Colt's 1979 Ford F-250 Project

Blog for 1979 Ford F-250 Ranger. I do some things to it and im going to let the world know about what i do to it.

I hope to Add pictures from whatever im working on. I do have photos in it right now. Go to: Photo Gallery and Video

Starts with: August 12th.

Thats the day I got it.

THE BLOG WILL START WITH AUGUST 16th!!

This is between august 12th and 16th.

The truck needs ALL new body parts. The floor on drivers side has a 5 inch hole in it. The motor has some things that need to be done. It misses on cylenders. 1-3 at a time. The right side of the block is the most of the problem. I checked the compression on ONE of the cylenders, it reads 120! I don't know what cylender order it is yet. haha.

It does have A/C and AM radio. The blower on the A/C is bad. Bad bearings. :-(

I heard the A/C model is a pain in the but to get to! ahh well.

The front gas tank "saddle tank" doesn't work. It's either the switch selector, pump, or ripped wire.

The ALT gauge doesn't work out of the 4 that are there! not bad! :-) its stuck in the middle.

THERE IS A BAD HORRIBLE SMELL IN THIS 4X4 VEHICLE!

I took out the useless moldy, torn up seat. Ripped out the moldy floor mat and insulation underneath(thats cracked). Washed out the floor to remove any standing chunks.

oh, and when it first opened the passanger door for the first time when it got here.... there was a FRESH baby mouse in the doorjam smashed! so great! gotta hunt a mouse nest!

It still smell's! bad! I even have an air freshner in there!

I turn on the A/C blower (A/C needs freon anyways) no smell comming out of it!

Today, I pull out instrument panel.

Why? Because none of the things work such as- Washer pump, e-brake light, lights in gearshifter on steering column all dont work. Nor does the radio, vaccum on A/C and horn.

First things first... Pull out Inst. panel.

It's hard at first... but i find all the screws and take them out. I also take all my knobs off on lights, radio, A/C, ect...

I still cant pull it off! its stuck by the radio. I have to take off the little nuts holding the plastic to the radio. heh, nuts. lol

Now it comes off. I find out why my truck smells like rat s#!t... I take off the plastic around my inst. panel. You can see all kinds of thinks packed in there! Peices of the seat, paper, and floor mat!

It appears there is a large vacated mouse nest on top of my inst. panel. There were no rats but why did it smell? The urine and the crap they left behind when they vacated!

I pull out the actual inst. panel. I get all that crap off my panel! then.. its water hose time! I start spraying crap down! yes, key is out. I just wash everything out! Radio, all around and on inst. panel.

I spray all around, on and in the inst. panel. Behind it! Fuse grid, radio, dash, A/C controlls, IGN, everything!

Then i turn off hose and wrap it up! I shut and lock the truck up with windows rolled down just about 3 quarters thick.

More tommrow!!!

I go to my truck today. I go and turn the key to see what was fixed or broken. The only thing that worked was the E-Brake light and windshield washer pump. 2 things that work now that havent worked before. Oh, and the ALT gauge works to!

It still smells like rat sh---you know what. :-) I am still hunting the smell.

I am also trying to remove the AM radio and A/C Controlls. But they are a pain in the butt! The A/C has atleast 5 maybe 4 vaccum lines! The radio will not pull out 1 inch! The wires to it are too tight!

Back to washer pump. The pump works now but wont pump! So i take the lid off the tank and empty out everything! I can't get to the pump. I find out that the pump is a "Lifetime Pump". Which means the pump is not removeable. It's built into the tank. I spray some penetrating oil down the input part of the pump where it sucks the fluid. I also spray WD-40 on the contactors of the pump. Still wont pump. Now, I hook up the feeding line backwards and pump it to the ground. Sure enough alot of crap blew out. It was clogged. The pump has a grinding noise when it runs. But when its dry it runs like its brand new. So it pumps fluid out now. But the sprayer is only good on the passanger side. The one on the drivers side is clogged also im sure.

That's all I did for today! Check back tommrow.

Today,

I did not do much to my truck today. I did try to losen the blower cable that selects weather you wan heat or cool. Still has a smell and no other nest is visible. However, there is abunch of ants that crawl around the truck. So i guess the ants will get rid of it. I hope. But thats about all I did to it. I also did start it today too. My truck now does blow cool air. Not A/C but cool. Like it sucks in air form outside.

