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BillyBob Work-in-Progress Log

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.

You will need the Adobe Acrobat browser plugin to view these wiring diagrams which are in the PDF file format. This format allows zooming and panning. If you don't have this plugin, it can be downloaded and installed (free) from the Adobe site. The button below will take you there.

BILLYBOB WIRING DIAGRAM Here's the wiring diagram updated with BillyBob's current state 'cepting the third-party strap-on turn-signal director.

STRAP-ON TURN-SIGNAL DIRECTOR/BRAKE LIGHT CIRCUIT This turn signal and brake light circuit diagram shows the current state of the third-party turn-signal director wiring, which will remain in place until I figure out the problems with the OEM turn-signal director. It also shows the OEM headlight switch.

63. The Big Move, Phase 2

September 22^nd 2010 I've been loafin' on phase 2 of the big move to the BillyBob Shop which is clearing out the BillyBob warehouse in Boca. Finally got around to getting a new battery for Renegade so I could move him out of the way. Last nite, I took the battery up to the warehouse and got the Jeep started. Moved the Jeep out and put a load of stuff in Deerslayer's Bed to take back to the BillyBob Shop. The trick will in in organizing the shop to accomodate this stuff. The loft space is about filled up.

September 26^th 2010 Picked up 'nother load at the warehouse on saturday. When I got it back to the BillyBob Shop, I started the convoluted process of assimulating these goodies into the shop. This process involves sitting with a beer or cigar or both, while listening to doowop music and trying to figure out how to organize and store the varied items, one-by-one. I'm trying to do it without heading over to Home Depot or Lowes for shelving or other expensive solutions I can't currently afford. Thirsty work for shure. The house beer is PBR.

September 28^th 2010 Saints n Sinners CC member French pulled into the BillyBob Shop parking lot right behind me when I got there last nite. club member Johan was close behind. We had a PBR and studied the Merc for awhile. They were going to adjust the valves on French's '49 Chebby so I grabbed some feeler gauges and followed them over to Johan's shop. Johan's more of a perfectionist than I am so we did it twice, two different ways. First, was the traditional method with the engine running. The engine still wasn't quiet enuf for Johan so we tried the method outlined by my friend Nathan Hall (VWNATE), the one I use with BillyBob. With the engine still, we discovered one of the adjusters wasn't tightening up correctly. We removed it and found the threads galled. As luck would have it, Johan had an old, discarded 216 stovebolt in his shop from a pre-war fire truck restoration that SnS member Russ Gagliano's shop did and, he had the adjusters from it. He examined all the adjusters on French's engine and replaced a handfull. Several had their threads fouled. Finally, the engine was running quiet enuf for Johan. We knocked it off about a half hour before midnite and retired to Denny's for some grub which French insisted on payin' for.

October 4^th 2010 On saturday, I spent the day organizing the BillyBob Shop and storing away stuff that I had brought down from the BillyBob warehouse bay. I had a box of tools that I bought down from my parents' place in '04 and never looked at at the time. Spent a couple of hours organizing the tools and waxin' nostalgic. I had just cleared up some shop space when Rob Stannard, his brother "Krashman" and others showed up with an engine and tranny for the Merc. It's a Chev smallblock and we've been talkin' Ferd and Chev bigblocks but it's hard to say no to a free, running engine.

October 7^th 2010 Went down to the Monterey Club last nite to watch the Cupcake Burlesque Troupe audition applicants for new cupcakes. Krashman (Craig Stannard) was there and he gave me three hefty cartons of new assorted nuts, bolts and brackets. Companies he deals with routinely throw this stuff in the dumpster. He has agreements with several of them to intercept these throwaways. They are a welcome addition to the BillyBob Shop if I can just find a place to put them. Craig also has sheet metal, including stainless, ready for fabrication, for the askin' if I need it.

October 18^th 2010 On saturday, Deerslayer and I went for 'nother load of stuff at the warehouse. Brought back a wire shelving unit and some heavy BillyBob stuff - A three-speed Muncie tranny with Borg-Warner overdrive, a 848 cylinder head and the clutch and flywheel that Greg Hill gave me at the Hutchinson show. Unfortunately, I wuz off-balance when I picked the tranny up and my right leg buckled under me. I tried to throw the tranny away from me and use my hands to break the fall. I landed with a "ommph" and my hat went sailin' across the concrete. I suppose I wouldn't have fallen if there wasn't a guy in the bay across from me standin' there to see the whole thing. I got up with bruised foot, knee and pride. Thanked the great mechanic in the sky for givin' me a mulligan. Retrieved my hat and took a look at the tranny. It appears undamaged. Got the shelving unit set up at the BillyBob Shop without further incident.

