Projects 1950 3100 Truck Project

Very cool pics! Enjoy while she's little. It's not just a cliche when they say they grow up too fast.

 

Thats a fact...this year went by way too fast. Thanks guys.
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Great pics and a great truck-Congrats on your build and your beautiful little girl!

 

wow! Great great build with even greater pictures of your daughter! Thanks for sharing and doing it right. Lots of good info on here! Cheers!

 

Finally going to get something down around here. Broke out the harness....cut all the tie straps and re bundled the wires how I wanted them. Ordered 20ft of 1/2" cloth/asphalt loom, 20ft of 3/8" 10ft of 1/4". Also ordered a roll of cloth electrical tape and a bix bog of heatshrink connectors. Cant wait to be able to start it with a key.

 

Sounds like you got a plan, good luck and keep us informed...Jim

 

Good deal, looking forward to the install.

 

Great progress buddy. Those pictures are classic, keep up the great work


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Thanks guys...

So Saturday was the day.....I had previously taken the harness and rebundled it, as I wanted to run wires differently than they had them.



I got that done and was ready to order supplies. I decided to use heat shrink butt connectors for everything. My soldering skills are so so and that is so much more time consuming, that I figured a good butt connection and heatshrink is better than a half ass solder job and will be much faster. I found this 3M kit on ebay for $75, then for another $15 I ordered a 75 piece set of extra butts in red, blue yellow. These things were .50 ea at NAPA!!

 

Then I ordered 1/4" 3/8" and 1/2" asphalt loom...and a roll of cloth electrical tape....



Once I got all my goodies, I decided to wrap them up to the point at which I knew for sure they wound need to be wrapped. In a perfect world you would install everything where you want it, cut it all to length, take it back out, THEN wrap it, then reinstall it, but NOOOO not me.. Fortunately it work out ok.

 

So I hauled it all outside and proceeded to get after it..



I started with under the hood latch panel. I installed the electric fan relay and drilled my pass throughs and installed grommets. Didnt get any pics of that but it looks nice. Then I had to decide on a mounting spot for the box. The wires stick out behind the block so it wont lay flat, so off to the hardware store to find something to make a bracket out of, here are the results..

 

I want as few wires as possible in the engine compartment, so I ran the rear tail light section through the old parking brake pedal hole and drilled a hole in the kick panel and added a grommet for the front section. I am going to use a heavy rubber mat and a firewall cover when all is said and done so it should all be covered.



I then ran all the rear wires along the frame, and all the front wires up along the inner fender and connected headlight, then through the inner fender and across the core support to the other inner fender and back in to the other headlight. The only wire coming into the engine compartment is for the temp sensor for the electric fan. All the wiring is covered in asphalt loom, and I used some long pieces of metal wire to help pull all the wires through the loom, it was a pain in the ass..

 

Finally settled on a air filter. Really wanted something old, but needed something ASAP, I like it, kinda generic but whatever. Will work till something better comes along.


So now just need to secure all the lines and reinstall the switches and its all good. A lot of work but if it were not for a couple little fumbles it would have been perfect. I still need gauges and figure all that out, but that's for another weekend. Looking to convert the orig gauges to electric senders to clean it up a little more...

 

So two questions....the park lights go off when the headlights go on. Can I add a jumper between the park and tail to keep them on?

Also, for some reason when I turn the right blinker on, both front blinkers flash. The rears work perfect. Brake lights work perfect, but that is the only gremlin. Oh, I am going to add a couple more body to frame ground straps and see what happens first, might fix it....

 

Definitely check all the current grounds you have and make sure they are clean clean clean and connected well. Those turn signals can be nothing but problematic if they aren't

 

Yeah I figured out why my blinkers were acting up. The two terminals inside the socket of the right blinker were touching. When the right blinker was turned on it sent power to the left parking light. Once I separated the terminals everything is OK. Though after a few minutes, I couldnt get anything to work. I check this that and the other and then realized my battery was dead...... I bought the battery over a year ago and it has apparently held a charge through 3 test drives, numerous show off start ups and sitting for that time and I never had an alternator hooked to it, never even crossed my mind that I might need to charge it up, haha. Did that last night and installed a ground strap to the cab. Will mess with it more this weekend.

Also came up with a cool way to secure my wires along the inside of the firewall without any screws or adhesive, pics to come...

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Looking great! I love the pic of the truck with you and your little gal. Print that and frame it!

