wallytoo

in putting the various body panels back on the truck after getting the motor back in, i am missing a few of the bolts and the steel spring-clips that hold the panels togethter. these are the hex-head (1/2") bolts with squared threads. are there sources for those? thanks, wally

welcome to the forum. while not from idaho, i used to work out of coeur d'alene, and spent a fair amount of time up in bonner's ferry and naples (yes, that naples, during that time) i also worked briefly down in elk river. had a coworker who lived over in spokane, so i often made a triangle drive from coeur d'alene, spokane, and bonner's. enjoyed exploring many of the old mining trails and mines. wally

it runs. took a bit of adjusting to get the distributor correctly aligned so that the points opened at the correct time. once that was correct, it fired up instantly, on 1.5 year-old gas that was in the tank. without a recharge of the battery, which also sat in the truck for 1.5 years. it idles nicely. i need to adjust the clutch a bit, as the release bearing is riding the fingers.

i've ordered from gary many times. just ordered a few things 2 weeks ago. placed the order at 5:00 pm, and the parts were on my porch before 10:00 am the next morning. i also bought most of my engine rebuild (237, bored .060 over) parts from him, and his prices, for everything, were better than i could get anywhere else. i picked up my rebuild parts at his warehouse in massachusetts. had a nice conversation with him while he put my order together, too. wally

no pics. i'll try to take some tomorrow as i make more progress.

engine is now reunited with the truck. need to install the transmission, pedals, hand brake, and all the engine accessories & hose hookups.

snow (25") has been removed from truck, and truck is now in the garage, awaiting the installation of the engine. hope to do it tomorrow, and have it on the road by monday.

i resolve to get my '48 back on the road. since the engine rebuild is virtually completed, what remains is to get it back in the truck, with everything hooked up correctly. it has been about 18 months since it last ran the road.

maybe not pretty, but better than before:

update on progress, which has been slow, but is moving forward again. back in feb/march, the machine shop did their thing. bored the cylinders to .060 over, installed a completely new valvetrain, ground the crank .010 under, milled the head and block, fit the rod bushings and wrist pins, etc. sat in the garage until a few weeks ago. installed the rings on the new .060 over pistons. installed the new main bearings and crank. then had to find a rear main seal (VPW - thank you very much!!), because the one i had been sold was a bolt to the outside of the block type, and my block doesn't have that. installed the rear main, then the rods/pistons fit to the cylinders. put the oil pump back in. got the oil pickup assembly back on (taking pictures of it beforehand really paid off), then went to work on the timing gears/chain. needed to make a new oil tube for the crank gear lubrication system. used some steel brake line and a steel cable holder, and bent it to fit. should work. installed the new timing chain (after aligning the marks, and making sure #1 was TDC). used thread sealer/teflon on the timing chain cover bolts that pass into the water jacket. got the balancer installed over the crank, and added the jaw gear to the end. that's where i finished for the evening. hope to have just about everything else installed by the end of the day tomorrow.

only saw the beginning of it, at 1:35 am. fairly heavy cloud cover, but moving swiftly, which allowed some breaks to see the event.

the flat side with the lip does indeed go "up".

not only seen it, i've worked on it. friend up the road had it for a short time, sold it about 5 months ago. has the saddle tank instead of the tank between the framerails. the original fuel filler isn't attached to anything. it had a plywood headboard that we junked, since it looked terrible. it's a nice rig, and the two-speed works. the tires are pretty good, too.

don't suppose it's green, with a gravel body dump?

the interference is the piston skirts in the #3 and #4 catch the end of the distributor and won't allow it to slide by. ask me how i know this. what you really want is for #3 and #4 to be at the top of the block, so the skirts are up in the bores. that applies to the 25" block, which i have. don't know about the 23" block.

there's no way a b1f weighs only 3200 lbs. my b1fa152 weighs over 4.5 tons. with just a chassis, i'd expect the b1f to weigh over 6000 lbs.

i like it even better when i get to "downshift" without the clutch - using the two-speed rear.

that's subjective. i happen to enjoy driving my 1.5-ton a lot.

makes sense, don. that may be why most of the big trucks were equipped with a governor, too.

interesting that only the "4-H" is a 2-ton, while the others are 1.5-ton.

not neccessarily. i was able to find some in-line voltage reducers that seem to work for the heater and wipers. i mounted them under the steering column, just inside the dash (the reducers get warm). the lights you'll have to change.

and my answer remains the same. the truck can travel at a slightly higher speed for a given gear in high range vs low range.

uh, yes, for a given gear. not a lot faster, but mine will go about 15 mph faster in 4th high vs. 4th low. wally

i agree. the eaton on my 1.5-ton works great. shifts quickly and cleanly, up or down. wally

nah. i'm a cheap s-o-b. i only want to buy stuff once, so i maintain what i do buy. my lawnmower was purchased new in 1998. i keep the blade sharp and the air filter clean, too. the snowblower was a freebie "throw-in" from a craigslist purchase 3 years ago, wasn't running. i cleaned the carb and got it running. i've spent about $40 on it, and it works fine (it's a 1974 toro). i spray it down with wd-40 after EVERY use during the winter, to minimize corrosion to the sheet metal and other exterior parts. every one of my vehicles has over 100K (2 have more than 200K) on it. they run, they're safe, they're reasonably reliable. why get rid of them?