Hillbilly Hauler, or.. my first diesel

[Beagle]

I'm starting to wonder if SBG put a curse on me. I finished the drivers side in the almost dark last night, drove it a little and was really happy. I go to do the passenger side a few minutes ago and whammo - cracked rotor, messed up pads, horked brake caliper pistons. So much for 60.00 ... more like 3 times more and three times as long as it shoulda taken. Nobody here to help bleed the brakes. True to that Murphy feller's proposition I suppose. Ah well, it's still 3 times cheaper than one payment on Bruab's Sixty Thousand Dollar Mom Buggy (see front page Jeep story).

not sure if you can see the detail here but it's not real pretty.



smooth...



the gouges are where I spread the caliper to get them off the rotor which had a lovely matching gouge on one side and worn down so bad I had to become abusive to the caliper to even get it off the rotor.


awesome. Just awesome. Like rays of sunlight. Little jerk that started it all - the one on the far right is extra special but I couldn't get a focus on it.



and obligatory custom tool:




oh ... almost forgot. Truck in air with busted leg:



I had said something in a previous post on Scott Liggett's truck thread about 3 ton jackstands being okay for an unlifted 1/2 ton but just barely enough for a 3/4 ton, Squirrel said 6 ton would be the ticket. He's right. I bought a pair and they are a lot less scarey (much bigger). Worth 40.00.

The caliper is not hanging from the hose in this picture even though it looks like it. That white cord is 1600 pound strap, has ahold of the mounting bracket. There's still flex in the brake hose.

[Beagle]

Found a vacuum pump and did a halfass brake bleed on it. Still drives a ton better - the bearings on the passenger side weren't quite as roached as the drivers but holy carp, the brakes.... they worked fine but man, they were a disaster waiting to happen. So...

Thanks Tom for the bearing idea
Thanks SBG for being a pain

oh - and STILL NO PIC of the truck with the wheel back on. Use your imagination.

So...

3 x what I thought it would cost
3 x as long as I thought it should take
3 x more trips to the parts store than I thought

just at 180.00 and still 1/3 the price of one Mom Buggy payment. Yay truck.

[DanStokes]

You forgot ; 1/1,000,000th. of the cost of running into some soccer mom due to equipment failure. The jump in insurance premiums alone would pay for this repair several thousand times over.

Dan

[SuperBuickGuy]

I'm starting to wonder if SBG put a curse on me. I finished the drivers side in the almost dark last night, drove it a little and was really happy. I go to do the passenger side a few minutes ago and whammo - cracked rotor, messed up pads, horked brake caliper pistons. So much for 60.00 ... more like 3 times more and three times as long as it shoulda taken. Nobody here to help bleed the brakes. True to that Murphy feller's proposition I suppose. Ah well, it's still 3 times cheaper than one payment on Bruab's Sixty Thousand Dollar Mom Buggy (see front page Jeep story).

You shall refer to me as "your worship" from here on out - and post pictures of all repairs, not matter how mundane. You dissed me, you paid. I'm good with this

[Beagle]

I was thinking more like Evil Betty...




Kung Pow. If you haven't seen it, you really should.


on the other hand, I was thinking about driving that truck down to Location X with the "free boat" behind it today without doing the passenger side until next week and after looking at those brakes, I was glad you were being you. So... not Your Worship and not Evil Betty. How about SBG?

[SuperBuickGuy]

My favorite of that style is "They call me Bruce"
best line "I love Sushi"
"Suzie's my girlfriend!!!!"

[milner351]

This all looks too familiar. My "new" 91 has a front wheel bearing starting to tell me it needs to be replaced, but it made the 1250 mile drive home. I hope to get to that sometime before the summer towing season.

Nice work - just remember - you're lucky to have the skills to be able to do all this stuff yourself, and you've saved not only the money to have someone else do it but the invaluable cost of the saved frustration from paying someone else to do it wrong the first time, and possibly again the second time.

[G-Motive]

Familiar is an understatement .... I think I've installed about 50,000 of those Gas Magnums.

[Beagle]

o'reilly specials... not really my favorite. Budget driven.

So this is a moving target now - something is still messed up but it changes according to which way the wind is blowing. It gets death wobble around 50, plus or minus 15 mph and never the same speed. If anything, with the new bearings/races and rotor, the wobble speed moved up to about 55 instead of 45. My Lightning did this too but it got better after a sacrificial book of checks and replacing every moving part in the front end. I wasn't looking to do the same with this truck but I guess I should just do it, it doesn't cost that much. The radius arm bushings look original and worn out.

Would that make sense for a moving target issue? The radius arms moving around courtesy of crusty old high mile bushings? It drove great for about 50 miles, then every bad habit it has started showing up again when I put it out on the highway for an extended trip. It gets to be like a hoppity hop at around 60. If you slow down, it'll settle down. If you speed up, sometimes it will settle down. If you hit one of the many Camry swallowing pot holes, it changes behavior but will still pogo, just at different speeds.

high mileage stuff is kind of interesting and definitely cheap, but I'm about ready to find something with a couple hundred thousand less miles on it.

oh yeah, since I'm sorta bi-polar, here's a picture for SBG.

[Russell]

I have never done it but if the radius arms bushings look warn I would start there. There is always the solid axle and leaf spring swap! how is the mustang coming?

[STINEY]

My buddy (who maintained a whole FLEET of E-350 based breadtrucks for 15 years) said that those radius arm bushings are the key to the whole front end. If they are bad, you don't stand a chance of making it go down the road correctly, according to him.

He also said to stay far away from fancy aftermarket bushings here. They just can't take the abuse and wear uber-fast.

And they can look fine and still be bad. So if you have some that look just a little suspect, they are really, really whooped. He recommends replacement every 30,000-40,000 miles, like clockwork.

[STINEY]

I second the vote for solid axle leaf spring swap, just for the record.

[Russell]

My buddy (who maintained a whole FLEET of E-350 based breadtrucks for 15 years) said that those radius arm bushings are the key to the whole front end. If they are bad, you don't stand a chance of making it go down the road correctly, according to him.

He also said to stay far away from fancy aftermarket bushings here. They just can't take the abuse and wear uber-fast.

And they can look fine and still be bad. So if you have some that look just a little suspect, they are really, really whooped. He recommends replacement every 30,000-40,000 miles, like clockwork.

Wow 30-40k I wonder how many trucks with 100-200k still have the OEM bushings?

[STINEY]

Wow 30-40k I wonder how many trucks with 100-200k still have the OEM bushings?

Probably tons. Buddy Ben says that's why these Fords have the reputation of steering like herding cats.

[Russell]

I have driven some sloppy fords but non of them were anywhere close to the Dodge that I had the rubber was coming out of the four link bars. It was not un common to have to steer right to go through a left hand turn on the highway I do miss the 12 valve