 

More or less done with wiring. Ran out of cloth tape and loom so i ordered more but got all my lights working, amazing what a few ground cables can do. My push button starter works like a champ, very cool. Actually took it out on the highway and got it up to 70 and it was smooth as glass. Then my hat blew off and out the back window. Man there is a lot of wind without a windshield.

Also ordered shoulder belts for it. Next up is glass install then exhaust. Should be done with that by next weekend.

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Did you figure out how to get your parking lights to stay on with the headlights? Want to do the same to mine.....

 

Nice! I bet you're stoked. I Can't wait to get mine to the point I can drive it, even for a second! What did you use for the starter push button?

 

Thanks man, it was just about the coolest thing I have ever done auto wise. I have driven some bad ass cars, but there is nothing better than driving one you built yourself....As far as the pushbutton I think I got it from speedway, it was labled as a 34 pushbutton starter if I remember right. I drilled out my throttle cable hole and mounted it there, directly above the orig style ignition switch. Looks really cool....need to post up some pics.

Yes, I added a jumper wire between park and tail points. BTW, I used a speedway hi low switch, it has a fourth pull position for highs, so I dont have to use a dimmer switch..

I had mentioned I am running my wires along the inside of the firewall, but couldnt find a way to secure them in place. I tried those sticky squares that have slots for tie straps, but while sitting in the sun they fell off. Then I had an idea. I got some small neodymium magnets, threw a wrap of tape around them over the harness and they are stuck like chuck. Going to put them in various spots to keep the wires neat.

 

I don't know what neodymium magnets are, but I get the idea. That is awesome! Probably looks like the wires are just kinda sitting there...

 

From websters online dictionary:

Neodymium magnets - Small REALLY F'n STRONG MAGNETS....

Seriously though they are the strongest magnet available and are used in all kinds of stuff like hard drives, power tools, etc. You can get them all over ebay, I think even Lowes/Homedepot has them...

I laid one on the fender and could not get it off. They have a little square hole in the middle and I had to get a screw driver and pry it up on one end to get it off. I bet I could have picked up the truck by the fender if I pulled straight up....

 

Few more from the photoshoot with the baby and the truck..

 

Don't want to impose on this great post. For those of you struggling to find a rear bumper. We used a front bumper on the back along with a front valance pan. Looks great. I will post pics when I can. Looks almost continental kittish.

 

I'm sure it wont be any problem, where they are placed, but just an FYI regarding neodymium magnets and heat:

Neodymium magnets are sensitive to heat. If a magnet heated above its maximum operating temperature (176°F (80°C) for standard N grades) the magnet will permanently lose a fraction of its magnetic strength. If they are heated above their Curie temperature (590°F (310°C) for standard N grades), they will lose all of their magnetic properties. Different grades of neodymium different maximum operating and Curie temperatures.

I don't think you'll ever get them above 590*, but if you notice they start not holding well, try replacing them with new ones!

 

Wow..did not know that..thanks.

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Got some indicator lights...old-school..

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Made some progress, then created a whole lot more work for myself. Decided to forgo trying to convert orignal gauges to electric and bought some off of ebay. I think they look awesome and install so far was a snap.



Senders installed. Havent decided how I am going to hide the wires just yet...


Then things went downhill.. I got the gauges in and called the wife out to check it out and then fired it up ANDDDD the gauges were all over the place. I was bummed...I figured I did something wrong or they were bad. Later that night I remembered I hadnt grounded them...haha. Hope thats all it was...

So the next night I decided to mount all my indicator lights and call the dash done. I mounted the orange fog light indicator in the empty hole next to the right gauge, and then drilled out for the blue high beam right between the gauges. I hemmed and hawwed for 30 minutes on where to put the turn signal lights and realized I had a limited number of spots based on bracing and switches etc on the back of the dash. I obviously wanted them to be symetrical. The only place I could put them was right above the highbeams on either side.

My bright idea was to pick a spot for the left one, mount it, then try and get other other side in the right spot...royally f'd it up...11/16" hole in the wrong spot all due to my impatience.......

Came up with a good idea. First of all made a hole template with some graph paper, then used the graph to make a cool plate which I am cutting out of stainless plate, will mount all the lights in that then mount to the dash over my screw up.. Pics this weekend of the finished product.

 

Looking great, man. Can't wait to see your fix for the dash.