Category: Repairs

Good news! The dashboard is officially out of the truck. I had to disconnect one final wiring harness at the steering column, push the bulkhead connectors through the firewall (not without ruining two of the small rubber grommets, which were hard as rock), chase down, label and disconnect several more random wires, including several going from the brake controller to the master cylinder. Once I had sorted those out, I clipped the two wires leading up to the nonexistent dome lights and pulled the cable going to the PTO through the firewall, and the whole thing came out.

Flush with success (and trying to plan for a rainy forecast on Monday) I hauled it and the dash from the green truck into the basement, set things up on the workbench, and started swapping the wires out. The fuse panel went in easily, and I pulled the main loom over to the gauge cluster to start moving wires over. Things got confusing very quickly until I worked out how the loom was oriented and began moving the gauge leads over; the spaghetti of lighting wires was difficult to sort out until suddenly it all became clear. The two main question marks left are the leads to the aftermarket oil gauge, which takes a smaller lightbulb, and a random gauge light clip hanging off the bottom of the loom that I can’t track down.

The headlight switch took the most time to deal with, because I was having a problem with the button latch on the bottom not releasing the knob. I monkeyed with it for a while, took a short break, and then unscrewed the bezel holding the whole unit to the dash. Pulling the knob all the way out at that point, I pushed the release button and the knob shaft popped out. I scrubbed the outside with electric cleaner and wire-brushed the contacts, then reinstalled the switch and hooked it back up. The ignition switch was a little more nervous-making, as I’d already swapped it out once very early after I’d gotten the truck and suddenly I couldn’t start it. I carefully followed the hookups on the back of the original ignition unit and screwed it back in place, but I have to verify I’ve got the wires in the right place.

The other thing I noticed was that the mechanical linkage from the heater control was slipping off the lever when it was open—it was actually disconnected when I got the truck. I pulled the wire off, bent it to add the right amount of torque to hold it down on the post, and reinstalled it.

With the old loom out, all of the scabbed-in wiring fell away and the whole unit looks a lot cleaner. The big question I’ve got now is how to add a radio in to the wiring; most likely it’ll be on its own fusible link but I have to figure out how it would be keyed to the ignition switch. I cleaned up the backside of the dashboard and got the whole thing ready to reinstall, but I’m waiting on a package of size 57 bayonet LEDs to replace all the filament bulbs before I put the thing back in the dash. Also in the cart is a new choke cable to replace the frozen one I pulled out.

So next up on the list is to clean up the firewall where I’d welded in new metal—wire wheel off the scabby seam sealer I used last year, treat it with rust encapsulator, put clean seam sealer over everything, and hit it with a coat of red paint. I’m waiting on the Scout Connection to see if they’ve got three new bulkhead grommets they can send me, and I have to find some plastic plugs for the holes left from the old A/C system. The last thing I’m going to do order and install some heat matting like I did in the Scout to cut down on temps coming in from the engine bay. When that’s all cleaned up, I can hang the dash back in place and hopefully never have to take it off again.

Here’s a video containing most of the updates from last weekend, when the green truck was towed away, to yesterday afternoon, when I swapped out the hardtop for the soft top on the Scout.

I put the nutmeg snap top on the truck for now; it’s in the best shape of the three and will definitely seal up better than the others. Everything went on smoothly and I think I had the whole thing wrapped up in about two hours. When that was done I made some adjustments to the rearview mirror on the driver’s windshield frame. because of where it’s positioned, when I open the door beyond a certain distance it moves the mirror outwards, messing up the alignment. I was thinking I was going to move it upwards on the frame, but there isn’t enough room to go much higher than it already is. So I adjusted the bar further outwards and bent the mirror mount inwards, and that pushed the arm further outside the door’s arc.

The next thing I did was replace the gasket on the door of the IH fridge, which was sweating out the sides last summer. I sourced a new gasket from a freezer parts company and paid more for shipping than I did for the gasket. It went on pretty easily, and it seems to seal tightly, so I’m counting that as an easy win.