Today, I didnt do much today either... Look i have no cash okay.... haha. I do but i have a VERY strict budget. I did have 1 Brakelight go out on me.... I did work on reverse light to see if i have a buld to replace... i dont. I also took out the radio mount which also houses the A/C controlls. Oh, and P.S In yesteryday's writting... I didnt loosten the cable i took out the mount for the cable so the blower doesnt blow hot air. But I can't get that Radio out still! The cable is sooo tight that I can't even take the plug off of it! Oh i counted there are 9 Vacum lines. Also there are like 10 wires going to it. HELP: IF ANYBODY KNOWS HOW TO TAKE OFF THE BLOWER CASE FOR THIS VEHICLE PLEASE TELL ME. REMEMBER ITS THE a/c MODEL.

Thats all 4 today! hopfully my lazy butt gets up and does something on thursday

.

Today, Guess what I did to the truck? You guessed right Nothing!

Sorry, I did intend to pull off the saddle tank but the weather didnt look good soo i couldn't. But it is going to be harder to do things due to school starting. Then when the time change happen's... It will be REALLY hard at first. Why? Because ass soon as the time changes first... As soon as I get home @ 4:47 I have 1 hour b4 its dark. I am not lying. I will take pitctures. Oh, after it rained today my dad and I went out side to look at it. Alot of water leaked in but didn't stay. The rust is soo bad that water cant even stay in. My dad looked at the floor on the passenger side [its in the photo album] and poked it with his finger. What happend? It went thru. Yep, it went right through the metal. Water also leak's in from the dash. The vents in front of the windsheild outside i think have rusted and water leaks in there. OH, 1` last thing the blower motor is out. It finally locked up. :-(

I was starting to question the truck today "about rebuilding it". My mom says: "well you know you can sell it. Maybe someone will buy it." I told her, "Who said im selling it?". I am NOT going to get rid of that truck and I do NOT intend to. The running gearS" All the joints are good, all the Rims arent old, and the frame is not showing signs of giving away at all. The engine is having some troubles like spark blug wires and distributor but thats not mager. That motor is a freggan beast, it got 2 Differentials! none of that cv joing crap, and it will make a great heater in the winter. 

Maybe i can drop the tank this weekend. We live in Houston, TX. We just got hit by hurricane IKE on SEPT 13 of last year. The house is still not put back together after 1 tree hit it.

Thats all I have for today. Check back later.

*SORRY i couldnt make videos due to rain and i have school on Monday. So i havent been updating*

Today, I found out that the A/C on my truck DOES WORK. How do I know? I put the belt on the compressor and hooked up the clutch wires. But... I was wondering if it did have any? So before I even ran it all that day I decide th pop the Release caps off. This model has caps you can twist off with a wrench to let out the illegal R-12 Freon. I was NOT going to let the freon out. I was going to see if there was any pressure in there at all. Ok, I grab a cressent wrench and adjust it. I begin turning it slowly. Well as im turning it slowly -pssss- i quckly tighten it back. Well... My 30 yr old truck thats been on salty roads still has good A/C. Now it doesnt work... But that did show that it does hold pressure in the lines. I found a little glass lens next to the Evaporator coil. It comes off of it. I cleaned it off so you can see the freon inside. I turn on the engine and compressor. Sure enough its working. Now, There is not enough freon. If you feel the front two hoses it the front while compressor is running. You can feel one get semi cold. The other one gets real hot. The lens shows very LITTLE freon left.

OH! 1 more thing... I think i know how to take the A/C crap out. Along with the Blower, heater core, and condensing coil.

Check back later!

