What OT crap are you working on

Another step forward. Waiting for the insurance agency to call back so I can get the historic vehicle plates underway.

 

Whitewall wheel?

 

Yep

 

Vega almost ready

 

Helped my oldest son get his car back on the road this evening. It’s only been since August 2024 since it has been broke down in the shop.

 

It has been a few months since I've really been on the HAMB. But it's not because I haven't been doing any car things I've just been unsocial during car stuff so this is my current toilet I mean project I mean pick up.
I paid $500 for it a few months ago and I have been cranking on it about three or four hours a day for weeks now It's still got a long ways to go I've never had a vehicle that has been more jury-rigged in this pickup. Somehow it had the wrong vehicles tail light lens screwed into it and instead of unplugging the wires to the tail light they cut them ironically about a foot and a half away from where the plug was under the bed.
Anyways it is a 318 truck, 727 automatic and it's a 1975 d200 (I live in California 1975 is pre smog It was definitely the selling point When I decided to take this project on.
It technically runs and moves apparently it has a 1969 industrial 318 in it The water pump and the fan ***embly sit a mile high and the radiator was lifted three or four inches so the fan is kind of in the fins, The water pump outlet is on the wrong side and they used pieces of hoses and pipe to make everything work It's very hokey. Once I realized this I bought what was left of a parts truck and I got some doors another 318 (That should donate It's front engine parts to make this one correct) and it gave me the coolant reservoir and a few other odds and ends for 250 bucks all the parts were definitely a deal.
Going to the inside of the truck it too is jerry-rigged (Is it jury or jerry? I have Heard it both ways) The gauge cluster I don't think anything worked on it other than the amp meter I now have almost everything working The speedometer cable is coming in the mail I don't know why the speedometer cable is broken but it is. I also cut a hole and put a tach into the dash And because at some point in the truck's life somebody cut the radio out and put in a really terrible early '90s dual knob I decided I might as well recut the hole a third time and try to make a clean install of a modern radio It seemed cheaper than trying to find a stock radio so that is now done. I have also started painting the inside of the truck originally the truck was a pale yellow with light tan interior somebody had painted the outside of it white I will be honest I kind of like the white once I removed all the smashed trim I think the white looks pretty sharp and I'm going to take it to the next level I'm going to make it look like spirit of America 1976 as a tribute to our semiquincentennial birthday. So I filled 117 holes across the bed rails, The doors, and where the trim used to be...
Not hard work but man what a boring job (zap, zep, zap, zap,.... Times a million times).
Since this photo was taken I also managed to find a decent tailgate out of the junkyard and a pretty good condition tin grille, I will try to get pictures of all this stuff in the next few weeks there isn't a lot of photographic work to really show off right now other than I took that ugly gray camper show off that you see in these pictures and I got 200 bucks for it and I managed to find a set of 16-in Chrysler 8 lug steel wheels to replace the mismatched wheels on the truck, I have two Ford truck wheels, 1 Ford Van wheel and 16-in Dodge wheel and the spare underneath was an original 16.5... I sold the two pickup truck wheels and made the proper Chrysler wheels free plus I now have a matching 16-in spare... The only real win on this truck is the last owner bought brand new load range e Firestone all-terrains which is awesome because I want to use this as a truck... Since this photo was taken I also came across a set of Dodge hubcaps at the Long Beach high performance swap meet and they are now installed and repainted and everything is coming along nicely.
This has been a pretty fun project if I'm being honest it's just old enough that it's easy to work on and it's just new enough that the parts are pretty easy to find... I didn't really want to take this project on but a drunk driver took out my last pickup That was last August and although I now have that truck where it is yard driveable it's still a long ways from being on the road and I don't know if I really want to fix it because life is too short to drive it boring vehicles after I post this I will also post a picture of my inspiration and the picture of my 2005 that is now probably better off as a engine donor although I'm not really into late model hemis.

 

This is about the only photos I have so far of the work I've been doing it isn't much, I will do better I know all of us use this site like a car magazine and I am totally failing. The adverti*****t is for a Dodge truck and I'm not going to clone it but I'm going to get real close to it, I bought some store stencil decals But I wasn't sure if they are the right size but I think I got it down pat I was just messing around and I did this in about 15 minutes a few weeks ago... Also this is the blue 2005 that was my car hauler for years being a half ton it was a little under sized weight-wise in my opinion but I sure liked having air conditioning in a heater that actually worked but it's effed up And the guy didn't have enough money to replace it (and the 1958 trailer that he wiped out) so I have the truck and a lousy $5,000 check. I would imagine I can fix it I'm learning that I can fix anything as I get older. I already got it steering straight but that's another story for another day...
Anyways here is the inspiration photo, me goofing around with the gas cap and screwing around to make the paint look correct Oh and a picture of the door fully repainted on the inside The door looks so ***y now. Not bad for a dupliColor vinyl spray painted door panel and some fresh white rustoleum (I am painting the truck with a gallon of Rust-Oleum and the inside is probably a spray bomb because it's easy to match lol) The goal is $3,000 for 100% everything to make this my daily driver I'm in it 1800 and some change right now I still got to upholster the seat and my weather stripping and carpet and a ton and I mean a ton of body work...
Oh I'm going to include one more photo inside the pickup bed This is most of the parts I bought for $250 that I mentioned in the other post.

