AM General FJ-8A

I took the wheels over after work and had some new Goodyear rubber put on. She's back on all four feet! Also painted the dash panel and the engine compartment side of the core support and the side panels. I should be primering the other side of these tomorrow.
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I primered my front clip pieces, my rear quarter pieces, and the roof today. Actually I'm in between roof coats now. Has anybody done any big truck painting that can give me some guidance on this? The roof is huge and the only thing I know to do is stand on an 8' ladder and lean over. I can reach about halfway and my shoulder is killing me by the time I got one coat on this.I can wetsand out the stripes in the primer but I'm trying to figure out how in the heck I'm going to make this roof look decent. There's just no way I can see to get a nice continuous pass. I'm just going with single stage white so I'm not trying to do a show quality job but I dont want it to look terrible, either. any advice from some real painters????

 

Hmm?? You could chop the hell out of the roof,
channel and 'Z' the frame, section the body and
slam the suspension into the weeds....and it'd
still be tall!

It could be really popular and make you a lot
of money at the track though! Maybe not in
actual competition. I'm thinking more like in
the concession area!!!

Mart3406
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Yea, it's a big freakin box, that's for sure! That's a pretty good idea about track concessions; Ill have to think about that.

 

You COULD chop and section it to this extreme...nah! The wind-up key would be a conversation starter, wouldn't it?

This IS the smallest street-legal truck in the world, BTW.

 

Man, that's pretty cool! I thought my old Ford Aspire was little!

 

Man, it's been a long week. I started a new job and didn't have a day shorter than 11 hours yet. I can see my idea about having the ISCREAM finished this spring are looking way too optomistic, but I'll stay at it the best I can until it's done. I spent a few hours this week and today wet sanding with 400. I'm about halfway around it not counting the roof so it's got a ways to go. I'll hit it again with 600 when I'm done, although with white paint I dont think I have to be as picky as when we painted my son's Firebird black. I'm sure it'll be a good 3 or 4 weeks before I'm done and ready to think about painting the body. Then I still have to go back and do the hood and doors. It is what it is; I got to make a living first. Here's the dash; that was about the only thing worth taking pictures of today. <!-- attachments -->

 

I got a few hours in yesterday so I decided it was time to try my new paint gun. I wanted to get some color on the interior so I can start putting some things back together inside soon. I just did the areas that will show after the interior panels are put back in. I've got the whole thing wet sanded for the first round; one more time around and we'll call it good. Then I'm going to go for painting the roof first. In two weeks my wife will be gone for the weekend plus I've got that Monday off so I'm hoping to get to the point where I can shoot the roof by then.

 

I love the name that you gave her!

 

Thanks; actually a guy on another site came up with that. I think its pretty cool, too.
I took a pint of POR 15 and painted the floor tonight; that stuff really goes a long way. I even had a little left over.
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I can appreciate all the hard work that has gone into this thing but I have to ask, with all due respect, what does this van have to do with pre-65 traditional hot rods and customs?

C'mon guys...

 

Nothing, really. I started posting it because it was pretty unusual and I thought the "Vintage Step Van" thread on here was really cool. Also I thought it might interest someone as a shop truck idea for their rod shop. But I certainly dont want to offend anyone; if the general consesus is that I should stop posting on it, I will. Ive got a thread going on my 48 Plymouth build, too.

 

Don't forget this one , krooser:

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?p=5084115#post5084115

Or maybe it needs a few more pages, before you don't approve of it?

C'mon, Brother............
.Folks are looking at it, and approving of his hard work,( as you say), and some parental unit bonding...
Don't look, if ya' don't like.

Not bitching, just voicing, like you.

Later.

 

Doesn't hurt to ask, but seems like a lot of interest is being shown. Might not be 100% on topic (pre 65 rid), but it's definitely in the "different" category! Unless a lot of people complain I'd keep posting. If you don't like it don't follow -- easy enough!

 

Keep posting, wtf! Hell, we have car haulers, trailers, vans, wagons, limos, hearses...so why not this van??? It's a build. It's probably more work than a substantial number of folks here have accomplished - ever! So, keep updating this build! It's informative, and educational, regardless if you are building a AV8 or a pickup!

