May 2010

Getting the engine out was part of the battle.  The next thing I moved to was the glass.

Not sure what happened, but I don't have pics of this FUN and EXCITING process either.  Lets just say that the windshield is held in place by this thick, black tar-like sealant that is a HUGE pain in the tail to work around to get the windshield unstuck.

After I was done, Shane gave me a tid-bit where you can fish a thin wire through the sealant and use the wire to disengage the glass from the car.  Oh well.  I'll use that trick when I do my next car 25 years from now.

More disassembly.

Oh.  Before I go into the additional disassembly, I'll mention that I also found a neat item at the Cedar Rapids swap meet  in late April.  I found a 9" Ford rear end housing which set me back a mere twenty bucks.  Its 7 inches too wide, so it will need to be narrowed, but that might be an adventure for another day... or I'll pay someone to do it.  We'll see.

Next on the list was the front suspension.  I was pretty affraid here, not knowing how easy it would be to get all the fasteners off in the right way.  In the end, I did end up having to cut the springs in a couple places to get them out (I'm not using them anyway)... but things are out.

Here's the mass of stuff (above) which I'll probably not use again... so I'll have it in the attic for the next 5-10 years until I know for sure I won't need it anymore.

Here's the empty void left by the suspension. You really can't see it in this picture, but there's a lip on the frame there where the upper A arm sits.  What's crazy is that this location is a great/horrible spot to gather dirt/grime/rot.

Here it is, cleaned out.  Amazing that this isn't more rotten.

One of the things I didn't post a lot about in my previous post was my work to get the dash/heater/etc out.    I pulled out the ash tray and after sifting through some old pennies, dirt, dust, etc... I found what you see in the picture below.  I don't believe this was used for any electric purpose.... but I may be 100% wrong there.

Lastly - one other new item has made its way into the garage.  An new welder has arrived.  This one should weld the thicker and thinner metals all together.  I tried it tonight on some of the heavier stock for the rotisserie and it did a pretty nice job.  I actually had to dial the heat back a bit to get the weld looking nice.  We'll see how it handles the thinner steel before I sell my smaller Lincoln welder.

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These last two pics I thought I should post - some of you might know my buddy Shane.  If not, I snapped a couple pictures of what he's working on right now.  They're below.

Its been a while since JANUARY

So I'll try to break this up by timeline... because yes... for a time there my progress in the tear-down did slow quite a bit.  Here's February.

FEBRUARY

I spent quite a bit of time sandblasting in the homemade bin and made some progress on the roof.  Unfortunately, the siphon feed setup I was using was clogging quite a bit and it wasn't making as quick work of things as I had hoped.

Knowing that I'd need to get the car into the driveway for some more significant stripping I decided to put that on hold. 

The next thing I tried was additional testing of that Eastwood Acid etch seen in an earlier post.  Here's how the roof looked in process and the hood after some light work with the etch and some ceran wrap (I thought it might help keep the goop from drying out).

My opinion... but I think its quite a bit cleaner... there's still some deeper rust pits, but I can see them now... and hopefully a higher temp will help the goop act a bit more forcefully come spring time.

MARCH

Things started to pick up a bit in March.  Why?  Because the PFG bonus decided to hit and I was able to use some of it to further 'invest' in the car.  First on my list - STEEL.

As you can see here we've got some heavy duty stuff.  I'm guessing in the 500+ pound range.  Not a bad shot of the car in the background.  Neat so see how it looked then to now when I'm finally posting this.

The steel will eventually be destined for a home built rotisserie.  Yep  -I intend to flip the car like a chicken in a wal-mart roaster.  Now that I've got the steel, its time for some more disassembly.  But first, a shot of my cheesy smilin' little helper.

On to more disassembly.  For some reason I misplaced or delted the pictures of just the fenders off the car.  No big whoop there, but the hood followed the fenders along with the radiator, pullies, and all the other accessories in front.

In progress:

Here's the aftermath:

I hate to admit it... but these things sat on the floor for several weeks.   

On to the engine.

And its out.  Oh - one thing worth mentioning... I tried one last time before yanking this and everything else to get the car into a movable gear.  It ran, but it would have been great if I could have limped it out into the driveway for stripping and working. 

Still ran, but no forward or reverse gears- so it was time to come out.

I wonder if old Jake and Son in Conrad is still open for business.

Here's the engine on the stand (borrowed from Shane)

The void that was left after removing everything.