advice." Really, that still is the plan.
    Last edited by Luva65wagon; January 10th, 2012 at 01:50 PM.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  5. #50
    Not much new to post on this. Gene and I cruised out to the Arlington Pick a Part and scouted for a pair of buckets seat. Looking for a decent set of red seats. SCORE! $25 a piece and have a very firm set of seats out of an Escort. No real signs of wear -- just a little dirty. Hardly any fading or anything. So I'm cleaning them up. Also grabbed a set of nifty red arm rests in the car and a red overhead map light, which will look pretty cool.

    More parts came in from National Parts Depot today, but the cowl repair parts were back-ordered, so that's a bummer. Looks like I may be cutting the cowl out of the other car "just in case" after all. The Mustang fender apron will work, I think, to relocate the battery tray to the lower parallel to the core-support position. Will take a little hacking, but looks doable.

    Started cutting out the rotting floor tonight, but not too much of it yet. Got late.

    Thanks again Gene for driving.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  6. #51
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Location
    Sequim
    Posts
    2,117
    I need a Gene. My Larry is on Vacation for 3 weeks?? Maybe twins is what I need??? Nice work on the Ranchero can't wait to see the put it back together pics...

  7. #52
    Gene just likes driving that new truck of his. I can tell.

    Well after Gene left yesterday I started hacking out the floor and finished up a lot of cutting tonight. The driver side torque box is pretty thin, so I'll be looking at beefing that up. Thankfully I grabbed some stuff off that other Ranchero. Cut the back of cab/front of bed to make a patch for the rusting parts. Anyway, the pictures are pretty self explanatory.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    Last edited by Luva65wagon; January 10th, 2012 at 01:52 PM.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  8. #53
    A few more pictures...
    Attached Images Attached Images
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  9. #54
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Location
    Sequim
    Posts
    2,117
    It is amazing to see the fast progress on the old girl. How big is the pile of parts in the house/garage getting.
    Hopefully you can start putting the parts back on soon. Keep us posted.

  10. #55
    I have stripped the entire floor out now of anything rotted. I will be making that D.S. torque box plate from that sheet of steel plate you're letting me cut a piece from (thank you again for your continued support to seeing this ripen).

    I started staring at the cowl last night from every angle to see if there was any possible way to replace it all in one swale-foop. None that I can see. It is all too interwoven into the A pillar.

    So... though I resisted up until the very last moment last night, I started drilling spot-welds on the donor piece at about 7PM last night and got about 75% of these on the leading edge of the cowl broken free when I called it quits at about 9:15 last night. Man, what a pain this is. No rhyme or reason to the pattern of spot-welds, that is for sure. It's looking like swiss cheese.

    Fortunately, I won't have to be so picky on the car. Most of that I'll use the pull and peel method of metal removal. This is where you slice off the big parts and grab and edge of the strip that is left with channel-locks and roll it off the spot-welds. They peel right off leaving very little left behind. That's how I did the floor. I did not drill one spot-weld on the entire floor. You can only use this method when the stuff you are removing is toast.

    I was going to hold off on this cowl for until the floor was done, but it got the best of me. I succumbed to its call.

    The donor cowl looks really good and more and more I am kicking myself for cutting up the WRONG CAR!
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  11. #56
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Location
    Sequim
    Posts
    2,117
    Stuff happens?? I think it was a toss up between the two. The good on one was bad on the other and visa versa. I feel your pain with that cowl area. I did that on the delivery and I do NOT want to do it again.
    Just think how proud you will feel when it is done. I know I look back through my pictures and it keeps me going to see how far it has come. Keep at it and the fun will come soon enough.

  12. #57
    Quote Originally Posted by doghows View Post
    Just think how proud you will feel when it is done.
    That's funny... that's exactly what my boss said to me a couple weeks ago after I told him I'd already "donated" a couple thousand hours (and counting) of my own time on a software project I'm doing at work.

    As I'm sitting there drilling out spot-welds I keep saying to myself.... "I am, indeed, crazy."
    Last edited by Luva65wagon; January 10th, 2012 at 02:01 PM.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  13. #58

    Day 20 - and counting

    i can't believe I've only been at this for 20 days. Seems like a year already.

    Have been out there being busy getting stuff cut out and cutting up other stuff and putting the other stuff in. Dissecting the cowl was fun but I got it all apart and the old one out in one piece - sort of.

    Gene has been stopping by and watching and helping. I gave him the task of cutting the old cowl cover and shock-tower braces off so we could see what it was like under there, while I drilled a couple hundred spot welds.

    I decided I would use the dash from the red interior since the dash was pretty decent and had all the holes for the dash-pad.

    If you look close at the pictures, you'll see I cut about 2" of the replacement cowl to firewall and used this as an overlap. I then used holes in the two parts as a key to make sure the parts were exactly the same height all the way around. I have some more welding and grinding to do, but it will be pretty invisible (not that I really care).

    I'll give a big kudo's for Gene being awake the night I cut the old cowl out. I had the jack stands in the back and a pair on the front near the core support. As I got to the part where the last 10" of cowl was getting cut through, Gene says, "You know, you ought to put some jack stands in the center of the car -- it's moving a lot." Sure enough, I would say, 50% of the rigidity of the car is in the cowl. You cut that out, and the car will pretty much fold up... and almost did.

    Anyway, here's where I'm at on day 20 and counting.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    Last edited by Luva65wagon; January 10th, 2012 at 02:04 PM.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  14. #59

    More pics

    These pics show the new cowl welded in. This of note:

    I welded three studs in for the 65 driver side air vent.

    I realized that the damage I saw on the dash (Kenny and I noticed the night we drove back from Sequim sitting on the ferry) must have been some upper collision that hit the upper door hinge. Lots of funky repair (and lack of), but it is all good now. I couldn't totally straighten the door pillar, but it's OK

    The pile of cowl_bunnies is how much (less the bigger trash in the pile) debris I got out of the NEW replacement cowl. There is no way all of that could have ever washed out. I have to say, this is one wacky stupid design.

    I have used Rust Doctor on this part, which is why it is black/blue. Gene donated some Hurculiner I will coat all of this with before I cover it all.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    Last edited by Luva65wagon; March 27th, 2011 at 10:49 PM.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



  15. #60

    Driver side rear torque box and dash

    This is a picture of the repair I made to the driver side torque box and a picture of the new dash just sitting in there and the old one out.

    Correction: Gene cut the parts and I welded the pieces in. Gene, notice I bent the profile before welding it in. Then after the two parts were in, I torched the angle and bent it to follow the profile before welding the two parts together. Looks pretty close to the original.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    Last edited by Luva65wagon; March 27th, 2011 at 10:54 PM.
    Roger Moore

    63 "Flarechero"
    powered by: 347ci stroker | Tremec T5 | 8" 3:45 TracLoc rear



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