Tinkering with Deerslayer

DEERSLAYER LINKS including vendor sites for parts and tools as well as sites for old truck and hot rod organizations

TINKERING WITH DEERSLAYER chronicles the day-by-day maintenance and improvements episodes for Deerslayer, a '37 Chevy farm truck hot rod.

CRUISIN' WITH DEERSLAYER Roadtrips, cruise-in's and truck show stories and tall tales.

TONY'S DUNGEON Tony Pascarella's forum entries at OldGMCtrucks.com and H.A.M.B. regarding Deerslayer, particularly the 302 GMC engine build in his farmhouse basement.

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

PROJECT NAILHEAD Chronicles the rebuild of a 1954 Buick Roadmaster 322 nailhead engine as a future replacement for Deerslayer's Jimmy 302.

15. Still avoiding the big jobs

April 27^th 2011 Haven't been doing much since the last Deerslayer log entry. A little maintenance to keep Deerslayer going and that's about it. I've been layin' low and waitin' for good times. Tuesday, a week ago, I got a couple of shots at the tuesday nite cruise-in.

I was drooling over this Olds torpedo. So much so that I completely missed the significance of the exotic next to it, a Porsche 918. Guess I've turned total greaser. I appreciate the technology of new iron, it just doesn't ring my bell like it did when I was a teen.

Color me confused. In the last Deerslayer log entry, I reported that the AC Delco R45 plugs I put in Deerslayer were starting to give me a cold start miss so I surmised that the miss problem wasn't because of the racing plugs since the R45's were doing it too. Tony, Deerslayer's builder, suggested I check the plug wires. I haven't gotten to that yet but, before the ink was dry on the log entry, the misfiring disappeared. Deerslayer has been running like a top for over a week with no signs of engine misfiring!

May 4^th 2011 OOPS! More confusion. What I thought was a Porsche 918 is, in reality a Porsche Carrera GT. Got the correct info last nite, straight from the owner's mouth, at this week's tuesday nite cruise-in. Like I said, I'm not into the exotics. I had to leave the cruise-in early, before dark, since Deerslayer's headlights stopped working on friday nite and I haven't figured that out yet. When I got back to the BillyBob shop, I discovered that one of Deerslayer's dogdish hubcaps had made its escape. Damnation!

Deerslayer's bed has been getting pretty ratty. The varnish is in bad shape and there are more than a few gouges from actually using the truck to haul stuff. I spent this past saturday giving the bed wood a light sanding, then cleaning up with shop vac, compressed air and a mineral spirits rubdown.

Afterwards, the bed got one coat of the Old Masters Marine-Spar Varnish. I'll repeat this process again in a few weeks and eventually bring the bed back to a more show-worthy condition. I also messed around with the starting circuit. A week or so back, the "bad starter" symptoms started up again, this time with the new starter. Several times in a row now, when I toggle the starter switch, I get a snap and the ammeter pegs on discharge. Two or three trys and the starter turns. On saturday, I connected the remote starter switch I use during tune-ups. No problem, started right up. I put the remote switch away and haven't had a problem since. 'Nother headscratcher. My friend, John Carey, thinks many of my electrical problems are due to the battery cut-off switch. Who knows, he may be right.

On sunday, the bunch that usually meets for the breakfast cruise-in in Fort Lauderdale, converged instead on John and Joyce McGinnis' residence in Davie, Florida. They have a fifty acre lake and run a water sking school. Joyce served up a heck of a fine breakfast and we sat out on their porch afterwards and threw the table scraps to the lake fish.

May 9^th 2011 I finally got tired of putting air in Deerslayer's left front tire every couple of days. First thing, saturday morning, I took it off the truck and plugged it. Deerslayer had conveniently shed the dogdish hubcap on this wheel tuesday nite so there were less steps to this task than there would be normally. I heard some clattering when the cap left the truck but had no idea where the noise came from at the time. Three hours later when I pulled into the BillyBob shop, I saw the cap was missing. ARRRUUGH! I knew the last time I put that cap on, it went on too easily. I should have taken it off and re-positioned it. Now, I'm paying $48 for a hard lesson.

Continued on with Monthly Maintenance, then some engine detailing and a quick-n-durty fender waxing. On sunday, I cleaned up the BillyBob shop and messed around with Deerslayer's front turn signal light, the one that fell off some time back, between breakfast and early evening cruise-ins. I was home at dusk because Deerslayer's headlights still aren't working.

May 16^th 2011 The new, generic, headlight switch arrived from Chev's of the 40's earlier in the week. On saturday morning, that was the first order of business. Five wires on the old switch and five terminals on the new switch. So far, so good. I was able to pull the switch and wires down far enuf for access after disconnecting it from the dash. It was pretty easy to guess which wires were power and dash light leads. The headlight, parking lights and tail light wires were a different story. Had to try different terminals for each one of them until I got it right. This process was made more difficult by the fact that the headlights never came on during the entire process. The new switch, being a re-pop part, it didn't quite fit and I had to enlarge the hole in the dash a bit before the switch would fit.

Okay, so it wasn't the headlight switch. I wanted an excuse to replace Deerslayer's seventy-four year old switch ever since I lost all the lights going down the road a couple of years back. I had rotated the knob to make the dash lights brighter and all the lights in the truck went dead. Some frantic fiddling with the switch knob got them back on again. I've been wary of the original switch ever since.

Even tho' I've built my own computers from scratch, electrical issues are still pretty much voodoo magic to me. I girded my loins and got down under the dash where Tony had built a fuse panel. While I was trying to make sense of it all with my Mark I eyes, I spied a blade terminal that had come loose from its fuse. It was the headlight wire. Yippy! I had put aside the whole day to take care of this problem and I was done early. I spent the rest of the day patting myself on the back with cigars and Iron City Beer.

On sunday, after the breakfast cruise-in, I fooled around with Deerslayer's parking light that had fallen off sometime back. Tony fabbed these of from old cowl lights. At one point, I bought a couple of similar cowl lights off eBay because, at $24 for the two of them, the price was right. They didn't turn out to be close enough to be usuable. I wanted the trim ring so I wouldn't have to repair the beat up one but the eBay units weren't close. I sanded and tapped away at the damaged trim ring until it appeared I had reached the point where I was doing more harm than good. I sanded the bucket too. Both items were PRE-Paint prepped and given coats of self-etching primer. When that set, they were given coats of filler primer and set aside. It was time, at that point, for the sunday nite cruise-in at Wahoo's.

Well, another month has passed. Progress has been minimal but that's all that the current financial situation will allow. Also, summer is here and it's hot in the shop. I will keep slogging away at it tho'. Hopefully, I'll get some bigger tasks accomplished for the next log entry. In the meantime, here's one last pic that I snapped out back of the Krash Lab this morning. There were some surveyors in the alley earlier, making marks for some improvement, no doubt. I guess moving trash out of the way is not part of the job.