Foiled again

Remember Dick Dasterdly?   From the Wacky Racers.  He was the one that was always trying to kidnap Penelope Pitstop.   

Why yes, I am talking about a cartoon.

His tag line was always “Drats! Foiled again” each time he would fail at kidnapping Penelope.  Because of course he would always fail, because he was a bad guy and good guys always win. 

I know, your asking yourself,  “Self, is there a point to this?”

Well Self, there is, but we will get to that later

I know everyone is just at the edge of their seats wondering where we are on the truck re-build.

Since we last left our faithful Heroes….

The engine and Transmission have been pulled

And the front suspension has been torn down.

Found many issues in the front suspension,

Mainly the fact that this truck is almost 50 years old and has had many hands in it over the years.

But also the fact that somewhere along the line someone installed the wrong ball joints in the upper control arms, and in the process actually cut up the arms to make them fit.

No bueno,  so thats a couple more parts I didn’t originally plan on buying.

For the lower control arms, the ball joints will not release from the spindle.  I have done everything I could to get them to separate, and honestly I am convinced they are the wrong ones also, which is why they wont come loose. 

So there’s 2 more parts to throw at it.

Fine, ordered more parts

Take new uppers, install parts in them, go on the truck, all good.

Lowers, go to install the ball joints in the lowers, using a screw type ball joint press and no go.  It will not press in

Of course these are brand new ball joints and brand new control arms so all the tolerances are tight.

So added to the collection now is a 20 ton press from good old horror freight.

Using said 20 ton press, the ball joints went in with some difficulty, but that was more about having enough hands to hold everything and press and etc.  (thanks to the LOML, all went well)

So parts go on the truck, all is looking good, have springs in, new spindles, ready to go and…….

Wait for it

You know its coming because the title of this is foiled again,  and I haven’t talked about that yet,

So you just know the next statement is going to be about how something doesn’t work

I mean, the very next statement

the one right after this one...

Well, yes, something doesn’t work.

You see the old lower control arms have a relief stamped into them so the bolt and go in for the lower shock mount.   These units, do not.

Drats – foiled again

So now it will be removing the lower control arms, modifying them to work (not un common with re pop parts) and then putting it all back together.

No big deal, just takes time.

Yeah, time, something I seem to have very little of

Well, actually. I guess that depends on how you classify it.

You see my time jar is full for things like sitting in a airport, in a airplane, driving a rental car and sleeping in hotels.

I guess the time jar that is empty is the one for the things I want to do.

But then again, I guess that’s the point right, we have to do the things we are supposed to do, so that we can do the things we want to do.

Ever the challenge to balance things in your life

Cherry Pie

DD