46 Power Wagon Restoration pt. 2

[Bruce in BC]

!/2 ton hood stays

Got a link, or picture? I gots no clue what dey lookit like.

[Greg Coffin]

Here's what Kevin Foust used on his 1/2 ton. They are not factory, but they work the same way. VPW has them for $35 each, though not is stainless! I plan to use them on my 6x6.

[Desoto61]

See, I knew there was a reason to show all my mistakes! I had thought about trying to work up some sort of hood prop or gas strut assembly instead, but that might just be the winner. Thanks!

[Desoto61]

Got the last of my wires run for the gauges. The provided lines that come with the Speedhut gauges are very nice, shielded with strengthening lines, so I ended up pulling the wires provided in the Painless harness and ran all the provided lines. They're bigger, so a little tricky to run and splice through the bulkhead connector, but since most of their senders require an extra wire or two, I would have needed to run extra wires anyway.

Either way it allowed me to start tying all the wires back and organizing them better. Then I can cut and make final connections and start trouble shooting circuits. I connected a small 1.5 amp trickle charger to the battery cable and ground point, and then pulled all the fuses. Then I could plug in each fuse and test the circuits. The charger isn't big enough to run some of the accessories, but it's also to small to let any of the magic smoke out of anything. A few small issues, but mostly easily resolved, the wipers aren't parking correctly all the time and I'm not sure if that's a lack of current or something in the wiring or motor.

One other task was to build my access panel to get to the fuse panel. I had gotten overzealous and started painting it, but some careful cutting with a body saw opened the panel up without damage to the coatings. Some high strength magnets epoxied to the outside of the box will hold it in place without having to cut or weld and allow easy access. I coated the interior with some spray in bed lining, the exterior will probably get a coat of lizard skin to knock down any vibration.

[Desoto61]

Ran a bunch of errands today. Dropped off the drive-shafts to get them checked and modified. The front shaft needs balanced, I think there's a seal in the splines that's probably long gone. The rear shaft needs the same plus the transfer case side of the shaft needs replaced with the big U-joint style to match the center output yoke on my transfer case. The intermediate shaft will need similar to mate to the NV4500 output, plus shortened by a bit. Guys not sure what they can do with stuff that old, getting harder to find the right yokes.

Stopped on my way and picked up a piece of aluminum plate to make a better fan mount. After some measuring and mock-up I marked out the location of the fans and cut them with a jig-saw. The provided carriage bolts hold it in place. Biggest problem now is trying to install it. It won't go back in with the fans in place. Will have to try and install it and then mount the fans, it's that tight.

[Desoto61]

Mostly trouble-shooting wiring. Quickly ran into problems using the small battery charger with just not enough amps. Have a big rolling charger that will do more but without a battery they give out weird voltages. I did eventually hook up on of those small battery jump-start packs, again not enough umph to run anything too big but large enough and more stable output.

I had pulled all the fuses except the one I was testing, which worked for some things, but not others. I spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out why the parking lights weren't working properly. Turns out that the power feed for the parking lights is actually shared with the horn circuit, and I didn't have the horn fuse in.

Biggest issue right now is that convenience module and my lighting wiring. It's doing what it's supposed to, but it's also turning some things on when they're not supposed to be, so I have to figure that out yet. The fan controller powered up but I can't seem to trigger it off the manual run switch like I'm supposed to.

Ordered an air filter and picked up most of the fluids I need to add yet, so I'm getting closer to being ready to fire up the motor in the frame. Now I just have to figure out how to get that power to the ground. The driveshaft shop is having issues balancing the Detroit u-joints as they don't have the right fixtures and the yokes are getting tough to find. Did some research last night and found a conversion joint that goes from the Detroit 5380 to a Spicer 1410 (Neapco 2-3190, Precision 362, Dana/Spicer 5-357X), that should hopefully allow them to build a new intermediate and modify the rear drive shaft and balance them.

Meanwhile I thought I had goofed when I ordered my gauges as they were supposed to have an output for the cruise control but didn't. When I looked at the instructions it mentions it's an optional feature. So I called to ask if I had to request the output and how I should hook up the cruise speed wire without that output. The customer support person told me it was optional but after talking to the tech support person about wiring up the sensor wire he said it should have been present on my unit and they're sending me a new speedometer with the correct wiring which makes my life a little easier (hopefully).

[Bruce in BC]

fan switch

(1) power to switch
(2) power to relay, which should be #85 or #86
(3) power out of relay which will be #85 or #86
(4) Once you have power out of the switch, check for the fan feed power at #30
(5) If you have power at #30 then check the output feed power at #87

Could be that the relay is faulty, or one of the feeds is accessory instead of main.
Have you fed power directly to the feed side on the fan?
and of course you are not feeding any of this power through the temp sending switch but are passing it.
You know all this stuff, I am about to go through the same thing. Still mudding in my roof and replacing some side window frame wood.

[Desoto61]

Yes, problem is it's not a simple relay setup. It's fancier then that (because me), http://www.amazon.com/Flex---lite-31...fan+controller

It has power as I'm getting the trigger light. But it has two pins that allow you to lock the fans off or on. I wired it to a three-way switch in the cab so I had the ability to do either if I wanted.

