July 13th, 2008

Scott got lost and didn’t show until late today so we weren’t able to get very much done but we did start tipping the iceberg today. :):):):) Scott brought over the intercooler. It’s a little thick but I think we can make it work.

Now it’s time to see if we can get this front subframe in place and welded there.

First, we have to grind everything off and get all the rust off and have a clean surface to work with.

Holy Crap!!

After some fitting we were able to get it to fit with no problems!!

We were going to tack it into place but for some reason the welder wouldn’t work. So we have to settle with a jack holding it into place for the moment until I can figure out what is wrong with it.

This is all I have until next week. Oh Wait, I’m suppose to be in Pensacola next weekend. So I won’t be posting anything new for that weekend that is truck related.

The Sunday after the Turner Field event (June 29th) Chris and I started working on the truck and made some progress before our fatigue from the previous day kicked in. We were able to remove the rear axle and springs and place the 240 rear subframe on the jack to see where it would sit in the rear. I didn’t get any pictures of that as I was stupid tired.

Check out my handy car dollies that I made one day! It still cost $200 to make myself! But it will hold a 3200 lbs car damn it!

This is what we were left with once we left with for that day. I think we went in a watched NASCAR for the rest of the day. Ghey Amanda, Ghey..

July 5th, 2008

I made it out to the garage for a little while and was able to make some progress pulling all wiring and tubing from the frame. I was also able to remove the front subframe and torsion bars. And that was actually a pain in the ass. I didn’t get any pictures of it being removed.

July 6th, 2008

Scott came over and we were able to make a decent amount of headway. Today was removing all extra brackets, tabs and braces that weren’t gonna be used again. I wanted to pressure wash everything too.

Here’s Scott showing us his bald spot.

We slid the 240 front subframe under the frame to get it ready for fitment.

After sliding that into place we called it a day and I grabbed these pictures of what we did.

So this concludes July 6th.

I don’t know why but I’ve been seeing a lot of damn snakes lately! Been seeing at least one snake a week. Sometimes 2. I saw one yesterday but he got away before I could get a picture of him.

Here’s a few pictures of some of the ones that I was able to get some pictures of with the iPhone.

Don’t throw rocks at snakes. They get pissed like anyone else would.

This one was bigger. Almost 5 feet long!

A Soccer Mom got to this one before I could.

I hope I’m done seeing snakes. Getting scared to open the pedestals at work now because I’m worried there will always be one in there.

Kathy asked me if I wanted to run the road race with her pretty much right after we had started dating. I said sure. I hadn’t run in a road race since I was like 12 or 13. I think I was in better shape then. I was having some issues about half way through because I hadn’t trained enough to be making such a long run. My knees started to kill me around mile marker 3.

This was Run Group 1 that was running by on the other side of the fence.

Kathy and I were in Run Group 9, so we had some time to kill. So we went to our setup area and just hung out and took a couple of pictures.

It was time and we were excited. Kathy was VERY nervous. It may have also been because I told her that I wouldn’t be talking to her when we were running so I could conserve energy. I know that was tough because she doesn’t have a quiet bone in her body. She out-talks me if you can believe that!

Here we are about two miles into it. Look at the pack of people going up the hill! People as far as the eye can see! Or at least as far as my iPhone can see.

Yeah! The finish line!

We’re gonna run it again next year. But this time we will be training more frequently than this time. I want to finish the race with no issues other than fatigue.

Kathy and I went to Destin 5 or 6 weeks ago and had a Blast!! One of her acquaintances had a weekend open at their Condo on the beach and ask if we wanted it. And of course we said HELL YES!!

Here’s some pictures that I took with my iPhone. None of them are that great and I didn’t get that many outside but I will try better to get more pics from now on.

This was what you see when you walked in.

2nd bedroom. Kathy hates having her picture taken. It’s only because she won’t pose.

The bunkbeds to the left.

Walking into the Kitchen and living area.

Master bedroom on the left.

Kitchen.

Living Room.

Bartender Kathy.

The view from the balcony was awesome!

Enjoying some margarita’s on the balcony.

We slept in late and got a late start. We couldn’t get enough of this view.

We went out on the pier and these guys were hanging all around waiting on people to throw them a fish. They would get into fights with each other over them. They weren’t really scared of people to much either.

Some church in Brewton, AL. It was pretty neat with all the ivy growing up it.

Destin was a great time. I use to live in the area years ago when stationed at Eglin AFB. It had been 13 years since I had been there and things had changed some but it was mostly still the same. We plan on going back again in August. This time maybe Chris and Amanda can join us.

I needed to start breaking the truck down into sections and working it down to the frame. I decided that starting with the bed would be a good start seeing that it’s relatively easy and has the appearance of a lot of work being done without completely killing myself in the beginning.

Once I removed the bed I saw that there was a lot more room to work with than I was expecting and that the frame was tubular from the factory. So that saves a lot of work from the get-go.

Now it was time to start with getting to truck prepped for removing the cab. This was going to be more time consuming. This required removing all lines, hoses and wiring that went from the frame and engine to the cab. I also had to remove the steering (which was a complete pain in the ass!) and auto shifter in the floorboard.

I don’t have any pictures of this except for the shifter being gone. I was in the zone with removing and getting prepped that I completely forgot.

We ended up having to cut the steering column. We couldn’t get the pitman arm to free up and let go of the gear arm.

Pulling the cabin was kind of scary to me because if we damaged anything I’d be up the creek without a paddle. Because having to replace the windshield or doors would be an almost impossible task seeing that no one could even give me a quote on the windshield because most people won’t deal with anything earlier than 1980. :/ And the problem that I was worried about was if the roof was to give way to some of the stress being put on it by crimping in the middle causing the windshield to break.

So what we did was got a 2×4 cut at 50″ and placed that across the cabin so that it took all the stress of picking up the cabin.

And then I was going to need something to pick up the front. So we did this and attached them above the roof to the engine hoist and lifted.

This a little better picture of how the lift was done.

You can see where we had to cut the steering rod.

Next was the gas tank.

You can see a little bit of rust damage where the gas tank was mounted. This will soon be removed.

Drive shaft was next.

Enough posting for another day. Gotta go find something to eat. AGAIN!!

I bought the truck on April 26, 2008.

The Interior was great too!!

A couple of shots of the stock motor. L16

I will post up more when I get a chance.. Pizza is burning right now.. Gotta go!!

Time to size things up:

After getting the truck home it was time to size up the project to see what I was up against. Here’s a few pictures of what I was looking at:

I’m looking at the motor mount points here to see what they look like and measuring distances from side to side front to back and top to bottom. Gotta see if a SR20det will fit in here.

This is old school technology. Torsion bars instead of springs!

Solid rear axle and plenty of room. No wonder this truck is so light!

General Prep and Repair:

Since I traded the M30 without the seats, GeForce Harness and Steering wheel I had some things to go ahead and get installed. The wheel wouldn’t bolt up to the Datsun, plus we weren’t gonna be able to use the stock steering column anyway.

I went to the junk yard and found a 1977 620 truck and was able to scavenge some parts. And seeing that my truck is an automatic I needed the clutch supplies from the parts truck to convert mine. My truck was also missing 3 point seat belts. It only had 2 point. So I was able to use the ones from the parts truck as well. I got home and installed these new parts as soon as I cleaned them up.

Ok thats it for now. Next is the disassemble.