Project: Midnight Panic

You’re inspirational man, in a here’s what worked for me kinda way, but with some pretty focused skills. (and a sweet set o machine’s skills)
Too bad I wasted all my brain space throughout my life with focusing on oilfield related crap, maybe ide behaving fun cranking out aluminum parts
 
If you're following the YT channel, you got the update a day early,
Finally got around to finishing the paint work last saturday, I thought I had the bed skins sanded pretty good & could jump right into painting, so the Kiddo came down to the shop just to hang out & be part of the process a bit, besides, she was the one that suggested adding some color to the project, Turns out there was a fair bit more sanding that needed done, but eventually I got them all scuffed up, cleaned up, prepped & in the booth,
Allsion even hung out in the booth for a couple minutes, without really having proper respiration she didn't get to stay for the whole process,
She did come in & check on things between coats though.
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Four different colors were laid down in different stages after multiple masking sessions,
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The next day we rolled the doors up to see how they looked in the sunlight,
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The next step was to fill all the light holes,
 
The front blinkers were easy, new "clear" lenses were received from LMC & screwed in place,
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For the marker lights I did the same as the headlights & cut out some aluminum ones,
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While I was at it, an aluminum filler was cut out for the fuel door as well,
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Next on the list was re-torquing the head studs, I've never worried about this much before, but I know some guys do,
This time I had a sneaking suspicion that I had an issue, since I keep getting a little air in the cooling system, & torquing the head studs again after a couple heat cycles might be the fix,

I did not take any pics of that process, but there is good video of that,

Unfortunately, my coolant issue was not resolved with re-torquing the heads, so it looks like I will be doing this job again as soon as the new head gaskets show up, (end of next week maybe, I hope) I'm interested to get in there & see what is going on,

I took the last couple of my days off to work on windows, starting with a cardboard template for the back window,
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Since the rear window is to big to fit on the router table, i just cut it out with a jigsaw, then finished the edges with a belt sander,
Then I got to thinking, I do plan on cutting the side windows & inner door panels on the table, & when I do get to that point it would be nice to have a better system for holding thin flexable material down, currently I have been using masking tape on both the back of the part, & the waste board on the table, then glue the two layers of tape together, once machining is done just peel the part off the table,

On more expensive, commercial/production grade machines they have a vacuume bed to suck the material down & hold it to the table,
So I built a vacuume top for my machine, Again, no pics, but I will be doing a little bit of a video on that later,
Now with a more user friendly/simpler work holding setup for large flat material, I figured why not cut something into the back window? After consulting the girls (wife & kid) they both felt "Ford" oval would be fitting,

Before committing to doing anything to a large piece of polycarbonite, a test piece was used, to test both the new table top, & how the machine would work on that material,
A scrap left from cutting out the rear window was slapped on the table, vacuum on, & engraved the wifes name, into the material, backwards,
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The vacuum top held the material great, & the machine both engraved & cut the poly (lexan) very clean,
After peeling the protective coating off the front side,
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Digging back in memories to my "Technology" class in Jr High, I remembered an assignment we had dealing with "internal reflection" & some of the tests we did using lights, lasers, fiberoptics, different types of clear plastics, & even liquids, & kind of re creaed some of that,
By simply shining an LED strip into the edge of the poly,
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It goes without saying, now I'm going to have to have a, illuminated Ford oval in my back window, :laughing:

As I mentioned before, the rear window is to big for my table, one way,
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But for just doing the oval I was able to rotate the part 90* on the table & get this job done,

The oval was engraved the same as the name plate, basically a pocketing tool path .005 deep using a 90* Vee cutter set at .008 step over, (each cut pass is 8 thousandths of an inch over from the previous pass,)

Just a little over 3 hours to do a 24" wide Ford oval,
while it was on the table I milled an 18" long slot, .375 wide to hold a pretty standard cut to length LED strip,

I think the results will be well worth that effort,

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Next week I will continue on with windows, Unless some gaskets show up earlier than expected,
 
Love the sidelight block offs. Love the paint. I have one suggestion and one begging.

Suggestion, I think you could use some of that blue somewhere on the front of the truck. Maybe just on the dash board.