 

I am glad I am not the only one that calls a 2001 a new car lol

Did you figure it out?

 

This has the richer at around 5 inches from the floor

 

Whelp, the elephant is gittin ett. Ugly as homemade sin but it’s solid, hopefully I learned a few things so the other side goes quicker it has to right,….right? Yah right

 

Im in supervisory mode at the shop

 

It looks good and as you said solid plus you're never going to see it. When I was younger I used to beat myself up because my patch panels didn't ever come out looking like the factory did it Now that I am older I actually really like well done repair panels that are homemade It shows a lot of time and effort went into keeping the vehicle on the road.

 

I am trying to spend three to four hours a day on this 1975 Dodge pickup I don't know if I'm going to achieve it but that is the goal. I love working on my stuff but I am tired of the perpetual projects and having six or eight dead cars It's time to get stuff finished but I digress. I pretty much took the last week off because it was over 100° here in Southern California which is pretty rare And it was kind of windy so I couldn't put up an easy up I was just roasting in the sun on the side of the house and I wasn't feeling it, in the month of March last time a heatwave like this happened was in 1914 I wasn't around back then.
Anyways Tomorrow I'm not positive yet but I think I'm going to remove the messed up hood and then "restore" the hood hinges by cleaning them up and spray painting them gloss black. I think I am also going to flip the hood over you see in the photos and do the top of the hood with an actual spray gun using white rustoleum (I finished all the bodywork today and I sprayed the bottom of the hood I forgot to take a picture of all my hard work on the top of the hood before I put a light coat of primer on it But I probably got 12 or 13 hours pulling the ding out of it using filler and using the air inline sander over and over and then going over it with 180 grit on the DA electric sander (that cheap sander is in the picture). That hood before I started on it waved more than the crowd at a baseball game during the 7th inning stretch. Somebody had sandblasted it and then left it in the rain so it had surface rust all over it, I sanded the whole hood and anywhere I couldn't sand a used a wire wheel. I bought one of those harbor freight unispot type welders where they weld the little tab that you pull with a slide hammer and it works pretty good for 90-ish bucks So far I would say it is a recommended buy... Definitely better than filling a ding with filler/Bondo.
I want to be clear the hood definitely has filler but it's pretty thin I just don't want anybody to think I am a whiz bangg at body work. Lastly tomorrow I think I am going to pull the cowl vent and figure out why the wipers aren't working and maybe get them up and running and probably vacuum all of the leaves and dirt out That is probably rusting the truck out from being in there for 50 years. Oh and maybe I will sand the cowl vent and paint it too... The Plus side of using non-metallic cheap paint is I can do this section by section and it will look pretty good and if I'm not happy at the end I can real quickly spray one light even coat over the whole mess to make it uniform but I think it'll be fine.
Anyways to future readers I am using rustoleum professional series paint in the 1 gallon can along with some krylon hardener That came with a cabinet full of chemicals I bid on at an auction a year or two ago I have no idea if it works or not but I figure it can't hurt it, I will say the paint sprayed on exceptionally well and laid out really flat with little to no orange peel texture I am thinking the catalyst hardener helped that I'm not sure normally there is some orange peel. I took this picture it was almost dark outside so I could be mistaken It might be pretty rough I will see it tomorrow and it's good enough it's only going to be seen when the hood is open. I don't want to mess up my expensive spray gun so I am using a HVLP gravity feed harbor freight spray gun They used to be green the one I bought a few months ago was purple It's like a $30 spray gun it works great for spraying oil-based enamel paints and primers. I am thinning the paint with literal paint thinner In fact you can see it in my photo (normally I use acetone but I have a lot of old paint thinner I'm trying to use up)...
I wasn't kidding in a previous post this was going to be a budget build, a gallon of paint is new but all the other chemicals I bought at estate sales So I probably paid a dollar or maybe $2 for the gallon of paint thinner... Side note here in California because of our emissions BS we now have a different alkaloid enamel paint formula then I think the rest of the country has, It smells a lot like liquid toilet bowl cleaner, It definitely doesn't smell like the rustoleum the way I remember it. It seems to spray the same and thin the same but it cost about three times more than it used to and that smell is really weird. Anyways here is the bottom of the hood painted, and the top of the hood using one can of white primer. Once the paint is dry I will paint the top of the hood. More to come hopefully real soon.

 

So you are in Riverside, I'm about 30 miles west of you. Hot you say ? It was boiling the paint of my truck. Spent the THIRD TIME putting back the brake ***ebly on the right rear of a 1965 F100. Drive it 1 mile, step on the brakes and the entire ***embly of parts just pops off the backing plate and locks up the wheel. Three times in a row. We are giving up. Figure the backing plate must be warped and wore out on the mounts.