Progress on the Galaxie has been ongoing. Since the last update, Dad did a lot of work fitting the headlight buckets, which he restored while they were off the car. He also fit the grill and the headlight doors. He repainted the splash pan as well. Most or all of this will come off the car when it gets painted but all of this needed fitting. Dad did a lot of work massaging the grill to a much straighter and better fitting condition. Here is a pic my brother snapped Saturday morning...
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We are loving the fact that the entire car is in black epoxy primer and that all of the major eye-sores on the body are gone. Here is a neat pic. This is from under the front wheel well on the passenger side, looking forward. This is a splash shield that fits behind the headlight bucket. Dad found a pair of these NOS. He never had them before. Just another nice rare part on the car....
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When Sean went over to Dad's Saturday, Dad had got the car off the stands as pictured above. He decided he didn't like how the passenger door was fitting. He felt it was a little low with respect to the top of the fender and the top of the quarter panel. This door is not off of this car. The door off of this car had a crease all the way down it so it was replaced with this door many years ago. Unfortunately, the door was all the way up on the hinges and wouldn't go higher. Dad and Sean pulled the door off the car, elongated the holes to get a little more adjustment, re-hung it on the car, and then touched up the paint on the bolts. It went very well. Here are some pics of the process....
Here's the door coming off the car on the 'dolly'. This is an attachment you can add to just about any floor jack. It is made by Steck and we really like it. It is very affordable. Is it as good as a dedicated door jack? Probably not but for half the price and taking up half the space, it's pretty good....
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I believe this pic shows the holes after being opened up some to provide more adjustment....
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Here it is back on the car and they are touching up the paint on the bolts....
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Next, they moved on to installing new felts or 'dew sweeps' on the outside side of the window opening. Dad had replaced them previously (years ago) but wasn't happy with how the first shot at it turned out. With Sean's help, they got new sweeps on both the passenger door and quarter panel installed. It went well for them...
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The sweeps are held on with clips and screws. The hard part is drilling the new sweep for the screws as they don't come drilled. It's nice that it turned out well for them. The new weatherstrip now needs to go on the passenger door but the wing window needs to go in first. We're waiting on a special tool for the rivets that hold the wing window together and hold the seals in it. We got the special rivets last week but it's unclear whether they are correct or not. Hopefully we'll have everything we need to restore the passenger wing window by the weekend.
Meanwhile, I've been working on the second Toploader transmission. Sean and I got the main case cleaned up last week. It was a bit of a project with the wire wheel, thread chasers, a razor scraper, wire brushes, mineral spirits, a few cans of carb spray and lots of compressed air but it came out pretty clean....
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While Dad and Sean were working on the passenger door and the dew sweeps on the Galaxie I stayed home Saturday morning and worked on putting the transmission back together. It went pretty well considering I had to clean each and every part as I went. With the previous transmission, everything was already clean and overhauled from a previous teardown when I swapped the long mainshaft for the short one. By lunchtime I had the reverse idler back in it along with the shift levers. I also had all the needle bearings in the cluster gear with the dummy shaft and had it laying in the case. I was ready to start cleaning the main gear train, rebuilding the synchronizers and swapping everything to the short shaft...
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Around 3:00 PM Sean and Dad came over to see if they could lend a hand. With their help I got the rest of the gear train on the short shaft, got the shaft and the gear train placed in the case, got the 1-2 and 3-4 shift rails and forks installed and got the rear main bearing pressed on. By then I was tired and it was 5:00 PM. I decided to pick up the tools and felt confident I could finish it up on Sunday. Unfortunately things didn't go our way Sunday. It was one of those days where everything was a fight. Sean and I got it all buttoned up by around 2:00 PM but something is wrong. If the tailhousing bolts and the front bearing retainer bolts are all tight, the gear train is in a bind and the transmission won't turn. I think I know what is wrong. At the back of the main case, there is a big thrust washer that goes between first gear and the rear main bearing. There was a new washer in the kit and it looked like an improved design so I used it. I'm guessing it is thicker than the O.E. washer and is the cause of the difficulty. Unfortunately we are going to have to tear the trans most of the way down to find out. Sean and I are planning to do that tonight. I'm guessing we might be able to button it up tomorrow night. I hope for the next update I can tell you we have the transmission buttoned up and have a wing window done or we've started on putting the transmission and the Gear Vendor's overdrive in the car. Stay tuned. More to come. Thanks for following along.