How To: C15a Wire-3 restoration

[Jordan Baker]

I have not really done much work over the winter as its been too cold in the shop. One day I will have insulation and proper heat.

I did pickup a pair of door window frame and a front brush guard.

Some of the small parts I have made are as follows.

#1 a new pedal bumper made from a cut down hockey puck.
#2 new cab to frame front bolts. I cut down 5/8 bolts on the lathe and re-threaded them to the proper 9/16-18. It was my first time using the lathe and they turned out great.
#3 new cable release for the 4 wheel drive disengagement arm. The original cable had rusted away and broke. I was able to save the ends after soaking in Evaporust. I bought a new cable from Cnd Tire along with the aircraft cable. The threaded end was a cut down 10-32 hex head screw. I drilled it out on the lathe and then soldiered in the cable.
#4 a new made finger latch. I gave up trying to find some NOS ones (next week Ill probably find a box full). I flattened out a rusty original and traced it onto 16ga. Cut it out with a zipdisk in the grinder. I bent it to shape over a piece of hard wood and then dished the finger portion with a ballpeen hammer.

These are small parts that most wont even know are there when the truck is done, but I enjoy creating that attention to detail.

[Jordan Baker]

Lastly I managed to find an original Chevy speedometer. It came out of a GPW however its stamped on the back AC/GMC.

[Bob Carriere]

not being unhung up with part numbers and.....

....if you cannot find the part make your own.

Kudos.

Cheers

[Jordan Baker]

Thought I would do a trial fit of the new to me roof and lower rear wall. Everything seems to line up pretty close. The next step will be removing the old sheet metal and welding in new. The roof is pretty solid but it will need new rain gutters and some spots replaced due to rust. I also took advantage of the really nice and warm day yesterday to POR15 my front window frames. Any ideas on how I can get the POR15 down the insides of the frame and where the weather strip goes?

[Bob Carriere]

It's a messy job but thin out the POR by 5 paint one thinner....use only POR thinner.

Wear rubber gloves..... and a drip pan.....

pour the paint down the hole .... a large syringe from TSC for cattle will work best.

Blow your channels both way first..... pour the paint collect and repour in the other direction and let it drip...... you may have to cut off solid drips with a pocket knife.

Try not to get any on you or take a picture of the mess.

You are doing a good job.
Cheers

[Bob Carriere]

the rain gutters are a one shot assembly with a large spot welder......Roof section window frame and gutter. Would be very hard to salvage a used one.

Carefully cut off the old one.

And have a sheet metal shop do you a couple of sections and mig weld inplace with drilled holes in the new section 1/4 inch and do a rosette weld that you can sand down.

When you do the grinding of the welds on your roof watch for heat build up that can cause warping.......we orefer trhe course flap wheel to a disk...... leave the little pinholes you find and fill them with a then coat of JB weld..... works well on clean metal and can be sanded flush.

We use it at the barn and prefer it to glazing compound

[Jordan Baker]

Thanks Bob

Once I get to taking apart the roof rear panel I will be adding in the window I got from you. Much appreciated. The roof will need a lot of little bits redone and fixed.

For using JB Weld would you sandblast, then JB, then POR15?

I will try out the drip process when I get the chance.