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 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.

20. Project Nailhead

December 27^th 2011  On Christmas morning, I met with four of the guys at the sunday morning breakfast cruise-in. The bagel shop we meet at was open. On Christmas afternoon, I met up with the sunday nite cruise-in group in Lighthouse point and we proceeded to cruise down the beach road, A-1-A, to Fort Lauderdale and back, a distance of about fifty miles. We had a good turnout of five corvettes, a camaro, a nova, a comet, a studebaker and the Deerslayer. There were a lot of "distracted drivers" sharing the road with us and we had to pull over and reform quite often. On Fort Lauderdale Beach, on the return leg, Rich Shumacher's Studie started acting up. It's a '66 Commander 2-door sedan with a pro-street setup - tubbed with the big tires and a 572 Chevy big-block engine. The electric fuel pump was working but the gauge at the regulator wouldn't move off the zero peg. After a half hour, we tried again and he got the six pounds he needed. Two of us followed him home without further incident and had a few beers at his house. There was no sunday nite cruise-in as the Wahoo's restaurant was closed.

January 5^th 2012  We're going thru a chilly snap here. Without heat in the BillyBob Shop, I tend to move even slower than usual. On New Year's morning, I met up with the breakfast bunch in Fort Lauderdale for coffee and puttered around the shop in the afternoon, detailing Deerslayer some. Went to the sunday nite cruise-in but our DJ, Eugene, didn't make it so there was no music. Eugene is originally from Philly and he was hangin' out with some Mummer expatriates in Delray Beach. I made one new year's resolution - "Be impeccable". Easy to remember, covers everything and is impossible to achieve but, I'll chip away at it.

My plans for when I wear out the Deerslayer's mighty 302 Jimmy engine is to have another hot rod engine ready to take it's place while I rebuild the 302 at my usual glacial pace. With that in mind, I've been looking for a Buick Nailhead for over two years. The main problems in finding one has been my reduced income and the fact that I don't want to spend the shipping charges to get one here. Most of the ones for sale tend to be in Kalifornia or some other place too far for a roadtrip. I was watching a '58 364 on the HAMB for awhile that was in Atlanta but it was sold before I could get the scratch together. A newer 425 became available in Fort Lauderdale. It wasn't my first choice (more power than I want, too new) but I was still a few hundred short when it sold.

A '54 322 became available on eBay a few days ago. It's located in Palm City, Florida, seventy-five miles from here. It's a 200hp 4-barrel model with 309 ftlb of torque. I won the auction for $600 and will be going to pick it up in a few weeks. This will be a long term project since nailheads aren't cheap to rebuild and I've never rebuilt an engine before by myself. I was a helper to my Dad sometimes when I was a youngster. I wanted a nailhead because it's a fairly narrow v8 and it has gobs of low end torque. Additionally, some bigger Chebby trucks in the late fifties had Buick 322's before the Chevy 348 was introduced. I started a new Deerslayer maintenance section called "Project Nailhead" to keep track of the nitty-gritty.

January 16^th 2012  Well, haven't gotten much done in the past two weeks 'cept go to a couple of shows and cruise-ins. Still been too lazy to shoot pics at these events and missed some good opportunities. On saturday the seventh, went to the Daryl Gwynn show in Lighthouse Point and had a good time with friend from many different groups. I was interviewed in a short videoclip from ManCave-TV.com. If it is ever posted, I'll link to it in a future log entry.

On sunday, the eighth, one of the breakfast crew, Jim, showed up with a new toy. A '37 Chevy two-door sedan. With it parked in close proximity to the Deerslayer, I got a chance to see the differences between the car and truck grilles. The truck grille is a bit taller and wider and the vertical bars are spaced farther apart.

Last tuesday nite, I missed a great photo op while I was elsewhere at the show, drinkin' beers and smokin' a cigar, both provided by my good friend, John Ray. When I cruised in, just after five, Jeane, had me park right next to where the entertainers were going to perform when they arrived. It was the Blues Brothers and I missed taking pics or even a video clip dancin' and singin' "on stage" with the deerslayer. Oh well, next month is another opportunity to improve my reporting.

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Issued Monday January 16, 2012

Updated Thursday May 24, 2018

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