 

Thanks for the support, guys. I really wasn't even thinking about the year being out of the accepted range when I first posted it. I just figured somebody would like the idea as a weird little shop truck. BTW, it'll be for sale when it's done so if anyone would want to slap their shop logo on the side and have a really bizzare parts runner, this may be the one for you.

 

Wasn't it the same style all the way back before '65? If so, its grandfathered!!

Still, way cool. Keep at it.

 

I gotta say it's not a project vehicle I would have chosen but I do admire your ability to jump on a project and "get 'er done" and keep up an awesome build thread at the same time. An impressive bit of work going on here. I'm just waiting for you to decide that what you really want to do is turn it into a gasser.

 

Probably paint it white and put Free Candy on the side with electrical tape. So it can be easily removed.

 

Dont tempt me; it's already got a straight axle.

 

I started painting and got the roof and one side finished. It came out OK; I'm still not a very good painter but buying a nice gun definately helped. I didnt realize how bad I was fighting my old cheap gun intil I used a decent one. It's really hard to see where your last pass was when you're doing the second coat on a white paintjob. I ended up with a couple of dry streaks on the side; is there any way to fix these without repainting the whole side? I also did all the pieces for the dighouse and the side braces; they all came out acceptable. Hopefully I'll get the other side tomorrow and the front on Monday. Then it's time to take a paint break and start putting this thing back together.

 

I went out this morning to look how the first side dried and I was not happy. One bad run and more orange peel that a Sunkist. After I dropped three bills on a new gun, too. Of course it had to be a problem with the gun. So I got the box the gun came in to see how to send this piece of crap back and found an interesting piece of paper in the bottom of the box. It said "READ DIRECTIONS THOROUGHLY BEFORE USING." I figured it must be suggestions only, because why would I need to read directions when I know everything? Let's see, air pressure at gun handle-wrong. Fan adjustment-wrong. Fine air adjustment-wrong. OK, I thought. I'll TRY and adjust it like they say and see what happens but I'm sure it wont be any better. You can guess what happened next. After also putting up a large halogen shop light so I could see properly, the other side came out about 10 times better than the first. Who would have thought? Tomorrow I'll do the front and think about what to do with the first side. Not sure if I need to completely do it over or if I can wet sand it out with some 1500. Any suggestions are more that welcome.

 

"If all else fails, read the directions!" I wish I knew who was the first to say that, I'd sure give him credit! I sometimes have the same problem...

I gotta tell ya though, large flat panels are the HARDEST to spray! I'm not pro painter wither, but I've had them tell me the same, and on the couple cars I've painted those seem to be the hardest. Part of the problem is keeping really a really steady and straight pass with the gun over the length of the panel.

 

You're not kidding, Frank. Lose your concentration for a second and your screwed. I'm glad it's almost done. After looking at that big run near the back i decided to just do that side over. I sanded it down using some wet 600 and shot it again when I did the front. I'm glad I did; it came out much better. I still have the doors, hood, and roll up door to paint but I'm taking a breal from the bodywork for a while. I'm going to work on getting it put back together and moving under it's own power. Here's where I started and what she looks like now; it's come a long way. <!-- / message --><!-- attachments -->

 

Here's a few shots from tonight; my wife is finishing her degree online so it's giving me some time to work while she's busy with her classes. I set the motor in place; right now it's just sitting on the mounts with a floorjack under the trans so it looks a little crooked. Hopefully I'll have it bolted down tight this weekend. I put a B&M Holeshot converter in it while I had the trans out. That should make for some good smoky burnout action.

 

I started putting some of the side panels back on; I used some allen head stainless screws and they really make a difference in the looks. Also had to pull the motor back out; the header was hitting the frame on the passenger....ummm...drivers side so some more notching on the frame is in order.
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Man i had forgotten about this thread, Looking good.

 

I love the concept of a some kid in a Honda with a fart tip on it and a hundred stickers pulling up beside a big white delivery van and getting his ass handed to him

 

Now that's a picture in my head that I wont soon forget! Hopefully I'll get to do that.

 

Making this big block fit has been tougher than I thought; you'd think with the size of this beast anything would fit with no problems but the framerails were a little narrow. I had to notch and re-box the rails on both sides plus cut off some header tubes and reweld them on at different angles. It's finally in there with just a few inches on each side to spare. I also put a little more together inside while I was waiting for the header coating to dry. I tried some stuff from Speedway; hope it works good. It's supposed to cure with the exhaust heat.