On sunday morning, got the shop space a little more organized by finding a place to stash BillyBob fenders and grille parts. Started looking thru the hardware that SnS Krashman had given me and found some cad plated nuts, washers and brackets to replace the rusted nuts and washers holding Deerslayer's bumper brackets to the frame rails. Went up to the boss's house in the afternoon to help him get Max's Hemi Charger started. After that we got Big Red started and started working some on Frankie.

October 29^th 2010 It won't be long before I'll be going home in the dark. Snapped this nite shot of the BillyBob Shop with my crappy camera. The shop is pretty full up but I still have a lot of stuff to bring down from the old BillyBob warehouse bay.

Currently having a slow tire leak problem with Deerslayer and I picked up this refurbed Campbell Hausfeld 7 Gal. Carry Tank off Amazon.com for $27 including shipping. It provides a little insurance until I get the leak figured out. I can also use it for Renegade and BettyLou now that I don't have the air compressor up at the Krash Lab.

November 10^th 2010 I've been tryin' to get my dead rear in gear to get something accomplished in the BillyBob Shop. It's been slow going and it's all my fault. In the meantime, I got some more new tools. I can't afford to buy a new tool anytime one strikes my fancy these days so now I purchase them as the need arises. Deerslayer's tire leak wuz all I needed to send for a Lisle Leak Test Tank. Yeah, I know I could have emptied a plastic storage box and probably make it work for the leak test but what's the fun in that?

When I have to add ATF Fluid to Deerslayer's tranny, it's a pain. I have to remove the parking brake from the side of the tranny to get to the fill hole. Even then, it's messy and I lose a lot of expensive fluid on the shop floor 'cause access is tight and the siphon is not the best tool for this job. I didn't know what the best tool was until I came across a message thread at the Garage Journal forums. That led me to a Plews Lubrimatic Fluid Quart Pump. At around $10, including shipping, I can get another one for diffy gear oil if this works as well as I 'spect it to . . . There's a fly in the buttermilk tho'. The Redline Company doesn't use a standard quart container. The neck is narrow and the cap is small. Good news is that the pump will still fit the narrow neck. Bad news is that the cap is too large to screw down. The current solution to this problem is duct tape. We'll see how that works out. I have to remember to keep the container upright at all times.

November 12^th 2010 Last nite when I got home, my neighbors were having a photoshoot outside the BillyBob Shop. They asked if they could shoot with Deerslayer an' I said sure! It was too dark for me to get any pics with my crappy camera (they had a powerful strobe on theirs) and if I get a copy of the photoshoot digitals, I'll post them down the road. The model was in short cutoffs and skimpy bra. Today, I have to clean the baby oil off of Deerslayer.

November 15^th 2010 Didn't get much done over the weekend. My friend Anthony is in the hospital and I didn't attend any of the cruise-ins I usually go to with him and Lou. Got the Flamingo Room cleaned on saturday (that's the ten by fourteen office at the BillyBob Shop. It has two mirrored walls and one of them has "Flamingo" etched in the glass with a pink flamingo as the letter "F"). Got the Deerslayer detailed on sunday between the morning breakfast cruise-in in Fort Lauderdale and the evening cruise-in in Lighthouse Point.

This is a short episode, but it's time to post and get my lazy butt in gear so I'll have more to report in the next BillyBob Shop log entry.

November 17^th 2010 Well, just damn! The LAROKE website hosting company is having problems with their "FTP servers" and I can't publish to the BillyBob site. I spun my wheels for a day, making shure the problem wasn't at my end, before posting an e-mail to support. I would rather chew off my arm than spend any time on the phone with tech support so I prefer e-mail first. Surprisingly, I got two replies within ten minutes. One was an automated receipt of my e-mail and the other was from a techie admitting to the problem and linking me to the same trouble ticket so I will get a response when the problem is resolved. LAROKE is no longer a business and I only publish once a month so I can afford to wait it out. If it was my bread and butter, I'd be having spitfits.

Okay, due to technical difficulties explained above, this log entry will be a little longer. I ran up to BillyBob's Boca warehouse bay at lunchtime yesterday and took another load of Billybob parts down to the BillyBob Shop. I hadn't started Renegade for a month and I was fearful that his new battery had been drained. He started, however, and I was able to charge the battery some while I was loading up Deerslayer.

November 18^th 2010 Was notified by the website hosting company today that I could once again publish to the LAROKE site so we're back in business and here it is.

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