Author: bill

Warranty

As reported earlier my Eastwood welder decided to stop working completely about two weeks ago. I detached and re-attached the hose and gun assembly, thinking maybe some of the wire had bound up inside, but it came out straight and clean. I was at the end of a spool so I put a new one in, and it worked briefly for a few small welds. But the next time I fired it up I got nothing. The unit powered up fine and the fan was blowing but I got nothing out of the gun. I called Eastwood’s tech support and over the course of a week talked to several very nice CSA’s who took notes and assured me they’d get back in touch, but I had to do the legwork. I took the gun apart and tested for continuity at the switch, which checked out fine, and by request I cracked the case to look over the boards inside to see if anything was visually damaged. I didn’t see anything wrong, but yesterday I was finally sent an RMA by email to exchange for a new unit. I was worried about finding a box to pack it in, figuring I’d already recycled the original, but spied it under a bunch of tarps in the garage, holding the pedal assembly and air cleaner from the green ’68 parts truck. It was a bit worse for wear but I taped it up and reinforced the bottom with some 2-ply cardboard, and sent the unit out this morning. In the meantime I’m going to see if I can rent one locally so that I can finish the small welds required to button up the firewall and gas tank, and get the truck off jackstands. 

The Scout is still at the shop; I haven’t heard back from them yet but when I checked in on Monday he said they’d cleaned off the underside, run it up, and put it on the lift to look for leaks. Apparently there are two outlets on the transfer case that are weeping and another leak up front somewhere. So I’m hoping I’ll hear back from them today, and if not I’ll check in tomorrow.

Finally, I reconnected with a guy who had some parts trucks in a yard close to my sister’s place in New York. He still has a C-series Travelall in his field that I’d like to look over, so I’m making a plan to go check it out when we’re up there for Thanksgiving. So I’ve got to put together a recovery kit to bring north with me, including fire and cutting tools. This might be the impetus to buy a cordless angle grinder, actually…

 

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Warranty  |  Posted in Welding

Small Victories

It’s been dry and mild here in Maryland for the past three weeks. Sunny, uncharacteristically warm weather yielded three weeks to enjoy beautiful changing leaves; usually there’s one day of beautiful color, it rains, and the trees are gray and naked until March. There’s also been lots of dry sunlight to work on the truck in shirtsleeves. The forecast for Sunday, however, was for rain, so I decided to visit the local pick & pull for some parts before everything turned into cold soupy mud. I was on the hunt for an electric steering unit from a 2009-2013 Toyota Corolla, and the app told me they had two on the lot. I carried in a metric-based tool roll and impact driver, and found the first car after a few minutes of confusion. Someone had already pulled the dash mostly apart, and most crucially, pulled the lower linkage from the bottom of the steering unit. The second Corolla on the lot didn’t have electric steering assist at all. So I consulted the website for alternatives and found a donor 2009 Nissan Versa several rows over that hadn’t been touched. It only took me several minutes to deconstruct the dashboard to get to the motor, and after a half an hour I figured out how to get it detached from the wheel, off the dashboard, and on the floor. Then I put a socket on the bottom of the linkage and with one mighty pull, got it disconnected from the car.

Back at the house, I laid it out on the bench, tested the motor on 12V power, and verified it worked. Laying it out on the floor with the two columns I’ve got, I’m not sure if I can use either one to make a new unit, but I think the one from the green truck will be the best candidate. Most likely I’ll cut the shaft at the bottom to disconnect it from the power steering unit at the bottom and find a way to construct one good unit out of the two. We’ll see.

The theory here is to have a unit that doesn’t need a computer or any other input to regulate the motor; with no signal from the CAN BUS, the attached ECU (that silver box) will always provide average power assist and return the wheel to center at any speed in what’s called fail-safe mode; and if the motor fails, it just reverts to manual steering. This is what Brian has on his Scout and it’s pretty slick—and his unit was from a Versa as well. Having driven his truck with both the manual and the power steering I can say it makes a huge difference, which is why I’m pursuing this project.

