How To: C15a Wire-3 restoration

[Jordan Baker]

Things moved along rather nicely over the past few days. I finished all the welding and fitting for the lower cab wall. I then cleaned and metal prepped the metal using the POR products. The wall was given a spray of POR15 to seal against hopefully any rust. Then the usual tiecote primer and final SCC2 layer.

For the anti-sqeak material I used the product Mac's Antique auto parts sells. It worked great and matches the original stuff pretty closely. For making the curves along the frame I had to take small wedge cuts. I used 3M spray adheiseve to secure it to the cab frame and make sure everything stayed lined up while installing the wall.

The only other issue I had was the the wall ends wouldn't line up for the bolt holes. I think this may have partly been caused by the wall frame getting pulled a bit from installing the sheet. Ratchet straps came to the rescue and I was able to pull the ends in one at a time.

Lastly I installed my rebuilt/NOS rifle mounts. Its nice to see parts making their way from the cabinet to the vehicle. Slowly.... but its in the right direction.

[Jordan Baker]

Last group of pictures for now.

I did have a lot of trouble trying to get the long cab to rear crossmemeber/spring all lined up. I found my issue was that I bolted the spings down tight before installing the cab. I ended up having to undo the mount to frame bolts and this let everything move around and fall into place.

[Alex van de Wetering]

Lovely work again Jordan. I also have the Anti squeak from MACs, but I think the original material might have been a bit more sticky(?). Maybe, it's worth trying to warm it with a paint stripper and than applying it?

Alex

[Bob Carriere]

My rear wall bolts on top of the dot and dash floor plate so I will have to use a rubber gasket/antisqueak soft enough to conform to the floor plate design.

I tested the bare wall frame and the holes do line up...... for now.

Been playing with test pieces trying to roll the proper curve at each end but with a full length / full width piece it is a bitch to hold over head when doing the second curve. Hoping to have a close fit.... preshaped panel that will require minimum clamping and gluing.

Was just toooooo hot and sticky for that kind of work today!!!!

Cheers

[Jordan Baker]

Thanks guys for the compliments.

Alex I was thinking along the same lines but that's why I figured using he spray mount would work. It really grabbed the anti squeak and I had to be careful while pressing it down. I stayed away from softening it up with turpentine as I didn't want to wash away any of stuff in the cloth.

I wanted to try and pre shape the panel but had the same difficulties of getting the other end all matched up. That's why I opted to clamp and weld and slowly move along. My worry was that I'd get the other end bent and it would be off.

When I do the roof my plan is the same to slowly work along except for the fact that I think starting in the middle would be best. Time will tell though.

[Jordan Baker]

Busy busy busy has been my life since mid August. Now its all back to normal again and Im happy.

Spent a few hours out in the shop today working on my dome lights.

The right side one is an original NOS light. The left side one has been made from scratch. I picked up 10 sockets on ebay for a few dollars and free shipping from China. Two months later they showed up. The orginal sockets were held on by rolling an edge over on the tabs. I decided for simplicity to solder them on. My next step is to redo the wiring with proper modern period style wires.

One thing I am looking for is a picture/details of the bracket these lights mounted to.

[Jordan Baker]

Finished the work on the spare tire carrier and tool box yesterday. This box is a copy that was made a number of years ago. I had to go back an do some minor work on a couple of details to make it closer to the originals. The pivot brackets for the clam shells and the hasp for the locks needed to be rebuilt. Lastly the clam shell retainers were made as the one original I had was rusted out.