wagon progress

[MP&C]

Been playing catchup for a while since my cross-country venture, time for some long overdue updates. Finishing up on our tailgate, the last stainless pieces of the puzzle came from McMillan Rod and Custom in WI. Pretty good source for polished stainless trim pieces...















We had emailed them dimensions for existing holes in the tailgate, and the welded studs were spot on.























All our stainless parts added for a test fit/pre-drill/pre-screw of all the hardware to insure they'd go in straight during final assembly. Here's my contribution to the upholstery effort on the car....























And our tailgate installed....















And our update would not be complete without the requisite back up and punt moment. As we were closing the tailgate there was a slight binding as the tailgate was all but closed. Hey, you know my luck by now. Seems our trial fit in bare metal showed no issues but now we had multiple layers of paint that didn't want to play nice. The hinge notches in the bottom of the tailgate skin were digging into the inside of the hinges..















At this point a hinge is an easier repair than a completed tailgate, so the hinges were milled down .080 on that face and the countersunk holes deepened that much as well..















Then about three rounds of epoxy, block, repeat to eliminate the casting flaws, and on to the organic green kandy basecoat once more...















And then groundhog day, install it once more, with much better results this time.

[BamaNomad]

It looks fantastic Robert!~

[MP&C]

Thanks!! Some updates on the shop truck... When I picked up the vintage farm tags in Delaware the gentleman was having a men's yard sale with plenty of car parts, etc. I picked up some stainless hub caps and trim rings, I just needed to hammer out some dings and paint the letters.








I had installed a used SUN tach to keep track of the rpm's. Not the one I wanted, but you just don't find used Rotunda tachs sitting on a shelf. Or do you... a couple weeks after installing the SUN I found a gentleman in Idaho that rebuilds the Rotunda's. He did have one rebuilt, ready to go. I will say the Rotunda is like a fine Swiss watch when compared to the Sun, a high-quality movement.





The Rotundra did come with a stainless flat mount for installing on a dashboard, and I needed a column mount so let's fabricate...














Another thing I was looking at doing was to fill out those rear wheel wells with a bit more tire. I had searched far and wide for a 15 x 8 stock steel wheel but they always seemed to have the wrong back spacing. I finally had more luck when a friend said he had some Jeep wheels in that size, with the correct bolt pattern. A test fit showed the back spacing to put this one about as dead center in the wheel well as you can get.













Now we have the wheels media blasted and dropped off for powder coating.











The tires installed should have about 3/4" clearance on either side..

[MP&C]

Well, it's about high time we got back on the console...








We had designed the "hoop" to go around each leg of the horseshoe shifter, and to hold bulb seal rather than a strip brush, for a cleaner look. When we ordered the shifter it came with the new clear bezel for gear indication, but since we didn't have the factory console and it's matching parts, it was a bit much for us to incorporate into our fabricated console. In an attempt at simpler is better, one of the hoops was made with a wider flange for adding gear indicator nomenclature.





Well, we have been waiting awhile for our turn in line at the machine shop, and that day finally arrived








Next was the layout of the locations...





The ends of the slots were cut using a 5/8 diameter RotaCut, joined together between with a Milwaukee M18 14 ga shear, and trimmed afterwards using Wurth snips.


https://youtube.com/shorts/vA83vJVWn...KUzlgmDHCVFgM7


Then the 4-way power window switch was added to the rear, using the same process.








And lastly, our AC vents added. I didn't have any RotoCuts in the 2-1/2 diameter, so we opted for using a hole saw. They can be sketchy when cutting through sheet metal, with the pilot drill wanting to pull the hole sideways. So we sacrificed an extra holesaw arbor to make a bolt-in guide, and changed the pilot bit out for a piece of 1/4 round stock.














Holes deburred and vents installed..





Final version


https://youtube.com/shorts/P94H8M4Ut...YffFOc_l96Whkg

https://youtube.com/shorts/6lWksNqKv...sE_F7LUX7CDUhV

[Belair-o]

Sweet! You do wonderful work!

[MP&C]

Thanks!!

I got the 15x8 wheels and 285/70-15 tires installed on the rear of the shop truck. Sure changes the attitude...

[busterwivell]

Beautiful Truck!