"Blanc-Oh!", my distraction

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Wed Apr 21, 2021 8:35 pm

That is exactly how I did it. I want to be kind to grandfather's 1/2" Craftsman drill motor as its older than I am and has likely drilled a million holes. It is also only a 3.5 amp motor, so I could load it hard enough to slow it down to where the cutter seemed to work the best. I'll guess that to be around 100 rpm, down from it's rated 425 rpm. That, of course, made it get hot faster......

The current spare is on an OEM Alcoa 15" wheel. I don't think cutting it to a star pattern will work. There are ten holes, which is workable, but they're just big enough that they would make a pretty large radius if you used then for the corners of the more or less triangular cut-outs. Maybe its possible and I'm just having a failure of Imagination, but it really doesn't look like it will work well.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Sun May 02, 2021 3:58 pm

Keeping the 4WABS is looking to be a trick with the 8 lug conversion. Not a lot of room where the sensor has to go. Wonder if the pilot hole size is the same for the 5 bolt and 6 bolt spindles? If they are it might be easier to drill the 8 lug spindle and the caliper bracket to 5 bolt, and trim the caliper mount ears off the existing 5 bolt knuckle. Something that I didn't want to do because they seem to be a rare knuckle, but if that is the easiest way to get there then that's what I'll have to do.

I was able to obtain a set of the front tone rings. I may need to fabricate an OD spacer shim to properly register them on the 8 lug hubs.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Fri May 21, 2021 9:26 pm

Hypothetical question: Say that you were building a 408 w/ AFR 195's and are intending to smog it. What hyd. roller cam would you choose?

RyanDS650X · Post by **RyanDS650X** » Sat May 22, 2021 8:47 am

ntsqd wrote:Hypothetical question: Say that you were building a 408 w/ AFR 195's and are intending to smog it. What hyd. roller cam would you choose?

I have an E303 ford cam in my 408 and it passes smog in AZ

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ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Sat May 22, 2021 4:08 pm

That is good to know, thank you!
<off to look at it's numbers..... >

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Mon May 24, 2021 6:52 pm

In other news, I got the Mark Williams bearing caps cut to dimension and installed. They don't leave a flat reference face opposite of the faces that need to be machined. I ran into this with the 8.8 caps as well. The instructions talk about using a con rod cap grinder to machine them, but that's not a tool that I own. The solution is that I measured the SHCS C-Bores and their register surfaces were within .001" of each other. So I made some spacers from Ø.75 mild steel bar stock. Cut and then faced them on the lathe, then stood them up on the surface grinder and made them exactly the same length. I set each cap on those in the mill's vise and that got me square and true. I put two grooves in the side of one and always used it on the right side. The caps were also only put in the vise in one orientation. Seemed to work.

I started setting up to machine the housing for the speed sensor. First I made a sleeve for the sensor to fit into. I will eventually weld this into the housing.

Then I bored a hole in the housing to fit the sleeve. The plan is a large ring around the sleeve, also welded to both the housing and to the sleeve. That is why the large flat spot around the hole.

The sleeve was a bit longer than the sensor so I trimmed it back to the same size. then I tacked a piece of .037" thick sheet metal to the bottom. That sets the gap between the tone ring and the sensor. The only spec that I could find for this gap is .005" to .050" At .037" I'm not quite in the middle of that, but I think that it will work fine. We shall see.

Once everything is welded into place on the outside I will cut off where the sleeve extends into the diff cavity and grind it flush to the inside of the housing. Then I'll go in with silicon-bronze filler rod and float a bead all the way around the seam where the sleeve comes thru the housing. That is how I sealed drain plug bungs in 9" drag car axle housings back in the day.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Tue Jun 22, 2021 3:18 pm

ABS sensor port with guards is finished. The orange paint must be Imron or similar, it does NOT want to come off. Having to resort to paint stripper (sad stuff these days) and power wire brush to get it off. Which means I get an all-over orange magic fairy dusting! Yea! NOT.