With my welder down, I had to pivot to smaller projects. As mentioned earlier, I had a bunch of things I wanted to knock out, and I got a fair bit of them done. First, I decided to use locknuts and washers to button up my mirrors. It took some travel to find someone with the correct stainless hardware in stock, but once I had that I got the passenger side closed up and mounted on the truck with little hassle. I’m glad I pulled the driver’s side off, because when I went to take the nuts off the rod snapped on both sides as it had on the other one. This was easy to put together, and it mounted quickly. Now both sides of the truck have refurbished, adjustable, period-correct mirrors.

Finally, I started to hunt down live wires on the rear of the truck. There’s a trailer plug with a tangle of wires hanging below the hitch that I can’t identify, so I turned the marker lights on and tested them for continuity. Nothing seemed to work. Another rusted bulb was hanging under the truck, so I tried that one as well; no dice. Looking up. I remembered there was a mystery wire running out of the rear quarter into the back of the door, and put the test wire on that: power! And turning the markers off killed it. So I put a splice on the wire from the license plate holder, connected it to the mystery wire, and used some new stainless hardware to permanently mount the assembly to the rear door. So that’s one more requirement checked off for a street-legal truck; unfortunately now the headlights aren’t working and the front turn signals aren’t lighting. So there’s more work to do.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Small Victories  |  Posted in Electrical, Junkyards, Travelall

Holding Pattern

I’m in the middle of a couple of projects and I can’t currently make headway on most of them. First up, I’m waiting on some parts for gas tank—Summit is supposed to send me a fuel hose with a 90˚ bend, which isn’t supposed to ship until November 21. There are other fuel hoses available, but none of them are long enough to work. So when that shows up, the tank will be ready to hang back up under the truck.

I’m stalled on sheet metal repairs because my welder is down and I’m waiting for Eastwood to get back to me about warranty parts. Their help desk is backed up this week. I’ve got a couple of things I need this for:

  • The clip for the filler hose needs to be welded to the face of the firewall.
  • Three captive nuts that need to be welded to the inside of the firewall for the inner fender skirts.
  • A captive nut that needs to be replaced for the forward gas tank strap.

The mirror repair is the other thing waiting for a welder; I need to cut a couple of metal strips to weld to the threaded rod that goes inside the housing. When that’s ready I can re-assemble the bad mirror and mount it on the truck. I guess I can cut and thread a second rod to refurbish the second mirror while I’m waiting.

So this weekend I think I’ll work on the electrical system and continue troubleshooting stuff like the blinkers, high-beams and get the  license plate light working, and try to install the cabin light. There is no provision for a door-actuated dome light anywhere, so I’m going to do some research into how that might work.

Depending on weather, I might be able to touch up and clearcoat the seat box this weekend. At the very least I’d like to drill for bolts and get the mounting location dialed in.

But if it does indeed get down to 60˚, I can start scraping the insulation off the ceiling. For that I have to suit up in Tyvek and use a fan to blow the particles out as I go; fiberglas insulation is hateful in any form. I’ve got 70% of a roll of Cool It heat matting that I can start with but I’m going to have to buy a bunch more to cover the whole thing.

One other thing I might do is venture out to my local pick-and-pull and snag an electrical setting setup from a Corolla. I’ve got some instructions and details from a couple of locations as to what I need to get and from which models, and the weather is supposed to be pretty nice (and dry; there’s nothing more hateful than wandering through a swampy junkyard), so it might be a good day for an early junkyard trip.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   1 Comment on Holding Pattern  |  Posted in To-Do List, Travelall

October Update

Here’s a recap of the last two weeks; it’s mainly covering the disassembly of the two spare C-series doors, welding the passenger footwell, cleaning out the gas tank, needle-scaling the passenger-side front fender and frame area, and weatherstripping the two front doors.

