Work on My F8, No. 11

[Mike K]

Jim

this is the floor layout on the C8 ?????????

Mike

[Mike K]

Jim

This is a pic of the floor .. an original 1A1 body . Maybe the F8 has a different layout . Someone else may add more .

Mike

[Jim Price]

Mike:
Your drawing and picture are indeed correct! However, both Bob (my welder) and I, after having a close look at the bed that came with my truck, determined that the original design was not sufficient to support repeated heavy use. Because I intend to use the truck at reenactments, we altered the design of the bed frame to meet the expected loads.

Regards,
Jim

[Jim Price]

This past week was a bit of a slow one, mostly measuring, more measuring, discussing, cussing and other assorted important digressions. However, we did accomplish the following:

Welded the sides of the bed to the floor.

Welded the angle iron braces onto the ends and sides of the bed sides. These took the place of the flanges which had been formed from the single pieces of the sheet metal that made up the bed sides for each side of the bed.

Repaired the ragged hole in the left rear end "cap" (torch-cut during ithe truck's civilian use...) to match the factory-made one on the right side. We had saved both end "caps" when scrapping the old bed...

Welded the underbrace to the bottoms of the end "caps" and then welded the brace to the end of the bed.

Removed the old sheet metal from the original angle iron (which we had the foresight to save when we scrapped the original bed.... ) which fits around the sides and bottom of the front of the bed and sides. We're having this important piece of angle stripped and then we'll affix new sheet metal to it and then bolt all to the front of the bed.

Propped the new tailgate into place just to see if it fit. (Whew! It did!) By the way, we saved the old tailgate and will remove all the old furniture, including the fold-down step, and install all on the new one. More to follow on this.

The replacement right-side manifold (which has the lower profile) arrived. We may get it installed next week. Depends on how excited we get about finishing the bed.......

That's all for this week!

Regards,
Jim

[Jim Price]

As the angle iron that wraps the front of the bed did not arrive back from the stripper yet we turned to an avoided project, the reconstruction of the exhaust pipes.

Suffice it to say, the job of taking a set of exhaust pipes that were designed and manufactured to exhaust out the right side of the frame and altering them to exhaust out the left was not an easy job. It required making 11 different cuts in eight places on both pipes but when we were done both fit like they should!

Prior to installing and trying the pipes for fit, we installed the replacement manifolds, the right side having a more shallow profile. Below are pictures of the maniolds, old and new, showing the difference between the two.

Also shown is a picture of the right side pipe where we altered it to fit the space betwen the manifold and the driver's side foot space. A picture of the reformed exhaust pipes are shown as well.

That's it for now!

Regards,
Jim

[Jim Price]

This past week was an almost non-productive one. Bob, my helper was out for a day, and I went over to California for a long weekend starting on Thursday. I buy, sell and trade militaria of all kinds and was at a militaria show in Pomona. Didn't sell much but have nearly cornered the market on size no. 3 British gaiters, having purchased some 35 pairs!

We were able to attach the front frame to the bed. As mentioned before, we had a new bed made and it was a bit smaller width-wise and so we had to cut and weld the original piece. It had also been twisted and bent and that took a bit of finesse to get it straightened. I'm picking up the steel plate that goes over this frame tomorrow. Pictures are below.

Now for some bad news. When filling the radiator, we soon noticed water coming out the back of the oil pan, not a good sign. We stopped with the water, took off the pan and put more water in the radiator to see where the leak was coming from. It was the No. 4 cylinder, right rear.

We then removed the head and pushed out the piston and found at least 4 holes in the cylinder wall, one the size of a three pence piece! Needless to say I was astounded as we had just the week before ran water through the heads to flush out the water jackets. We must have by chance left the piston over these holes and thus did not discover the damage.

I am pursuing legal remedies regarding this matter and cannot got into details of the purchase of the engine. I will say that I took what I considered to be sufficient steps to protect myself on my purchase and my attorney has agreed with me.

End of story! Well, not completely! Not to be discouraged I immediately beat the bushes and located another engine which is for sale by a local antique auto parts store who has guaranteed it to be a "runner." I'm having a look at it tomorrow and will be sure that I obtain a well-written, cover-my-tush, bill of sale!

Lesson learned! One can't do too much to be sure the engine they're buying is everything the seller says it is!

[Keith Webb]

That's terrible!

I hope you can get things sorted without too much expense or trouble.