36 Ford truck on Ranger

[Bamamav]

That Merc coupe with the grill off of the 4 door will be sharp!

 

[MercuryMac]

Yo Bama, you're thinking just like me. Whooa. Here's what my dream was at first, when I just had the sedan; I'd chop it all up and make a Lincoln Zepher type car, and then I got the Monarch coupe. My dream should end up almost the same.

 

[MercuryMac]

Enough rambling around let's get some progress reports, eh. Oh, ya, that's me. I finally got the speedometer ratio adapter that I E-bayed. I was a little let down because it was a straight through one and I thought I had ordered an offset one. Its was almost what I wanted and it screwed right on the transmission speedo drive and the selected adapter drive pin fit also. Then it became obvious, even to a flaming optimist like me that the speedometer cable would not bend around the brake power booster and screw into the adapter anymore. Tears filled my eyes there for a time while I tried to see what could be moved two inches sideways, the booster, no; or the motor and transmission, nope. I took the adapter over to my little pile of warn out adapter parts and started taking an old Kenworth one apart because it was an off-set case, so would maybe hold the new gears. Then I took the new adapter apart and was checking out the gears when it struck me that I could maybe just put the new case back together kitty-wompus and voila I made it into an off-set new adapter. As I crawled back under the truck I happened to find a piece of paper that on closer inspection, told me how to do that. Men, Huh. Never read the instruction first. Anyhow, it got screwed on there and moved around a bit, so it fits like factory.
While I was fiddling there I noticed that the drivers side running board was warped in near its front end so I pried it out as I heated it and left it blocked to cool. About then supper was calling me.

 

[skull]

huh??

what are these "instructions" you speak of[S must be Canadian thing

glad it worked out 0K.

Later

 

[MercuryMac]

Na, never saw them before. I blame the English, at least that is the language they were written in. Anyhow, those dang instructions may come in handy someday. I might be a little meeker today.

 

[Torchie]

Nice Mac.
2 build threads at once.
And I can't even keep one going right now.
Directions??? I bet you were great at putting kids toys together at Christmas time.
Torchie.

 

[05snopro440]

Enough rambling around let's get some progress reports, eh. Oh, ya, that's me. I finally got the speedometer ratio adapter that I E-bayed. I was a little let down because it was a straight through one and I thought I had ordered an offset one. Its was almost what I wanted and it screwed right on the transmission speedo drive and the selected adapter drive pin fit also. Then it became obvious, even to a flaming optimist like me that the speedometer cable would not bend around the brake power booster and screw into the adapter anymore. Tears filled my eyes there for a time while I tried to see what could be moved two inches sideways, the booster, no; or the motor and transmission, nope. I took the adapter over to my little pile of warn out adapter parts and started taking an old Kenworth one apart because it was an off-set case, so would maybe hold the new gears. Then I took the new adapter apart and was checking out the gears when it struck me that I could maybe just put the new case back together kitty-wompus and voila I made it into an off-set new adapter. As I crawled back under the truck I happened to find a piece of paper that on closer inspection, told me how to do that. Men, Huh. Never read the instruction first. Anyhow, it got screwed on there and moved around a bit, so it fits like factory.
While I was fiddling there I noticed that the drivers side running board was warped in near its front end so I pried it out as I heated it and left it blocked to cool. About then supper was calling me.

I started reading that and thought, I hope he knows you can just spin one half of the case 180°. Glad you figured it out! More importantly, did you take it out in the snow to see if your speedo works better?

 

[animal]

Whew.....glad that worked out. I'm not sure I'd have thought of taking it apart. I would have called the seller and made a fool of myself.

 

[Dirtyrat]

Great work! I'm glad you got it hooked up, hows the speedo work now?

