Sunday, February 8, 2004  -  Well I got started about mid-morning getting the rest of the frame stripped down, and got it mostly cleaned up in preparation for it's trip to get powder-coated. As mentioned in my last update, I got the engine and transmission pulled yesterday, so today's task was to remove the box, front and rear suspensions, brake lines, rear wiring harness and the multitude of clips and miscellaneous brackets.

I started out with the box. The only part of the truck's wiring harness that still remained was the section for the rear taillights. I snaked the harness all the way to the back and left it hanging from the rear of the bed. I've heard many horror stories about how hard the bed bolts were to remove. In many instances, the carriage bolts holding the bed would be rusted badly enough that they had to be cut out. I was extremely fortunate, though...the back half of the truck still had a liberal layer of undercoating which protected the bolt threads, so all eight bolts holding the box came right apart. Well, I DID have one snap off completely, but the others came off like they were just installed. I laid a small section of carpeting down on the shop floor, and then lifted the front of the box and very carefully worked it down off the back of the truck and down onto the carpeting. It's now sitting on end, where it will stay for a little while, while I'm scraping off the remainder of the undercoating. NOTE: in the future, make sure you unhook ALL the wires from the clips holding it to the frame. I forgot to unhook one clip, and snapped a couple wires while lifting the box up on end. Oh well...it'll be an easy fix.

At first I tried to very carefully remove the brake lines...but the years of rust and wear had taken their toll on the connections. I could NOT break any of the fitting loose and ended up rounding off the connectors. I finally just snipped the lines as close to the fittings as I could get, figuring I'd just add another connector and reflare the ends. However, upon further investigation, I found a small hole in the rear steel line, just as it goes into the rear flexible hose. So...it looks like all new steel brake lines are going to be installed. I decided to not take any chances with the remainder of these 37-year-old lines.

Next on the list was the front suspension. I removed the entire assembly as a single unit, since it was a lot easier this way...and the entire front suspension will be replaced anyway, from a newer-model pickup with disc brakes. I had a heck of a time removing the cotter pins from the radius arms. They were rusted enough that when I tried to remove them they broke off. I was able to get one to break off flush with the threads which allowed me to simply spin the nut off, but on the other, I had to take the cutoff tool and cut into the nut parallel to the threads, essentially cutting the cotter pin off flush, which then allowed me to spin the nut off.

I then spent several hours removing all the various clips, small brackets, etc. I'm putting everything in it's own ZipLoc bag and marking it as to it's contents, so I won't have to try to remember all these details several months down the road. I'm also taking lots of pictures, just to be safe. Once the clips and brackets were removed I spent some time with a scraper, a wire wheel and a sander, cleaning the frame up. When this frame goes in to be powdercoated it will run through an industrial-strength sandblaster, but the cleaner the frame is when it goes there, the better it's gonna look afterwards. I still have a few hours worth of work to do on the frame cleanup, and then it'll be ready to ship off. In the meantime, I'll be getting started ordering replacement clips, clamps and suspension bushings and picking up some steel brake line and fittings.

I'm hoping to have the front suspension from the donor pickup in the shop by the time the frame gets shipped off, so some of it's components can be sent along to be coated at the same time. Once this suspension is put together, I don't want to have to pull it back apart down the road to do any more detailing...so while it's apart now, this is the time to do it. Stay tuned!

Fig. 1 - Here's a shot taken immediately after removing the box.

Fig. 2 - When removing the brake lines I found this hole in a steel line by the rearend. Therefore, all lines will be replaced, just to be safe.

Fig. 3 - I dropped the whole front suspension as a single piece, since it was a lot faster this way.

Fig. 4 - Here's a shot of the two sets of engine perch holes. Which holes were used is dependent on what engine you're using.

Fig. 5 - I decided to make the middle crossmember removable, by cutting the rivets holding it to the radius arm brackets and replacing them with bolts and nuts. This shot shows one rivet removed.

Fig. 6 - A shot of the bottom side of the radius arm bracket holding the middle crossmember.