My 1957 L6-226 Wagon Build.

March 3rd update:

I have been on the other side of the world for the last few weeks working. So with a little help from the jetlag I decided to work on the wagon.

In the last installment I decided to pull the door latch out and apart to see why it wasn't working properly. I found the clockspring that keeps tension on the fork broken and needed to get a new spring if not a whole new assembly.



Scanning the web and some of the good used sources on this forum I found a nos latch mechanism in england and a good used one from Casey out in California. I also found the clock springs from a guy on ebay in Missouri. With all three things ordered I had to go out of town rather abruptly. When the paycheck calls with an open expense account you gotta do what you gotta do.

Fast forward to yesterday when I get home from 27 hours of air travel, feeling like a champ, I find the NOS latch from England is for the passenger door and not the left or driver's door like asvertised. Fortunately Casey's part was in good working order. With a little cleaning, a lube and testing all was good and it was installed.



Not a great photo - but imagine this inside(and flipped for the left side



After that it was time to rebuild the guts of the door and window:





It will be so nice having a working vent wing window on the driver's side.

I also splurged on new lock tumblers from a guy on ebay. The driver's side is in and functioning. Two more locks to go.



Its, 236am in Kansas. While my body still disagrees, its time for bed, hopefully.

More tomorrow.....I think.

Good work Ben.

For what it's worth, I also purchased a door latch for my drives door and upon receiving it discovered that it was for the passenger door.

Sunday update on Monday:

I started off by finishing up the Driver's door rebuild.



I need to touchup the brown paint but, function before fashion.

I then started working on the distributor mount with the broken ear. I noticed the crack shortly after I parked it for the salty road winter period.



I got a spare from a member online and quickly got the switched out. I will take the broken on to my Aluminum welder to get repaired and put into spare storage.



While I don't have a lot of pictures I did find a broken clutch pedal return spring while checking fluids so I replaced it with a spare and the wagon was road worthy again. Back into daily commuter status.

Road tires have been order for the Yellowstone trip and I am going to work on alignment Wednesday night. With my upcoming work schedule it will be all hands on deck when possible to have the rig ready.

More to come.

Friday, April 6th update.

Its been awhile since I have had time to prep the wagon for the trip to Yellowstone. Spending lots of time in Japan for work makes it had to get barn time.

I started off by unloading the road tires for the Wagon. 99% of the trip to YNP will be on pavement so I will save our ears and my army tires for another day.



Then I went about installing an oil pressure gauge. I have the stock dummy light and the gauge on the filter. But it would be nice to see whats going on from the driver's seat.

With this setup I am getting the pressure reading from the oil rail where all the lifter and bearings are fed.







The filter reads a bit lower than the rail side of the system just like my old Chevy did. The filter is really just a controlled leak anyways.

Then I decided to pull the drag link and cuss a bit. I had ordered the rebuild parts from walck's some time ago and today they were going in.

With everything apart I found one broken spring. Eventually I will need new balls but today they looks usable.







After finding most of the rebuild components didn't work I used the good old parts got it all assembled and adjjust oer the manual. I may have done some swearing to while trying to make the wrong sized new parts work.

After that I took a photo of the work bench. More Sunday.



All of that fits in the back or in the tool boxes under the driver/passenger seat.

More to come.

Welcome back to the States. Looks like you are checking off maintenance items one at a time.

Sunday, April 8th update.

Swivel ball seal day.

Today my goal was to get the seals on either end of the front axle swapped out for new ones as the driver's side wasn't holding fluid, or corn head grease.



I hadn't done this during the overhaul because I didn't know how they were then and figured I would wait and see.

Dissassembly went easily. The driver's side was pretty low on "fluid". It was caked up enough that it is hard to day if it was the original seal.



In the picture above you can see the new seal in place but sticking out a little. I didn't know it but figured it out on the other side that the original metal backing plate for the rubber seal must need to be replaced as well. I will get to take that out in a few weeks after the next Asia trip.

Being ignorant (of the error I mean) I buttoned it all up and added fluid.



Then I moved to the other side. In this side I found an extra metal tag noting "Bendix Joint"



Looking through the fill hole on the housing I can see the U-joint assembly.



In the picture below you can see the metal backer plate of the older style two piece seal assembly. This one pulled out with the seal and I had a bit of a WTF moment since this didn't happen on the other side.

After seeking enlightenment and reading the manual I learned this was part of the assembly. It also looked like the new seal assemply has the metal part inside the rubber - so one piece instead of two.

Once they were buttoned up I filled them with Champion brand 00 grease. Which says it is designed for this. I also have John Deere Corn Head Grease but I figured I would try this.



In the picture above I decided to cut the felt wiper pad in a non straight line approach. My hope is that this cut method doesn't give a straight gap for foreign matter to travel into the swivel seal. Maybe we will see how it goes.

More to come in a few weeks.

I was just looking at axle shaft steering joint identification and even though my passenger side joint said it had a Bendix joint shaft inside; it was actually a Spicer u joint shaft inside. At least I am pretty sure that is what I was looking at inside the housing. At some point I will open it up and check.

Today I wrapped up changing tires. I did two tires Tuesday and the last two today. I am switching from the Firestone army tires over to Samson road tires. I ordered them some time ago from simple tire as they were advertised for antique trucks......or Trailers as the sidewall says.....


Anywho on the went.







Those 10 ply tires sure are fun to spoon on with tire irons and your knees....



Done!

Doing them tires old school. You are no doubt a manly man.

They should roll a little more like round tires than the others. Ha

Very cool,

Duane

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

Thanks Duane - I think I am a little cheap and it feels good to do it. Once you know how it isn't such a big deal.

