I'm a DUMBASS!!

[mofugly13]

I\'m a DUMBASS!!

I've been working on ideas to get the 3" wide ford 57" springs to work on my K5 when I swap in the 1-ton rear. So I went to the yard and looked at the truck I pulled them from. The hangars for the rear springs are very similar in design to our chevy hangars, just different dimensions. So I go back on a Saturday with a couple of grinders and a drill to get them off the ford. Anyway, once I am at the Junkyard, and I run my cord and get ready to start grinding, I realize I have no eye protection, whatsoever! "Mutha Fukkah!!!" I said. This truck is stacked on top of a van, so I would be grinding overhead, and I ain't doing that without eye protection. So I decide to try and drill out the rivets. No luck starting the drill as the rivets are rounded on top. Aha, I grab the grinder and grind a flat on the top of a rivit, with my eyes squeezed shut, of course. Wow, I'm thinking. It took about 30 seconds to grind a decent size flat in one rivit. I look at the other 23 rivits I'd have to grind and decide that,even if I had eyewear, it would take me a whole day to gring all these friggin rivits off. So I decide to see how the drill works out. Well, I grab a nice sharp 1/4" bit and proceed to drill. As I mentioned this truck is up high, I'm trying to drill about a foot over my head. I have no leverage whatsoever. Drilling for about a minute yielded me minimal results in the form of metal removal, so I decide that to drill them would take even longer than grinding them, and there's other crap I have to take care of at home. So I decide that before I spend any more time on this, I'll pull the part numbers of the hangars and go to a dealershil and see what they charge for them. So I wrote down the numbers and went on home.

So I go to the dealer on Tuesday and ask the guy for prices on the parts. They are $38 EACH!!! /forums/images/graemlins/eek.gif /forums/images/graemlins/doah.gif Well, I thought that was pricey, but I recently got my tax return, so I said "Give me two of each, front and rear hangars." The dude tells me that they are a special order item and If I get them, there are no returns, period. He asks me if I'm sure I want them. I think about it and say OK, I'll take em. So I go to the front and pay, and the deal is sealed. (I picked up some f-250 shock towers BTW, still availabe, ~$11 each.) So, now that there is no turning back, $160 later, I wonder if maybe I should have just gone and spent a day at the yard. "No sense in thinking 'bout that now." I tell myself.

Friday I go and pick up my goodies. Oooooh! All shiney, black and new! The guy throws 'em in a box, and I'm off.
When I get home and start looking at them, I take the rear hangar and start figgerin' on where to cut so I can do a shackle flip. Then I realize that I should have bought FOUR of the front hangars only! DUMBASS! DUMBASS! DUMBASS! /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif
Now I am kicking myself in the ass! I might just go back to the junkyard and get those front hangars. But I sure as hell dont want to. So now I will just stew in mild misery and contemplate how to get that friggin' pinion out of the D70.

 

[sled_dog]

Re: I\'m a DUMBASS!!

what a pain, don't you love when you realize you wasted money cause you were just trying to do things the easy way?

 

[mofugly13]

Re: I\'m a DUMBASS!!

Well, I just went downstairs and managed to remove the pinion!! So, I feel a little better. /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

 

[marine_enlisted]

Re: I\'m a DUMBASS!!

You are not alone. I'll share my most recent dumbass moment.
I bought a NOS D60 off E-bay recently. It was a dually axle so I had to buy SRW hubs for it. I got new studs and everything to convert it. I read billavistas article on Pirate on how to convert the axle. I looked up to see what it would cost for me just to go buy the right rotors and the Autozone price was $47.99 ea. for SRW rotors. Just for the hell of it I decided to look up what dually rotors cost. Autozone sell these for $99.00 a piece. /forums/images/graemlins/yikes.gif Now, since my axle is brand new it has Bendix brand rotors which must be much more expensive than the 1 yr warranty ones that Autozone sells. For a brief moment I was thinking I should put the expensive / harder to find rotors on E-Bay and sell them for more than it would cost to buy new SRW ones from Autozone. But alas the impatient dumbass within surfaced and I said screw it I'll just drill theses sluts out and get it done. Well, I misread the article when it comes to drilling out the dually rotors to fit SRW studs. I thought the studs were supposed to be press fit to the hubs and rotors alike. So I special ordered a 21/32" drill bit ($23.00) for a .015 interference fit between stud and rotor and proceeded to drill out the rotors. I get them all drilled out , no problems there. I put the studs in the holes and bust out my trusty Mac Toolslong barrel air hammer and get the studs about 3/4 of the way in with that, then head over to the press to drive them the rest of the way in. I get a few studs in on the first rotor and on a couple of them I hear a loud metallic ting . I think it's just the frame of the press creaking from all the pressure, so I finish up that one and go on to the other. I hear the same ting a few times on this rotor too. I finish up on the dimly light press and move my stuff over to the workbench where the sun is shining brightly through the window. I take a close look at the studs to ensure that they are seated all the way and in the light I know realize what those ting sounds were. My rotors cracked around 7 of the 16 studs. /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif At first I thought screw it I'll run them, and then realized that these are too important to half ass and pressed out the studs and threw the rotors away. They never even got a chance to stop a truck, brand new, expensive junk. So I ended up going to Autozone and buying new SRW rotors for $47.99 ea and I am stuck with a $23.00 21/32 drill bit that I'll probably never use again. Once I got the new rotors home I checked the stud clearance and they dropped right through the holes in the rotors, no interference fit whatsoever. /forums/images/graemlins/angryfire.gif Boy did I feel stupid.

 

[tRustyK5]

Re: I\'m a DUMBASS!!

/forums/images/graemlins/doah.gif /forums/images/graemlins/doah.gif

Rene

 

[Corey 78K5]

Re: I\'m a DUMBASS!!

Sure as hell hope You did some measureing. I did the 3" swap on Mine. I must have checked damn near every type of hanger Ford made for the 70', 80's and 90's models and they were all to wide by 1/2", 1" over all. Basicly the center line of Your springs would be 3 1/2" from the outer edge of the frame rail instead of 3". So If You do use Ford hangers the center pins holes on Your axel will be 1' narrower that the center pins on Your springs.

 

[mofugly13]

Re: I\'m a DUMBASS!!

Yeah, I did a BUNCH of measuring. I have a crapload of notes and sketches, and before I do anything, I'm going to go back and remeasure and recalculate everything again. I have to move the spring perches anyway. With a chevy frame using ford hangars, the spring perches should be 41" center to center. I was thinking about spacing the hangars off the fram to match the perches on the axle I pulled off the ford. That would take some 1 3/4" spacers, which seem a little too wide, I think. Right now I'm regearing, so I've got some time for figgerin'. /forums/images/graemlins/thinking.gif