The WC53 Carryall thread .

[jim lee]

There are no rebuildable used heads you can grab anywhere? Seems pretty scary using "Ya ya, no problem" venders for parts.

-jim lee

[Bruce in BC]

hard to find a 4bt up here let alone parts

Cracked heads are way more common than you would expect. Finding a used uncracked head is short of impossible. According to my Cummins manual, if the crack is short and does not extend into the valve seat the head can be used. The crack in my head goes through the valve seat and beyond. Oddly enough it is not the exhaust that cracked but the intake. If I was only using the truck around here I would not be concerned, but the truck is going to see some long trips like it did last summer. A breakdown on a long trip would be a pain in the hoo hoo. Cummins does not use old heads on their remanufactured engines. I suspect the issue with the eBay seller may be shipping- but you would think he would be up front about it and try and help a customer. No response from the guy when I sent of a query this morning. He supposed to have 20 heads in stock some loaded some not.
I really do not want to have inserts installed but that may be what I have to do.
Between the head, gasket set and injectors I could buy 3/4 of an injected Chevy crate engine, at least that would be the case with my local Cummins dealer.
I like the engine but the cost of parts is absurd and its not like I have the fuel turned up or the pyrometer temps are high. Seldom break 900 degrees with the new turbo.

[jim lee]

Is that the engine they use on the Dodge pickups?

-jim lee

[Bruce in BC]

Not the engine they used in the pickups

The 6bt was used in the pickups and the big Dodge trucks use a cummins and the smaller ones use some other engine. the 6bt and 4 bt use many of the same parts - bit of a modular design.

[Bruce in BC]

Progress on the fan hub.

So I went looking for a fan hub to borrow but the fellow with the 6bt blocks had moved them to the back of a cargo container and I doubt they will see the light of day for years. But I did find out what we are looking for under the hood of a gmc topkick. Engine was transplanted in. The fan hub is shorter by about 1 inch or a tad more. The fan bracket is from am early to mid 90's non intercooled truck, most likely a Dodge.
The eBay seller replied to my second message - the 88 dollar international shipping charges? Turned into 300 dollar shipping charges, I am looking at other avenues, at least in the short term.
Interesting thing with these Cummins motors- the piston sticks out above the block. The clearance comes from the gasket. So if you have the block decked you need to go to a 10 0r 20 thousand thicker gasket. it would be a good idea to stamp the surface of the head with that information if the block was decked.
P pump engines used different pistons than VE pumped engines.
Intercooled engines had lower compression than non intercooled.
The injectors changed from 9mm to 7mm and the spray pattern changed along with the tip change- a simple change can drop the engines hp and milage.

One small step forward, 5 backward.

Bruce

[Bruce in BC]

This set up is even better

Check out the front of this Fleece engine block. None of the pulleys stick out. Now my question is could a person run the belt from the crankshaft pulley up to the top idler pulley or do you need to run the fan clutch pulley as well? It is flat and would give a full 2 inches of clearance over the stock 4bt set up.
Just stop the video at 2.10 minutes give or take a shade.
I am waiting for a call from Alec's machine shop regarding a new head . Sure wish I could find some interchange data on what 4bt heads will fit a 86 block.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1cZW_K2Hf4

[Bruce in BC]

ebay wc53 30 grand

Interesting what you can paint over and have the value go up...or at least the asking price go up. Love the big dent in the roof, the sheet metal welds and wiggley roof insert, toss in some pieces that sure look like the paint went right over some dirt and spider webs and you have the perfect WC53. Decent truck for a build? Maybe....depends what is under that wonderful paint job. The price? that is a whole different matter, about 18 grand overpriced IMHO.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Dodge-WC53-...ZZ-1FW&vxp=mtr

Got a late email about a head. They are closed on the weekend. Gave them about 10 casting numbers and low and behold they had a supplier with one of them. I hope it has the 7mm injector holes. Interesting on one page of my Cummins book it states " If the crack goes across the seat face the head MUST be replaced and just a couple of pages later it talks about needing to put in an insert if the seat face is cracked. Some one needs to proof read their manuals

I am thinking about building my own injector pop tester, I could buy one but I want one next week not next month. Need a hydraulic jack, a gauge and some fittings. We will see how that works out - Got my injectors soaking in some diesel, going to clean the outside, tear each down, turn the ends from 9mm to 7mm and hopefully test them before they go back in the truck.

It is cold, snow is flying, the perfect time to get things done - except my shop is freezing- 33 degrees in there right now.

Bruce

[jim lee]

That poor Carryall. What a mess! The paint job looks like it was done by Cub Scouts.

I do wish I had that rear seat though.

So you are getting closer to having a head on your engine?

-jim lee

[Bruce in BC]

Cylinder head

I am closer to getting the head, I will phone them on Monday and make arrangements. I also got bold and ordered a 2004 Cummins idler pulley. I am going to attempt to make a bracket that takes the place of the old hub and keep the same timing belt. Then I get to hammer out a shroud and remount the rad fan. I will post when the head comes in and give my observations. Not sure if it is loaded or not and at this stage I do not care.
That is quite the paint job. Why folks do this I do not know. For the folks who know what they are doing a paint job like this gets in the way, makes it harder to value and would tend to chase smart buyers away.
Edit - Cummins manual says the fan blade should be 2 - 4 inches away from the radiator, mine is way closer, but only because there was no room to move it farther away.
edit #2 here is a way better deal on a Carryall. Needs work but the rusted out sections are available from the likes of matt tisdale? I know I have seen new door skins and door bottoms for sale.
https://cnj.craigslist.org/cto/d/194...349217469.html
I wonder how Alex is doing with his truck....

