62 Crew Cab 4x4 restoration project

Scooter, that info is not quite correct. The water based paint is only available in the smog areas of CA, rural paint shops still sell the good stuff. Bought some dupont centuri acrlic enamel a month ago.
 
scooter, that info is not quite correct. The water based paint is only available in the smog areas of CA, rural paint shops still sell the good stuff. Bought some dupont centuri acrlic enamel a month ago.

I stand corrected. Thank you. It actually been a couple years since I have actually looked into it. I friend of mine works at a powder coating company, who helped me paint my 74 Scout, mentioned back then that it's starting to get harder to get the better quality automotive paint. Even in my area, they are starting to crack down on it like smog heaven la area.
 
Hi,

the drama of the build continues...
It will be nice when I can say the build without the drama continues.

My truck has been at the paint shop the past couple weeks. I'm just having it painted an off-white color. I pass by it every night as it's on my way home from work. Even though it's behind a locked gate, it's easy to see as it sticks up above all the other little sports cars and imports there to be painted.
Tonight, on my way home, it appears it was completed. Yea! I'm sure I'll be getting a call from them tomorrow.

However, it appears to be painted a piss yellow color, and not the off-white like I wanted. :confused:
I'll be able to tell better tomorrow in the daylight. I hope it was just the street lights giving it that shade of yellow, but I don't think so. It was supposed to be wimbledon white, but it looks more piss yellow than off-white to me. If it's yellow, now what do I do? I can't afford to have it painted another coat of paint. And I'm sure they will not repaint a complete truck like this for free, even if it was their mistake. Perhaps it was my mistake, but their little paint chip inside their office sure did not look yellow. It's going to be a very sleepless night tonight.

Learn from my mistakes - that's the main reason why I type all this build info - if/when you take your vehicle in to be painted, don't assume it will look like their sample. Even if it's a professional paint shop, have them do just one fender, then call you in to inspect it before they complete the painting on the remainder of the vehicle. I learned this lesson the hard way, and I hope I saved you a very valuable lesson.

Wish there was someone in this area who has actually seen the truck lived in this area to bounce ideas off of. I know it's not as cool as a Scout or step-side pick-up, but it's intended to be an on and off-road camper, not a rock-crawling trail rig or daily driver. I've had other vehicles in my life that have looked much worse than this crew cab truck. But I have never in my life encountered such negativity about a vehicle. I know the jokes will be coming again. Piss-yellow was absolutely the wrong color for this "pos Ford wanna-be".

I'll post pics of my truck tomorrow when I get it back. Hopefully it's just the light from the yellow street lights reflecting in the paint.

Steve
 
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In the case of true negativity towards a vehicle, its been my experience that there is very little you can do short of getting rid of it to change that opinion. Every improvement you know you've made to it either goes unnoticed or becomes a fresh opportunity for derision. Some people were just born with their heads permanently stuck up their own poo-chutes. What can you do when a person enjoys the smell of their own brand so well? I hope the color at least meets your expectations.
 
It's probably just the street lights. The lights in the valley are yellow colored so reflecting off a fresh paint job would give it that glow. I'm up in the valley few times a week, pm me your contact and lets get together and shoot the ish.
 
As an fyi I once had a paint shop shoot my truck the wrong color! I was clear that they would not get paid a dime until they corrected it at no additional cost. It was an uncomfortable conversation, but in my case it was clearly their fault and so they did the right thing. I hope it is just the lights, but if not make them match the chip to the paint and if wrong have them re do it or give it back at no cost (yellow probably won't seem bad if it is free lol). Oh, and one more thing… I have also learned that once you pay your money you have little recourse outside of going to court.

Cheers,
cheese
 
Cool truck, hope the color is what you originaly thought .I live in the san fernando valley as well, im just getting into internationals and looking for local fellow enthusiasts. We should hang out and drink some beers and bounce ideas off each other .
 
Hi,

I got the truck back today, late afternoon. :gringrin: I'm satisfied with the way the color looks. It looks so much better in the sunlight than from a distance late at night under the yellow street lights. :d here are a couple pics of how it looked before and how it looks now. I did not have the bodywork done at this time as I hope to find better doors and a better bed for the truck. This was just to make it presentable while I work on it to make it mechanically sound.