Next part of the rear axle project: Explorer RDB's. I've yet to model it in SW, but generally I'm thinking thin, piloting spacer/shim between the Exploder backing plate and the housing flange. Then a much thicker spacer on the backside of the wheel hub's flange. This I'll pilot on a diameter and capture with the wheel studs. The rotor will bolt to it and also have a piloting feature. I'm expecting that the hole in both the rotor and the backing plate are currently too small to work. Sucks about the rotor because I don't like having to modify wear parts, I like them to bolt-on right out of their box. If anyone has put these RDB's on a Bronco I'm curious about what was used for the parking brake cables. Re-purposed OEM, Lokar, or?

toddz69 · Post by **toddz69** » Tue Jun 22, 2021 3:35 pm

ntsqd wrote: ↑
Tue Jun 22, 2021 3:18 pm
If anyone has put these RDB's on a Bronco I'm curious about what was used for the parking brake cables. Re-purposed OEM, Lokar, or?

Lokar from your vendor of choice.

Todd Z.

ChaseTruck754 · Post by **ChaseTruck754** » Tue Jun 22, 2021 9:24 pm

ntsqd wrote: ↑
Tue Jun 22, 2021 3:18 pm
The orange paint must be Imron or similar, it does NOT want to come off. Having to resort to paint stripper (sad stuff these days) and power wire brush to get it off. Which means I get an all-over orange magic fairy dusting! Yea! NOT.

With it being good stuff would you not clean and scuff it and top coat it the color of your choice? Seems like an extra layer of protection. Then again I'm guessing the "I didn't do the job, I don't know how the prep work was done and I want it done right" may be the answer.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Wed Jun 23, 2021 6:25 am

Thanks Todd!

ChaseTruck, your first idea is a good one. Except for two things. I HATE orange, and where ever a rock or abrasion wears thru the top coat it would likely show orange. I honestly prefer rust to orange.

fwiw I now have an orange front axle housing, a bare LHD high pinion radius arm solid axle D44 with GM flat top knuckles, that needs a new home.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Mon Aug 23, 2021 11:57 am

4 of the 5 Method Wheels made it to me. The 5th has a Signature Required requirement, and the UPS system won't let me sign for it online. The vendor's rep keeps telling me to use the UPS app and sign for it and I keep telling him that the web page won't allow it. What part of "flip-fone" does he not understand?
Anyway. looks like it has to go back to where ever, and be sent again w/o the signature required requirement.

Now to figure out what to do for lug nuts. The lug studs are all 9/16" or will be soon.

Still need to measure for the drive axle lengths. That was supposed to happen last weekend, but family needs consumed that.

Modeling the Exploder RDB caliper mount/backing plate is slow going. Lots of odd shapes in it that aren't simple to reverse engineer. No plan to model the whole thing, but do need enough of it to be able to design the various bits needed to adapt these brakes to an 8 lug FF D60 axle.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Tue Oct 05, 2021 4:04 pm

Spent a week in the Oregon Outback two weeks ago. Had the same issue with the 4WABS that I'd had in Big Bear. Aging sucks, had to take a pic of the fuse ledger with an ipad, and then blow the 0.25 pt font up to a readable size to figure out which fuse to pull. Pulled it and drove the truck that way for the rest of the trip. I had wanted to keep the 4WABS because it seemed like it was working well as a "smart proportioning valve." However, driving it home with the fuse still pulled produced no undesirable effects. Not including the front ABS sensors makes the front 8 lug conversion dramatically less complicated. Our resident Bronco author (

) assures me that it is pretty common to do without on these trucks. I also realized that the loading isn't going to be varying as much as I had thought it might.
AND the fifth 8 lug wheel finally made it's way to me.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Wed Dec 01, 2021 12:02 pm

Minor update. Been using the truck, took it on a 5 days trip from Bend, OR to the Alvord Desert and then again on a 3 days trip in and around the Volcanic Tablelands just North of Bishop, CA. To carry the propane needed for the Camp Chef Sport Stove (pair of 30k BTU burners to cook all meals for 6 guys on) I needed a secure mount for a propane tank. Preferably not inside. This Coastal Desert is murder on bare steel, and the alkali Alvord dust is worse. Came up with this to bolt to the right swing-away:

It still needs it's shape tuned up a bit:

While on the Bend to Alvord trip I had a hood hinge firewall mount failure. Patched that and found that the right side has some issues too. Still debating on how exactly I'm going to deal with that. At least I now know the source of my metal on metal squeak. Plan to try to get the whole rear bumper into be powder coated before Xmas.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Sun Mar 13, 2022 6:57 am

The Exploder RDB project suffered a set-back in that the subscription use of SolidWorks that I had expired and was replaced with a sub-par piece of something generously called 'software.' I *think* that I've mostly solved the problem, but the models were all made in SW2020 and what I now have is SW2017. Just need to do some file conversions with a SW2020 license and then I can open my old work in SW2017. SW is notorious for not being backwards compatible.

In other news, it appears that the inner stub axle and slip-yoke are not made by anyone aftermarket, and there doesn't appear to be much in the way of service parts made either. Leaving luck at the junk-yard the only option for a more or less stock axles set-up.

Unless you step up to RCV. I was put off by their rather short service interval for the center CVJ (3500 miles then removal to grease it), but I'm being told by a reputable company that in less strenuous use that the service interval is far greater. It IS the $2200 dollar option that I'm not sure that I need.

Current status: Waiting on the 4" modified beams from Solo. GM backing plates have a new set of mounting holes centered between the original holes as this clocks the caliper and locates it in the OEM clearance on the knuckle. Spindles are thoroughly cleaned and have glyptal sealed bores with new spindle bearings installed. Knuckles have had the OE caliper mounts removed and ground smooth, been painted, and will get new TTX ball-joints in the next couple of days.

Rear axle is ready for the diff assembly. I've made my R&P set-up guy a set of set-up bearings for the D60 as he hasn't had any until now. I need to install the new wheel hub bearings and get the design of the RDB adapters finished and made before sending the housing out for the diff assembly.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Thu Mar 17, 2022 6:59 pm

Just got the beams. Occurs to me that some might read above as being 4" wider beams. They're not, they're just the normal camber comp for a ~4" lift.

And scored a bolt-in stub axle type diff assembly! ARB here I come!

In other news I've been able to get a functioning SolidWorks at home again. It is an older version than the subscription that I had, so I took all of the file to work and exported them as .stl and .igs files. The .stl's came in nicely and SW was even able to build a model tree from them. So they're not just stupid blobs, can edit them etc.

ChaseTruck754 · Post by **ChaseTruck754** » Fri Mar 18, 2022 8:47 am

I was wondering on the beams. I was reading it as 4" wider which surprised me. Nice score on the bolt in style diff, and glad the SW files were salvageable.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Mon Mar 21, 2022 8:14 am

I had just gotten enough education on them to understand the differences in the diffs and had thought to start looking for one on ebay when this one popped up.

The bad news is that the Exploder backing plates really don't want to bolt up. They actually are close to aligning on the various piloting features, but the D60 backing plate bolt holes are on a much larger bolt circle. I've not yet investigated if I can simply drill new holes in the backing plate, or if more elaborate methods are needed.

ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Mon Mar 21, 2022 8:16 am

That unmodified stub and slip really brought home the need to massage them for clearance.

hobbyturnedobsession · Mon Mar 21, 2022 9:31 am

Flap wheel makes quick work of that. Did solo clearance the axle portal for the passenger side? I can’t remember if it was required for additional travel or not. I know stock with beams you’ll rub a bit.

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ntsqd · Post by **ntsqd** » Mon Mar 21, 2022 3:42 pm

No obvious clearancing there. I'll compare to my current beams that don't rub and adjust as needed. thanks!

I have to wonder if a big part of the reason why crawlers detest the TTB is because they bind and then fail that joint without ever knowing why it bound up.

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