JR's Korner of BillyBob's Garage

WHAT'S NEW is a chronological listing of updates to the BillyBob site.

TRUCK LINKS including vendor sites for old parts, custom parts, and tools as well as sites for classic car and truck organizations

STORE Operating in association with Amazon.com, books, recordings and tools can be purchased.

PLANNING for the restoration including project schedule and cost estimates.

TRAVELS WITH BILLYBOB With apologies to Steinbeck, this area of BillyBob's Garage will be used to log the trips BillyBob and I make together.

WORK-IN-PROGRESS was the restoration of parts of BillyBob that I could accomplish without a garage up until the summer of 2010 when I finally got enough warehouse space to work in. Now, it also includes the continuing work on BillyBob in the shop.

PRE-RESTORATION includes log entries of minor repairs and adventures between time of purchase and the time when I started restoration, a piece at a time.

JR'S KORNER JR's Korner is the history of BillyBob before I got him authored by my brother, Wm. C. Kephart.

BILLYBOB MAINTENANCE Ever changing detailing, oil change, lube, etc. maintenance routines specifically developed for BillyBob, including required tools, materials and procedures.

PARTS SHOP The Parts Shop is a repository of How-To articles. Things that I have done over and over enough times to have developed a procedure. This gives me a checklist and saves brain cells.

STEALTH SHOP Urban residence design with large integrated shop and separate living quarters for a relative or renter.

8. Major Surgery - under the wrench

One day, about a year after I bought the truck, I noticed a miss in the engine. I was just driving along when it became obvious that the engine was not hitting on all six. Not a big deal. That tired old engine would develop a miss on a regular basis which was always due to an oiled up spark plug. As loose as the engine was, spark plugs would foul every hundred miles or so. I'd taken to keeping a set of spark plugs and a spark plug wrench in the glove box. I'd just pull over, find the fouled plug, change it and be on my way. Later, I'd clean the plug and return it to the glove box.

But on this particular day, the miss was not due to a fouled spark plug. I pulled all six plugs out and they all were a nice shade of gray-brown. Fouled plugs are black and usually wet. I checked the ignition point gap . . . it was set correctly. Using my amazing troubleshooting powers I chose not to believe my eyes and assumed it was a bad plug anyway, so I changed all six. The truck still missed! Hell with it! I drove the damn thing home and I decided to have a few Iron City's while I planned my strategy.

Two days later, I removed the valve cover (sometimes it takes awhile to plan) and had a look around. In the vintage Chevy engine the rocker arms are mounted on a common shaft. This shaft is secured to the cylinder head by means of cast iron supports which bolt to the cylinder head and have holes for the rocker arm shaft to pass through. Oil comes up through the center of the rocker arm shaft which provides lubrication between the supports and the shaft. Remember how bad the oil pressure was? Well, very little oil was getting to the rocker arm shaft which caused the shaft to quickly wear out. When the shaft got bad enough, it bound up in one support which promptly snapped. Because the shaft support was broken, one cylinder's valves never opened!

The truck wasn't going anywhere until I fixed the valve train and I couldn't do that until I got the parts and I had no idea where I was going to get the parts. In a flash of brilliance, I decided to rebuild the engine. After all, it shouldn't be any more difficult to find all the engine parts than just finding the valve train . . . right? I could put off the parts issue for now as the first order of business was to tear down the engine.

Remember. This truck was designed in the late forties and early fifties. In that timeframe trucks were not the status symbols they've become in the nineties. The only people who bought trucks were people who needed trucks. As a result, trucks of this period were very functional and also very simple. It's very easy to design a functional vehicle if you don't have to accommodate leather seats, 300 watt sound systems, extended cabs, light bars, mud flaps, big wheels, etc. All of this shit may allow one to express one's inner self but none of it helps the truck haul a load. In the fifties trucks were intended to haul loads - enough said.

On a sunny Saturday in June I started tearing down the engine. Because it was so simple and functional, I had the fan, fan belt, alternator (a non-standard item to be discussed later), water pump, exhaust manifold, and intake manifold off the engine in twenty minutes! Just try to get the fan belt - oh excuse me - accessory belt off a new vehicle in less than an hour . . . just try it! But now, I ran into the first obstacle.

I had removed all the head bolts but the head would not come off the engine. I figured the head gasket was probably bonded to the head and the engine block just like the rear seal had been so I tried prying it loose with a crowbar. Nothing. Next I tried turning the engine over with the starter motor. The compression should blow it loose. There was a problem with this approach, however, in that the engine's compression was down, being worn out and all. The head still did not move. I had no choice but to retain the services of a higher authority.

A little family history is in order. I grew up in a small central Pennsylvania town where my paternal grandfather was the "diesel expert." You needed a bulldozer or a dragline fixed you called "old Bob Kephart." My father had achieved the same mechanical godlike status for cars and trucks. He spent almost twenty years as an automotive machinist. You needed your car fixed you called "old Bob Kephart's son, Bob." I consulted old Bob Kephart's son, Bob - my dad.

I call him up. "Dad, I can't get the head loose." I said. " How many head bolts do you have?" "Seventeen." I offered. "You missed one." Dad concluded. "Look at the back right corner of the head. Dig down through the sludge. There's another head bolt there." My dad had not only pinpointed the problem in an instant, but he even knew which head bolt I missed and why I missed it. An amazing man!

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Issued Wednesday February 18, 1998

Updated Friday April 20, 2018

copyright © 1998-2018 William Craig Kephart all rights reserved