F1 Project

[Jack]

^^^ 100% agree thanks for posting.

[kentucky yeti]

This is very impressive, both the amount of work and the quality!

[ryeguy2006a]

Great work as always Luke! Great tip on the speed rate, to form a long string rather than chips.

[FormTA]

Started stripping the axle. I started trying to remove the leaf spring bushings. Well, I spent like 3 hours trying to get one out. I beat the living, well, you know what out of it..... I finally figured out f I drilled out the rubber I could curl the tube inward and it would release from eye. The next day I worked on the other one and had it out in like 30-40 minutes.

Maybe some will benefit from this if they ever need to replace their bushings.

[FormTA]

So, I have continued to work on this off and on. I have finished rebuilding the rear leaf springs but I switched out the overload spring (because one was cracked in half) with a flattened helper leafs I had laying around.

I pulled them apart and wire wheeled each leaf and sprayed them each with epoxy.  I then cut strips of UHMW (ultra high molecular weight)polyethylene 1/8 thick to put between the leafs. I used this when I built the springs for my solid alxe swapped S10 Blazer. It is super durable and slippery so the springs actually slide. Anyway both sets are done and assembled.  I'll get some finished pictures soon.



Logan helped and spray some leafs amd other miscellaneous parts in epoxy.





Once we got the springs rebuilt with new eye bushings, pins and clamps we started to wire wheel and use a acid solution to clean and strip the gm 8.6 differential.






Now this part you guys might find useful/beneficial.  I am rebuilding the S10 rear disk brakes which is a swap many do to our Firebirds.

I pulled the rear cover and removed the screw pin that holds the spider gears in place. This let's you push the axles in just enough so you van remove the retaining C clip. Once the clip is out you can pull the axle shaft.



You need to remove your original backing plate to install the S10 one like this. I media blasted this, sprayed it with epoxy and then VHT satin roll bar paint.







I then installed this emergency brake rebuild kit. The only part you need to keep is the little lever that the cable attaches to.



Here you can see the slightly rusted lever. I lubed up yhe internals with high temp brake grease too.



A separate kit has the adjuster wheels. Which I installed along with the brake shoe retaining clip (ar the top)






I then installed a new backing plate and the parking brake shoe. Th backing plate was completely rusted and gone from all 3 of the S10 axles I have so new ones were sourced. It was kink of hard to find these so I don't know how much longer they'll be around.





While you are at it you should replace the axle seals and clean up the axle shaft too.



I have all of the part numbers somewhere that I used and I can list them if others will find it helpful. Also once I get the diffential completely assembled, I'll show how (or not) the 8" trans am snowflake rim fits.

More to come hopefully soon!

[ryeguy2006a]

Looking good Luke!

[5th T/A]

Beautiful work Luke as always!

Years ago when I restored my 1975 TA, I found a differential out of a 1980 Indy Pace car. I wanted the rear end for the axle ratio, but an added benefit is it had disk brakes. I can't say there was much of a difference in braking performance. But something most people don't talk about is a safety advantage to putting disk brakes on a differential that uses C-clips. With rear drums, if you break an axle on a differential that uses C clip retainers, the outboard part of the axle, brake drum and wheel can come right off. Or it may destroy the fender. When you have disk brakes the axle will stay put.

[FormTA]

I have gen 4 read disks on my TA and it is way better than the stick drums I had before. In fact they feel the same as like my wife's Acura RDX. I can stop on a dime. Now, I haven't had the S10 disks on a Firebird before but I may soon. I have another S10 axle and I was thinking I can swap the rear disks to the Formula that my son wants. We'll see....

[ryeguy2006a]

The S10 brakes are a great alternative to the LS1 rear disk brakes. In fact could be argued that they are better because you can get some combination of a 2wd and 4wd that works great with factory staggered shocks. Another cool bonus is Flynbye performance has brackets that can be used with those brakes to run the C6 Z51 13" rear rotor!

[N PRGRES]

Awesome job!

