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.

7. Nervous breakdown: Taillights, Parking Lights, Turn Signals
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February 10^th 2001 Beautiful day. Decided to tackle the taillights. The driver's side light hasn't worked for some time. I intend to replace the wiring from the cab on back and replace the existing after-market lights with 54'-55' replicas with 12v turn-signal double filament bulbs.

But first, some cleanup from the last Nervous Breakdown log entry. I had mentioned that I didn't know why the existing battery cables were of different gauges, so I replaced the cables with new cables of the same differing gauges. I got an e-mail from Bill Hanlon of the Oletrucks maillist to shed some light on this issue:

Your question "Why the difference in cable gauges??" when referring to "a 32 inch 2 gauge red Battery Cable for positive to starter connection, a 38 inch 6 gauge black Battery Cable" for negative to ground connection" is a good one. The same amount of current has to flow in each cable. The current flow will not be more than the smaller of the two cables can handle. When it comes to battery cables bigger is better or at least smaller is worse. And 6 volt cables are bigger than 12 volt cables. Actually, there is no such thing as a 6 volt (or 12 volt) cable. It is just that it will require more amps to turn over the same engine with a 6 volt system than a 12 volt system. More amps need bigger wire. So the safe way is to use the larger cables that were stock on the 6 volt system.

Thanx Bill, I had suspected as much upon reading Randy Rundel's excellent book after I wrote the log entry. Your e-mail solidified the knowledge in my hard head. I will replace the negative 6 ga cable with a 2 ga cable to match the 2 ga positive cable somewhere down the line.

The existing lights are of the same type so this process shouldn't present too many difficulties. The wiring harness from Jim Carter's Antique Truck Parts does not document the wire gauges, so I'll have to guess at the connectors. The Calterm connectors I got from Discount Auto Parts to match those on the wiring harness are blue and designated as for 16-14 gauge wires.

I'm gonna leave the existing license plate light in place for the time-being until I figure out how to mount the replica license plate bracket and light assembly I purchased from the American Classic Truck Parts website. Started out by twisting, cursing, dremeling, and chisling existing bolts, stovebolts and nuts off/out. Wirebrushed the area and treated with a coat of Eastwood's PRE Paint Prep, followed by a brush-on coat of Corroless Rust Stabilizer to the disturbed areas of the bed support.

Waiting for the Corroless to dry, I threaded the taillight wires thru their rubber boots with the assistance of a coat hanger wire as a snake. Next, bullet connectors were crimped to the ends of the taillight wires. The old tailights were cut from their wires and bullet connector receptacles crimped to the old wires as a temporary measure. The disturbed areas of the supports were given a coat of Rustoleum Hunter Green after the Corroless dried.

The new taillight brackets which come finished in gloss black were attached to the bed support with 5/16"-18 x 3/4" flanged cap screws that I got from McMaster-Carr when working on the radiator support a few months back. These cap screws have a black finish too. Large diameter flat washers were placed between the brackets and supports to keep the brackets away from the fresh paint and secured from inside the support with lock washers and hex nuts.

Installed the light housings without the lenses and fooled around until I got the bright filament of each bulb working with the turn signals/brake light circuits. That's the reason for using the bullet connectors - If I get it wrong, it's easy to switch wires.

After I got the lights working, the wire boots were snugged on the back, all nuts tightened and lenses installed. The wiring was temporarily secured beneath the bed with wire ties. Everything is working and I only pinched my thumb once - A good omen and I'm quiting while I'm ahead for a change.

February 11^th 2001 The brake lights were only working intermittently. When I got to the Krash Lab, I backed BillyBob up to the front doors (glass) and watched the reflection in the rear view mirror as I applied the brakes and turn signals. The brake lights didn't work when pumping the pedal. If the brakes are applied, then first one turn signal turned on and off, then the other, the brake lights would work . . . ARRRUUUGH!! OK! looks like I'll have to install the new aftermarket turn signals soon instead of waiting for the Jim Carter wiring harness installation. In the meantime, I'll move my defensive driving practices to DEFCON 4. I picked up some 5/16"-18 wing nuts at Discount Auto Parts to secure the new battey top retainer I got from Chevy-Duty to the two threaded rods on the battery box. The top retainer will require some surgery to fit the new battery tho' because it is slightly longer than the original six-volt battery this retainer was designed for.

