Temperatures are still in the 30s this weekend so I made a list of projects I could do inside or in colder weather. The first and most important was to start up the Scout, get it out in the driveway and warmed up. It’s been two weeks since I’ve started her and she was a little grumpy but once she warmed up the lifter tick went away like always. I’m still very much not used to the new clutch. Then I played musical chairs with a new gas cap meant for the Travelall, but which didn’t fit properly anywhere. I’d ordered a Stant locking cap, but they gave me some weird Chinese offbrand with a huge gasket that didn’t fit. I tried it on all of the vehicles and it just barely fit on the Scout, but that’s not good enough, so it’s going back.
Next was something that’s had to be done for a long time: I continued making an inventory of all of the stuff in the bins out in the garage. At this point there are 10 of them out there and I only have the vaguest notion of what’s in each one. So I brought my laptop out and added the contents into a spreadsheet I’d started last week in the basement. This took a lot more time than I thought it would, but I found a bunch of things that are gonna come in handy in the next couple of weeks. in one bin was the original gas cap from the Travelall, which I had forgotten I had. I walked that right out and put it on the truck.
I also found the original Carter glass bowl fuel pump from Darth, which I’d like to rebuild, as well as the Holley 2300 from the green truck. A quick comparison to the carb on Darth shows some basic differences: the fuel inlet is on the opposite side, and all of the extra bracketry for remote throttle and choke control are missing. The longterm plan for Darth is to add fuel injection of some kind, so I’m not going to rebuild this one, but it’s nice to have a spare.
The whole process took about two hours. Most importantly, I need to find a better way of organizing this information. Ideally, it would be some sort of searchable database that I could access from my phone. My friend Bennett has an app called Sortly that he uses for his inventory, but I am resisting adding yet another app to my phone.
After lunch, I took the Scout out and filled up a 5 gallon gas can to bring back and pour into the Travelall. First, I pulled the fill tube off the pipe and properly hose clamped it then reassembled everything. The angle of the fill tube is such that it requires a funnel with a gas can, which is kind of annoying. I had to tighten a couple of the other house clamps up. Then I put some 50-1 oil in the carb and tried to light the truck off a couple of times. I noticed that the battery seemed to be dying off pretty quickly, which is strange, because it’s on a battery tender. Then I noticed that a bit of smoke coming from the negative terminal on the battery and realize that I need a new negative cable. Or, at least, I’ve got to unbolt it from the engine block and clean up the connection.
The next thing on the list was breaking out the welder and repairing one of my spare wing window units. I’m finally picking up a long delayed project of replacing the Scout wing window rubber. I think I started this project right before I got to Travelall and it’s just been sitting in the basement since then; at first I forgot why I’d stalled, and after watching the directions I remembered: I don’t have a rivet gun. One text to the Scout mafia later, I had one on loan.
Looking over my spares, I realized that the driver’s frame I was going to use is broken at the top, so I found another frame with a broken hinge mount on the bottom where the pivot pin sits, a common failure point on this design. When I started this project I didn’t have a welder, but now I can simply weld braces to the sides and it’ll be stronger than it was from the factory. I cut two small sections of 18 gauge steel, tacked them in place and then welded them to the frame so it’s sturdy again. After I ground it all down, I brought it back in the house and put it on the workbench. I started working the rubber into the frame and got it ready for the next step: two rivets on the angle side.
Something else I thought I would try was breaking out my tabletop metal brake and seeing if I could bend up the 16 gauge steel I’d cut out for the seat base. I need to take a sharpie and write on the brake itself: “Not good for 16 gauge steel”. The bends were not crisp, and I should’ve stopped at the first one. so I think I’m going to cut out a section of 18 gauge steel in the same pattern and get that ready for Brian’s professional brake.
Sunday morning I met up with Bennett, who was in the area, and we drove outside the beltway a ways to meet up with an old Scout guy who had put the call out for a period radio. Bennett had a 1974 AM unit in his stash and offered it up in the interest of getting the truck in shape. The fellow we met with has a green Scout I haven’t seen in 12 years, back when I sold his son a pair of Terra door windows I’d picked up somewhere. We stood in his garage and chatted for a while, and he showed us his progress. His truck looks very good: a ’74 with an AMC 256, bench seats, in a lovely shade of green. He’s got a bucket list of things he wants to get done, like finally getting a Terra cabtop on it, installing power steering, and some other smaller stuff. Overall, it’s a very clean Scout, and it was great to catch up with him.
Back at home, Bennett helped me diagnose the clutch by pulling the inspection cover off the transmission bellhousing. He looked at the flywheel/clutch while I pushed the pedal. He couldn’t see anything happening, which leads us to believe the two are rusted together. I’m going to try a couple of driveway fixes before I call in the big guns, but I’m pretty much resigned to having a shop look it over.
He had to head out, so after lunch I ran out for a better negative battery cable and replaced the bad one, then filled the carb and cranked it over until the battery started getting sick—which didn’t take long. I’d guess it hadn’t been charging well for a while. The other thing I’m noticing is that the fuel pump isn’t pulling the way it should—but to be fair I haven’t been able to crank it for long enough to get things moving. I’ll try it again this coming week to see if I can get her idling.
Down on the workbench I continued replacing the rubber in the wing windows. Bennett lent me his pop rivet gun, which is essential for doing the bracket on the front of the frame. I got the driver’s side in place and mounted, and found that the top of the window was out of alignment with the frame. After pulling the passenger’s side apart and replacing that rubber, I found the same issue there. So clearly I’m not riveting the bracket in the right place, or the new rubber is just more chonky than the old dried out garbage. More research is required.