Even had a compliment from the landlord - kind of. She stated, "now that it looks this good, are you going to drive it to work so it doesn't sit here every day?" I've told her many times I expect this restoration to take about 2 years. And with the many things I've found that the po's have messed up, I now expect it to take longer. I've given up on the hope that it will be ready to hit the road this summer. Hopefully next summer.

My next step is to make it theft proof. I've had three vehicles stolen from me, two never recovered and one recovered without an engine or trans. But they waited about a month to notify me so by that time it had racked up many hundreds of dollars in storage fees. I had no choice but to give it to the storage facility - what a scam.

But for now, it's painted, and there are no more broken windows!!!!!!! :smile5:
unfortunately they did get white overspray all over the engine. Now, instead of a clean, shiny red, it looks like it has a thick layer of white desert dirt on the entire engine. Oh well, its not a perfect world when one doesn't do the work himself.

it's probably just the street lights. The lights in the valley are yellow colored so reflecting off a fresh paint job would give it that glow. I'm up in the valley few times a week, pm me your contact and lets get together and shoot the ish.

Sounds great, I look forward to it! And yes, it was just the yellow street lights.

as an fyi I once had a paint shop shoot my truck the wrong color! I was clear that they would not get paid a dime until they corrected it at no additional cost. It was an uncomfortable conversation, but in my case it was clearly their fault and so they did the right thing. I hope it is just the lights, but if not make them match the chip to the paint and if wrong have them re do it or give it back at no cost (yellow probably won't seem bad if it is free lol). Oh, and one more thing… I have also learned that once you pay your money you have little recourse outside of going to court.

Cheers,
cheese

But if you don't pay, they can keep your truck with a "mechanics lien" and after 30 days dispose of the truck (sell it, give it away, etc) as they want. And charge so much in daily storage fees it would be impossible to reclaim the vehicle.

I'll take a free yellow - but fortunately there is no yellow in it.


cool truck, hope the color is what you originaly thought .I live in the san fernando valley as well, im just getting into internationals and looking for local fellow enthusiasts. We should hang out and drink some beers and bounce ideas off each other .

Yeah, I'll drink to that! I'm in van nuys.

Thanks.

Steve

btw, that second steering wheel is not for back-seat drivers. ;-) I intend to use the turn signal mechanism out of it to replace the missing assembly in my vehicle - just one of many future projects.

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One way to handle a bad situation is to write a check, collect the truck and then immediately cancel the check. I had to do that with a totally dishonest shop once. I then sent them a check for 1/2 the amount of the job, because that is about what they accomplished. They then turned me into collections, but didn't inform the collections agency that they had a check for 1/2 the amount of the job. The collections company made them return the check and continued trying to collect. I contacted my attorney about it and he said to tell the collections co to contact him and that was the end of it.

Except there was a ton of work to sandblast the interior tub of the Scout where they painted it so it could be line-x'ed. And on and on with lots of other stuff they did wrong.

Glad our paint job turned out ok!
 
Thank you, everyone. And fdchappie, I like your way of dealing with dishonest people.

Today, I was trying to figure out how to lock up the truck. After four trips to the hardware store, I've finally figured out how to lock the hood down with a padlock, no drilling, no welding, and no visible sign of it anywhere. That should deter anyone from stealing a battery or hot-wiring the vehicle. I've had 3 vehicles stolen and I don't want this to be a fourth.

Next step is to figure out how to lock the doors, then immobilize the vehicle so it can't be hooked and towed. I was looking at the boot type of wheel locks like police use. They sell them for about $100 on ebay, however those are mostly for a psychological deterrent show only. I was reading about all the different ways of how to quickly free your vehicle from their grip using a couple common tools, and sometimes using no tools at all, depending on the configuration of the wheel and tire. The ones that are impervious to everything but a cutting torch go for about $800 - far beyond my present budget.

Otherwise I'm still looking for suggestions on how to "theft-proof" my truck. I really don't want to remove the wheels and sit it on blocks as that would be such a pain every time I wanted to drive it somewhere, but that is about the only suggestion I've had so far.

