73 beast

[Scooter]

Yea it is a bit scary thinking of them worn out ball joints while driving. Can't wait until I have a chance to swap the axles from my rolled Scout which are still in good shape - hopefully. Wont know till I actually pull them out and check.

In the mean time, since I couldn't go to hollister this weekend, I did a little floor pan patch work. Where once was the huge heater assembly, which disapeared through this beasts life time, on the passenger floor under the dash area, there was holes left behind. So I cut out a couple plugs and patch welded up a few holes.




Over all, the passenger side floor pan under the seat and feet area, was is good shape. Driver side is a different story. Left side has the normal major rust hole right at the body mount bushing area. That whole floor pan section needs to be replaced. Also, in the bed behind the rear bench seat, right above gas tank, there's a nice big ole hole where some previous owner cut out. Kinda looks like they wanted easy access to the sending unit. Apparently, I'm the fourth owner of this beast. So I can't point the blame towards any single person. Pics will follow when I get to that point.

 

[vancetater]

I have got a good heater unit if you need one came off the stript rallye

 

[Scooter]

Thanks.
I have somewhat considered kinda robbing the one from my rolled Scout. I know it was working before the roll happend.

I have also considered going the vintage air setup route instead though. I have read somewhere where another Scout owner installed one into thiers with good results

 

[Scooter]

Talken about a fire waiting to happen. And, so very typical of 33+ year old wiring along with lack of maintenance. Probably every since I had this beast, there has been a little bit of starting issues, which has been getting worse over time. And there has been a definate battery drain. And this one wire May have been the culprit on the starting issue. Since it was connected to the ignition key switch and traced it all the way down to behind the fuse box connecting to the bulkhead connecter. The plastic sheathing was melted off, for the most part, all the way from the key switch to the fuse box. Ouch - btw - I did notice the sheathing on the wire at the ignition switch soon after I purchased this beast. But never took the time to trace the wire until now

 

[Scooter]

It's been awhile since I have had the energy or motivation to work on the beast. But I finally got tired of staring at this gapping cancer hole in the sheet metal between driver side door and rear wheel well



Then after marking and cutting out the old crap I cleaned it up and brushed on some por15. I used my plasma cutter for cutting out most of the crapy sheet metal. I did cut a little too much into the right inner panel but stitch welded it back up before the paint.



Through ihon I acquired the patch panel. Which is tacked into place for the photo op. Had to let it cool down before more stitch welding. Don't want or need the warpage.



Finally finished the body work. For not being a professional body repair man myself, it came out ok. Granted that I don't think this rig will ever be a winner at a car show, but it works for me for now

 

[Scooter]

One of the things that has been extremely annoying about this beast, is that one of the previous owners int it's life time, used 2inch pipe tube for the body lift spacers. as if the ole worn out original body bushings were not worn out enough as it was, the tube spacers compounded the situation. Anyways, I finally took the time to go into work on my day off last week to use the lathe to machine out a few 1 inch spacers. Only had enough time to cut 5 pieces. Needless to say I need to go back into work on my day off to make a few more.
Here's what I have so far

Btw - the semi rusty one in the finished photo, is 3/4" piece that I made about 8 years ago for my 72. The ones I am making now are one inch thick

 

[Scooter]

Got bored today and was able to get an extra pair of hands for some musical rigs. And since the only thing holding the roof together was the rust and paint and chunks of rust falling apart when hitting every bump in the road, I broke out my plasma cutter and choped up the rust bucket of a roof.

I already have a replacement roof that I have had on the shelf awaiting for some tlc. And some of ya May remember the paint scheme from another Scout build. Because this spare roof was taken off my barrel rolled 74 Scout, which was set aside in storage a few years before the roll. After some minor rust repair/replace and several rattle cans of paint it will be ready for the beast

Btw - I saved all the glass and lift gate from the old roof before getting cut up.

 

[Scooter]

Got busy today and started a rear axle swap. The rear-end out of the 73 beast is a Ford 9" that came out of a lincoln versailles. With 4.10 gears from what I was told when I purchased the beast, but not sure exactly. The axle I am putting in is a Dana 44 out of my 74 barrel rolled Scout. Which has rotors, 4.56 gears, ARB and 35 spline Axles. The 4.56 gears in the d-44 will better handle the 35 shoes that the beast is sporting. Plus, I'm swaping the u-bolts and mounting plates.

The theory behind this madness is due to the fact that I plan on bolting the Ford 9" under my 51 studebaker truck.

 

[vancetater]

Its looking good im glad it went to you and your putting alot of love into it

 

[Scooter]

its looking good im glad it went to you and your putting alot of love into it

Thanks.
Some of the work that I am doing to it is more of fixing the p.o virus. Mostly from the first two owners(p.o.) of this beast, since rumor has it that I'm the fourth owner. And I'm not sure if it's love yet, but more of shacking my head in wondering what these people thinking.

Once I finish with the rear end swap, the next order of business is gutting the 30plus year old wiring out of the beast. To much of a headache to trace one wire at a time, since I have a new wire harness available that I just pulled out of my 74 barrel rolled Scout. The 74 won't miss the wiring, untill I'm ready to work on it.

Btw - while I'm at it, during the rear-end axle swap, I'm relocating the upper shock mounts back to the oem location. But in order to do so, I need to cut off both exhaust pipes from the mufflers back. The current configuration of the exhaust plumbing isn't much to be desired. I will post photos later when I get to that point, which May show why.

