Back together

Lots of progress since my last post. The hood and bib have been stripped, primed, and put back on the truck. Eric came over yesterday and spent some time in the garage with me. He ran the die grinder for awhile and got a ton of prep work done. We daydreamed about Summer and kicked the tires on his Jeep a little.



Working on the floor sucks. I need a workbench that I can fold and put against the wall. That might be a summer project.

We played around with the welder a bit too. I really need some shielding gas- might try to pick that up tomorrow. This video is Eric.




I'm going to inquire tomorrow about getting the bezel powder coated white. I also cleaned up the front of the frame and the bumper supports and sprayed it all with some Chassis black. Here's how the truck looks as of tonight:





It's a shame I had to reassemble everything with the old hardware, but you can't buy these bolts at any hardware store. I'm looking into sourcing some zinc-plated Japanese bolts. Fortunately, Toyota only used a few different bolt sizes. Their manufacturing process was on top of the game back in 1978 too, apparently.

I cleaned up and repainted the radiator grill, but then I forgot to put it back on before bolting the bib up. I'm not certain yet, but I think I might be able to slide it down into the very narrow space between the bib and the radiator and bolt it in.




Since I had the grill off, I decided to revive the TOYOTA emblem that mounts right up front. This thing costs $65.00 from CCOT! I spent some time cleaning it up, and I plan to paint it with model car paint. I'm sure it won't be museum-quality, but I can think of better things to spend the 65 bucks on.



I came home to two Toyota boxes on the front porch today. U joints arrived from Cruiser Dan at American Toyota, and I got engine mounts (6 of them!) from Kurt at Cruiser Outfitters. Both of these guys have been excellent to deal with so far. I think I'll start with the U joints, but I'll probably try to tackle both of these projects on Sunday.




Along with the parts, I got another package in the mail today- a surprise birthday present from my parents!