Thread: Project Special K

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Got the engine out today and the old motor mounts. It was a good feeling to finally start this. Tomorrow I pick up the new front grill and cut the new crossmember to fit the motor foward about 1 inch. Managed to do it by myself, with only minor injuries, cut the pad tip off my middle finger when the socket slipped, and smashed opposite thumb doing something I don't even remember! Oh well it wouldn't be fun without a little blood loss!

Originally Posted by stovens

Got the engine out today and the old motor mounts. It was a good feeling to finally start this. Tomorrow I pick up the new front grill and cut the new crossmember to fit the motor foward about 1 inch. Managed to do it by myself, with only minor injuries, cut the pad tip off my middle finger when the socket slipped, and smashed opposite thumb doing something I don't even remember! Oh well it wouldn't be fun without a little blood loss!

That's the spirit.

Now get out there and leave some more body chunks laying around the garage floor.

.

Originally Posted by 123pugsy

That's the spirit.

Now get out there and leave some more body chunks laying around the garage floor.

.

Blood dripped on an engine is good for an extra 10 horse!!!!!

Thanks Pugsy! I went North to pick this up today. It was 150, freshly media blasted and primed. They have a complete 48 bed too, don't have a price on that yet. I figure my two dented grills will sell for what I bought the new one for. He also had a set of metal fenders that caught my eye. On the way home stumbled across the garage sale of an old collector. Picked up a vintage Craftsman bench grinder and a Mikita Belt sander for ten bucks a piece,a Phillips 66 Aviation porceline tin sign , and some other stuff. All in all a good day!

If that's true Dave this is going to be one fast engine! Here's a shot of the grill I picked up.

Good looking grille, nice find!!!!!

Thanks. I went to a swap meet last weekend, and was flat broke. I spotted it there and asked the guy if he still has it come this friday/payday, was he local? He said yes and yes. He also has an original 48 bed complete with wood subfloor and steel bottom. Not sure what to sell it for, until he finds out what his son bought it for. He son died recently after completing a 52 F1 truck, so this is all spare parts. His grand son is now driving the F1. Nice family with many cool projects.

Bummer that the guy had to die, but at least his son has the truck and will remember his Dad every time he drives it!

Yep. He seemed like a real nice guy. Had a couple of 60's Mustang Fastbacks, a 34 3 window, and a late fifties/60 Ranchero. Nice stuff, oh a a 48 Ford panel van!

Well had a few easy things I got done today. When I first put together the engine top half, I wasn't sure about painting around the engine where the intake manifold attaches. So I scrapped the cosmoline like stuff, that the long block guys put on there, off, and never painted it. Over time a light rust in the exposed parts has settled in. So I cleaned that off today, and carefully painted between it and the manifold, with some gloss black engine paint. Figured while I was at it, I'd spray the harmonic balancer, so I wire wheeled the grime of, cleaned it up, gave it a coat of rustoleum primer to get anything I missed, and then hit it with several coats of black too. Next will have to work some white into the timing marks to make it easier to see.
Aside from that installed a new serpentine belt in the MR2 Spyder. Was told by Toyota, that it needed a new belt as the old one had cracks, and they could do it for 221.00. Sounded a bit expensive, took car home, looked it up online since I don't have a manual for it, and found out it has a shock absorber tensioner, that makes replacing it very easy. Litteraly a 15 second job! So I replaced that too. A good day!
Lastly put the final coat of semi gloss verithane on a side board I picked up, made mostly out of oak, and laminate. So hopefully, the side board will come into the house out of the garage tomorrow, and then I'dd be able to put the engine mounts back into the truck, and have garage space to push it back into the garage, before the rainy Season starts up again. Once the engine is back in, then the hood can go back on, the sideboards can be mounted and I can finally clear out some space for other projects!

Sounds like your getting serious about this thing again! Good for you. Wish I'd get a fire under my hind side and hit the Essex again. Perley

Thanks Perley. Just need time and then able to hit the stuff in order of priority and expense. At this point it's mostly getting other higher priority stuff done to free time for truck!

Working on the window channel today. Spent about 4 hours looking for tools during the week, including an electric cutoff wheel. I have a pneumatic one, but I didn't want to listen to ringing in my ears for a few days just to cut some thick stock sheet metal! The electric works much the same as the pneumatic one! You can cut for about a minute, then it flips an internal breaker, which makes you stop, to hit the reset switch! On the pneumatic, it runs about a minute until it exhausts the air in my small compressor, then takes a minute for the compressor to catch up! Thank god I don't do this for a living!
Anyway, managed to get some pieces cut, and will work on the welding patches today. I never boxed the frame, but have some reinforcing cross members here and there. The problem is too many pieces will be inaccessable once boxed, and the frame itself, is wider at the bottom rail, then the top. My plan all along was to box in big sections where I could, and leave cut outs where needed! So today, I think I may start this process welding a plate back towards the bed where I need a vertical inside surface near the fuel tank to mount my fuel filter. I figure it will be safer behind me, than in the engine compartment on the firewall! Nothing like working backwards on a project!

Sounds like things are moving along. Keep grinding away... literally!

Boy it would be nice if they offered welding classes around here with times that didn't coincide with work!
After all day yesterday, cuting, grinding, welding it looks worse but I beieve it's better! There were two areas of the window channel with rusted through holes. One unfortunately is right underneith the drivers side windshield motor mount, so I was limited in what I could weld as a backing plate from the underside, but I think if I use some fiberglass inforced bondo with the plate under there as support it should be alright. The othere side I was able to get some substancial metal under the thin rusted sheet metal at get some good adhesion to solid metal. It looks like somebody gave Frankenstein a welder and grinder, but body filer will hide that. Today I have to do some volunteer work but hope to get an hour or two to work on it afterwards. Then I have the whole week to get the motor back in! All in all things still going as planned but slower than planned!
Was wondering if anyone has a unilite distributer, and if they have ever removed or replaced the light module? I figure I've got quite a bit of welding to do on the frame, and t would be nice to remove the module(welding can ruin it if it's in the car while you weld on it) while welding, then put it back when done. I haven't played much with it other than the installing of the distributer.