Gauages

Okay this part might seam a little crazy to some of you, but here we go. I wanted to keep the original cluster of gauges that came with the 1946-48 Ford dash, but with update gauges. I made a inquiry into having them done professionally, put it was more then I wanted to spend. We decided to tackle it our self and see what we could come up with. I had a old gauge that we dismantled to see what we could do with it and had test fitted it into the stock cluster. I wanted to do this before tearing into a new set of gauges. After playing around with the old gauge I was feeling pretty confident that we could make this work.

This is the stock cluster after taking the old gauges out and now have started to rebuild with the new gauges. Had to do some machine work to make the circle opening a little larger to accommodate the new gauges and made some bracket to hold them in place. We took the trim ring and glass off the new gauges and discarded them. There goes my warranty.  

Did some filing on the sides of the gauges to make a proper fit. 

The black rings had to be epoxy in place to hold the faces in. The original stainless ring and glass held the gauges together. Not picture is the stock glass and frame that protects and holds every thing together. 

The glass, frame, and trim piece all put together. 

Not the best picture, but this is the cluster installed into the dash. Looks pretty close to the stock gauges except you can see a little of the radius at the top. I'm very pleased on how it turned out and that we saved about two thousand dollars. Next we will fit the speedometer, tach, and clock. 

Small Stuff But Important

Working on some of the small stuff that needed to be worked out and finish up.

We will be using stainless tubing to run the coolant from the radiator to the motor that is located behind the cab. These are some of  the brackets that will hold the hard lines off the frame.  

Used 1-3/4 for the bottom outlet and 1-1/2 for the top inlet. Also have two bleeders at the two highest points to release air out of the lines.

We have flex hoses between the motor and the hard mounted tubing ,also at the radiator. This is where we will have one of the bleeders for any air trap in the lines. Still have a little more work to finish up but getting close.

 

Installed the emergency brake and ran the cable to the drive line brake drum. Also installed and mounted the electric kick down for the transmission. Have the cable for the shifter installed on the transmission side, but need to connect to the steering column to finish it up. 

Everything is a little more difficult when the motor is behind you. This is the bracket that Chris fabricated up for the accelerator cable to work properly.  

Here is the complete setup for the new accelerator linkage. Instead of pull it is now push and pull. More small stuff coming soon.

Interior Valance

We had two changes in mind for the top valance. First we needed to house the screen for the side and back up cameras, and second we wanted the ends to flow better into the headliner. 

The truck has all these amazing nice curves in it and we felt that the straight line on the valance didn't really fit the truck.

That being said Chris put a little curve into the part.

The two sides are done and Chris fabricated the parts to hold the screen. The opening will have a door to hide the screen when not in use. Most of today's technology will be out of sight to preserve the vintage feel and look. 

The old vacuum windshield wipers will be replaced with electric motors. Will fix the old opening to be smooth with the rest of the panel   

Test fitting the screen and holes all finished up.

Cover made for a nice clean look. Still have some adjustments to be made to the door skin.

Needed to make some adjustments to the support to house the screen.

Made the new brackets to hold the electric motors for the windshield wipers. Hope they work as good as they look. 

Every thing now fits nicely behind the valance. Next up is to trim the fiberglass headliner to fit to the changes that were made.