 

[MercuryMac]

Thanks for the applause, guys. I didn't take it out yet and drive in the snow. When I got up this morning and looked at the thermometer, it said -20C. The other reason is that I had been trying, before, to make an ratio adapter up at the speedometer head end so the top end of the Chev speedo cable will not hook up to anything yet and no amount of Imagineering yesterday shed any light on the problem. So I worked on the '34 Plymouth a little.
Today, I'm going to take a flathead six to a friends place and do the valves.

 

[Torchie]

Cross pollenation of the build threads. Isn't that illegal?[cl[cl
Still cold and snowy here as well Mac.
Stay warm.
Torchie.

 

[MercuryMac]

You guys are going to laugh at the piddely picture, rest assured that a lot of thought went into this plain looking speedometer end. This is '87 Chev cable that had appropriate ends on it [for a Chev]. I cut the flare and the hold down off, then cut another one half inch of the mounting tube off, slid the old Ford mounting nut on and re-flared the mounting tube. I rolled the acetylene bottles over to the truck and with fear dripping off me everywhere I got ready to heat the mounting tube up to re-flare it, knowing that I would probably melt or burn most things nearby. That's when it hit me; "this is a tube that I'm going to flare, why don't I just use the tube flaring tool". I turns out that if you use the anvil the right way up there is a countersink hole that you don't want in this case, but if you use the anvil up-side-down you get a flat flare that works in a speedometer head.
Keep on tinkering.

 

[smallfoot]

Heheh! ain't it the truth...it's all those little steps man! Some days it seems you spend hours and hours trying to figure out one of those little things out and at the end of the day you think it was wasted, but it wasn't really. Hope it works...

 

[MercuryMac]

Here's what I have been hoping to see for two months now. The speedometer cable is screwed in at both ends now, but not test driven. I did put the cordless drill on the bottom end of the cable clicked it to reverse, and spun it up to 80.
Some of my heater hoses leaked even though I tightened them unmercifully. I put a bunch of new type hose clamps on the heater hoses. These are specifically for silicone hoses so they have an extra tin strip around the inside to better seal the silicone hoses. The guy at the hose store seemed to know what my complaint was about and these clamps were his answer.

 

[Dirtyrat]

Glad to see you finished up that cable, will be interesting to see if the gear change setup accurately shows your speed on the speedo!

Were the clamps backing off or just not sealing?

These clamps from fastenal will do the trick (Constant tension setups made by ideal)
http://www.fastenal.com/catalog_pages/2010/10-168.pdf

 

[RickyBobby]

I use those hose clamps on the race car stuff, very nice.

 

[MercuryMac]

Dirtyrat, the old ones seemed to stay tight enough, but I thought they weren't round enough on the inside to seal properly. I have used those constant tightening ones on the big trucks quite a bit.
RickyBobby, I had not seen those kind of new clamps before so I was ga-ga about them. In my mind they would make a better circle than the old kind and seal better. I think the inside of the screw housing hasn't got the same curve to it as the outside of the hose, sometimes.

 

[Bamamav]

I've noticed a lot of the screw clamps you get now will pop open if you over tighten them. Seems like they're not as strong as they used to be.

 

[MercuryMac]

It seems like I've turned my back on the old girl [the '36] and some of you may be right. Tonight, I topped up the antifreeze, primed the carb and took off for a test drive. The transmission and shifter feel good. The speedometer speed reading was guessed at with flaming optimism and I over shot my goal of having it show the right speed. It reads about 10/7 too high, but I can get different plastic driven gears for the end of the cable.
Thursday night at the A&W is a large possibility.

 

[Torchie]

It seems like I've turned my back on the old girl [the '36] and some of you may be right. Tonight, I topped up the antifreeze, primed the carb and took off for a test drive. The transmission and shifter feel good. The speedometer speed reading was guessed at with flaming optimism and I over shot my goal of having it show the right speed. It reads about 10/7 too high, but I can get different plastic driven gears for the end of the cable.
Thursday night at the A&W is a large possibility.

DO IT!!!
And post pics.
Torchie.