BillyBob Work-in-Progress Log

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.

WORK-IN-PROGRESS is the restoration of parts of BillyBob that I can accomplish without a garage.

PRE-RESTORATION includes log entries of minor repairs and 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.

Slight Facelift Page 3

January 16^th 2000 Yesterday the weather was miserable but today turned out to be nice enough to paint BillyBob's doors - cloudy and cool (for Florida) with a bit of a breeze. I started by again masking off all the glass, door handles, and other chrome and rubber close to the doors. ~!@#$% I missed one of the rear quarter windows somehow, and incredible to believe, did not notice my error until the door next to it was sprayed. My un-aided aging eyes can't detect overspray on the quarter window, but I'm sure it's there.

I'm still getting glossy areas alternating with splotchy areas. The passenger side door turned out better today than the driver's side, probably due to prevailing wind conditions for lack of a better guess.

January 23^rd 2000 Today, another beautiful Sunday, the pickup bed sides were wire-brushed and treated with Corolless stabilizer. I'm pretty sure now that the single quart of this stuff is going to be enuf for this project. I might even have enough for the wheels which is the next project. Finished up by roughing what's left of the paint on the tailgate, front bed panel and front apron, then washing for next week's painting.

January 29^th 2000 I'm back to Saturday sessions with BillyBob and reserving the shorter Sunday work sessions for Renegade, my Jeep. Today, the Front splash apron, front bed panel and tailgate were masked and painted. I ran out of masking paper and had to improvise with plastic trash bags. For the first time today I warmed up the spray can with hot tap water before spraying. It made the paint much more manageable and I don't know why I didn't remember the technique. I always followed this process as a kid when painting model cars. The forward edge of the splash apron was too difficult to get at with the spray can so I will have to do some touchup later by hand. Next week, the rear fenders will receive preparation attention.

February 5^th 2000 When I purchased BillyBob from my brother, JR, in 1995, he arrived in Florida with three hub caps. When I found the fourth hub cap among the extra parts in the pickup bed, I saw it was rusted out too badly to be mounted. Two of the other three hub caps on the truck were pretty corroded. Only one hub cap had any of its original shine. I checked out the Golden State Pickup Parts catalog I had and found they wanted over $70 each for these hub caps. That was too rich for me at the time.

Over the years I've checked other suppliers and the average price for 54/55 hub caps is in the $45 range. Last Sunday I visited the Jim Carter Truck Parts Website to check out hub caps again for the next BillyBob project which will be cleaning and painting the wheels. They were selling reproduction deluxe hub caps for about $30 each. When I visited their specials page, these hub caps were one of the five or so items listed and they were on sale for $20! As my boss likes to say "timing is everything". I ordered online and the hub caps arrived yesterday.

I installed the hub caps first thing. I was as excited as a kid at Christmas. These hub caps are different than the ones that came with BillyBob but they look good to me and, in Old English terms, I am well pleased. I can feel the spirit of my dad lookin' over my shoulder tho'. When I was a teenager, he never ceased giving me a hard time for purchasing chrome lug nuts, chrome foot-shaped gas pedal, and chrome piston-shaped shifter knob for my '59 Ford sedan with my limited funds instead of paying attention to the car's leaky wheel cylinders. He was right . . . Adding brake fluid every week was not the solution to that problem as I was to learn in a rather intense incident down the road. I'm fixin' the shift linkage next and then the wiring Dad, I promise. The rest of today's session was spent rust-treating the rear fenders and getting the pickup bed sides prepped for painting next week.

February 12^th 2000 You couldn't ask for a day much nicer. If my weather luck holds, I'll be finished with this project in another three or four weeks. During the week I picked up some more cans of "Hunter Green" Rustoleum and it's a good thing 'cause the bed sides took two cans, about twice as much as I'd estimated. When I was at Home Depot, I grabbed a Rustoleum sprayer handle attachment as an impulse purchase. This little plastic gizmo attaches to spray cans with a little collar and provides better control of the spraying process. The jury is still out for that claim in my case. I gotta get accustomed to the device. It's like when I specified an art pen and digitizer tablet for my Mom's computer. Her art work suffered at first because she had gotten quite skillful drawing with the mouse, an instrument totally unsuited to computer art. Now, after she has struggled thru the learning period, you'd be in for a helluva fight if you tried to take the art pen away from her.

February 19^th 2000 I can see the light at the end of the tunnel on this project. Today the bumpers and running boards were wire-brushed and prepped with Corolless. Those are the last parts that need to receive the treatment. The paint was roughened on the rear fenders and they were washed for next week's paint application. Three more good weekends and I can move on to the wheels.

I had to run for parts and BillyBob's three-on-the-tree gear shift mechanism locked up solid between first and second gears. This happened twice. The solution is simple - Drift to a stop (clutch still disengaged), off the road, if possible. Set the parking brake and turn the engine off. Retrieve a rubber mallet "I keep for just such occasions" from under the seat. Crawl under BillyBob and lightly tap the linkage arms at the transmission. Get back in BillyBob, check gearshift lever movement, start up, and continue on. The second time this happened today, I didn't realize there was a mud puddle under BillyBob until I felt it seeping through my jeans. I guess Murphy is sending me a message. I'm ajusting my plans to restore the shift linkage at the same time I do the wheels, or maybe sooner.

February 26^th 2000 Painting conditions are marginal today . . . more wind than I feel comfortable with and scattered showers. Got some clouds and sprinkles after I sprayed the first light coat of Hunter green on the rear fenders. After awhile, the sun came out and allowed me to apply a second coat. This project is about two weeks from being finished.

March 4^th 2000 It is a little windy but otherwise wonderful today so I decided to finish this project up. The running boards and bumpers were roughed-up and washed. After the sun dried everything, only a small amount of masking off was required. The running boards and rear bumper were finished with Hunter Green and the front bumper with Satin White. I couldn't find the "Shell White" that the grille had been finished with when I visited Home Depot last time so I settled for the "Satin White". There is a slight variation in the two colors, so I will re-spray the front bumper when I finally locate another can of "Shell White".

Well, that's it. BillyBob looks great compared to what he looked like at the end of October when I started this slight facelift. My knowledge has grown too during the process and I performed the work at a relaxed enough pace that it was fun and not a chore. My next two projects are painting the wheels and restoring the three-on-the-tree gearshift linkage which has been giving me some trouble.