That brings me to my next question, if anyone knows the answer. My front wheel locking hubs use two little set screws to attach them to the hub. However, today I noticed the set screws look like it needs an extremely tiny custom socket like the 7th one in the attached picture below. Those in the picture are made as wheel lug nut locks. But I need an extremely tiny set-screw version of the 7th socket shown there. Anyone have any idea where I could purchase such a socket? Is this another po sabotage or are such sockets somewhat common, and use something similar like a torx wrench or a bristol wrench? What's the name or what would I call such a set-screw wrench with the hole in the center?

Thanks.

Steve
 

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And another question - why did this picture appear in my post when all my other pictures appear only as links? I didn't do anything different.
.
 
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and another question - why did this picture appear in my post when all my other pictures appear only as links? I didn't do anything different.
.

When you post only one picture it will show up like your previous post. When you post several pictures you have to link them to your post as an image. I went back and edited your last post with multiple pictures so that they show up. Go back to that post and click the edit button. From there you should be able to see what I did and duplicate it on your future posts.

Btw - nice build up! Love the travelette you have there.
 
A locked garage is probably the best way, you know out of sight, out of mind. Do you have a regular parking space for the truck? If so, perhaps a big chain to a post?
 
The socket is an anti-theft bit, also called a tamperproof bit .I have an assortment of them if you need to borrow or harbor freight has them
 
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Hi,

thank you for the compliments, everyone.

looks good steve,nice job-Jeff:icon_mrgreen:

And it will look even nicer once I install that nice, nos white steering wheel I got from you. I can never thank you enough for that one. Thanks again.

Hopefully now I can get back to the important work of making this truck driveable.

a locked garage is probably the best way, you know out of sight, out of mind. Do you have a regular parking space for the truck? If so, perhaps a big chain to a post?

That actually might work, I'll chain it up like a dog (is there such a thing as an International dog?). ;-) that won't stop a determined thief, but it will stop the opportunistic thief who happens to be driving down the street with a tow truck, and seeing the truck and unlocked gate, decides to hook and book.

On a related note, I've pad-locked the hood in such a way that it cannot be seen; and without drilling or welding anything. But there is no way I can think of pad-locking the doors so it cannot be seen from outside or inside the truck without doing a little bit of welding. So my next day off on Wednesday is going to consist of a few more trips to the hardware store to make the necessary pieces. Then I need to find a mobile welder, or a welder with a shop close by to me here in van nuys. I don't yet trust this truck to take me around the block - far too many things still wrong with it, and too many things I have not looked at yet, such as the brakes, inoperative gas gauge, bad wiring etc. So any recommendations for any welders here in the san fernando valley, anyone?

I once had a 57 Chevy 4x4 panel truck I locked this way. And once I came home to find the headlight bezels and front bumper gone, and they made a serious attempt to get inside, but did not succeed. I suspect if I did not have the hood and doors locked more securely than just with the little factory door locks, that vehicle probably would have disappeared too. And that truck was parked down a hill, in my carport on a dead-end street. Where as this truck is parked in my drive-way on a busy residential street. I've seen evidence that people have been in my truck already, but it looks really rough inside right now and with not much of anything worth stealing.

Also once, a few weeks ago, when working on the truck, I left for less than a minute to get something, and when I came back, someone was there on a bicycle looking over the tools and truck. His story - he was there looking for a job to work on the house.

the socket is an anti-theft bit, also called a tamperproof bit .I have an assortment of them if you need to borrow or harbor freight has them

Thank you for the offer. I will check with harbor freight first, and if they don't have them, I would like to borrow yours. I never thought about it before, but I do like the idea of locking on the locking hubs. But where do you get the replacement set screws? Like most things on this truck, I'm sure the po stripped them too.

I think that was his method of making things theft-proof. I did a test-fit of the snow-plow grill guard onto the front of the truck. To make things more manageable, I first removed the big lights and their brackets from the grill guard. 6 of the 8 bolts holding them on had their nuts so stripped that they would just spin. And the only way for me to get them off was I had to hack-saw them off.

I'll post pics of the grill guard and other work once I get to that point in the build. At that time I'll ask your opinion if I should even use the grill guard and lights. I like the idea of the off-road lights mounted there in front, but it looks odd, at least to me, probably because I've never seen a snow plow's grill guard and lights before.

I have the front hood emblem, but not sure what emblems should go on the side of the hood and doors. Could people please post pictures or links to pictures here of what those emblems should be for a 62 pick-up and-or crew cab?

Thank you all.

Steve
 
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