Bruce

[jim lee]

Not heard from Alex for awhile.

I'm tearing my hair out on mine. I've been trying for days to finish up a few things, and I swear, I'm getting absolutely nowhere.

-jim lee

[Alxj64]

The other funny thing about that Carryall on eBay is that the selling company has an IG account that is blatently wrong about the origins of the truck. Claiming that it was a Military Ambulance chassis that had a civilian body put on it and was sold to the public. The original family bought it in 1941... blah blah. Frustrating to read for sure.

That second one for sale in NJ has crept down in price. It started out around 10k and then as more and more photos are appearing, the price is creeping down. I see it is at $6k. The seller has built a few I believe as I know I've seen this truck lingering in the background of some other photos. I spoke to him on the phone a few years ago and I believe he owned the WC53 that was in the Disney Movie "The Finest Hours"; very nice guy.

I've been around, just tinkering with some more wiring stuff, brake system things as well, but nothing fluid related yet. I had to make a brake light switch mount. Instead of using a pressure switch, I am using an adjustable limit switch under the dash so it is in closer proximity to the CAN system main harness. I have a build thread in the "Diesel Conversions" section of this forum that I bump on occasion and not always dump into this thread. I feel like this is more about Bruce's truck and the various other "network" of Carryall things we find.

For those on Face-space. There is a Carryall group now that someone started with a few more pictures appearing. There are a lot more of these trucks out there still than what I think we all realize.

Edit: Also, there was more banter in another forum about the "original / resto-mod" crowd. Granted I'm not as extreme as some of the guys out there adding a ton of chrome and power steps and things, I still have modern things in my "vintage" truck. For some reason it gets under my skin but is actually motivating as in my head I start thinking "You think I can't do this... Effing watch me!" and I also clam up on sharing my work because what people don't know, won't hurt em.

[Bruce in BC]

Aluminum fuel tanks.

What thickness is standard for aluminum fuel tanks ? I see a few aluminum tanks suspended by angle aluminum welded to the end plates and a few suspended by straps. it strikes me that the straps would be less likely to fail and the angle aluminum would fail around the welds from the tank and vehicle flexing. Does any one have experience in this field"

I like the tank on Alex's vehicle and how the exhaust is run. That is where I originally intended to run my exhaust but there are air bags in the way.

I just this moment finished machining the mount for the new idler pulley that will replace the old fan hub pulley. I did a bit of drawing, and think I figured out where to move the new smaller pulley and still use the old belt. Also there are two mounting points and it is possible to flip the adapter around which adds two more positions for a total of four. Of course we know the first position is going to work just fine.

As to this being my thread- NO WAY- I keep posting to keep the thread alive and am ecstatic when other folks drop by with their rigs. There are lots of blogs and threads run by one person and their vehicle - most go dead from lack of interest and input. The more folks posting the better. of course I need to get back to adding pictures....will do so real soon.

Engine - not much to say, I have a head ordered and will have it checked before i install the thing.

Picked up a totally fresh rebuilt turbo 350 with upgrades and a NP205 yesterday. It will get a doubler. This is for my trash truck- which I would love to stick a M37 body on, cage it and run 42 inch tires........but i doubt that is going to happen.

take care
Bruce

[jim lee]

Here's one for you.

Not sure if I'll ever finish it, but I need a speedo for my Carryall. Its going to take forever to get mine rebuilt so I decided to look into making a digital copy. The idea is to make it look just like the original, but have digital guts, cause they are easy to do.

First test of the speedo needle mechanism.

I actually measured the speedo needle on my carryall then 3D printed all the bits. I also have an encoder I've been working on that screws into the speedo cable end under the dash to run this.

-jim lee

[Alxj64]

Bruce, my tank is 1/8" thick but I've seen tanks built as thick as 1/4" on heavy equipment and as thin as .040" on performance aircraft and race cars. Mine is built with 5056 so that it could be bent with out cracking; unfortunately 6061 T6 is precipitate hardened and unless it is stress relieved along the bend prior to bending, it will certainly crack.

Mine will be settled into a pan with rubber type insulated guards and then some sort of strap will hold it into the pan. The pan will be hard mounted to the rear cross member but then bushing mounted on a poly hinge set to the shock / over axle cross member. The idea here is to isolate the tank from the chassis. Since the frame will still twist, bend, flex, etc with every bump and load cycle, I figure the tank itself needs to be isolated as best possible from these stresses. The pan mount with bands and isolated supports for the pan should give me substantial isolation. I do, however, have to make sure I run a separate wire to ground my fuel sender.

The tank skid / pan is only built out of 1/8" A50 mild steel. I had been acquiring some pieces and day dreaming of building a small forge. I had acquired a nice anvil last year but never got around to mounting it. I did both of those things this weekend and got my rivets heated. Driving some 3/8" steel rivets, even when hot, is not possible with my 4x aero type rivet hammer. That being the case, I smacked a few hot ones with an 8 lb sledge to test set them. The ones in the photos of my tank skid mockup are not driven yet but rather are just there to show the intent. I've tracked down a large hammer but will need to find rivet die sets for it or machine and harden my own sets for the hammer. The hard part will be finding a spring retainer for the hammer I found.

Jim.. That speedo is awesome! Your wife said in Instagram that you have a way with electronics, solenoids, etc. That 3d printed speedo assembly is awesome. You could make quite a small fortune if you offered to retro-fit stock gauges. I know I'd pay for one done for my next Carryall build as I'll have VSS sender on the transmission but I want the dash to be stock still! Very cool work!

[Waspworks]

^ awesome!!!