'69 F100 Ranger - Canada-born, Atlanta-raised, movie star(?)

[LeoZelig]

Thanks Adam! This group of folks and knowledge here keeps me moving in the right direction. Thanks for the encouragement!

[LeoZelig]

The next thing our truck needs are some fresh tires - the current batch are all dry rotted. And all four wheels need to be cleaned up and repainted before they get new rubber, and that's hard to do without putting the truck up on blocks... a no-no in my town.

Fortunately, fellow Fordification member, Joe (NWFLF100), gave me a couple wheels when I made the trip to see him earlier this year (thanks again, Joe!).
So my plan is this: remove the tires from the wheels Joe gave me, clean and paint those, then get tires mounted to them. Put those wheels on the truck, then lather, rinse, and repeat with the other two sets of wheels.

I thought I'd need a machine to remove the old tires, but our son who worked as a mechanic while in school told me it could be done with hand tools. That blew my mind! I piked up some tire irons at Harbor Freight and watched a bunch of YouTube showing a variety of methods folk use.

I tried one method using a floor jack and a cargo strap - that was a non-starter.

What did work for me was an Aussie who used a bottle jack to break the bead.

bead breaking.jpg

Breaking the bead was probably made way more difficult by the fact that the old tires may have been on the wheels for years, but they broke.... eventually.

Wrestling the tires the rest of the way off the wheels was a battle, but persistence paid off in the end.

prying.jpg

I cleaned up one of the wheels, trying my new sandblaster - lots of mess, and not a miracle tool. But it did do a good job on getting tight areas free of rust.

Next, I tried a wire brush in my angle grinder on the more open areas. That's much more efficient than sandblasting for big open areas!

Check out the difference between the one I cleaned up and the untouched one. Amazing!

before after.jpg

Once I get these all cleaned, I'll prime and paint them. But those are jobs for another day.

[LeoZelig]

After more in-depth repairs, it was time for a gimme.

The windshield wipers were just a faded version of their formal selves, so it was time to replace them.

Perished 1.jpg

Perished 2.jpg

I replaced them with some new 15" Trico Classic blades that look period-correct. I really like the metal arms.

New Blades.jpg

It was time to give Roy a little exercise with a neighborhood drive, just to keep his joints all limber. While driving around the neighborhood, I ran out of gas and my wonderful wife had to come rescue me (she's a peach!) - I guess I overestimated the fuel. Time to move the fuel gauge repair up the list.

I can hear you now, "but Chris, why don't you just keep him topped off if the fuel gauge isn't working?" That's a fair question. I know I'm going to need to replace some fuel line rubber under the cab before much longer, so I want to make draining the tank an easier job.

When I got home, I found the driver's side sitting several inches lower than the passenger side. My mind went straight to thinking the worst, that something in the suspension had rusted through. Instead, it turns out that the front, driver's side shock absorber failed in the compressed position - that's a new failure mode for me!

Over the next day, it slowly decompressed. But driving it with the risk of that happening again is a non-starter. Replacing shocks just moved above the fuel gauge repair.

[basketcase0302]

Nice progress, (and yeah most all of us has had our priorities list change from day to day on our bumps LOL).

A head's up on the wheels, maybe think about coating them with Ospho first before priming them. Or even take them to a local powder coater, (ya'll have several there in the Atlanta area) like i did my dually rims. Think I only paid maybe $30 per rim to powder coat mine?

And a heads up on the truck squatting...most all of us had seen rotted cab mounts, (most the time due to leaf debris plugged cowl areas dumping the leaves down into the lower fresh air vent area adjacent to the cab mounts). Maybe time for an inspection on both front cab mount sheet metal areas under the hood where they meet the cab, (they are replaceable but only after a lot...of work).

[3 Speed]

I can hear you now, "but Chris, why don't you just keep him topped off if the fuel gauge isn't working?" That's a fair question. I know I'm going to need to replace some fuel line rubber under the cab before much longer, so I want to make draining the tank an easier job.

Just remember not to top off all the way. Gravity and/or outside temp will pull/push your gasoline right through the filler cap, over your paint, and onto the ground.

Take my word for it!