Begging, please, please, please get rid of the “pop” rivets on the fuel cover. Solid rivets or stainless screws. Pop rivets are not worthy of this build.
 
This weeks update will be a little short, mostly just to get the build here & the YT stuff all on the same page, (I posted more here than was in the video last week)
For the most part all I did was continue with windows anyway, starting with getting the rear window installed & wired in,,,,,Yeah, the rear window has an electrical plug on it.
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Fortunately I had power readily available at the back of the cab for part of the rear steer, That part of the rear steer was to be used for remote contolled steering, Which I figured might be handy when loading this thing in the trailer, I didn't get any pics, but basically I used a cheap remote winch controller to activate left & right turn from outside the truck, So while wiring in the rear window, I finished installing the reciver for the reamote,



Once that was complete I continued on with the side windows, Knowing I was going to be able to use the CNC router for that project I modified my new vacuum top with a slug of aluminum & a pocket machined through one of the vacuum passeges, the slug being a "snug" fit, then slotted for vacuum to pass through,
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With this setup I am able to rotate the slug & block off the vacuum from half of the table.
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This will come in handy if I ever need to hold smaller sheets in place,
I couldn't simply slap some polycarbonite windows in the door & sall it good, I really feel they need to go up & down, not with a rgulator, more like a slider, to at least have them in either the open, or closed position, (closed to limit mud intrusion, open for egress in an emergency situation)
Also, the wing window is being eliminated in favor of a larger, one piece side window, to make this all work I disassemble the wind window assembly & stole the window track the original side glass used at the front edge, cut it down (shortened the track) then reinstalled it at the front of the door cavity using a couple of exsisting holes still left in the doors,
For the rear track I used the original part, but I had to add a spacer to get the rear track to match the vertical angle of the new front track,
A little hex bar was used to build both the spacer, & a large washer, since the lower mounting bolt passes through a large square hole that offered adjustment from the factory,
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Once happy with the window tracks, a couple test windows were cut from some scrap bead board, then test fit. The first version fit close, & after a couple modifications the second attempt was cut & tested,
Being happy with that version, I slapped a sheet of polycarbonite on the table & started making chips,

Natrually driver & co-driver names were engraved in the lower rear corners while they were on the machine, the co-driver being especially important.
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And of course my logo in the lower front corners, (in case anyone needs to know where to get a pair)
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It's pretty wild playing with this machine, that logo is less than an inch long, & engraved about .005" deep.

I got both windows installed, & about the only thing left is to figure out how to make sure they stay in the "up" position, yet able to be opened from either inside, or, outside the truck, I have a several ideas ranging from dowels/pins through the windows, to magnets, or maybe even small gas struts & a cam over machanism, (if I can find a light enough strut & make sure the 1/8 poly will handle those forces without too much extra bracing)

Yesterday afternoon I did get my new head gaskets, just in time for me to go back to work,
So that's where I will continue nexr week,

This update is honestly much better in video form, with that said,

 
As always, never ceases to amaze me. I really enjoy how you’re able to plan ahead in the beginning stages of the build and make it future proof.
 
It was a pretty busy weekend so I started out by knocking out that head gasket job,
It’s a bit of a process getting that far into the engine,
Pulling all the same parts I did a couple weeks ago (valve covers, stud girdles, rocker arms) plus the blower/hat, intake manifold, headers, & push rods,
Finally pulling the nuts, studs, & heads,
Right off the bat I noticed an issue with the head gasket at cylinder #1
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That shape is one of the cooling passages in the bottom of the cylinder head,
The gasket was being pressurized between the gasket layers into this area & ended up forming the top layer of the steel gasket into this shape matching the passage opening,
I’m doing so it distorted the fire ring area of the gasket cracking through the fire ring & finally the pressure/formed area burst,
This is obviously the main source for air in the cooling system, & most certainly the reason coolant was getting into #1.