*ATTENTION* DATE 08/24/09

It will be harder for me to do things on the truck considiring school is back in my life. After we have the "annual" time change... I get home @ 5:10 everyday. So after the time change I have 1 hour of daylight to do whatever I want. Then its dark. If I do not update the site its because im busy, not neglecting. :-)

I worked on some of the sparkplugs. I am finding some crap in thoes things! lodged into the little space where it screws in. Oh, and the crap on them? its dirt. dirt + motor = Blown motor. Bad situation!!! They are also black. Not 1 shiny part. But the air filter is soooooooo old that it has kinks around the top and bottom so it doesn't filter. But like i said where you pull the wires off it has dirt. Packed, dry, old mud. Its supposed tor rain tommrow the 28th. I have a dentist apointment on the Monday. So I have a Busy week. Along with homework. Back to the truck now... However, this weekend im planning to power wash the under carrage, engine, inside the cab, outside the cab, and dash. At least the ol crap like this has 2 computer modules under the hood. That i know of.... Anyway I WILL TRY to take more pictures tommrow and through-out the weekend. L8r.

Today, we- WOW lots to say here to day...

Ill do it by order.

 1st. me and my dad are talking in gerage. We decide to go take a compression test. I went and got the compression tool and adapter. I got it ready. We then begin taking the spark plugs out. They are 4-inch pistions i found out. The spark gap is .44

Ok so we take all the plugs out, Scrub, and spray with Carp & Choke Cleaner. Then we let them sit for about 1/2 and hour. After that we begin with our compression test. 3 said 145 PSI and others said 135 and 125. We calculated it and they are all within the good range. Now we go to gap the clean plugs. Like I said the gap is .044 mm. We then spray solvent and scrub agian. After 30 minutes of time. It's time to put the plugs back in. There were alot that were dirty! Like it had suit build up and oily all over. I was worried that the rings were bad but thankfully not. When I decided to look at the air cleaner... I opened a can of crap. Black suit burnt on the top, cracked on the side, dents all over... Worse than that the Air Filter itself was so badly brused it wasn't actualy doing its job. So we picked up a new air filter. Fit right on the spot. I went inside and turned the engine. crank, crank-pop, crank, crank, crank, cra---vroom. She had life! But it still ran the same freggan way! Im thinking after all that little stuff still? I went inside and told my dad considiring he has had a few 79's in his days... I told him, "Dad, its still shaking real bad and is running rough." My dad said, "still"? I told him yep. grunted and got up. He went an looked at it an said, "is your distributor wires connected in the right order?". I said, "huh?". He said, are you sure they are in the right order like is the wire connected to the right spot"? So he began checking. Sure enough... There was 1 wire crossed and 1 that was the opposite. He connected them proplery. I went inside and started it. Started easyer and purred like a kinnen. Sounded clean. Very clean. I was shocked what a difference 2 wires can make. How did we find out it was wires? because the first time we fired it up it would keep backfiring. At the same time over and over agian.

Ok, so now we are mechanicaly set motor wise. We also decided to look under at the under carrage. Front shaft from the Transfer-case to the Differental. It probly can shake an 3/8's of an inch back and fourth. We can't tell if its supposed to be like that. We we kind of consirned about this. I'm thinking there is a bearing and bushings missing. There are wires snapped, metal bent, and minor rust on the frame. 

We'll thats all for today! OH and P.S the reason i couldnt do anything on monday is because I had a dental appointment that day. I had to take meds so I was dizzy and could not funcution. Still am dizzy here at 12:55 @ night.

More l8r. *UPDATING WEBSITE SOON*

I can't beleive is almost another week. You 50 people a day are probly wondering why is been a week? Well freaking school. Yep. With Homework and other stuff I have barely have no time to myself. Anyway, The reason is I took so much time is because my $100 investment for my garage is temporary offline. My Window Unit Air Conditioner. The poor thing works so hard and it has ALOT of cleaning to be done. OK! enought about nagging about my life. So I did have time to work on truck a little bit today. The brakes. They are spongy... Verrrry spongy. Air is in the lines. I took the top cap off and push the brake petal to see if the brakes would work. Because forcing fluid in there and letting it come back into the brake fluid tank would suck the air back up. But I guess it worked 50/50. Like they will work fine then the pedal willl have to be mashed in all the way to make them grab. My truck like I think I have said before. it has a bigg freggan hole on the drivers side! like 7 in long and 3 tall. Verrry big hole. I guess run a tube up my pants and I guess port-a-car. hah. jk. So yeah thats all I have not very exciting but its something.

*WEBSITE UPDATING SOON*