[LeoZelig]

A head's up on the wheels, maybe think about coating them with Ospho first before priming them. Or even take them to a local powder coater, (ya'll have several there in the Atlanta area) like i did my dually rims. Think I only paid maybe $30 per rim to powder coat mine?

Powder coating? Thanks, Jeff - very interesting - I like the sound of that. And I had to Google Ospho - sounds like I need to pick up some of that. I need to figure out when to use POR-15 or Ospho... they sound kind of similar. Can anyone help with understanding the different uses?

At any rate, I am considering whether I might want to get a set of refurbished steel wheels - I found some on eBay previously, but it's looking bare at the moment.

Just remember not to top off all the way. Gravity and/or outside temp will pull/push your gasoline right through the filler cap, over your paint, and onto the ground.

Take my word for it!

Thanks for the tip, 3 Speed! I would have found out the hard way, if it hadn't been for you! I'll make sure to leave some extra space at the top of the tank.

[basketcase0302]

Chris,
Ospho and Por-15 are pretty much on the same page.
I'd painted/primed over Ospho many times, (we used it heavily in the HVAC industry here in Florida).
I'm pretty sure Ospho might be a little cheaper, (cost less) than Por-15?

[LeoZelig]

I'd painted/primed over Ospho many times, (we used it heavily in the HVAC industry here in Florida).

Jeff. that says a lot to me right there! And it does seem to be a bit cheaper, too. I'll pick up some Ospho.

Oh, and I forgot to thank you for your tip about checking the cab mounts. A quick survey of them showed nothing alarming. I will take a closer look, and plan to use Ospho to arrest any rust I do see. I didn't remove the inspection panels, so I'm sure that will tell me more when I can see inside.

[LeoZelig]

On this day, I planned to replace both front shocks. If you'll recall, the driver side shock failed in a compressed state and while it released somewhat, it never fully released.

I used a bottle jack on the I-beam to reduce the tension on the old driver's side shock and removed it. I installed a new Gabriel Ultra shock, and while tightening the top nut to torque specs (25 ft-lbs, with a range of 15-25), the threads stripped on the nut and the shaft . That does not exactly inspire confidence in the brand, but maybe I just got a bad one.

Since I had a second shock, originally planned for the passenger side, I decided to install it on the driver side. This time I set the torque wrench to 20 ft-lbs for the top nut - it tightened just fine. I'll return the defective shock and replace the passenger side later.

Installed.jpg

Check out the difference in shock lengths! I assume this is due to the shock failing while compressed, but could the failed shock have also been the wrong size?

Shock Difference.jpg

Moving on since I couldn't finish the shocks, I replaced zerk fittings on both lower king pin fittings, as well as the draglink fitting, with angled zerks so I could get the grease gun to attach, then I greased all three spots.

Zerk.jpg

Finally, I cleaned the threads on one of the lugs and lug nut for the passenger side front wheel. Previously, it had been very difficult to tighten - now it works just fine. Someday, we will replace that drum with the lugs, and the nut, but this is good for now.

[LeoZelig]

I received the replacement shock for the one that had the top threads strip, so I installed it on the front passenger side without problem. I torqued the top nut to 20 foot-pounds rather than risking going 25 again.

Next, I moved to the rear shocks. First, the passenger side - I was surprised that the shock (a coil-over, actually) still had a ton of load on the spring. Once I took the lower bolt out, all the energy released in an instant . Luckily, I wasn't caught in the parts explosion. Whoa - chalk that up to a lesson-learned!

Here's one of the old coil-overs:

coil over.jpg

I completed the passenger side, then moved to the driver side.

installed.jpg

This time, I used a ratchet strap to take up the spring's compression so I could avoid a second explosive disassembly!

compression.jpg

That worked just great, and I replaced the shock, lowered the truck and torqued all the lugs to spec.

During a test drive, I heard a metal-on-metal scraping when the drive shaft turned. It seems that changing from coil-overs to conventional shocks changed the geometry of the exhaust in relation to the drive shaft. Keen-eyed readers will remember that I previously had a scrape between a muffler and the drive shaft. It's the same situation again, and I'll need to see if I can adjust the exhaust hangers to eliminate the interference. But that's enough for today.

[hfdco4]

Any new updates?