But I don’t understand why it’s leaking between the layers of the gasket,
Even though there was a major failure on the one gasket pictured, both sides were actually leaking compression past the fire rings into the cooling system in several areas at some point,
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Just in case, I did double check the area of the head & block where the failure occurred,
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Using a precision ground 1,2,3 block, I could not find anything that was even .0015 out of flat, (smallest feller gauge I have)

But even if it was an issue with deck/block surface, why leak between gasket layers where there should be no question on RA, or cleanliness?
Flatness could effect sealing between layers, but I would expect at least some evidence of leakage on the block or heads.

Something to ponder anyway,
After extensive cleaning, new gaskets were installed, & the engine was reassembled,
I put on a new blower pulley slowing the blower down to 20% over driven,
Since I had to reinstall the distributor & set the timing anyway, I set that to 30°
The engine sounds really good, & it will go through several heat cycles, then re-torque the head studs before really flogging on it again,

With that stuff out of the way I finally got to install the bed skins,
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I ended up building a few more support rods to make the skins more rigid, then finished them off with the tail light lenses,

That evening & a good part of the next day was spent with the family hanging out & checking out monster trucks since they were in town,
But we did get to take the truck out of the shop before the end of the weekend & get a few pics out in the sunlight.
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I’m not going to lie,
I may end up repainting the front clip, 😆
But like I told the wife, if I leave it as is, I could probably got rowdy with this thing for years & never crash it, or at least not damage the fiberglass hood,
If I repaint it, the truck will get wrecked first real event out, just the way it works.
But it is most certainly driving me nuts.




 
Blows me away how you non-chalantly tear the whole engine down. Can’t say I’m wild about the magnet bedside braces. You will probably prove me wrong.
 
WaterH said:
Blows me away how you non-chalantly tear the whole engine down. Can’t say I’m wild about the magnet bedside braces. You will probably prove me wrong.
Click to expand...
Nah I just pulled the heads off, easy peasy 😆

The magnets are completely experimental, I could pick the whole bed skin up with one magnet,
Doesn’t mean they’ll work for this application, but I’m curious enough to find out,
Besides, they were easy enough to install it almost felt like a lazy/easy out.
 
Skipped_Link said:
I’m not going to lie,
I may end up repainting the front clip, 😆
Click to expand...
I wasn't going to say anything... But, since you did :flipoff2: Valid point on letting it take beating vs. something just happens after a bunch of rework though.
Do the dots on the bedsides stand out better in person? Get a little glimpse of them in just the right light on camera.

Awesome work as always. Look forward to seeing some race video. :smokin:
 
FlatLander said:
Do the dots on the bedsides stand out better in person? Get a little glimpse of them in just the right light on camera.
Click to expand...

They do show up better in person, as long as you are close enough to the truck.



It's been a pretty busy couple of weeks, & I chose to wait on an update until I had enough content to be post worthy, so no I think I'll break it up into multiple posts to get everything caught up,

Picking up where I left off, I wanted to get inner door panels built & installed, This was a cool project & made for a pretty good video, but I got so focused on the video that I really didn't get many pics, (this part of the project is not that great for pictures anyway)
Well, other than a finished product pic,
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For those interested in the complete process of building the panels, here is a link to the YT video.



If you’re not interested in all the information the video contains, here’s the condensed version.

 
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Next up was a recovery/lift point at the front of the chassis, For this I utilized the winch mount area,
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As you probably remember I have a brand new Warn Zeon 12 winch that bolts to this chassis plate, but it is very unlikely that I will really need it very often, So I am going to keep it as a bolt in option, in case I ever take this truck to an event where self recovery is an option,

For the rest of the time, a receiver tube that bolts into this location would be more useful,
For that option I drew up a few parts & headed to dads shop to see if the plasmacam table still worked, (it's been a bit since I've needed that machine) fortunately all is well there, & he had even fixed up a few things that were showing signs of wear & tear.
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After a little cleanup, everything was tacked together,
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Then finish welded,
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Then finally run through the bead blast cabinet & powder coated,
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A total of six bolts hold this part in place, & I've already tested its capability of supporting the front half of the rigs weight,
I have intensions of doing a YT video on this part as well, but I have not been able to get to that yet.

This particular piece along with the door panels did a pretty good job of consuming an entire set of days off.
 
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