Diablo Build Update (pics)

[devilman96]

Ha! Finally I quit avoiding some of the work I need to get to!

Some pics... I started my supports for my seats and the sub boxes that needed to go under them... I got this set from a 04 Monte Carlo and they have power everything to boot! The stock height on the deuce seats was 14 - 14.5 inches which I find to be to low for me so I am making the low point 15" on these by building a 7" 3 sided stand. I got the seat belts to boot and will be attaching them to the box so I used 1/4 x 6" flat bar and 1.5 angle for the mounting points...

I know I will catch some grief about the sub woofers but I had to have them and again... noooo BOOM BOOM!!! This thing will be balanced to play anything from Jerry Reed to Metallica when I am finished! The enclosures are .670 cubic feet in volume (per manufacture specs) and made out of .750 MDF, sealed with GE silicone, nail gunned, and then wood screwed together. The subs are made by Rockford Fosgate and are 10" Stage2 4 ohm woofers... I am SURE Bridgeport never intended a J mill to cut inlets in MDF but I have the worlds largest router!

I am holding off on finishing anything until I get them in the truck and can see what colors I want or need where (black and OD) should be a fairly nice and concealed set up when finished... At a minim they should make for a great butt massager! LOL

What else??? Clutch swap is planned for next weekend... Ken is going to drag the POS over on Saturday evening (again thank you) and I will HOPEFULLY have everything set to go for a Sat/Sun swap out... I will try to document the job as best as possible with pics... Would make a great "how to" I think...

 

[Desert Rat]

I'm in awe!

 

[hot rod deuce]

HAHAH the women are going love that! As much as i like the idea i think i am goona stick with air bags in there instead!

 

[Recovry4x4]

Rectum wreckers! Just how many low frequency decibals can the common a-hole take? I'd feel violated sitting there with that stuff pounding at my back door!

 

[clinto]

Rectum wreckers! Just how many low frequency decibals can the common a-hole take? I'd feel violated sitting there with that stuff pounding at my back door!

 

[wallew]

I am SURE Bridgeport never intended a J mill to cut inlets in MDF but I have the worlds largest router!

You should send that pic to Bridgeport. They would LOVE to see a 'different usage' for their J mills...

jim

PS - I have tool envy...

 

[devilman96]

Tool envy eh? The short tour... Its taken a lot of years but they are worth it!!! I'am slob so dont mind the mess...

 

[devilman96]

Well... The clutch is in the shop they said Friday to get it back so I have my fingers crossed on that part!!!

I had a lengthy discussion with him about clutch types, materials, designs, etc... The friction plate core I have is a five finger design with ceramic pads... Not much room for improvement there and is highly suggested over a full circle organic disk type...

The pressure plates for these trucks have 2 different designs (that I know of). The one I am having rebuild is a 4 finger design, the other I have seen is a 3 finger... The four finger is the better way to go giving more support to the pressure disk when being lifted...

Sorry I don't have pics but I will post those up after I pick the stuff up when its new "looking"...

I also broke down and bought a front wiring harness... which means I now have little reservation for pulling the cab off...

 

[devilman96]

Ok... The clutch parts are back... IMHO a SLIGHT over charge in the price but what can you do when you want something fast... 360$ for the rebuild and flywheel ground. The plate is now sporting copper crematic pads which are supposed to be "the thing"... We will see how they holds up in time I guess.

Pics... Everything ready for the clutch job, rear main seal and gasket, pressure plate, friction plate, flywheel, throw out bearing and carrier and pilot bearing... I also have the seals for the PTO, transfer case and rear of the transmission plus gaskets but I don't want to unbox them and screw up the part numbers for cross referencing.

I took my new wiring harness (I HATE ELECTRICAL TAPE) and covered in with wire loom for added protection. I think someone in whatever office needs to do a little Mil Spec updating on these poor things. How you can still get your hands on rubber coated wire in this day and age is a myth to me... Hopefully the loom will give a little more protection and help it hold up to heat and age a little better.