 

[vancetater]

Ya I did not do many modifications to that truck, the exhaust came off my first Scout I just bolted it up I did not like how it was routed around the t case.

 

[Scooter]

Yea, that's a whole other issue that will be fixed soon enough. The design of that front passenger side of the exhaust pipe frome header to muffler was very poorly planed out. I'm not pointing fingers, but it sure makes me wonder what the guy was really smoken when that pipe was bent. Can't run a front drive shaft due to how the pipe routes directly in front of path of the shaft.

I won't be dealing with complete exhaust system upgrade until I'm ready to swap in my front d-44 from my barrel rolled Scout. I need to source inner axle seals that fit my custom inner axles. Along with the need to fix/replace the ARB copper air line inside the diff housing. Once I have that figured out, I have considered doing a separate write up on it.

I was actually referring to the rear most plumbing of exhaust pipe from mufflers back to tailgate. Which is why I plan on cutting off the rear most pipe, so I can mount the shocks in the stock upper mounting location. The custom shock mount that was welded to top of frame will also be cut off. A few pics to show off.

 

[Scooter]

Omg - talken about a serious case of po virus. I'm finally getting around to replacing the body mount bushings. And some one used conduit threaded couplers as 2" body lift spacers

I could have purchased 1" body lift spacers. But where's the fun in that when I can make my own out of a solid piece of 2-1/2" bar stock. Plus I'm a cheap bastard with free piece of material from work. I had just finished the passenger side when I stopped for a photo op.

 

[Scooter]

Well, while I was replacing the body mount bushings, I noticed that the rear most body mount on passenger side, under the tailgate, was bent out of shape and down by roughly 1/2"

So I spent time today fabbing up two new pieces out of 3x4" x .250" thick angle, replacing both sides.

The new piece came out to 1-1/2" longer than the ones I cut off

I have enough material of the same dimensions as those new pieces to replace the oem piece between frame rail. But I will wait until I'm ready to fab up a rear bumper with tire carrier. In the mean time, I am working on bracing the new pieces I just welded in for the body mounts.

 

[Scooter]

Now that I'm taking a brake from worken on some one elses rig, I'm finally getting to working on my own beast. Replacing a section of the floor up front, under drivers feet.

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When I was replacing the body mount bushings I had to cut the one hole and bolt just to get the old body mount bushing and spacer out. Basically it was all glued together with rust. Then plasma cut most of the floor section that I'm replacing and decided to pull the left fender off, due to some cancer rot on the a-piller, and ended up with a little gift hiding behind the fender.

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[Scooter]

Now that I'm taking a brake from worken on some one elses rig, I'm finally getting to working on my own beast. Replacing a section of the floor up front, under drivers feet.

When I was replacing the body mount bushings I had to cut the one hole and bolt just to get the old body mount bushing and spacer out. Basically it was all glued together with rust. Then plasma cut most of the floor section that I'm replacing and decided to pull the left fender off, due to some cancer rot on the a-piller, and ended up with a little gift hiding behind the fender.

Yes, there is a swivel wratcheting wrench tucked in there behind the cut up oil jug. Lol. Gave me a good laugh.

I have some left over pieces of new sheet metal from past work to where I plan on making up a few small patch pieces to fix some of the cancer spots. Basically one section at a time, instead of the whole bottom section of a-piller at once. The body mount wedge, that sits on top of the body bushing, for the most part seems solid, except for the top where the channel piece sits on. So, ill cut and fit a piece of new patch just for the top section of the wedge, instead of replacing the entire wedge itself.

 

[Scooter]

Well, not only was I getting tired of looking at the gaping access hole above the wiper motor in the windshield frame, I was concerned about the rest of the integrity of the rest of the winshield frame, which seemed a little more flimsy than normal. So this afternoon when I got off work, I ended up pulling out the winshield. End result is that I'm surprised that this thing even held in place and didn't fly off to hit some one.

Passenger side - top and bottom of frame:

Driver side - top and bottom:

I currently have two replacemt windshield frames in decent shape. One is complete with glass, minus the hardware. And the second frame has no glass or hardware. For now I will be swapping all the hardware brackets from the rust bucket over to the one frame with glass, along with some rattle can paint. Then the glass from the rust bucket will be salvaged to be installed into the glassless frame to be either used as a spare backup or installed into my rolled Scout, if/when I can get to it

 

[Scooter]

Spent a good part of the weekend welding and fabing on the beast. Also, spent time prepping the spare window frame for install. Had the brackets powder coated.

Since I'm not doing a complete body off resto here, I just rattle caned the frame. Then installed the wiper moter with the linkage and brackets. Was kinda hoping to actually get it installed this weekend, but being it a two person manhandling it will haft to wait till next weekend.

The new patch floor panel and channel have been welded in. Also had to patch up a small section of the kickpanel at the same time. I ran out of gas for my welder, so I could not finish welding a new piece into the bottom outer portion of the a-piller. I would have layed in a coat of por15, but I am not done welding yet. I have another small rust repair to patch up first. Before I welded the top sheet metal on top of the new channel piece, I welded in a small spacer around hole for the bolt of the body mount bushing, so it won't crush sheet metal when tightened up.

In the mean time, until Friday when I can get to welding supply store, I will be working on the next phase of a complete re-wire of the beast. I been stranded a couple times due to electrical issues already. Along with a major battery drain.

 

[Tahoedonner]

Looking good scooter

 

[vancetater]

Would that happen to be a 9/16 ratcheting wrench