[Fix Until Broke]

Not much unfortunately....Still trying to figure out how to strip the paint(?) off the back bumper. Hot tank with some nasty white powder in it didn't touch it, chemical stripper didn't touch it. My next thought is to sent it to a heat treater and have them stick it in their tempering oven at ~900F to cook the paint(?) off. Maybe it's powdercoating? How do you get this stuff off (I'm tempted to leave it on!)? I'm planning on having it galvanized so it will go in a molten zinc bath at ~850F - maybe they can do it twice? Once to cook the coating off and then again to actually galvanize it?

While transporting the hitch/bumper assembly it fell off the trailer at 75 MPH and slid down the interstate (oops!). Very fortunate that there was light traffic and only part was in the travelled portion of the road so was able to pull over quick, run back and get it off the road (then carry it the 1/4 mile back to the trailer - I'm out of shape!). That took the paint(?) off the bumper in a couple small spots. Hitch itself appears undamaged - No flipping/tumbling/etc - just bounced off and slid.

 

[Fred Kiehl]

I developed some overheating with the 454 in my 91 OCC when using the AC. I ended up putting a 2500 CFM heavy duty electric fan on the right side, a new 180 deg. thermostat, and replaced the bleeder with a filler at the high spot of the system. I have not tested it much yet, but I did let it idle for about 10-15 minutes, and it held temperature reasonably well.

 

[Fix Until Broke]

Not sure technically if a hearse is a wagon or not, but this seems close enough .

Went to start it and it just cranked and cranked, no fire. Hmmm

Seems that some critter decided that wires looked tasty and ate some of them...

Somehow they at them way up by where the wire pokes out from above the fuel tank so there's only a couple inches of wire left to hook on to. So, spliced them all back together again and it fired right up.

On my actual wagon, I finally got the repair panels installed in the rear wheel wells and a first coat of paint on the back 1/3 of the underbody. Will post some pictures of this later.

The bumper is slowly getting cleaned up - paint will come off with a fingernail now after about 3 days soaking. Hopefully it will get to the point of coming off all on it's own soon. Trying to let it soak all week.

 

[Fix Until Broke]

Rear inner fender patch area sandblasted, cleaned and prepped for "assembly"

No pictures of the assembly process, but there's about 1/3 of a tube of windshield urethane in/around there. I used some angle iron and vice-grips to squeeze it all together since there was some oil canning on the existing sheet metal.

Similar on the other side... but due to the bigger patch, had to use a couple pieces of angle and more vice grips. Had removed some of them below before I remembered to take a picture...

Also got the first coat of paint on the floor pan and frame. Chassis Saver Aluminum and a quart will do the entire frame and underbody. I'll cover it with roll on bed liner - Monstaliner Black. I don't know that it's any better or worse than anything else on the market. Time will tell I guess.

UCP934 Silver-Aluminum – Used as a pre-primer under gloss or antique-satin black. Heavily filled with over two pounds per gallon of flake aluminum to help smooth and fill pits and deeper rust damage. Interleaving flake creates an incredibly dense barrier to prevent moisture permeation. Commonly used for marine barge and oil field maintenance. Great for metal roofs, steel truck rims and to rejuvenate tired, rusting chain link fence.

I kind of like how the silver/aluminum looks, but since the entire rest of the underbody is already black, I'm not going back to re-paint it silver .

Progress seems really slow, but keeps moving along. Should get more done next weekend with having an extra day due to the 4th of July holiday. Should get the painting done, rear end disassembled/reassembled at least. Maybe, just maybe start putting things back together under there?

 

[Fix Until Broke]

This week I was able to get all the areas you can't see painted. What tedious and un-glamorous work this is - Likely never to be seen by anyone, but really important to help keep the corrosion at bay.

While that was drying, I pulled the rear end apart. Everything looks great inside. Just some light visible wear on the axles, nothing you can feel, just a shiny spot where the rollers ride. Gear teeth look good, magnet just had a light layer of slime on it, no large particles so that's good. I ordered all new bearings, seals, etc for it a couple months ago, but darned if I could find them this weekend. Probably have to order them again - not the end of the world, just frustrating. Since I couldn't put it back together, I ground down some rough spots from the factory welds and re-welded a couple of them. Also started on redoing the rear axle brake lines. All the tabs that hold the lines in place had rusted off so I got started on a couple new ones. shown below. I will probably weld on a couple nuts to the tube for the ones farther out toward the drums.

