[scoutboater]

Alright guys, I'm finally doing it - I'm starting my official build thread. My wife and I have been in our new home for a little over a month now, and next week I'll be bringing the Jeep to it's new home in the garage. :2thumbsup:

I'll work on pictures of the new house for all of you tomorrow after the sun comes up... For now, I'd like to tell you the history of my old girl, and some of my plans for her. My dad first bought this jeep when it was a couple of years old from a friend of his. He kept it for a number of years, right up until a financial situation forced him to sell it. He kept track of the jeep thru two more owners, and finally bought it back from the second one. I guess that makes him the second and fifth owner of the old girl. Unfortunately, while she was with her forth owner, she suffered a fire under the hood, and a patched together repair of the damage.

A couple of years ago now, my father saw fit to let the old girl go, and he handed the keys over to me. I've done a little work along the way, mostly cleaning up a little wiring and keeping her running, plus a really bad paint job on the hard top. Most recently, the 35+ year old points elimination kit bit the dust, so I end up putting a set of points in her just to get her going for next week's move.

Once I get her home, the first task will be to clean her up a bit and get her settled into her new home in the garage. Of course, I'm hoping this isn't too much of a shock for her, being inside that is.:teehee: Once that is done, the punch list includes an upgraded distributor with an MSD box, a good suspension rebuild, and some drastic cancer repair with parts off of a donor body. A complete re wire is also on the list, and a T18 and MPFI round out the ultimate dream.

For now, I'm going to leave you guys guessing as to what the name of this thread stands for. Stay tuned, and I hope you enjoy.

 

[Mike Romain]

You won't be the first DINKS to have your Jeep project interrupted by an addition. Got my last frame that way. Lol!

 

[scoutboater]

Mike, you could be right, but any 'additions' would be definate suprises. In any case, here are some of the pictures i promised you all last night.

First up is the new house.



And the garage, which still needs a little work...



That is todays project - cleaning out and organizing the garage, which still has remnants of the big move in it. My wife wants to get her car back into her side (it was in there for several weeks, but that got messed up last weekend...), and to finally make room for the Jeep on my side.

Finally, here is a pic of our two new children playing in the back yard. They get a little rambunctious sometimes, but at this moment they were fairly calm...

 

[scoutboater]

She's Home!

Alright guys, I have gotten the old gal home, and I have the pictures for you as promised!

First pics are of her old resting place, but thankfully not her final...







It took a little while for me to remember that after the conversion back to points, I didn't straighten out the final starting issue... Once i remembered that cranking her with the key killed power to the ignition, I manually jumped the solenoid and got her going. After that it was no time in getting her on the trailer and strapped down.





A short drive, a trip thru the carwash, and a drink at the gas station later, she got the first glimpse of her new home!





Once I got the old gal unloaded, I noticed that she was running worse than usual, and that she was whistling again. So I popped the air cleaner off, and started checking for vaccuum leaks around the base of the carb....

I found a new one on the front side, and got it temporarily sealed up with some RTV. I guess this means that finding a proper base gasket for this carb just moved up the list...



In addition, I have isolated the starting issue either the 'I' post on the starter solenoid, or the wire connecting it to the '+' terminal on the coil. I'll work more on that this weekend.



In any case, here is one final pic of her in her new home, ready and waiting to consume my free time :2thumbsup:

 

[Truck633]

My buddy used to throw his DINK status in my face all the time, I had one daughter and NO wife at the time..... Any extra money went to bills rather than Jeep parts!! Then I added the wife and a boy to the mix!! (decided then, it was finish my degree time)

As for my buddy, he was in full dink glory, then kerblewwwwie... two kids in less than 2 years!!!!

 

[scoutboater]

Alright guys, its been a rough time at work lately... But I have been spending some of my precious free time on the jeep. Most of the 'Jeep' time has actually been spent on the garage, getting it ready to go, but there has been jeep work as well.

In the garage, I swapped out the single 60W bulb for a pair of 4ft florescent lights.



Then i got some old cabinets from my FIL, and my better half helped me paint them and mount them into the garage. I even managed to tap into the washer plumbing to get the sink to work!