Finally, I did a bunch of finish sanding on the driver’s fender to the red truck, getting the curve of the fender lip to feather out into the flat section much better than I had before. I sanded it first with 320 and then with 600 grit before shooting it with some IH implement red out of a rattle can. I have to clean up some of the edges on the front before I go to wet sanding everything, but it’s getting closer to being done.

I put another solid day in on the green truck in an effort to get it parted out and moved along as soon as possible. The focus for this day was to get the rear tailgate down and prepped for removal, the seats pulled out, and the brake system drained and removed.

First things first, though: it was warm enough to get the pressure washer out and start hosing the whole thing down. Most of the dirt and lichen came off easily, and some more of the green paint gave way to the red underneath. I got a ladder out and cleaned as much of the dirt off the roof as possible—it’s making the fuzzy inside part of the car cover filthy.

With that done I put the battery back in the truck and lowered the window as much as I possibly could, and then tried the latch—which worked! The gate came down hesitantly. I think the hinges were full of rust and they didn’t want to budge. When that had come down I was able to use the impact hammer to loosen all but three of the bolts holding the inside cover on, and cut those off with the grinding wheel. With the panel open I could see how the door was assembled and mostly what I’d have to do to get it off—I think it’s going to be the hinges mounted underneath the rear deck, which means I have to get the bumper off to access them.

Next I wanted to get the heater box out of the cab, so I cut the bolts off the firewall and disconnected the hoses coming to the engine, which were dry as a bone. The box fell inwards into the cab, and I spent way too much time trying to get the rear cover off the box to disconnect the control linkage when I should have just started with an Allen wrench to pull the knobs off the dashboard. Eventually, I did this, and they all came out much easier than I figured they would. I labeled everything and hauled the box to the tailgate to look it over: it’s rough. I don’t know if I’ll be able to refurbish it, but I might give it a shot with Brian’s metal brake, maybe this winter.

After some lunch, I put a mask on and cut the cover off the front bench seat, vacuuming off years of dust and mouse poop, and made it so I could access the mounting bolts underneath. I don’t have an intact bench seat so I was surprised when the seat portion just popped up and off the frame. With that out of the way it was easy to pull the seat out and put it in the driveway.

After that was out, I got the IH-branded seatbelts off the floor. Two screwed right out but the other two (the ones mounted directly over the existing gas tank) required the grinding wheel. But they all came off in one piece, and now I’ve got slick IH seatbelts for the front bench.

Cleaning up after myself, I must have shoveled about five pounds of rust out of the cab. The cowl vent on the passenger side is so much worse than the one on the Red bus ever was. I don’t know if there would be enough there for me to repair, honestly.

I still had the power washer out in the driveway so I cleaned the bench seat frame and blew a bunch of mildew off the seat, then set them both out to dry.

Toward the end of the day I knew there was some rain coming, so I started the cycle of heat/penetrant on the pressure fittings going into the brake cylinder, eventually getting one to come off cleanly, one to give me a little bit of a fight before it let go, and twisting the third into a pretzel before it gave way. I loosened the bolts on the firewall and was about to find a way to drain both that and the clutch cylinder when it started to drizzle.

Sunday our Easter plans got changed at the last minute so I spent some time in the yard, clearing leaves out from under the porch and clearing out the greenhouse, which were both way overdue. I pulled the Scout out of the garage to access tools, and while I had it in the driveway I took some advice from Bennett and tightened up the bolt to the exhaust manifold on the passenger side, which had come very loose. And magically, my loud exhaust leak was gone!

I pulled the bench seat out into the sun of the driveway to dry off, and late in the day mounted it in the Red bus. For the first time since I bought this truck, I was sitting in the proper seat behind the wheel, and it felt really good! Things like that keep me motivated for sure.

I then spent some time in the garage moving things around to make room, taking some pictures of the Hollywood doors for Bennett, who said he’d be interested in them (which is great, as I need to make space for four Travelall doors shortly) and measuring the box I made for storing the spare rear glass. I’ve got to run to the Lowe’s for more plywood to build out proper crates, and then I’ll be ready to cut the glass out and store it carefully.

This evening I’m pretty wiped out—tired and sore. But I got a lot accomplished, and I’m getting closer to the finish line; the big question is where I’m going to store all this stuff.