[FormTA]

Made some more progress and finished rebuilding the leaf springs and got those attached and blasted and painted some brake line brackets.







I really hope people appreciate this as I really had to dig through my parts stash to get to my original rims.

Here are how the fit the S10 rear disks.













So, they seem to fit fine. About a 1/4 of clearance and I'm sure there would be a way to attach the parking brake easily too.

Remember,  I am not running the TA rims  that was just to show folks who are looking for alternative rear disks for their F body's. I still need to find some seriously offset steel rims I can rum moon/dish hub caps to go with the 49 body. You can see the 3rd gen Camaro rims that I used to run on my 98 S10 Blazer with 31s. The offset is crazy on these.

[roadking77]

Nice work. I can appreciate having to dig something out. Although from what I gather you have a quite a bit larger stash of parts to deal with

[ryeguy2006a]

Good info on the S10 rear brakes.

[b_hill_86]

Thanks for checking. I didnt have any plans to upgrade my rear brakes but the S10 upgrade interests me and I currently run those stock wheels. Though I’m working on going back to rally’s

[MNBob]

The S10 brakes fit under my factory turbo wheels, which I believe are the smallest of all the factory wheels.  The increased stopping power was an improvement over my factory rear disks.  There are many different length E brake cables listed on rockauto.com for a Blazer, and they have end tabs that fit on the little hooks shown above.  I ran the cables down the left side of the car and crossed a long one over on the rear axle.  This eliminated the factory cable X crossover on the mufflers.

Ryan, does FlynBye still make the extension brackets to fit the 13 inch C6 brakes?  I do not see them on their website; but I might want to get a set in case I ever want to upgrade. 

[FormTA]

Good info! I also have a 79 formula that will probably get the left over S10 brakes from the other axle I have.

[FormTA]

So today I finished up what needed done to roll the axle under the frame.  I now have a rolling chassis.  I also started assembling the bed. I want to get this all lined up and welded together so I can spray it in epoxy as it's all raw metal. It does seem to have some sort of anti rust coating but flash rust is showing up... So I got pretty far and as I'm writing this I am final welding it. I got it all squared up and the panels drilled for plug welding.

I still have not idea what I'm doing, just making it up as I go...

[FormTA]

So, I decided since I am going to paint this truck I didn't want the chains that hold the tailgate closed (and up) banging around and chipping the paint. Originally they used metal hooks slid through rings to keep the gate closed. Really basic stuff back then. After looking around and purchasing some hidden latches I realized I didn't like anything available for tye old F1 Fords. Most of the hidden latches require you to drill holes through the tailgate to bolt the latches too. These bolts are visible when the gate is closed and looks bad to me. So, after some searching and coming up with nothing I decided to make my own. This latch will slide into the rolled lip at the top of the gate and I will make a stainless striker plate kind of like your house door has. I made this really quick at work this morning, it utilizes a bolt knob we make for centerfire riffles.







I offset the plunger so it would he closer to the cab so it will grip more metal. It will make more sense once I get a picture of it installed.

Here you go, I Obviously still need to notch the gate for the knob to come through and mount it, but you get the idea.






I also plugged the holes where the chains mounted to.

[5th T/A]

Very impressive fabrication and engineering! The tolerances on your tail gate latch are slightly higher than you would see.

[ryeguy2006a]

Very nice Luke! I like the custom stuff.

[FormTA]

So this weekend between picking up the Charger donor car and unloading it I was able to complete my sanding of the truck bed. I sprayed epoxy primer and 2k primer on it. I still have the front side to spray. I'll get that once I get the tailgate ready,  hopefully by this weekend.  Once that is all in primer I'll set it on the chassis. That will give me space to pull the engine and get that ready to move over to the new chassis.

This thing took a ton of primer, lots of sq feet there. I used up all of my primer so I picked up a gallon of each primer and a gallon of reducer plus the required hardeners for a staggering $520... PPG Omni line. Just though that I'd post that for those wondering about supply costs.

