Ground up 86 4x4

[murraygmc]

whell thats a good thig i guess lol

[Engineer]

I was just kidding about you sandblasting my frame. MO to NH is a LONG way to drive. Well, maybe not. I am always looking for a reason to drive my Chevys. 

A guy at my church has said that I could borrow his sandblaster. I wish he hadn't. I almost had my wife convinced that I had to buy one because nobody had one I could borrow. LOL!

Anyhow, why do you think the sand is etching your frame? Are you using coarse sand? I am planning on using fine, or possibly medium silica. I used coarse once on a different project, and it seemed that the airflow was having a difficult time picking up, or flowing the sand fast enough to cleanly blast the piece I was working on.

In the pics it looks as though your blaster nozzle is huge compared to anything I have used.

[thirsty]

We use a medium grit media to sandblast large propane tanks and the blaster is a 300# capacity Clemco fed by a sullair tag behind compressor. It's a pretty evil tool. It can't be used on anything light duty. It took less than an hour to do my frame with it. It cost me nothing to do so I could handle some hand sanding to smooth it up.

[thirsty]

Made some more progress today (Saturday). Last night after a hard week of work I got the front end in the garage and prepped it for blasting. This morning I loaded it up to take to work. I had to work till about lunch time before I could get started on my truck parts. I managed to get all the small chassis parts and the front end blasted, primed, and painted. Next thing is to bring it all home and assemble it. Can't wait for that! Pics of this weekend coming next.

[SGarage]

I'll let John explain the weekend, but here's what I learned:

Gorilla tape is wicked good protection when applying angry/evil sandblasting power!




And, a boom truck is way easier than anything you could imagine when moving this kind of stuff around.

[thirsty]

Got some more parts recently.

Here is the interior I got from a friends scrapyard.


This is the cab that was brought from CT.


The motor that's going in. It may be greasy but it's strong. Pulled that out of a parts rig I had.

[thirsty]

Everything is home and the chassis is just about finished now.

Here's the front end in the blast room.


Front end and all the small parts blasted and primed.


The last of the parts loaded up for the ride home.


Chassis together.


Transmission cleaned up.


Motor, tranny, and transfer case installed.

[79K20]

That is looking sharp! Keep up the good work!

[thirsty]

Here is a better pic of the chassis.

[Captkaos]

great progress, but I have to say I love that gas pump!

[thirsty]

Thanks 79K20.

Capt... The pump is a 1951 MS80. We restored it in 2002, we had alot of fun doing it. Here is a link to the project.
http://www.suitorsgarage.com/localnettom/gaspump/projectsgaspump1.html
As far as the truck build goes, next step is to get the donor cab off and get going on that.

[thirsty]

Got my donor cab delivered last night. It's a 87' 3/4 ton 4 speed. Not much else I need except the cab off it. The truck has frame issues so no need to shed any tears about hacking it up.

[velojym]

Here is a better pic of the chassis.

Aw, heck. Just hook everything up, slap on a couple seats...
 

[thirsty]

Thought I would let everyone know that I didn't give up on my truck. My wallet however is not cooperating with me lately.
The truck just sits in the way (unless I push it out then push it back in) waiting for some money to be thrown at it. I do talk to my painter regularly just can't seem to commit to the money for the rest of my parts.

I hung a few parts on it so I had more incentive to get it done.

[three8six]

put a flatbed on it man call it good