Will E Coyote and the 59 el Camino
07-20-2009, 05:52 PM
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Will E Coyote and the 59 el Camino
Today I finished the last of the welding of repair panels. So far I have disassembled some of it, power washed the Texas sand off it, heat gun and scraped the rustproofing off it, sandblasted some of it, cut out and replaced the floor boards and a variety of other rust spots.
While under the car, I noticed a small stone laying part way out of one of the holes along the bottom of the frame rail. The frame rails are boxes of welded steel panels. They have perforations here and there for attachements and I think for factory lift and assembly points. Anyway, I poked at the stone and it fell out of the hole along with a little trickle of dirt and gravel. Sort of like when Will E Coyote is standing on a thin out crop ledge over a canyon, just before it cacks and he falls.. Yea, like that a little trickle of stones. I was perplexed because I thought all the heavy power washing would have cleared everything out. So I poke a little more, thinking, maybe some dirt got packed in by the water spray and now it has finally dried out enough. So, like Will E. Coyote, I poked at the hole some more, and more dirt and pebbles fell out. So I got out my ACME air hose and blow gun kit, like will E. Coyote, and poked that into the hole and squeezed the trigger. Like the look on Will E Coyote's face when the cliff breaks off, I was dumbfounded to see a huge billowing cloud of dirt and dust blow out the far end of the frame rail. AArruugghhh!!! So I spent the next hour running coat hanger wire into all the holes along the frame rail and stirring up and blowing out the dirt and stuff still remaining inside the rail box. Just as I was wiping the grit out of my eyelashes, like Will E Coyote, it dawned on me that, that was just the one side...must the other frame rail still be packed too? Duh! Sure enough another billowing cloud of dirt came out of that side too, but not so much.
and so it goes, cleaning and grinding and fixing, oh my!
Steve
While under the car, I noticed a small stone laying part way out of one of the holes along the bottom of the frame rail. The frame rails are boxes of welded steel panels. They have perforations here and there for attachements and I think for factory lift and assembly points. Anyway, I poked at the stone and it fell out of the hole along with a little trickle of dirt and gravel. Sort of like when Will E Coyote is standing on a thin out crop ledge over a canyon, just before it cacks and he falls.. Yea, like that a little trickle of stones. I was perplexed because I thought all the heavy power washing would have cleared everything out. So I poke a little more, thinking, maybe some dirt got packed in by the water spray and now it has finally dried out enough. So, like Will E. Coyote, I poked at the hole some more, and more dirt and pebbles fell out. So I got out my ACME air hose and blow gun kit, like will E. Coyote, and poked that into the hole and squeezed the trigger. Like the look on Will E Coyote's face when the cliff breaks off, I was dumbfounded to see a huge billowing cloud of dirt and dust blow out the far end of the frame rail. AArruugghhh!!! So I spent the next hour running coat hanger wire into all the holes along the frame rail and stirring up and blowing out the dirt and stuff still remaining inside the rail box. Just as I was wiping the grit out of my eyelashes, like Will E Coyote, it dawned on me that, that was just the one side...must the other frame rail still be packed too? Duh! Sure enough another billowing cloud of dirt came out of that side too, but not so much.
and so it goes, cleaning and grinding and fixing, oh my!
Steve
07-21-2009, 02:37 PM
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Leave it to Mopar guys to think weight and performance. As I was restoring my 1970 Challenger, I went to a swap meet looking for original cast iron 440 exhaust manifolds. I found a guy with a huge Igloo cooler full of Mopar cast iron. I offered to buy the exhaust manifolds and he said just take the whole thing...he meant the whole cooler full of cast iron, "Everybody wants to swap out the iron for aluminum intakes and such."
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