My 74 project

Got a few things done today. Hoping to get the tub off tomorrow.

 

Score! The PO did a disk brake conversion.

 

Awesome find. Keep it as original as you can. Is that wheel chock a set of BBQ utensil's?

 

No, poker chips!

 

So two days in and the body is off and not a single sheered bolt. I'm off for a week starting Friday so I'm hoping to get the frame off and blasted.






More to come!

 

Great progress, Eric! I know you're a big dude, did you hoss that body off all by yourself? I ended up standing my tub up (firewall down) on a rolling board (actually the base of an old big-screen TV, just a flat board with castors) which made it easy to move around in the garage. I'm so envious of the space in your garage. I've been stumbling around in a 1-car garage trying to do my body off resto. I've got my body back on the frame now and working on getting it painted while the weather is decent. My ever-extending goal is to be in paint by fall and work on the engine and wiring over the winter, and having it driving by spring. But we'll see how it goes and how the money holds out.

Good luck! Let me know if you need a hand with anything. Hope you took lots of pics in the tear down, my poor memory has been failing me a bit trying to put things back together! Photograph everything and put the parts in labelled bags, it helps so much later on.

 

Thanks Matt. Yeah, I put all the bolts in individually labeled bags and took tons of pics and plan on taking more tonight. The lighting was bad in the first group. I had to grab a neighbor to give me a hand. It was a little much, even for me. LOL!

I hope to have the fuel lines, brake lines and engine out over the next few days. Then getting the frame and axles, blasted and all that jazz. I'm actually really surprised how easy it came apart.

 

Putitn' it back together ain't as easy. Still fun.

 

So here is the current progress. I uploaded everything to photobucket. I'm too lazy to post all the pics here one at a time. As soon as I can get up the funds to get the frame and misc parts blasted and painted I'll start the buildup process.

http://s435.photobucket.com/albums/qq75/Ryan3260/Jeep%20Rebuild/

 

Did you find a place to do blasting? I've heard a lot of people use American Stripping in Manassas. I have a set of wheels I'd like to get stripped and powdercoated but I've never been serious enough about it to contact them and see what it would cost.

 

Oh, and do you have an engine hoist or did you borrow/rent/(steal?) one? I only need one for a day to put my engine back in and don't really want to have to buy one.

 

There are actually 2 sandblasters within a mile of me. I decided to go with Sandblast America. They gave a better price than Dominion Sandblast. I've had Sandblast America do a few small things and the work was good. They seem like good folks over there. I had the owner come by and qoute me a price on the frame, axles, 5 rims, skid plate, crossmember, front and rear bumpers, and a ton of misc small parts and he said $800 would get it done. To me that price is very reasonable.

I rented the hoist from Sunbelt.

The "new" '74 should be here Saturday, I'm pretty excited!

 

You got another one? Pics!

Does Sandblast America do coating, too? Or just blasting?

 

Yeah, I couldn't help myself. I posted a CL link to it a while back. It was a plow Jeep up in Leadville, CO. Bought it from the original ower. He said the factory steel cab has never been off and has only seen 3 winters worth of plowing. He said he's unable to use it anymore due to disability and that it's been sitting for a year. It'll be here Saturday/Sunday. When I get it cleaned up I'll slap up some pics.

Also, how unusual is it that this was sent from the factory with the hard top already installed? I used a VIN decoder and it listed it as having a Full Cab. Here's the VIN: J4M8FTA51306

They do coating and painting.

 

Sweet, I remember you posting the link and mentioning it when I saw you. Looking forward to seeing it. You've probably found a good majority of the original 258/T18 Jeeps still out there!

The last 5 digits of the VIN are sequential and will give you an idea of the build date if your yellow dash sticker is gone. Mine is 74908 and is a June, 74 build date.

 

More pics added.

http://s435.photobucket.com/albums/qq75/Ryan3260/Jeep%20Rebuild/#!cpZZ1QQtppZZ16