[5th T/A]

Looking forward to seeing this one in paint. I love the look of pickups in this time period. In a different world I would have a stock one as a daily driver!

[ryeguy2006a]

Wow, the prices of paint supplies have really gone up!

[FormTA]

Finished up spraying epoxy and 2k primer on the back of the box and the tailgate.

[b_hill_86]

I may have missed it if you said before but what color are you going with?

[FormTA]

It's a Toyota red called Sunfire red pearl used mid 2000s.
Kind of a dark red. I wanted to use hot rod flats red but I hear it's really tough to get a consistent sheen with that stuff so I decided to to just go base clear with the Toyota dark red.
We'll see, I'm going to order some this winter and spray the tailgate and see how I like it.(the Toyota red)

[ryeguy2006a]

If you wanted a flat color,  you can always go over the whole thing with Poppy's Patina wipeable product. You can use a Matte, satin or semi-gloss. That's the plan for my car.

[FormTA]

Ya but I have nothing to start with. What were you thinking, sprayed the base coat and then not clear it? Then use a flat whipe on clear?

[ryeguy2006a]

Yes, exactly. It's made to wipe on over old paint and clears. Let me know if you want any "fauxtina" tips

[FormTA]

 

Check this out

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vk-DSNZRefs&pp=ygUWQ2FzZXlkIGN1c3RvbXMgd2lwZSBvbg%3D%3D

[FormTA]

So, I got my wife and daughter to help me carry the bed from tye back of my shop and around to the fron and set it on the chassis.  I throw the tailgate on amd just because I wanted to see how the tire would sit in the wheel wells, I threw a fender on.

To me it looks almost perfect which will make creating mounts fairly easy.  Remember this is a 4x4 now so it will sit higher and there is no weight on the chassis yet.

[ryeguy2006a]

Looks like the perfect amount of wheel stick out! What's that other car in the garage next to the F1?

[FormTA]

Actually the wheels will be about an inch farther out. Those are 96 Camaro wheels which don't have the correct offset.

[FormTA]

Pulled the cab off the rusted chassis that I was using to mockup things.

Plan is to clean and replace any seals that might be leaking.

[ryeguy2006a]

Looks great! I need to pick up a tractor like that.

[5th T/A]

Luke, do you have two chassis for the F1 pickup?

As others have said before that’s a great tractor. I don’t have the use for one full time. If you were my neighbor, I would be bribing you with a few dinners from time to time to do a little landscaping and grading around my house.

[FormTA]

Yes, I have 2 S10 chassis. One, I completely rebuilt because it was a nice solid frame. This one was going to be the one but it is just so rusted and totally unsavilable.

Yes, this is a great little tractor. I built my old 1947 Farmall BN with a loader amd 3 point but it really rutted up the yard. I was able to talk my wife into letting me buy this one. The old farmall served us well for many years (20+). I actually bought it from the original owner, I sold it to my brother and it's still going strong.  I got forks and a rototiller for the kabota, it is really handy to have around but I have only put 50 hrs on it in the past few years. It does make a great engine lift though.

[5th T/A]

That’s what I thought but wasn’t sure. New chassis is beautiful. You will have the best of both worlds when complete. Classic looks and modern ride and handling. Will the ABS be functional? I like the fact you are not lowering it to the ground, just not my thing. Who knows, maybe when it’s done l would take my TA out for a ride and short visit to see it. That is of course if you would be up to company.

[FormTA]

Larry,

Absolutely, hopefully I can keep the momentum and get this think finished.

Yes, the plan is to keep the air bag and ABD system.  I put all new wheel sensors in the front so hopefully it all still works. I am going to replumb the abs box so it fits in the F1 engine compartment.

[FormTA]

 Luckily I didn't have the cab or front sheet metal to get in the way of the engine removal.

I was able to use 4 feet of extentions to get the torque converter bolts out.





Motor is out of the donor truck. Now to clean it up and replace the gaskets and seals.



Somehow all of this wiring has to go inside the cab...