After a 36 mile run for some leaded fuel I can say the 10ply road tires are MUCH quieter and the steering is much tighter with way less body roll than before. So far so good.

I am running out of things to tick off the list before the YNP trip which is a little over a month away. This weekend I will swap the front axle pinion seal, install the NOS vented dana 44 diff cover and see what other trouble I can get into. I have my spare radiator being recored for the trip, and I found out that honeycomb cores like my original/current radiator has are available again for recoring old radiators. That will be a future project as the honeycomb radiator is cool looking.

Just as an fyi to anyone interested in the Firestone army tires - after 5,300miles they have between 2/3 and 1/2 the tread left. I will put them back on at some point.

More to come.

I will start a trip thread in the trip section when we shove off.

Flinthillsben said:

Thanks Duane - I think I am a little cheap and it feels good to do it. Once you know how it isn't such a big deal.

After a 36 mile run for some leaded fuel I can say the 10ply road tires are MUCH quieter and the steering is much tighter with way less body roll than before. So far so good.

I am running out of things to tick off the list before the YNP trip which is a little over a month away. This weekend I will swap the front axle pinion seal, install the NOS vented dana 44 diff cover and see what other trouble I can get into. I have my spare radiator being recored for the trip, and I found out that honeycomb cores like my original/current radiator has are available again for recoring old radiators. That will be a future project as the honeycomb radiator is cool looking.

Just as an fyi to anyone interested in the Firestone army tires - after 5,300miles they have between 2/3 and 1/2 the tread left. I will put them back on at some point.

More to come.

I will start a trip thread in the trip section when we shove off.

Click to expand...

Looking forward to your trip info. Oldest son has done YNP from southern Ca twice since I started this Wagon. Love that park. Went 5 or 6 years ago with oldest daughter.

Have fun. Great memories have to be made, not watched on TV.

Duane

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

Flinthillsben said:

Done!

Click to expand...

Just noticed the subtle Yellowstone plates. Looks great and I hope the month goes without a hitch so you and your family can enjoy that trip and the biggest issue being what to see not whether the car will make it or not.

Tilatobawillys said:

Just noticed the subtle Yellowstone plates. Looks great and I hope the month goes without a hitch so you and your family can enjoy that trip and the biggest issue being what to see not whether the car will make it or not.

Click to expand...

Yep - the plate will be removed before the trip to ensure nobody climbs in for an unwanted selfie.

This will be the third 60+ year old vehicle I have driven to Yellowstone and back so I am pretty confident. By then the 6000 miles of break in and prep will have helped as well. I have spares at home ready to ship where needed, lots of new or used parts are a phone call and few days away so I am not stressed about it. Preventative maintenance and listening to what the vehicle tell you are key.

Flinthillsben said:

Yep - the plate will be removed before the trip to ensure nobody climbs in for an unwanted selfie.

This will be the third 60+ year old vehicle I have driven to Yellowstone and back so I am pretty confident. By then the 6000 miles of break in and prep will have helped as well. I have spares at home ready to ship where needed, lots of new or used parts are a phone call and few days away so I am not stressed about it. Preventative maintenance and listening to what the vehicle tell you are key.

Click to expand...

True, we got spoiled by computers in cars but even now you have to listen for things that a computer can't yet detect. Older cars require you to be the computer.

You're wagon looks great Ben! The tires should make a big difference. I hope you have a safe and relaxing trip.

Big Dog Frank said:

You're wagon looks great Ben! The tires should make a big difference. I hope you have a safe and relaxing trip.

Click to expand...

Thanks Frank!

Sunday update :

Today I started off by replacing the input seal on the front axle. The existing one likes to leak and while I don't mind applying asphalt preserver to the public roads it can get a little expensive.

Here is the input shaft, drive shaft and axle without the worn seal.



The I went about tapping in the new one and the paper gasket.



Ignore the felt washer - it didn't have a spot in the assembly. At least not that I could see.

It went pretty quick.



After that I sorted tool boxes into the underseat storage. Craftsman sells small plastic tool boxes that fit well under the seat in the boxes.

More to come.

Got a good 250-300miles in yesterday and today. Short of a last minute shakedown run this will be the final mileage prior to the Yellowstone trip. I swapped in the 160F thermostat last night for todays 85F degree 175 miles and installed the CJ hood latches to stop the hood flop that happens at cruising speed. I also put my slightly more incognito license plate on.





Tomorrow the headliner goes in. Then we start on the the 6,000 mile service. I got on the road roughly a year ago - so not a bad year mileage-wise.

I have a cool idea for the underseat tool boxes. If it works I will share it tomorrow in the Sunday report.

See you in the funnies.

That's a newspaper joke if you know what that is.......

Headliner day!!!!

As a pre warning I can say once I was in the heat of it I didn't get many photos. So I will share what I have and will get more Tuesday.

I started with a 9' × 12' woven canvas drop cloth. The kind you would find for a painters drop cloth. I lined up the centerline as best as possible and started from the rear upholstery line.



For this setup the bows will be visible - covered wagon style.

I used a staple gun and just worked my way around the upholstery in the ceiling adding bows.



It gets hot inside a tent inside a car....



The centerline was hard to keep straight so over the length I was about two inches to one side.

I trimmed the uphostery line with oak trim and brass like screws, and tucked the canvas into the window surrounds. I will get some more photos later. I am beat.

More to come.

Here are some more pics of the headliner and modified refrigerator magnet map holders installed on the windshield trip.







I found this trick in an old grain trick for holding weigh in receipts from the local Co-op. Works well from the recording trip meter distances for fuel mileage and also holding paper maps.