I figured I should be able to trigger the fan-on circuit even though I don't have the engine running yet to get to temp or the AC charged to test the AC trigger.

Need to trouble shoot the wiring between the switch and unit, if not that then it's the unit itself, but being electronic it's harder to trouble shoot.

[Desoto61]

Talked to the driveshaft shop this morning about the conversion u-joints for the transfer case ends of the intermediate and rear driveshaft. I couldn't find the Detroit yokes any more, so they'll probably have to install a Spicer 1410 unit on both shafts and I'll use the conversion joints to mate to the transfer case yokes. That should also allow them to be balanced, just have to swap out the 1410 joint for the conversion joint before putting it on the truck.

The remaining problem is the smaller Detroit 5160 ends. There is no conversion joints that I could find, but the big issue they have is that the Detroit joints use a 1.232" cap diameter, which seems to be unique, so they don't have anything that takes that size, it's either too big or too small. The Spicer ends are 1.188" diameter. So what I may need to do is get another joint and have two of the end caps turned down to 1.188" that can be swapped in for balancing and then swapped back for installation. They may still have to shim the unit for width in the machine but they seem to think that won't be a big deal. For balancing the reduced material shouldn't be an issue.

[Desoto61]

When I bought my wiring harness Painless was running a deal where they threw in one of their braided loom kits, so I've been slowly working on covering all the wires outside the cab. The small stuff is very finnicky to install, the larger stuff is easier but not by much. I did order the little tools to install it though it's only for some of the larger sizes but it works very well where you have a long enough run. Regardless it looks nice and does a great job of controlling and protecting the wires.

Managed to track down a few gremlins and seem to have most of the wiring stuff locked down, at least the parts installed. There are still plenty of wires to connect but most of the connected stuff seems to be working.

Not a ton of space for an air cleaner, this one fits well but still tight. Might be able to snake some tubing around to a different location but I'll try it here first. Plan on trying to make a heat shield to hang off the bolt on top to protect from the exhaust manifold heat.

[Desoto61]

It's alive!

Spend the last few days adding fluids and checking things over in preparation for trying to fire up the engine. Installed the gauges temporarily so I had some idea what was going on if I got it running.

Very excited but also very nervous, things can go wrong very quickly. After bleeding the fuel lines and charging up a battery I cranked it over to try and get some oil pressure with the fuel solenoid disconnected. I think the battery I used is going bad as it struggled, but after a few times I reconnected the solenoid and gave it a go.

Good news is it runs! Bad news was I plumbed the power steering box backwards, and had some weird issues and spilled fluid everywhere while I tried to correct it. I have it fixed but still have a leak at the power steering box, it works but is leaking around the output shaft, so I'll have to either try and re-seal it or replace it. Box seems to work well otherwise.

It vibrates a lot at idle, though does smooth out with a few more RPMs. Gauges are nice and seem to work well, though I have yet to get everything set up. I'll have to figure out how to determine engine speed so I can calibrate the tachometer, and there's some extra resistance in the fuel tank sender so it will have to be calibrated manually vice using the sending unit values.

Regardless after many years and countless hours it runs! Now to try and make it move!

[cj7and8]

Congratulations!! That is very exciting! Looking forward to seeing it move under it's own power next!

[Bruce in BC]

Vibration at idle

I noticed that. I have images of all sorts of stuff rattling lose. I would love to get my hands on one of these and seriously balance the internals and see what difference it would make. Being an industrial engine it might make a great difference but with the firing order it might make no difference at all. congratulations on firing it up. Next you get to move it a few feet.

Bruce

[Desoto61]

I noticed that. I have images of all sorts of stuff rattling lose. I would love to get my hands on one of these and seriously balance the internals and see what difference it would make. Being an industrial engine it might make a great difference but with the firing order it might make no difference at all. congratulations on firing it up. Next you get to move it a few feet.

Bruce

Oh good, it's not just mine! It smooth's out with a little more RPM, but is pretty pronounced at idle, though I haven't checked the idle speed yet, need to figure out a way to do that.

I imagine softer mounts would help but then I'd get more motor movement which would be a separate issue, the MC is still pretty close to the intake elbow.

I'm guessing balance wouldn't hurt but that it's more about the firing order, otherwise Cummins wouldn't have built that balance shaft assembly they offered for them. Can't imagine that was cheaper than just doing a better balance of the motor.

Problem there is, besides being crazy expensive when they do show up, the look to bolt between the block and pan, making an already tall motor even taller. I think it will be interesting to see how Alex's common rail will be. Sure the displacement is different but wondering if being able to tweak the injector firing can calm it down any.

As for movement, still working on that. Have a plan for the intermediate shaft with the conversion U-joints. Still need to figure out what to do with the rear driveshaft. Either have to see about replacing the t-case end of mine with the larger Detroit or a 1410 with the conversion joint to match my output yoke, or trying to find a later 6x6 output yoke so I can just bolt the existing rear shaft in place.

[Bruce in BC]

transfer case woes

I gather you are using the original transfer case. It almost makes sense to go to a NP205. Is there a way to machine the yokes to take a larger and more common universal joint, like the 1410?
The other thing to consider is having a custom output machined. Tom's make output flanges, they have different spline counts. You might be able to get one with the NP200 or NP201 spline count.