Eneto-55

Some of those FB groups are really trying hard to weed out the scammers, but this place, as a sort of "community", makes a person a whole lot more at ease to make a deal with someone you don't know face to face. But I watch those groups mainly for photos of the cars, mainly detail pictures that might someday help me (or someone else) know how things go back together. Then the interior photos, for original detail in cloth pattern, etc. (I don't really look twice at the heavily customized cars. Not that I exactly despise them or something, but there's no need to know "what it's supposed to look like" if it's going to be a custom.)

Cool Beans!

One thing I noticed right away is that he (the guy in the video with the fancy system) is using only a single anode. I haven't watched the entire thing yet, so maybe he periodically rotates the carburetor part, but the current connects with the closest area to the anode, so that is where the most metal is deposited. In the cadmium (and other metals for that matter) we plated back in Tulsa (United Plating Works), there were always anodes all along both sides of the tanks. Then we also worked with a smaller anode (connected with a cable) so that we could hold it inside internal areas of the piece being plated. One time I got pretty sick from cyanide gas, because I spent most of a day standing beside the cadmium tank, moving the clamps on some piano hinges that had no holes in them at all, so no place to hang them from. I had to change the position of the clamps about every 45 seconds. And then the other thing, that someone has already mentioned, is that you should never touch the part before starting plating, or at any time during the process. (When I was doing that job with the piano hinges, I had an extra clamp, and would lift one end of the hinge - they were about 5' long, as I recall - at a time, and put the extra clamp onto the part, take off the one near it, then repeat the process at the other end. I think if I were going to set up a plating operation, I would strongly consider doing hot tin. It isn't a bright color, but it is "food quality" plating. Oh, and if you are working with aluminum, you can anodize that w/o any prior plating, just get it chemically clean. We DID glass bead blast all used parts that came in for reconditioning, but everything still went through the correct acid before plating - nothing ever went straight from the blasting cabinet into the plating tank. (I do wish I had made notes about various things back then, but when you are young you do not realize that you will forget so much.)

I'm on P15 and flathead groups on FaceBook, and I have often suggested coming here for information. I wonder, is anyone now regularly on here that heard about the forum on FB? (The biggest draw for me to keep looking there is the photos, particularly of very original cars that were recently pulled out of long-term storage, where they had been sitting long enough that there are few changes that have been made already. Since my 46 was already dismantled when i got it in 1980, and I then dismantled it even more, I copy any photos that show detail, anywhere on the car. Never know when I might need that exact photo. But on the whole, it's a terrible set up to get really useful information. I don't think I've ever asked a question there, just try to help out a bit from time to time. Lots of really "green" new-comers there.) EDIT: What I meant to ask (and was not very clear), is if anyone came here specifically on a recommendation on the FB group. That is, someone who had not yet found THIS forum, and heard about it for the first time on FaceBook. (I'm wondering if it is doing any good to try to send people here for information, and a MUCH better all-around experience.)

Did you do a comparison between 12 & 6 volts? - curious how much slower it runs on the lower voltage.

Sorry - You're around 43 years late for me.

Another possible option might be to get it plated back to just a bit smaller ID than original specs, then have it reamed out. I have no idea how costs would compare to sleeving. There are challenges to electro-plating the inside of a bore, but this case is large enough that it isn't that difficult. However, the things we bore plated were done using cadmium, not industrial chrome. Except I don't really know that they never bore plated in the chrome section of the plating shop where I worked - I was seldom asked to work on anything chrome - just small pot metal pieces - mostly fishing reel handles. How would straight hot nickel hold up? (We plated oil-field flipper valves with that method, and that process might put the material on more evenly than the other type of plating.) Is stainless steel better than industrial chrome? Questions I do not know the answer to.

I would probably use something different if I was doing it now, but undercoating was pretty much all that was available back in 80-81, when I was at that point. (Maybe rock-guard was already being used, but would have been really expensive compared to the stuff I used, and at that time I was just looking at rebuilding it as a daily driver. Also, seems I heard some negative things about that early rock-guard stuff.) Anyway, I did mine both inside and underneath. Did it with the body off of the frame, so it's completely coated. Afterwards I wished I hadn't done it inside because of the smell, but it cured over time, and then I painted it with enamel.

Never trust the internet with something you want to keep.

Yeah, Don Coatney used it quite a bit too, and so all of those are already gone. (Fortunately I had copied lots of his photos that were pertinent to my own car. Maybe I should search for your threads as well, to get copies of pictures I might need in the future, and have missed.)

While it WAS in Texas, you can "mark yourself safe" from that. (It was a 68 Dodge Polara station wagon that I converted into an enclosed trailer, in 82. But I sold it the following Summer to a Canadian who used it to move back home. Doubt if it ever made it back to Texas.)

Should I admit that the only time I welded sheet metal I used a gas torch and bailing wire?

I have wondered if they were actually intended to maintain that area closed, even when the pedals are depressed. So if they are just meant to seal the area when the pedal is up, I think I would make something of a bit different design, something with a spring, perhaps. Or maybe one of those "accordian" type boots that modern vehicles use to run the wire loom into the doors - fix the bottom end, and let the top end compress against the bottom of the floor when the pedals are released, as per your description of the originals. Or, perhaps some sort of leather boot affair, long enough to allow free movement of the pedals. I think I would attached it at the top side, however. But I haven't experimented with this yet. Presumably the purpose is to prevent dust, water spray, and fumes from entering the cabin. I haven't figured out how to get up in there to close it, but my 46 has a gap in the sheet metal way up in the left cowl area behind the cowl to frame brace/mount that goes right into the space in front of the left front door. I cannot actually see it, just feeling up in there from the bottom. And I know for sure that there is no such opening on the right side. It's as if the sheet metal piece that forms that area was missing a corner, and it was just used anyway. From feeling up in there, it's clear to me that it is a factory cut edge - not a ragged edge at all. And I'm pretty sure no cables or such like went up through there.