Does anyone know what the coiled wire is for on the outside of the brake lines? Planning to bend my own from Nickel-Copper, but don't have any of the coil to replace the original.

Hopefully next weekend I can get the underbody painted black with bed-liner. If I can get that all done in a weekend I'll be happy. Maybe my rear end parts will come out of hiding by then .

 

[grandpas wagon]

Coiled wire is for protection from kinking. It can be bought although your original looks fine.

Is that a mini sway bar? Never saw that type before. I admit I haven't read much in this thread, maybe you mentioned it.

 

[Fred Kiehl]

It looks like the ford anti roll bar, because it is clamped to the axle.

 

[Fix Until Broke]

Interesting about the coil to prevent from kinking. There are similar tight bends under the hood that they didn't use it on. The NiCop bends really easy and I've a bender that makes nice smooth bends so shouldn't be a problem. Both tubes will get replaced as they're pretty rusty/thin in spots.

The sway bar is from SpeedTech. I'm using their rear control arms which don't have provisions for mounting a sway bar, so this is their solution. I like the concept, however my gut (and others) say that it should be a bit thicker/stiffer. Having the mounting points so close to the center compared to out at the control arms puts the swaybar at a mechanical disadvantage. Others have put the ford design on and said it works very well so we'll see how it goes before passing too much judgement on it .

 

[Fred Kiehl]

I believe the coil is more for abrasion/damage protection. You have a lot of large bolts near them, and a slip could cause the line to be crushed.

 

[95wagon]

Finally got around to assembling the new front upper arms.
Tall joints
Del alum inners
Global West shaft.

The set in the car has del alums but on stock shafts and was never the closest fit.

Now to get a roundtoit

 

[gbhs72]

This week I was able to get all the areas you can't see painted. What tedious and un-glamorous work this is - Likely never to be seen by anyone, but really important to help keep the corrosion at bay.

While that was drying, I pulled the rear end apart. Everything looks great inside. Just some light visible wear on the axles, nothing you can feel, just a shiny spot where the rollers ride. Gear teeth look good, magnet just had a light layer of slime on it, no large particles so that's good. I ordered all new bearings, seals, etc for it a couple months ago, but darned if I could find them this weekend. Probably have to order them again - not the end of the world, just frustrating. Since I couldn't put it back together, I ground down some rough spots from the factory welds and re-welded a couple of them. Also started on redoing the rear axle brake lines. All the tabs that hold the lines in place had rusted off so I got started on a couple new ones. shown below. I will probably weld on a couple nuts to the tube for the ones farther out toward the drums.

Does anyone know what the coiled wire is for on the outside of the brake lines? Planning to bend my own from Nickel-Copper, but don't have any of the coil to replace the original.

Hopefully next weekend I can get the underbody painted black with bed-liner. If I can get that all done in a weekend I'll be happy. Maybe my rear end parts will come out of hiding by then .

Hey FUB, I have heard this coiled wire called
Rock Guard or Gravel Guard. Inline Tube calls it Spring Wrap. Here it is in Stainless. They also have steel. 3/16 < Click here.
Things are coming along on your build. Kudos Bud.

Mark: Snowman-33

 

[Fix Until Broke]

gbhs72 - Thanks for the tip on the spring wrap stuff, I'll check it out. Also, thanks for the kind words - This "last part" is taking longer than I thought it would - Just a few more weekends (for the last year ).

 

[Fix Until Broke]

New rear end parts showed up so now I have two sets (somewhere ). Got all the "edging" done with bedliner and a couple small spots that I had to massage for exhaust clearance. Just have the rear cross member/frame and main open sections of floor to do. Just like painting a room, all the edging takes as long as painting the walls themselves. Ended up changing brakes and oil change on the better half's daily driver so that took some time away from the Roadmaster, but needed to be done. Hopefully finish the bedliner next weekend as well as the rear end bearings/seals/paint. Then finally start putting it back together...slowly but surely.