Also, my wonderful wife has started a mural of some kind on the only remaining bare wall, but I'm not telling what it is



Finally, on to the Jeep work. I discovered that the source of all my vacuum leaks was indeed a mis-matched gasket at the base of the carburator. I ran out and grabbed the right gasket a couple of weeks ago, and quickly discovered that the thicker gasket made my carb mounting studs too short...
So I improvised, and removed the spacer plate where the PCV vacuum hooked in as a temporary fix. It made a HUGE difference once i re-adjusted the carb to run without the vacuum leaks.











I also decided that while I had the carb off, I might as well pop the top plate off and have a look in the bowl, and this is what I found....



I cleaned that all out, and put on a new fuel filter just to be safe.

Finally today I got around to getting some longer studs to swap in, and got the spacer and PCV re-installed.





I also had my starter solenoid waranteed since the 'I' terminal was not sending power to the ignition when the solenoid was activated in the hopes of quickly solving my starting problems.







Unfortunately, that didn't solve my problem. It worked great one time, and fired right up, but I shut it down quickly because it sounded like the starter was still engaged. When I tried again, she was right back to her old tricks with no power going to the ignition when the switch is in the 'crank' position. As an alternate solution, I have taught my wife how to jump the solenoid when I turn the swith to 'run', and the jeep cranks right up!



Finally, I'll leave you all with a pic of the jeep (already topless) in her new home. I even got the hood to come off with no fuss what-so-ever!

 

[scoutboater]

Also this weekend, my wife and I went to a community yardsale just a little ways from here. I didn't expect to find much of anything for me, but I ended up with just as much stuff as her...

My best tool of the day was this RIGID shopvac, sans the hose and accesories, for $5! It runs great and still has good suction, I've just got to pick up a hose and a filter and I've got a vac!



But my favorite find of the day is this loudspeaker!











Of course, all of the stickers are gone or too faded to read, but cast into the back of the bell (in the pics) is University Loudspeakers - White Plains - New York - Made in U.S.A.
The guy was asking $5 and claimed that it worked. When I started to walk away, he dropped to $2, and I dropped the money! I haven't hooked it up yet, but I don't think the neighbors (or the wife) are going to like it too much... :2thumbsup:

 

[roadhog304]

Nice looking place and jeep project you have going. I have had nothing but bad luck with the Borg Warner solenoid that you installed. My dad has had the same issues in his old ford truck. They would hang up in the crank position And not let the starter disengage. We switched to standard brand heavy duty versions and neither of us has had any problems since.

 

[HackFabrication]

For some reason, looking at that loud speaker, made me thing of the 'Blues Brothers' movie...

 

[scoutboater]

Well, I didn't get to make any progress on the Jeep last weekend... :thumbdown: But its ok, because the wife and I went on a trip for our 1 year anniversary!!!:2thumbsup:

On the trip, we happened through Toledo, and I managed to snap these pictures for you all to enjoy...











Moving on to today, I did get some work done on the Jeep. For starters, I finished dis-assembling the hardtop and looked it over for damage. I also found that a few ladybugs had been hiding out in the roof braces, but they are out now.













I also got took the seat brackets loose, and to my suprise the seats were only bolted to the original brackets, not welded. There is a peice of bar stock welded to the drivers side frame, but I don't suspect any real damage from it.







I also started the process of removing the roll bar, and got all of the bolts out of the dash and the sides of the tub. The bolts in the tops of the wheel wells, however, will not move by hand, and I do not *yet* own a 9/16" x 1/2" drive socket to go on my impact, so that project got put on hold.









Finally, I got out the shop vac and cleaned up the ladybugs and a good bit of trash that was in the floorboards, and started taking a better look at the tub. I found a lot of cancer and damage... :thumbdown:

















Next couple of things on the to-do list (maybe even later this weekend) are to find a storage solution for the hardtop peices, finish getting the drivers seat off of the seat frame and get rid of the old seats, and get the roll bar the rest of the way out.
I'm thinking overhead storage for the hardtop, and if I can get it to work out just right I may even get it over the garage door! The seat should be easy enough, I just ran out of steam earlier after I finished the passenger one. Finally, I need the aforementioned 9/16" x 1/2" drive impact socket to get the last eight bolts out of the roll bar, as well as some cutting wheels for my grinder so I can get rid of the "cage" that a PO welded to the front of it. I don't mind it, but it only bolts to the sheet metal of the dash, and I know in that form it won't do any good. So its going to go.