Ken is dragging the beast over tomorrow and were going to do a little service work to his tractor while its here... He is arguing just an oil change but I already collected all of the parts for the whole nine yards if I can get him to hold that rig still for long enough.

 

[Recovry4x4]

Think I'll bring my harness over too!

 

[wallew]

Dman,
Damn man, that's a sweet looking clutch. And you can be proud of that wiring harness. It should last for another fifty years.

And your 'garage setup' REALLY gives me garage envy. As I only have a carport (and I live in Denver) is the MAIN reason I don't have many power tools. No place to keep them. One of these days, maybe. I do have a TON of hand tools and quite a collection of hand power tools (plus a miter saw).

But I long for a really nice mill, lathe and drill press. Plus a parts washing cabinet and sand blasting cabinet (medium to large). Plus two or three grinders, a polisher, disk/belt sander and a table saw. And a mig welder to go with my oxy/acetalene setup.

ALL THE KEWL STUFF you already have. And MOST of it is not expensive. OK, the lathe and the mill, but I can get them used on the cheap. I turned down a lathe for $250 from my gunsmithing school when they bought new ones cause I just don't currently have the room.

 

[devilman96]

ah don't get to envious there... The tooling is all mine (except the parts washer, which I do have but is stored) but the shop is not!!! I work out of work which is a little unusual but its a two way street kinda thing. I can pretty much produce or reproduce most any simple thing you come up with. My employer gets the benefits of having a metal fab shop / welding / wood working / electrical / AC / hydraulic / whom knows what else... while I get the benefits of having a shop and all of my stuff insured against theft, fire, hurricane, etc...

Its a good deal on both sides and the tooling is great stuff to have... but changing jobs... man whatta bitch that is!!!

The tooling is what attracted me to GL... and then GL (and hurricanes) attracted me to MV's... Most guys go the opposite route!! I love my welders but I hate owning them sometimes, I learned welding at a fab shop (Friend whom had my truck up in Orlando) but I also learned that I DON'T wanna do it for a living!!! The belt / disk sander, band saw, tig welder, radial drill press and a few other odds and ends are GL items... Though they didn't look like they do now when I got them.

Ken... Bring it on... I should have enough of the four sizes to do a second... If not just swap me and I will wrap what I have and pick the rest up later.

 

[Recovry4x4]

Well, I delivered Mikes truck today. That cursed thing even gave my truck problems. Tring to stop at a stoplight and the brake pedal went whoosh to the floor. Not a good thing. I avoided a collision and got the thing stopped at a Lowes parking lot. After pulling the canvas seat cover out of my back side I found that I'd ruptured a steel line. A phone call and quick trip to the house netted me all the things needed to replace that line. Mike met up with me and we whipped it back into shape. Man, I love my cheapo power bleeder. Finally got back underway and then came the rain, the whole ride of probably 40 miles. Anyway, its delivered and Mike will be doing the clutch in the AM. Here's a few pics I took before I got underway.

 

[devilman96]

Well.... Truck 1 me 0.... Or more correctly... Memphis Equipment 1 me and truck 0!!!! There is only one thing more frustrating than ordering parts and getting the wrong stuff... Thats ordering parts, getting the wrong stuff, and missing stuff on top of it... *gurrrrr*

Clutch is done... I am missing a lot of seals that were supposed to be in my order and have the wrong transmission seals, PTO seals and one or two others... Gonna be a good morning of phone calls tomorrow!!! We re-installed the transmission, clutch stuff was great, no hang ups, turned a large dowel rod on the lathe for a alignment tool... Fortunately the rear main seal was correct but I cant reinstall my PTO box or jack shaft between the transmission and transfer case. It sucks having something out on the bench where it is nice and easy to work on and then having to half way put it back...

Ken was a saint yesterday but I think my trucks karma rubbed off on to his... Gonna have to keep the two away from each other!!! Ken says it needs an exorcism preformed on it... Bad when you have a 40 mile trip and leave home at 5pm and don't get back until well after 10pm!!! But again thank you so much for your help and efforts and yeah I will be building a replica el cheapo brake bleeder!!! Talk about tool envy!

