Spent a few hours today with the trusty sandblaster and the front end. I was surprised at how well my air compressor held up. I didn't blast continuously and would try to let the air compressor "catch up" from time to time, but I was happy with how it did and happy with the results. I also blasted a bellhousing - the pressure pot made QUICK work of that piece and the engine paint turned out nice. I only have about 5 to 6 hours on the pressure pot sandblaster I got from Tractor Supply a while back but I am not impressed with how quickly the "stopper"? is wearing out on the deadman's valve. The sand has worn away the tip on the closer (not just the ceramic tip - that is another story) but the top piece that slides over the tip - that piece is so wore out that the blaster now will leak air when the spring loaded lever is completely closed. I guess it is cheaply made. If there is anyone out there that has any good suggestions on a quality tip/closer I would appreciate it. I am going to look at TP tools.  I have one of their Blast Cabinets and have used glass beads for 10 years now. I reckon I have spent countless hours using that gun and have only had to replace the nozzle about 3 times. I know sand is more abrasive, but come on... 6 hours????   Maybe I should take some close up shots of the tip just to show the erosion that has happened pretty quickly.

 
 

Next up - disassemble the front end so that I can paint the frame and separately blast the pieces in the cabinet. I have new rubber for up front and I have new Aerostar coils as well. I did locate a split sheet metal surround for the steering column and shifter column, and I have started preparing the 56 column and other shifter parts for painting. I also have those hood hinges about ready for topcoat.

If you have been wondering where some of the time goes for projects like these and why it has been a while since my last post, at times my wife gets me side-tracked on things like this.

She found this door today at an Apple Harvest Festival about an hour away from us. "It was only $10," she gloated as I unloaded the thing from the van. "Where do you want me to put this?" I asked, knowing what she would say.... "Oh, just put it in the garage, honey." And so the buffet the garage has been on for the past several months continues. I have never seen a garage hold more crap.... let's see - all the camping gear, outdoor gear, snowtubing and snowboarding toys for the kiddos, gardening supplies (yep - I likes me my peppers, padre!), woodworking tools and table saw, several golf bags, bicycles, fireworks, MY grill/smoker, etc. And my wife laughed when I originally told her we needed a 60x40 instead of a 40x24. What was it she said, "How much room do you need for crying out loud?"
Maybe I'll just take the latest project she found and put it in the bedroom! I'm sure that would fly!



Daniel Jessup

Lancaster, California

aka "The Hot Rod Reverend"
check out the 1955 Ford Fairlane build at www.hotrodreverend.com

I got quite a bit done on the 55 Fairlane last night. The front end of the frame is about completely bare save a couple brake lines. I did not have a coil spring compressor but I opted to leave the shocks INSTALLED until after I had disconnected the ball joints. This left some tension on the shocks but since I used my jack underneath the lower A arm to offset the pressure and the upper shock bolts were removed first. After that the jack was released and the coil just slid right out. I will disconnect the shocks from the lower A arms once I have them on the bench to remove the bushings.
 
 

Speaking of bushings, some of them were so old and worn out they literally fell off in my hands once the bolts were removed. The only difficult item to remove was the large shoulder bolt holding the front of the lower A arm to the crossmember. It was rusted pretty well and once I had it removed I noticed it was pitted badly. I think I have a good used one somewhere. The reason for the rust? As you can see from the photos, years ago a previous owner had made a repair to the crossmember by welding in good metal that seems to be thicker than stock. Unfortunately no weep holes were never drilled in thebottom so all these years the moisture had collected in the crossmember with no place to go. The crossmember is very stout and I beat on it with a hammer all night long, but I think I am going to have a welder friend of mine look at it and shore it up in a couple of places. I made a note to myself to drill a few holes when he is done. I also started disassembly/cleaning of a 1956 Ford steering column and gear I had purchased a few months back. I like the 56 wheel better, and from what I understand the 56 steering gear had a 3 tooth sector over the 55's two.

Does anyone know why Ford had to put these shims in the FRONT of the Lower A Arm pivot point? I am wondering if they have anything to do with alignment (like the shims used on the Upper A Arm) or is this just something that Ford used because the crossmembers were never square? I don't think they have anything to do with alignment but I could be wrong on that.... I plan to put them back in because they were there when I disassembled the arm.


I did get a little hungry last night while working in the garage for a few hours and decided to break out the deep fryer and throw down with some homemade apple pies... yep - I put together the crust and all from scratch. You can see my kids tearing into these things. Nothing like a snack before the youngin's go off to bed!
  

If any of you have any tips on disassembling, cleaning, and inspecting the steering gear I would appreciate it. When I took off both of the covers of the gear housing last night, the gears themselves looked pretty good, I think I saw only 2 or 3 pits as I rotated the gears on the shaft and knuckle.





Daniel Jessup

Lancaster, California

aka "The Hot Rod Reverend"
check out the 1955 Ford Fairlane build at www.hotrodreverend.com

Mark

1956 Mercury M100
1955 Ford Fairlane Club Sedan
Delta, British Columbia

Thanks for the replies fellas -- I was looking at the crossmember yesterday and decided to go into the depths of crossmember hell. Healthy repairs had been made to the crossmember before (20 years ago) with metal plates about twice as thick as stock. Unfortunately no one had thought at the time to drill weep holes for the water to drain out and I suspected that there was some rot. So, after showing a few photos to my welding buddy (that's his full time job) he said it looked ok and he would bring some plate over to weld to the crossmember so long as there was good metal to weld to. After removing the very front angled "bumper" with my cutting wheel, I snapped a photo or two of what was behind it...
 
