Family Mountain Mobile (Fam.lee Moun.ten Mo.beel) - Take 2

[1-ton]

You can buy an aftermarket steering column housing. I just tore apart my tilt wheel steering column on my crew cab, in order to tighten the tilt wheel bolts that come loose. it is a bit of a job, but I got it done. Here is a place that sells steering column parts, or a complete steering column.

http://www.columnsgalore.com/index.htm?gclid=EAIaIQobChMItIbk18W75wIVwsDACh0GCQPhEAAYASAAEgLX_vD_BwE

You may want to loose that plastic fuel filter. If that thing melts inside the engine compartment it will burn your new rig down.

 

[B.N.Z.MTNS]

You may want to loose that plastic fuel filter. If that thing melts inside the engine compartment it will burn your new rig down.

Thanks for the link on the steering column.

Yes on the in-line fuel filter. I plan on putting an old school style metal filter. There are also a few other things I want to tidy up in the engine bay before I drive it much.

I discovered when leaning out the carb, some previous owner put a riser on the carb but the air cleaner lid hits the hood at the back. but rather than shave the riser a bit, their solution was to beat the back of the air cleaner cover down to make clearance. But of course the air cleaner became deformed as well and is not sealed well against the lid.

It’s just little stuff like those things that will take a little time and a few bucks to make right. But overall, it’s a worthwhile rig with a good power plant and fairly straight body.

 

[B.N.Z.MTNS]

I finally got around to pulling the faulty hub apart to see what was going on. Surprisingly it was well lubricated and everything seemed to be working properly when I manually engaged it with the outer hub off.







However, while I was cleaning old grease off of everything I discovered the thrust washer that pushes against the spring and clutch ring was severely deformed. Also, it would not travel the whole depth of the hub cap to fully engage the clutch ring. It appears somebody has had this hub apart before and really marred the threads and deformed the thrust washer.



I cleaned everything up the best I could and got it all basically working. The hub is fairly hard to turn, but at least it actually engages now.

The best part is that it took it on a test drive to town to run some errands and on the way home, the sunset was awesome. I found a pullout on the short mountain pass I take to get home and took my favorite picture of the rig so far.

 

[Bent77]

It appears to me that the PO might have performed some goat-humpery witchcraft with a tool similar to the one on a wooden stick in that last hub picture. No bueno

But as @ZooMad75 Mentioned, the sunset picture is calendar worthy. Sometime around September or so @mrk5 will love to have that

 

[B.N.Z.MTNS]

Well... this came in the mail today.
I guess I should prioritize and seal this thing up so it doesn’t whistle so bad going down the road. Then I’ll have to save up the big money for other projects in the future.
I promised my wife I would try to take care of some of the creature comfort‘s first and get it reliable before I started messing with the heavy hardware.

 

[Big Ray]

Nice rig!

 

[B.N.Z.MTNS]

As I consider BB20 this year, I thought I ought to go up the road from our house and flex things a bit to see what may need attention.
The weather was great and I couldn’t help but take a few pics for the modeling portfolio.

 

[JJHollywood84]

Nice looking rig. I plan on doing something very similar when I get back from deployment in a month or so. I don't need an insanely built rig, just something reliable that I can tinker with and learn on. Following this thread for sure and look forward to seeing updates. I love the last picture. I am curious about the roof rack and how it's placed on the roof, any chance you could get a picture of it? Looking for ideas on a roof rack for mine as I am a novice welder and do not have many fabrication tools yet.

 

[B.N.Z.MTNS]

Nice looking rig. I plan on doing something very similar when I get back from deployment in a month or so. I don't need an insanely built rig, just something reliable that I can tinker with and learn on. Following this thread for sure and look forward to seeing updates. I love the last picture. I am curious about the roof rack and how it's placed on the roof, any chance you could get a picture of it? Looking for ideas on a roof rack for mine as I am a novice welder and do not have many fabrication tools yet.

Thanks for the kudos on this suburban. I will let you know that most of it was this way when I purchased it and I did not do the initial work myself.

In regards to the roof rack, it is a Con-Ferr brand which was really popular back in the day, but I believe they are out of business now. Their mounting technology was not that great, it is basically a modified door hinge at each corner that drills through the roof.
There is a company called DiamondRax that is basically replicating the Con-Ferr racks. Their website should be pretty easy to find.

I can try to get some pictures of it for you, but honestly, there are so many better roof racks out there these days that I would invest my money in. The only reason I’m going to keep this one on there is because it is kind of a classic now.

You might try digging up the Dantes Peak build thread and he has more details on this rack in his thread as he was trying to replicate the exact vehicle on the movie. He used to live not far from me and I even went with him a couple times to pick up some parts for that build.

Thanks for your service.

 

[JJHollywood84]

Thanks for the kudos on this suburban. I will let you know that most of it was this way when I purchased it and I did not do the initial work myself.

In regards to the roof rack, it is a Con-Ferr brand which was really popular back in the day, but I believe they are out of business now. Their mounting technology was not that great, it is basically a modified door hinge at each corner that drills through the roof.
There is a company called DiamondRax that is basically replicating the Con-Ferr racks. Their website should be pretty easy to find.

I can try to get some pictures of it for you, but honestly, there are so many better roof racks out there these days that I would invest my money in. The only reason I’m going to keep this one on there is because it is kind of a classic now.

You might try digging up the Dantes Peak build thread and he has more details on this rack in his thread as he was trying to replicate the exact vehicle on the movie. He used to live not far from me and I even went with him a couple times to pick up some parts for that build.

Thanks for your service.

Thanks for the info, and for your support