In the meantime, I’m waiting for Eastwood to get back to me about my welder. I talked to their tech support line and they’re going to get back to me about the next steps, but it sounded like they’re going to send me a new part after we figure out what’s not working.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on October Update  |  Posted in Travelall

Weekend Update, 11.4

The garage is currently empty, which is a strange feeling. I dropped the Scout off at a new garage to have the transmission looked over, after the drive back from Indiana coated the entire undercarriage with oil. It took a while to find someone who would work on the truck. My long-standing transmission shop, who had worked on it as recently as three years ago, isn’t servicing manual transmissions anymore, and the fellow who fixed the manifold for me last year didn’t want to deal with heavy stuff like that either. This new shop was recommended to me by a truck guy I’ve met at Cars & Coffee, and when I got the owner on the phone I got a good vibe from him. I drove it over on Wednesday and buttoned it up for possible rain; they told me they’d store it inside for me. So now we wait to have the problem diagnosed. If this works out, I’ll look into having the Travelall towed down there to sort out the transmission.

Speaking of that transmission, after researching it some more Sunday morning, I was surprised to find that I’ve been wrong this whole time about it. I’d thought it was a non-synchro manual like Brian has in his Scout. It’s actually a T-98A, which is synchronized in all but the first gear. I’d been thinking about how I’d have to find a more modern transmission to swap in, like the T-19 in the Scout, but maybe I won’t have to.

Meanwhile, the passenger firewall is 95% buttoned up; all that’s left is to weld the hose bracket back on to the angled face and paint the new metal. I can’t weld anything, though, because my welding gun isn’t advancing any wire. I disconnected it, put a new spool on, and checked the contacts but the wire won’t go. I called the Eastwood store on Saturday and after talking with the shop manager, he gave me the 800 number for tech support; tomorrow I’ll call them and walk through some diagnostics. The unit has a 3-year warranty so he told me they’ll send me new parts free of charge.

So, I focused on what I could Sunday afternoon by busting out the needle scaler and cleaning off the frame and underside of the passenger inner fender to prep things for encapsulator. The area under the rocker on that side got cleaned off, and the underside of the bed is curing to get ready for a layer of undercoating. I then installed weatherstripping on both of the front doors, finished painting the gas tank, and needle-scaled the frame on the driver’s side before it got dark.

Down in the basement I cut down a 12″ section of 1/4″ rod and threaded it with a 28-pitch die on both ends. The goal here is to fabricate a new rod for the mirror mount that I can swap out for the rusty one in the broken unit. Now I have to pop the endcap off of the spare mirror to test the method before I go banging on the good one.

 

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Weekend Update, 11.4  |  Posted in Paint, Repairs

Floorpan, Continued

I spent a couple of evenings this past week breaking down the green Travelall doors and collecting all of the parts to see how things look. The passenger door is in worse shape than the driver’s; there’s a fair bit of rust-through under the wing window on the bottom. Both doors are down to the metal, but on each one the lower hinge needs to be drilled out. That may make reusing them both tricky, but I think careful screw removal and re-tapping the hole is possible. Both windows, scissor assemblies, latch mechanisms, and most of the window channels are all in good shape. I’ve also got a second set of pre-’65 door latches for both sides from my friend Don in Ohio, which will come in handy as spares in case I need them.

The other thing Don sent me was a spare set of IH mirror assemblies. One of them is basically just the bracket, but the other held the mirror housing (minus the mirror) which actually worked in my favor, because I can see how the interior parts are assembled. Essentially there’s a long rod that goes through the center, threaded at each end, and held in place with two brackets welded to the rod. So even if I wanted to pull the rod out of my good housings I couldn’t.

To recap, the threads on one of my good mirrors was so rusted the bolts snapped off on each side, leaving me with no way to attach it to the bracket. Pretty much the only way I can make my good mirror work is to carefully pull one of the endcaps off, pull the threaded rod out, and replace it with a new one. The rod is pretty simple; it’s 1/4″ and takes a 1/4″ – 28 thread, which is easy to find a die for. It’s getting the cap off that worries me. It’s thin steel over an aluminum housing, so I have to be very careful taking things apart.

Saturday I stopped in at a neighborhood estate sale and picked up $20 worth of brand-name used tools that will come in handy for backups and spares, including four vice-grips and several wrenches.