Just a thought, but if the seat comes loose and you have seat belts, then it's your body that is restraining the weight of the seat from flying forward. Maybe add some straps across the wood underneath, to reinforce the seat's connection to the body.

Our county here in Ohio is now using some sort of brine instead of salt, and people say it is worse than the rock salt they used to spread on the roads. Also, my point here is that they SPRAY it on. If they are doing the same there in Indiana, maybe the wind is blowing it in your direction, or possibly what ever it is they use is being kicked up by passing vehicles. Seem strange though, that there is such a noticeable difference between the bumper and the bumper guards. I wonder if the bumper guards were made some place different, and were not tri-coat chrome (copper-nickel-chrome). Back when we had cars with chrome on them, we rubbed it down after each car wash, with some sort of chrome polish that was commonly found at truck stops. It was in a metal can, with something soaked into like shredded rags, or just lumps of string. The idea is that chrome can develop pin holes, then the rust comes out and just spreads out over the surface. Then when it's polished, you don't see any rust spots at all, they are so tiny.

That is really interesting to me, because folks from the East sometimes characterized states like Oklahoma as being 'backward'. My Oklahoma title for my 46 even includes the original sale date, so I am assuming that it was issued a title when it was sold for the first time, in late 1946. (My Dad isn't living anymore, or I would ask him about the 37 Dodge that was hiss first car, or, if it was still 1982 or earlier, my grandpa, who was born in 1893, and drove for oil-rich people in Oklahoma in the 20's. (I do recall that my other Grandpa's first car was a Ford Model T already by around '27 or '28, didn't need to do any kind of test to get a driver's license - at that time, you just had to fill out a form and pay a license fee. That was also Oklahoma.)

It is my understanding that on the cars at least, the frame number is the original engine number. (When I cleaned up and painted my frame - Summer of 1980 - I didn't know any of this. I haven't wanted to destroy the frame paint job to find the number there, and the original engine was gone already when I bought the car.) So I wonder if a replacement engine number was added at the beginning of the title ID #. In a search earlier today, I found a scanned book about the Canadian vehicles (covering 1929 - 1953), and it says that the SN plate is located on either the right side A pillar, or on the fire wall (engine side) above the steering column. I downloaded this resource from: https://armyvehiclemarking.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/AVM-Dodge-Serials-Book-up-to-1952-compressed.pdf (Maybe everyone on the PU side already has this book. So far I've only collect the automobile manuals.)

We used to clean up pennies with a vinegar and salt mixture - wonder if that would work to clean the corrosion off of old stranded wire. Obviously, a person would need to get something else on it right away, but am I way out in left field? (Hadn't though of this until reading this thread, just now. Probably a hair-brained idea.)

I don't know about other states, but here in Ohio, when I bought an old car (75 Dart) from an individual out of state, I had to drive over to an area dealership to verify the VIN. (This could also have been done at the BMV, but the dealership was closer, and the fee was only a few bucks.) I would suspect that most states will want to see something of a SN tag. Did some of these Dodge PUs have the tag inside the glove box? Seems I recall something to that effect.

Are there holes on the A pillar where the SN tag is normally located (on the cars - not sure about the PUs)? (On the cars, the SN tag is on the A pillar, on the left side for most of the P15s, and on the right side for the 42 models. The number on the frame - on the cars - is the engine number, not the SN, which MoPar intended to be used as the vehicle identification number for titling purposes.) The main question is whether you have a title. Some states DID use the engine number, so that may be on the title, if you have one. (I guess the other question is whether it has the original engine, or if it has one at all.)

Well, that's starts right away, correct? (Maybe that's why it still looks so nice & shiny.)

Our church group had annual one week youth camp in Roman Nose. I think that the last time I was that far west in Oklahoma was in around 81 or 82, in Clinton, for a 50th wedding anniversary for a Cheyenne couple I knew from studying the language. A group of us sang for them (in Cheyenne), but I don't remember now even what song it was. I still have my old cowboy hat - straw hat, actually, with the Cheyenne bead work still sewn on it, something that was given to me by either them, or another Cheyenne language teacher. (All I remember now is part of a Bible verse she taught me. Learning Cheyenne was practice for what I did later - Bible translation for a tribe in Brazil.) My folks both attended the Mennonite High School, Corn Bible Academy, when it was still located in Corn. (Incidentally, my great grandfather, on my mom's side, was one of the original white settlers in Korn, as it was originally called.)

Unfortunately I don't have an extra transmission either. (The parts car came out of a salvage, and the trannie was already gone when I bought the car.)

Just a caution - I would be careful about media blasting pot metal. I started to clean up an aluminum roaster pan (not thin metal) for my mom by glass bead blasting, but even being cautious with it (holding the nozzle back), it roughened the surface. (This was, however, an industrial blaster, at the plating shop where I worked at the time. There was no such thing as soda blasting, or other alternative media at that time, unless they just didn't use it. We had glass bead & Aluminum Oxide. There WAS another type of media used for cleaning gold & silver - not sure what it was, as I never worked in that department.)

Welcome to the forum! I somehow missed your intro. I am also from Oklahoma, but now living in Ohio. I grew up north of Tulsa, between Owasso & Collinsville. (16 miles north of downtown Tulsa, and 16 miles west of downtown Claremore.) Where 'bouts you at?