Pete's 1960 Wagon

Spent some more time on the axle... I was thinking that the king pin bearings looked pretty good, until I put them in and tried to adjust the preload... When I turned the knuckle, it sort of "racheted" around the arc. Not good, so I ordered new bearings from KW. Fast forward another week, and the new bearings arrived.

I put the new bearings in, set the preload, and installed the new seals.

Pulled the wagon back into the garage, and started the dis-assembly of the original axle that has been hacked on for a SOA conversion, and then was returned to SUA (quite poorly I might add...)

Got one side all apart before calling it a night.

I'm going to clean up the brakes and brake backing plates a bit, and put them back on the new axle. I'll use them until I get new 11" brakes, or an axle upgrade at some point.

Getting closer to Moab- :cheers:

Pete

Looking good, Pete. Thanks for the informative pics. I'll be referring to these when I begin re-assembly of my axles.

~Bruce

That can't be the axle I gave you. The one I gave you was in perfect condition. :lol: I'm sure it will be when your done with it. Looks good. See you soon.

Steve

Sparky Powers said:

That can't be the axle I gave you. The one I gave you was in perfect condition. :lol: I'm sure it will be when your done with it. Looks good. See you soon.

Steve

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relative to the axle that will be coming out, it was perfect... Can't wait to finish it up for Moab.

Pete

Getting closer on the axle...

Out with the old greasy mess...

In with the new...


Just did a hack "scrape and paint" on the brake backing plates that were already on the wagon. Whittled off an inch of crud, and sprayed them black so they wouldn't look so bad with the clean axle. Planning to replace them later on with either a disc conversion or an 11" drum swap.

Tomorrow I will try to get the brake drums cleaned up and installed with the Warm M2 Hubs. Once that is done, just need to clean up the drag link and install the rebuild kit, and I'm ready to roll...

Realized once I had the axle in, that I will probably need castor shims... The old axle didn't have any, but the cobbed on spring perches had way too much castor. Planning to get an alignment before Moab, so I'll have the crew at Les Schwab deal with the shims.
One step forward today, without the usual two steps back. Hoping tomorrow won't be four steps back... :cheers:

Pete

Lookin good! :thumbup:

Cleaning up the drag link, to install the rebuild kit I bought for it, I found this scary detail... The end of the drag link has a crack in it, about half way through... :shock: No idea how long it has been this way, but I have put about 3000 miles on the wagon since I bought it. It looks like from the green paint underneath the crud, that maybe this drag link came off of an old CJ or something. Who knows, but I'm happy it held together...

Luckily, Sparky gave me the drag link and pitman arm from his wagon along with the axle, so I had a spare to rebuild.

The new seals that came with the rebuild kit are just about useless... The tin cover has to be bent open to get the drag link and assembly on to the ball stud, and then can't really be bent back into place. I used a hose clamp to do the job. This will be better than what was there, which was nothing at all...

The lack of seals allowed dirt and grit to grind away at the ball studs. Hard to tell from this blurry pic, but about 1/4 of the ball is worn away on the old pitman arm.

Mounted the brake drums, Warn M2 hubs, filled the differential with lube, and whipped up a batch of knuckle pudding. Still need to put the knuckle lube in, and I'll be ready for a test drive...

Pete

Filled the knuckles when I got home tonight. Mounted the wheels and went for a test drive with the new axle.

Everything seems to work well. The whole front end feels tighter and more stable. Definitely needs an alignment, pulls a tad to the left, and needs the castor shims, but overall, much much better than before.

My Moab list just got a lot shorter...

Pete

Nice work Pete.

Sprang for new tires for the wagon... the old tires were 20 years old, according to the date code. The wouldn't balance well, and would start to hop a bit at speed. The tread was cracking out, and I wasn't comfortable running it up and down the highway for fear that one would blow and take out the body or fender...

The new tires are Toyo Open Country MT 235/85R/16 . Here's a shot of the new with the old 215/85R/16 tires.

Did a test fit, and they clear the steering drag link and rear body just fine.

Had the tire shop do an alignment too (a bit more accurate than the tape measure job I did some time ago...) There are only two adjustments to be made, one is the tow, the other is the castor (done with shims). The castor was within 1/10 of minimum spec, so we left it as is. On the way to the tire shop, the wagon was pulling quite a bit to one side. Turns out it was one of the old tires. With the new tires, and the tow set correctly, it runs out down the highway nicely. No pulling or weird darting anymore... The steering box is yet to be rebuilt, but once I get that done, the steering should be as good as it was when new.

Moab, here we come!

Pete

Side shot of new tires-

Great pic; sweet tires.

Your Wagon looks good with new "shoes" on! See ya in Moab!

They look great. I'd love to run that size too but not sure they will clear my calipers, so most likely run 235x80R17's which is the same height and width.

Put my Willys Wagon back into the garage....don't be showing off those rubber shoes!

62 OlllO said:

Put my Willys Wagon back into the garage....don't be showing off those rubber shoes!

Click to expand...

Just making sure it is road worthy for you... :lol:

Might even have to find some dirt to play in before Moab...

I'm sure the new skins will fare much better than the old ones, which were a little scary on a hillside in the mud...

Pete

Much noise from them on the highway?

Gojeep said:

Much noise from them on the highway?

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Not that I can hear over all the other noise... LOL

Brooding sky...

Are these an E rated tire and were the last ones? Just wondering if the ride is much harder due to the E rating? I know you need to run less psi due to the stiff sidewalls designed to carry much heavier loads.