Salt Lake City '58 W300M Thread

[mdvberg]

Figured I'd start a thread on the W300M that I'm in the midst of restoring. This was originally going to just be a parts truck, but I've decided not to throw in the towel. This truck came out of Northern California (I'm in Salt Lake City), and is remarkably rust free, but at some point in its career had something very heavy slam into the cab above the passenger side door. It not only crushed the cab, it also bent the arch above the door (but didn't bend the door itself, which makes me think the door was open when the dent occured) The door would not even come close to shutting. In addition to the large dent in the cab, the entire top of the cab was flattened...too many heavy things thrown across the top of the cab over the years. First order of business was to crib up the cab with some 4x4's, and then I pressed the door arch back into shape with a 25 ton bottle-jack. Lots of hammer & dolly work, followed by some hand-held English-wheeling with a cheapo Harbor Freight benchtop model that I modified, and the cab is getting to the point where it's almost presentable.

Here's what it looked like before:



Here's a shot of the my "handheld" English Wheel being used. Works surprisingly well, and my neighbors like it better than the planishing hammer!



Here's where I am now. No big dents, and the English Wheel "re-arched" the flattened cab nicely! Just some Rustoleum sprayed on for protection right now. I should be ready to put down some primer this spring.

[rickt4498]

salt lake resto...

pretty impressive body work for a first attempt...

I'll send my cab over... ;> )

send more pics...

[mdvberg]

Get's even more fun with the rear fenders!

The rear fenders are some real beauties too...HA! I'm slowly getting better with my metal-work, but there is still a LONG way to go!

One of the fenders before (and this was after the previous owner had made significant progress!)



Same fender now...still more to do, but getting a bit better?

[Kevin Mienke]

Extra effort in straightening is justified when you have rust free sheet metal like that. Nice work.

[mdvberg]

Front Fender Progress

Picture of the straightening efforts for the front passenger side fender. This one was kinked to the point that I thought it would be very difficult to straighten. Wrong...I hooked a come-along to a crowbar that I shoved into the reinforced area on the bottom of the fender, and was rather shocked at how easily it straighted out. The only hard part was getting the steel wire that had popped out of the rolled edge back into place. I carefully pried the rolled edge up from where the kink was to the bottom corner, straightened out the steel wire and crimped everything back into place.

[mdvberg]

Steering Wheel Fix ?

I've searched a bit on the internet for ways to fix cracks in steering wheels. Seems like cyanoacrylate super glue is a way to fix the small cracks, and a two part epoxy for the larger voids? Anyone had any luck, other advice?

[PowerMan]

Nice job so far!!!
I don't know much about fixing the steering wheel cracks but would also like to know because most of the steering wheels on my trucks are the same.

Power Man
(Rob)

[Desoto61]

I've read a few restoration articles on this, and they all go with the epoxy fix. Seems to work well if you do can get a good coat of paint on it.

[willpower]

I think POR-15 makes a steering wheel repair kit for damage such as that. I don't have any experience with it but their other products are top-notch.

[mdvberg]

Crack Attack!

This may be a fool's errand, but I broke out the grinders this afternoon and attacked the "patch" that someone "welded" on to "fortify" a crack in the passenger's side rail. The crack goes right between the spring perch, so it was difficult to assess the full extent of the damage until the patch and perch were removed. Given that it was not much of a chore to get the patch off, I can't imagine that the truck was actually driven at some point with this thing on it!

I know that there are some strong opinions here (from people who are far more knowledgeable that I am) about welding cracks in Dodge frames due to the fact that they are heat treated. On some of the welding forums there is quite a lot of talk about using diamond shaped fish-plates to reinforce a crack of this magnitude, as it allows for a strong repair that will not result in stress risers if done properly. This crack is not in an area where the Dodge double-frame extends, so theoretically, a fish-plate could be used on the inside of the rail for a repair that is not too noticeable.

Completely crazy to consider, even if I had a professional welder do the job? If it is crazy I guess I'm in the market for a frame (anybody know of a source in Utah...?)

[John S]

This repair was the subject of a Power Wagon Advertiser article of a repair done by Cheyenne Dave on his truck Gus.

[mdvberg]

Thanks John,

Do you happen to know which issue? When I subscribed in late 2007, I received a batch of older issues, which I have gone through, and I don't remember seeing the article you mention in any of them.

[John S]

Feb. and March of 2004 issues of the advertiser.
copy and paste the link for a thread on the subject.





http://www.powerwagonadvertiser.com/...smember+repair

[mdvberg]

No dice in looking through my stack of back issues of PWA. I have a fairly complete set going back to October, 2004, but not too many editions that are older. Do you know if this article was just on replacing the cross-member, or on the frame repair and cross member combined?

[John S]

It was the Feb and March 2004 issues for sure. I have them . Dave's frame was cracked and the crossmember was cracked as well. I did the same repair on my 55 C3PW although my frame was not cracked.