 

[scoutboater]

Almost forgot, we went to the Henry Ford Museum in Detroit on our trip, and found this little guy tucked in with some of the other cars...

 

[scoutboater]

Well, I didn't get much else done today except for getting that second seat loose from the frame, but my wonderful wife got a lot of work done on the mural she is working on. Its not finished yet, but here are some in-progress shots for you all to enjoy.

 

[Unretarded]

Nice.........!!!!!!

 

[scoutboater]

Alright guys, I've been pretty lax on the jeep project lately, but I've been even more lax on posting about it, so I've got about 5 months of updates I'm going to run through really quick.

When I left off, I had the top and the hood off of the Jeep. Next up was starting to free the front bumper (still on there...) and the rest of the front clip. First step for all of that was unhooking the winch wiring.







It had been there a while, but I did get all of the wires loose without breaking any of them.

Once that wiring was out of the way, I jumped over to the windshield and decided to get it off. This is what I found:











After the cleanup from that carnage was done, I popped the grill and fenders off with no issues (and unfortunately no pictures...). But I wound up with this.



You can also see my current hardtop and hood storage just past the jeep.

 

[scoutboater]

With the front clip out of the way, I went back to work on the front bumper. I dropped the steering box out of the way to get to the main bolt on the drivers side, but I have had no luck getting the bolt to release its hold on the jeep. I finally wrestled it about halfway loose after soaking it in Kroil, but even with working the nut back and forth as I went to clear the threads, to bolt is completely jammed at the halfway point. I did get the rest of the bolts out (with a little grinder work), but that one is still in there...











I also started grinding the welds off of the winch mounting bolts. I guess its a good form of theft protection. Only problem is that I can't get my grinder to the lower bolts because of the fairlead. Christmas brought a good solution for that tho... :thumbsup:

 

[scoutboater]

In addition to that, I have removed the wiring harness from the engine compartment and the dash. Even though I plan on scratch-building a completely new harness, I too my time to label each connection during removal so that I can use the old harness for a reference. I also have removed the rollbar, steering column, and dash. Unfortunately, my camera was dead for the duration, so I don't have any pictures right now. I have found the charger though, and I as soon as the little light on my wall turns green, I will be taking pictures of her as she sits for all of you to enjoy.

I will also include pictures of all of the shop goodies Santa brought me. :thumbsup:

 

[scoutboater]

Alright, so I finally got around to getting some more pictures. Actually, I figured out how to take pics on my phone straight to photobucket, so hopefully I'll start getting a lot more pictures!

As promised, here are a couple of pics with no wiring harness/rollbar/dash/etc...





And here is the wiring harness in its new home.



Now for the pics of all the new shop toys! I must have been better than I thought this year. :2thumbsup:









For these, look under the tire, not at it

 

[scoutboater]

I was able to use my new air grinder and cutoff tools to get the welds off of the lower winch bolts, so the winch is now off of the jeep. While doing the grinding, I had to wait several times for my air compressor to catch up, so I spent that time removing the cable from the winch.





I also found some minor damage to the free-wheeling side plate. It looks to me like the cable got tangled and wrapped around it one time.



I don't think its a big deal, so once I get to re-building the winch, I'll use it anyway. Here are some pics of the Jeep and the winch finally separated.







I'm not sure yet about keeping that roller fairlead... Its in pretty rough shape, but it may clean up alright.

Next to come, I'm getting that stubborn bolt out of the front bumper one way or another. :gunfight::club::eyebulge::welder:

 

[2Xtreme]

Well, I didn't get much else done today except for getting that second seat loose from the frame, but my wonderful wife got a lot of work done on the mural she is working on. Its not finished yet, but here are some in-progress shots for you all to enjoy.

I'd say she's a KEEPER…!
Mural looks awesome!

 

[scoutboater]

I'd say she's a KEEPER…!
Mural looks awesome!

Thanks! I do plan on keeping her! :2thumbsup: