Last weekend I bought a gas pump at the Portland raceway swap meet. It was only 100 dollars and I didn’t nickel him down since I needed his help loading it (heavy). It is a1959 Wayne duo 420. this is after I spent several hours pushing the stainless sides and cleaning up the porcelain face plates and chrome surrounds. It came with two hoses and handles, so I polished them as well And I added some cheap LED lights I sourced on Amazon. They are the correct bright white that I think looks right for the pump I wired it with a vintage looking cloth extension cord I had lying around. And I made a provision for a 13.5”globe on top. today I picked up the tins from my sand blaster and pounded some dents out. Had to be careful as these are going to powder coat so no body filler. The sides will be black faces and red sides divided by a SS molding The lid is nice and will be Red the base will be red. I welded in bolts today to make it easier to re***emble. I ordered sone Texaco Ethyl stickers and the matching globe. Fun project. More to come
The most recent sticker I found on it was dated 1979, the gas price is set at 1.18 per gallon. I graduated HS in 1979, I pumped gas on 82nd in Portland for date/gas money (petroleum transfer engineer). I may have used this very pump, though I doubt it. I did find a nasty looking but quite dead scorpion inside, not indigenous to the PNW. Though I would love to pay $1.18 for fuel today, I sure wouldn't want the $1.50 per hour I made back then. In retrospect, we have it pretty good at the pump these days though I could use an oil check and a windscreen wash. I do recall staring down a lot of lady's blouses cleaning those bugs off. Some of them were quite stubborn. Ah the Winds of Change.
Being a pump jockey was an even better gig in the mini skirt era!!! And you're right.... bugs were sooo much tougher back then!
They required extra attention, I didn’t take any. I’ll see if my buddy did. I’ll keep posting the progress. I dropped the tins off this morning for powder coating. I thought it was. Most people want the older tall pumps but this one is in my era.
I found these stickers on Amazon for cheap! As advertised they were 6x7”. They showed up today I had already fabricated some aluminum plates to stick them to I matched the holes already drilled in the sides of the pump And that project is done. One handle has br*** fittings and an older handle which I polished the **** out of. The other has chrome fittings on the hose and the handle was covered in plastic. A newer replacement part. I removed the top plastic from the Sun dried handle (the lower piece is integral and will require fabbing new aluminum pieces, if I get bored…) and sanded and polished the handle, smoothing the edges to make it appear more time worn. The hoses were looooong, my wife liked them but I felt threatened. I chopped out a 5 foot chunk from each side. I cut the hoses at the fitting that secures to the pump, not the handle. I cut it flush and searched my shop for a piece of pipe and sure enough I found a Jack handle in a drawer for a bottle lack I don’t own any longer. I cut off a couple 4” chunks and used RTV to glue it into the fittings. After drying over night I installed that end in the pump and used the RTV to secure the shortened hoses to the fittings. This ensured they would lay nice and not be in a bind or stick out wired. A heater hose clamp secured them while they dried. The result is what appears to be a factory hose build. Only your hairdresser knows for sure.
Billy, you spend your time well. Many people might have been happy with that pump "as found". You made a "10" from a "5" in my opinion.
Thanks! Once the tins are back from powder coat, the pump should really start to take shape. There were a lot oof dents, some I could see and some were hidden by the 20 layers of house paint. The crease was about 10" long and that took some work to remove. I am anxious to see how my fillerless body work turns out.
Very cool!... I was a gas jockey in the mid '70s working at a Texaco station... Wild times for sure...
I was working as a petroleum transfer engineer in the 70's as well. One of the best times of my life, I just didn't know it yet.
Powder coater called and said the tins were ready. I ran out before golf and the black fronts were a funky green when we carried out to my truck. He is re shooting those. The base and lid were good to go so I had some fun this morning. I had welded studs in place and that made bolting the base together quite easy. I picked it up with my cherry picker and sat it down on the base. Easy peasy. Installed the light kit and globe. and one night shot The black faces will get a matching ethyl sticker on both sides. And yes, the light base is polished.
With me it was the Sinclair station on Circle Drive here in the Springs in 1982 while I was a senior. We still pumped the gas and checked the oil and cleaned the windshield. They called it mini service instead of full service. One of the guys that worked nights would roll the price back on a pump to .25 cents a gallon and fill his car before he sticked the tanks, then roll the price back up to normal. This was all done manually at each individual pump. As far as I know he never got caught.
Funny you mentioned that, Mrs BB was against seing in outside our home, thought it was nicer in my garage. Now she wants to move my Wurlitzer and stick it in the house in my bar! My powder coat guy had to reshoot the face panels as they turned out a funky black that in the sun was actually green. I just picked them up this morning and they look nice. Just have to figure out how to put the decals on without messing them up.
So, funny story. I got back from Mr Powder Coat and laid the panels on by pool table after putting down a couple of towels to protect the felt. I had the panels 2 toned. Any way I was starting to fuss with the decals when my wife returned from her walk. We started positioning the first one and I had to send her to the shower. I mean damn Geena! She came back smelling of tea tree and we got back to the stickers, the smell returned with a vengeance! I’m talking bad, bad BO stink. She said “that’s you” and I proceeded to take off my shirt thinking it had “turned”. Resumed work and the smell resumed as well. I’m down to my skivvies and one shoe when we realized it was the damn decals. They reeked!!! We gagged through the process and wrapped up the project with a finished gas pump and a fun story to tell. The original panels had SS strips up the sides, I only had 3 and they were beat to **** so I used 3M stick on vinyl trim. Yeah, I took the easy route. I chose black on the front because the decals had a red surround and there is no way that would match. If the stickers had a black stripe I would have reversed the colors. pump the jam!
The pump turned out gorgeous, and yeah sometimes the decals/vinyl can stink like crazy! When I first retired I started a sign business and some of the vinyl reaked so bad that it would give me a headache. Needless to say it didn’t take long before I sold it to a friend and found another hobby
I imagine it is bio recycled elements that cause the very biological smelling odor coming from those decals. We are still giggling about it.
Those hoses have compression fittings just like our beloved braided stainless steel an fittings. Fixed a few of them when at my buddies Phillips 66 staton and my uncles Standard Oil station.
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