Desotodav

Sign on Paul's garage...

Extended trading hours?...

Story does sound somewhat familiar... cat starts fire & is now nowhere to be found! What do you reckon Paul?

Sorry to hear of your situation Mark. I am confident that with your skills, abilities and your positive outlook on life that you will be back at work in no time.

I found the thread as this provided an answer to the second question which you put forward.... I still haven't pinstriped the wheels on my blue 52 truck. Maybe one day as I reckon they would look good with silver stripes!

We've had discussions on wheel pin stripes before. You may find those posts if you do a forum search. I'm on my iPhone at present otherwise I would have sent you a link.

Time really seems to pass so slowly when plodding along with these complete re-builds. It has been some 7 months since I have posted anything on my build thread... but rest assured that there is always something going on! I dropped the hood pieces and the hood support/radiator cowl piece off to the guys today as they are finally putting the truck back together. It has been a long (and quite expensive) journey but the end is now in sight! The panel repair guys could finish the project in the next month, but my bank account will need another break before then! I had my son photoshop a few colors from old MOPAR color pallets so that I could try to match an older style color to the 'coupe' truck vehicle shape (photo attached). The original color of the truck was almost like NAVY Grey, which my Painter told me would always look like primer paint so he preferred that I went with another color. In the end... I decided that he was probably correct and I have decided to paint the 'Pop' coupe truck an off-white. I have booked a final paint slot for January 2018. I still have all of the electrics and all of the chroming out at friend's shops and don't expect any of those parts back soon. The whole lot should come together nicely over the next 6 months or so though. I have many more progressive photos of the build, but I have just attached a couple of photos here from my visit to the panel shop today.

I haven't had much to do with the earlier model trucks, but I would suggest that the 2-tone paint was a factory option. I put the word out a few years back for a girl who wanted to sell her 37 Dodge and I had quite a few people contact me saying that they were interested in the truck. I would have bought it myself if I wasn't planning on going so deep into my 53 coupe truck project... but I put the seller in touch with the buyer and the deal was made. I must say that Ben had done a fantastic job of restoring the old rig - check out the 2-tone paint on his truck...

Hey Andy D... I got your email! I agree with you in that gets a little confusing here in Oz as we refer to many different vehicles as a 'ute'. The 53 Dodge truck which I am presently restoring (like the grey one in the photos above) is referred to as a 'coupe ute', but it is really a truck. I suppose that it all depends on a matter of opinion. I generally differentiate a MOPAR ute here by referring to it as car-styled ute or a truck-styled ute. Here are a few photos of car-styled utes which belong to friends of mine...

I have a friend considering selling his ute Reg... I'll have to keep you in mind when he finally makes up his mind and gives me some numbers.

Well done Keven. It's good to see you 'back in the saddle'. I look forward to watching your build. How was Brent?... is he alright? it's gotta be at least 6 months since he bought another truck so I suspect that he was suffering withdrawal symptoms at the time!

Oops... wifey doesn't approve. She said something about never going in the truck with that on the door. Oh well... back to the drawing board!!!

I came across another MOPAR sticker/sign whilst surfing Ebay this morning... http://www.ebay.com/itm/DE-SOTO-right-Sticker-Pin-up-droite-/132201828941?var=&hash=item1ec7d7d24d:m:mFGTGgMJtgH5eGUffx9knkA I reckon this one would look good faded into the doors of my 53 coupe truck. Will have to run the idea by my wife!..

Thanks for the great photos Merle. That copper tone sure is different. I was at a car show myself today. Seems that the judges really liked my 52, and also a GMC pickup there as well.

The dual horns were an option available back in the day. They pop up on Ebay occasionally, but are usually quite expensive. I bought both of my dual horn sets as a pair. I thought that changing the pitch was as simple as making a slight adjustment, but I was advised that they were manufactured with a high and a low tone. I have a set of 6 volt dual horns on my 52 truck and am presently piecing a 12v pair together for my 53 truck (which most likely will not end up dual-tone).

I an very happy for you Paul and feel that this device will work well for you as Darlene is a lovely person. But really... a device that lets a fella hear his wife all the time? That would rule out any excuse of 'selective hearing' when it comes to having to complete those 'honey-do' jobs! Sometimes a fella just needs some clear head-space!

Might pay to drop Mark (ggdad 1951) a PM as he has restored a couple of them. See thread to follow......

I had a couple of stainless steel pipes bent for my trucks at my local exhaust shop. The bending mandrel wasn't quite right, but I reckon they got them close enough. I took them the old pipe as a template. The cost was $30 each.

The tab on the vibrating horn plate goes to the back of the points set - see first attached photo. The small flat mounting plates go on the outside of the curved mounting plates. There should have been small round spacers between those curved mounting plates (where the plates attach to the bolts in the horn) as well. It was a bit hard to see in my dual horn photos, so I have attached a photo of a dual horn set which should make it easier to see... and have attached a copy of my dual horns which show the spacers near the relay - the single horn mounting setup is the same as the duals. I have been working on putting together a 12v dual pair for my 53 coupe truck, so I have a couple of single horns here if you need more photos.

Great advice Mike... was thinking that myself. Check to see if the 'woodruff key' (part 6-45-3) is still in place...

I'd be interested to see what your paint codes are like. Some of the other paint tags which I have seen here in Oz seem to four digits then a dash and another 4 digits... 'XXXX - XXXX'

I have been reading this topic with interest as I was searching the internet for a reference to color codes just the other day. Is it possible that Canadian color codes may have made their way to Australia?... and is there a way of deciphering the color code from the small data plate fitted to our vehicles here? I have attached a photo of the color data plate fitted to my 52 DeSoto truck here in Oz (truck built in Canada but assembled in Oz). I believe that the color is 'Waterway Blue'. My research only found small pieces of information/suggestions from other vehicle makes. Is it possible that the 'DC' at the start of that plate number may stand for Duco, '51' may possibly be the paint color year, and 'U' is maybe a reference for acrylic paint (or something?), and the final number could be the paint code # ? Does that make sense to you in the know?... or can you point me to somewhere where I might research some more? My curiosity of paint codes arose when I was reading a Facebook post recently and the owner posted a photo of the paint code tag from his 52 Dodge truck (also built in Canada but assembled in Oz)... photo of his tag attached also. Both his truck year and the paint code show similarities to mine.

Those old MOPAR boat engines sure are an interesting setup. There was a guy selling one just around the corner from my place a while back...

My old friend out west modifies his oil pump/s to take hoses for an inlet and outlet which run to a remote oil filter. He has done this on all of his MOPAR's (46 Dodge truck, 55 Dodge sedan, and 56 DeSoto ute).

I dug out both of my different spare tire mounting bars for a photo. One of them is more noticeably bent upwards on one end than the other. I have the flatter version on both my 52 and 53 trucks here in Oz..