Before the peanut gallery starts... I have a full set of pics that were taken on the reinstall from the rear main removal onward... I will edit and resize them tomorrow and will turn them into a tech article if anyone thinks it will help? (if the tech article section gets fixed for posting *hint hint hint*) all and all the trans was out in about 1 hour and back in about 1.5 hours with a lot of pressure washing, parts washing, seal changing, gasket swapping, etc, etc, etc, in between...

 

[m.walker]

I love the lightbar on back is that home made ? One more thing to copy !

 

[Recovry4x4]

That bar is genuine gov't surplus. I first saw one strung on the back of a shop van at the local guard armory. From that point on I was on a mission to get one. Asked around, no body had seen them. About a year later I asked a bunch of folks at Aberdeen and one guy saw one for sale there for several hundred dollars. I finally snuck up on it in the TM for the HEMTT wrecker. At least I knew where it came from. Well one day Austin Weber (beltfed34) listed on on Ebay. Had a smashed light and no cord. Bought that one. I emailed him about a cord and he said he didn;t have any. About a month later he listed another light bar in poor condition with a cord. He even put in the description that someone asked him for a cord earlier. I bought that one too then sold the light bar. The cord is like new. All together with shipping I have around $90 in it. The cord is around 30 ft long or so but I also found another trailer cord that has male/female connectors on it and its around 25 ft so I can pretty much hook it onto anything. Truth of the matter is that one could make one with not much difficulty.

 

[devilman96]

Ha!!! Its about time that I got around to doing something I PLANED on doing for a change... I will get some trany pics up with the tech article so I will skip them here and get on to the frame finally...

In the pics below I have removed the harness, airlines, etc... I whacked off the rear section of the frame (after taking a lot of measurements) and then threw the frame up on top to recheck my spring hanger positioning. The rear mount is critical because it has to fall into a certain area or I loose my rear air or have to hack up the hitch gussets which I don't wanna do.

Tomorrow I will cut the frame just past the first rear axle and line the rear up for rewelding. I have had a few odd looks at my cuts... Let me explane.. If you cut the frame straight up and down you have to use plates when putting it back together... If you zig zag the cut you end up with more strength due to a interlocking parts and a longer weld spread over a wider area.... Yeah I went a little HARD on the pattern but it really makes no more or less work when putting it back together. In doing this I will be able to grind my welds flush on the outside and hide them to get a stock look... I don't have to weld in plates... I don't have to knock out rivets and mounts... I don't have to re-drilling the back of the frame to get the bolt holes back for the hardware... the cross member spacing stays proportional through the length of the frame and I don't loose anything from the frame but the bogie stuff and one tie down / handle in the rear which I will remount later (due to the rear spring hanger location).

If all goes as planed (why ya laughing?) I will have the rear axle mounted in its new springs sometime Saturday...

 

[mangus580]

Looks GREAT!

I would have never come up with that theory myself, but now that you bring it up, it makes perfect sense!

 

[devilman96]

I wish I was bright enough so I could claim the idea but a few guys far smarter than me with much more experience taught me this a long time ago, same guys that do or help me do the fancy sheet metal work up in Orlando. (Fauver Machine and Welding)...

I had bought a boat years ago and needed the scag (lower fin) on the lower unit replaced which they sell blanks of so you can cut one off and reweld a new one on. Naive me in my haste and youth was all set for whacking the old one off in a straight line when the old man gave me a "listen up dummy, Im only gonna explane this once" speech.

I got a lot of speeches!!! and I do mean a friggen LOT of them!!! LOL But when it comes from someone that has proably forgotten more in his life time about fabrication than I will ever be able to learn it pays to listen up now and then...

Neat tricks are only cool if you share them amongst friends!

 

[mangus580]

Enlighten us!

Maybe you could actually make a 'bob-job' tech article?