Sunday I got back out to the truck and continued cutting and welding new metal in to the passenger’s footwell. I wound up taking more metal out, as I was having blow-through issues with bad metal and finding some pinholes as I was cleaning other sections. I think I’ve got all of the bad stuff out, and the stuff that’s still mildly pockmarked just got a thick coat of encapsulator. Underneath I ground out the rest of the welds and got it ready for paint. All of this took the majority of the day, as I was doing a lot of cutting and trimming, which sent me back and forth to the bench grinder.

The paint cured overnight and is now ready for seam sealer, which will be applied liberally around the edges before everything gets primed. On the outside edge of the footwell I ground everything flat and covered it in etch primer; it’s going to get several coats of chassis black and then a layer of undercoating to keep out the water.

Finally, I used some vinegar to flush out the inside of the gas tank and let that sit for a day and a half , shaking it around inside to get the crud out and neutralize any rust. Running a borescope down inside the tank, it looks shockingly clean apart from the remains of mud dauber nests. I flushed it with water and a solution of baking soda, then flushed it again and set it out to dry. The outside was covered with undercoating and some surface rust along the top and sides, so i hit that with a wire wheel and quickly got the whole thing down to bare metal. When the top and sides were clean I covered the trouble spots with Encapsulator and the bare spots with etch primer. I’m back and forth about pulling the fuel sender, but leaning towards leaving it in, as I know that it works and don’t want to mess with that.

So in the next couple of days when the temperature gets above 60˚ I’m going to apply sealer and paint to button up as much as I can.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Floorpan, Continued  |  Posted in Purchasing, Welding

The Verdict

I really dig this. I think they got a lot of things right here. Among others:

  • 200M range, with an optional range-extending ICE engine—this is the way
  • Split rear tailgate with a swing-away tire carrier
  • 4 doors but a silhouette pointing directly back at Scout II design cues (called the Traveler)
  • A 4 door pickup version, called the Terra
  • Optional bench seat!!
  • Buttons for the controls, not touchscreens
  • Multiple roof options (but no removable top)
  • Solid rear axle
  • Body on frame construction
  • Projected price point: $50-60K

It’s still pricey for our budget, but I would really love to move to an electric vehicle in something like this.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   2 Comments on The Verdict  |  Posted in Inspiration

Welding and Steering

On Saturday I got back out to the truck in the afternoon following a yard sale and continued metalwork on the truck. I had to finish welding in the floor plate first, which felt like it took more time than last Sunday, then grind down the welds on top and underneath. I was happy to see I had good weld penetration when I was down under the truck, though it makes for tired arms when you’re grinding upside-down for a half an hour.

Then I started cutting smaller sections out of the toeboard that had rusted through, including a triangle-shaped area on the A-pillar. I cut a section of new metal, got that welded in to the toeboard area, and ground it smooth, finishing up as it was getting dark.

Sunday morning I got up, walked the dog, and drove up to Frederick to pick up a steering column from another Travelall, sold by a guy I’d met last year. He’s grafted a Crown Victoria front suspension and Ranger rear on to his ’68, lowering the whole thing onto airbags and tubbing out the rear tires. It’s really cool, even if it isn’t my cup of tea. His work is really nice (he’s a bodyman), and it’s going to be a sweet truck when he’s done.

The column he sold me is a column-shift unit, which may work for what I need and may not. I think I can cobble together one good column out of the two and probably sell the steering wheel at Nats to make some money back. The plan is to get an electric steering unit from a Toyota Corolla and splice it into the column.

I had errands to run after lunch, so by the time I got back outside it was 3PM and I didn’t want to drag all of the welding gear out for just one hour. So I filled the compressor tank, busted out the needle scaler, and cleaned off the frame and undercarriage all the way up to the front axle. By 5PM I had the frame coated with Encapsulator as well as most of the underside of the body shell. That was extremely satisfying. Next it’ll all get a coat of chassis black and then the body will get a coat of undercoating.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Welding and Steering  |  Posted in Repairs, Travelall, Welding