February 17^th 2001 Jacked up the rear of BillyBob and placed jack stands. Checked placement of new replica license plate bracket and light assembly . . . looks like it goes at the middle of the back just under the tailgate (there are matching holes in this location). Problem is, it doesn't really fit well behind the home-built channel iron bumper some previous owner installed. I'll have to start researching an original equipment bumper and bumper brackets.

I placed both kinds of Wiring Harness Clips I got from Chevy-Duty on the frame for the new taillight, license plate light and turn signal wiring. These things did not fit well, probably due to the corroded nature of the frame, and when I threaded the wires from the Jim Carter wiring harness, they turned out to be too short to reach the passenger side taillight. Humbug! Time to retrench and rethink. I'll stop and purchase 14 ga wire in the lengths and colors needed and substitute a current style clip for this stage one wiring job.

February 24^th 2001 Received/picked up wire and other electrical accessories during the week . . . too much, in fact. Last saturday, I ordered 14 ga stranded wire from McMaster-Carr, 50 feet each of yellow, black, and blue (wanted purple to match the Jim Carter wiring harness, but blue was as close as I could get). The wire arrived mid-week and the conductors looked like aluminum to me and I wanted copper, so I went to Home Depot where I picked up two fifty foot spools (red and white). I went back to the McMaster-Carr website and searched for "copper wire" which brought me to the same product I'd ordered earlier???? Upon closer examination, the wire that I assumed was aluminum appears to be tinned or silvered copper. I also picked up a three-prong heavy-duty 12v flasher, black wire ties, Star Brite Liquid Electrical Tape and CRC QD Electronic Cleaner from Discount Auto Parts. A Stoplamp Switch (#53-011) and 12v Replacement Headlamp Switch (#53-156) arrived from Chevy-Duty. The headlight switch is too different in appearance from the original for my liking, so it will go in the emergency parts inventory.

I removed all the metal frame wiring clips that weren't working and replaced them with the sheet metal wiring clips which fit snugly in the frame holes - these are the wrong clips for the application but they work (Or are they? By the time I was finished, I was unsure of which clips are for the frame and which are for sheet metal). I pulled the new blue (purple) tailight wire thru the frame and cut it into three lengths: 1) back of cab to driver side taillight, 2) driver side taillight to passenger side taillight, and 3) a short length of wire for the license plate light that will reach both the present location and the future location. The wires were removed again and taken back into the Krash Lab for soldering two tee connections and crimping connectors on the ends. Several coats of the liquid electrical tape were applied to the soldered tee connections. This stuff is messy to work with.

The new taillight "harness" was re-threaded to Billybob's frame and new 14 ga wires were pulled for the driver side and passenger side turn-signal/brake lights (yellow and black, respectively). The wiring clips are open at the top and made out of spring metal, so pinching them closed to keep the wires in doesn't work all that well. Instead, I secured the wires to the clips with the small black wire ties. This pic is under the bed behind the license plate on the driver side of BillyBob with the new wiring in place.

After taking out the slack, removing the old wires, and securing the new wires to the clips, connectors were crimped to the old wires where they were cut off under the cab and they were connected to the new wires going to the back. It was a good thing I used bullet connectors 'cause I guessed wrong on which old wire was which the first time around. This pic shows that area under the cab once I made the correct connections. It's also a good view of one of the wire-tied clips (to the left side in the pic). To finish up for the day, I fired up AutoCAD and documented the tailight and rear turn signal area of the growing wiring diagram.

March 3^rd 2001 Not gettin' much done today. There's a downtown Boca Raton festival in progress an' the boss's daughter is selling parking spaces, including BillyBob's. During the week, she managed to schedule my weekend for a heavier workload (relocating four computers) in the hope that I'd be too busy to work on BillyBob . . . Doesn't understand that some of us live for these old trucks. Well, I got a space on the other side of the shade tree and she's got the main lot. Neither of us are entirely happy, so it's probably a good compromise. I cleaned off a portion of the firewall and mounted the new three-prong flasher next to the old one using an aluminum pop rivet to mount the flasher bracket.