 

Yep if you look at the photo of the bag of rust on the scale, you will see the readout - 2 lbs and 11 oz of rust and scale !!! The irony in all this is that the metal from the repairs 20 years ago is as stout as it can be and I can take a hammer to it all day long. The crossmember itself is still very strong but I am glad I opened this up. I plan to sandblast the inside and get where I can. After that I will treat the rust and then paint. My welding buddy will come over and put good metal plate to cover the front from top to bottom and from the thick reinforcement of the shoulder bolts from side to side. The other side is not quite as bad but I will have him weld there too.
I did try to remove the bushings from the lower A arms, but not having a shop press, I spent 30 minutes with a ball joint press, a hammer, and gorilla type force. I got one of the bushings to move about 1/4"  -- that's it. Any tricks to removing these bushings or am I going to have to take them to a shop to have them all pressed out?



Daniel Jessup

Lancaster, California

aka "The Hot Rod Reverend"
check out the 1955 Ford Fairlane build at www.hotrodreverend.com

Daniel, I took a small diameter drill bit (can't remember the exact size) and drilled as many holes as I could through the rubber.  Eventually I could push enough rubber out that the outer part of the bushing came of. Then you can work on the inner sleeve.  I think I used a die grinder ans a small cut off wheel to cut a groove in the inner piece and force it off.  Here is how I put the new bushings on.  I made a bunch of thick aluminum washers from scrap and disassembled a large three jaw puller.





Mark

1956 Mercury M100
1955 Ford Fairlane Club Sedan
Delta, British Columbia

Daniel
I have used an air chizel before to rip the bushing from back to front so it wil colapse and just push it out.

Gary Ryan San Antonio.TX.

Fellas thanks for the advice and ideas. I too decided to push out the inner bushing/sleeve by heating up the rubber (some of it was so worn it had just about disintegrated!) and just yanking it with a pair of pliers. After that I cut a deep groove in the ID of the metal bushing to get me started and then just simply tapped them out. One of them I obviously separated. It was not too difficult to say the least and now I can go ahead and blast those arms and then paint them up pretty. I barely nicked the edge of the ID on the arms, but I don't think it is going to be any big deal. Looks like those were the original bushings on the car.
 

Mark, I like that idea. I will have to see if I have a screw assembly long/large enough to press the new bushings in there.
Gary, I don't know why I didn't think of the air chisel! duh! That would have sped up the process for sure.

Daniel Jessup

Lancaster, California

aka "The Hot Rod Reverend"
check out the 1955 Ford Fairlane build at www.hotrodreverend.com

My welding buddy talked to me the other day and he said he wants to get on the project so that motivated me to get out the sandblaster again and go to town on the metal in question. You can see the photos below (looking from the firewall) I only need a few plates welded in and we are good to go. Could I get another crossmember from a repro shop? Yes. Would I feel confident in getting the geometry right? No. I am sure there is a good way to do that with the measurements and all, but I figure if my buddy is telling me that it won't take much to "shore it up" why bother - he's the metal man, not me. The front is pretty simply - one long piece and we are good to go. The rear will need 4 pieces as the lower metal is very solid and does not need to be replaced but the wall itself needs attention.
 

I also did some work on those front end parts as you can see... blasted with glass beads and painted with semi-gloss black Rustoleum. The center link was in very good shape and disassembled easily. It should be a breeze to put it back together. The other parts in the box are just the start to the rebuild of the front end of course - gotta get this thing back on rollin' wheels before I put the 292 and 3 speed overdrive in the car. The steering gear is ready for a new sector seal, worm and shaft, shims, etc. I soaked it in solvent in a parts washer for quite some time and then cleaned it thoroughly. I took a wire wheel to the exterior and painted it in semi-gloss Rustoleum as well. All of the parts I need for the rebuild are on their way and hopefully I can have that thing buttoned up by next weekend. Can't wait to feel that steering tighten up. The original was as loose as a goose!
 
 


Daniel Jessup

Lancaster, California

aka "The Hot Rod Reverend"
check out the 1955 Ford Fairlane build at www.hotrodreverend.com

  Replacement ‘54-56 crossmembers are available from Goodell Fabrications.
11986 S. 267^th E. Avenue
Coweta, OK 74429
Ph: 918-636-7071

Pricing is $299.95 postpaid.

Lorena, Texas (South of Waco)

My buddy Mike came over, looked at the crossmember, tapped around a bit, and told me he didn't think it needed to be replaced - let's weld her up! It didn't take him 20 minutes with my MIG 135 from Eastwood and Mike had it finished. We used 1/4" ad 1/8" plate cut to fit. He had good penetration throughout and I have already starting doing a little judicious grinding in a few areas to clean things up a bit. This thing is pretty strong and definitely stronger than stock. I have some Inner Frame Coating on the way from Eastwood, and will hopefully finish cleaning up the frame for paint soon.
 
   
 


Daniel Jessup

Lancaster, California

aka "The Hot Rod Reverend"
check out the 1955 Ford Fairlane build at www.hotrodreverend.com