Mercedes 2626 AK 6x6

[pairospam]

Hello all:

My life admits only a few hours to dedicate to the project these times, but something has been done.

Next time I could work at the shop I finished the cap for the filter, with some problems with the welding the thin grille. Anyway, it came out pretty nice and hopefully would work as predicted.



That week I could not be able to work on the frame, again; I had many things to do, places to go to, regular and extra work, etc. It was too hot to think about continuing with the removal of the paint of the cabin that afternoon so I profited of the creative mood and thought about to work out the front winch installation

I took out one of the winches from its original box, or what was left of it, and measured it all again. The idea was to build a compact box around the winch and bolt it hanging under the front crossmember, the more compact the arrangement the better, not to compromise too much the angle of approach. Considering the position of the radiator, some centimeters behind the crossmember, there should be enough space to hide the winch behind the fender, at least partially.

It was pretty useful to have the front crossmember of Spare to play with a little and to help for the measuring of the different components of the future winch support.



It seemed a good idea to make a mockup of the support/container with carton board to figure how things would look like and fit, and that’s what I did. The superior plate would be bent to follow the form of the cross member to which it would be bolted. The compactness would confere strength to the structure. The inferior and frontal plates would be one-piece mounted on hinges on the rear for easier maintenance and removal/installation of the winch.



With such an arrangement there was enough space left between the baseplate and the radiator. I was only concerned about the strength of the whole construct. I thought that a baseplate of 6 mm was a little weaky for a 20.000 lb winch, but that was what the manual said. Anyway, the mockup showed also that the front bumper plate would be intervened minimally to expose the protruding control box and the engage/disengage lever of the winch. The angle of approach would not be critically compromised. All in all, not bad.




Another day of monstruous heat came, and I thought that I was surely making some mistake, peeling off the cabin with the torch. I went to the basics, as it is always pretty helpful. What did I need if I wanted to remove the paint? A car paint remover, of course. At the car paint shop I asked the seller for a good one and he sold me a spray can for a few euros. I made a little test and waited the 10 minutes the instructions recommended. Nothing happened. I sprayed almost the whole the cabin and let it soak for one hour. It worked, but not as magically as I would have wanted. Anyway, it was far better than applying heat and it let me work on other things while waiting for the remover to act.




The installation of the front winch was something pretty interesting and I still had not enough time to submerge me in the grit blasting of the frame for many days, so I went to Verardo’s to collect some pieces to build the case and the framing. I bought him a piece of steel plate of 6 mm and got some profiles and tubes from the pile of scrap.



That afternoon we made something unusual and went to Santiago to have dinner with René and Karen Larraguibel, the travellers that had to make a pause in their long term expedition to the Americas because René’s new hotel required of his presence, and they were there for a few hours. We gathered also with Veronica and Nigel, another infected with the expedition truck disease. He is as the moment in the middle of a long term restoration/build of a F-350 based 4x4 camper, with as much attention to detail as myself, if not more.

It was a delicious sushi and a splendid evening.



Alternating between the steel and the cabin in the suffocating heat of the afternoon of San Felipe I was slowly making some progress and continued to remove the paint, piecemeal.

[pairospam]

The case would go bolted to the cross member from above, to the original defenses on the sides, but from behind there had to be a quiet solid structure to anchor it from. An 8 mm profile bolted to the frame rails would provide a good support and, even if I had to cut a little strip to allow the radiator stand freely behind, I was very fortunate that I could make such an arrangement without interfering with all the other stuff that ran by the place.




Concerned about the performance of the radiator with all that stuff in front of it? Yes, but just a little.

Saturday morning Carmen and I woke up early… no, not really, got in the Montero and drove south some 300 km. It was the wedding (the second one) of my cousin Daniela and the reception was in an idilic place in the country, on the gardens of a typical adobe house of central Chile. My cousin was pretty happy, the buffet was delicious, the ceremony a success, the pool very fresh and some of my cousin’s girlfriends very cute. Hmm... It was hotter than San Felipe because of the humidity, but it was a very pleasant moment.




We spent the night at my aunt’s, Daniela’s mother, and my uncle, a pretty skilled pilot and craftsman, showed me the right product to work the HDF lining panel of the Merkabah with. It was a special glue that resisted water and heat, unknown to me. Hugo used to build boats, so he knew what he was talking about.



We came back home by the coast instead of the highway, just to scape the sun, to watch the landscapes and the sea, drive a little on the sand, eat a good fish at our favorite restaurant in Duao, and to briefly visit a friend in Pichilemu. Wrong choice. We got stuck in the summer traffic for hours and arrived at 1:30 AM. This time I will not say: never again!



Sweating heavy, I started to cut the plate to build the case for the winch Monday afternoon. I wondered again if it had been a good idea to follow the manual this time and make it with 6 mm instead of using a thicker plate. A good design and solid welding should be okay, I repeated myself. Anyway, I went on based on the mockup design and spread sparks everywhere, as usual.



After some cuts, semi-cuts, folding and bending the half-case fitted pretty well on the curved crossmember. I only wished that both this and the one of the Merkabah were exactly the same.




When I put the massive winch in the case to make some measurements it looked like the plates were made of paper instead of steel. I thought about making major reinforcements... or should I do it all again?

[tonnar]

Hey Pairoa,
don´t you get some CSD-Discs in Chile to get the paint of the cabin?

Kind regards
Tino

[pairospam]

Hi Tino;

Excuse me, but I don't clearly know what the CSD-Discs are.

Pairoa

[tonnar]

These discs are made for removing paint or rust especially of metal. In Germany you can get them for power drill and disc grinder. example pic
Maybe you´ll find some if you look for Scotch-Brite.

[pairospam]

Oh yes, there's a lot! But I have never tried them.

I am gonna give one a try, though the spray thing has the advantage of the lack of dust.

Thanks.


Pairoa

[pairospam]

Hi everyone:

Greetings from the oven of Chile, the three times glorious city of San Felipe, Chile. Christ… it’s been quiet hot these days!

Just a few updates, as there have been not many news since the last time, working a lot of hours with so little to show.

I decided not to do the case again with a thicker steel sheet but to reinforce the profile that goes behind the case and to which it will be bolted. Some profile sections and pieces of 6 mm steel plates and a good welding should be enough to withstand the forces the winch may probably never have to face. I used every piece I found at hand. You know… your garbage is my treasure.



A complete longitudinal profile would be also used as reinforcement, and I had to cut off a long stripe to avoid conflicting with the radiator. I also cut and polished the pieces that would be welded together to confere strength and resistance to the new crossmember/support. The people at the shop shot angry glances from time to time on my insistence in using the noisy power grinder the whole afternoon.



When it came the time to weld I was very happy; you know I love to weld. I made sure of the aligning and perpendicularity of the pieces to make it all work perfectly, or so I hoped. Welding thicker steel is pretty straight and amusing so I had a good time, even if the heat of the welding added torture to the environmental heat.




The time to go arrived, at last and as always, and the product of a lot of hours of work stood still, rusted and apparently useless on the bench. That would change soon.



I followed Tino’s advice and got some CSD-discs from the toolshop; they worked great. These things are very abrasive and they last longer than I thought. I realized that I never wanted to try them because of the brand, a Chinese one with which I have had lots of problems before, but I also found some 3M for the drill and bought a couple. They really work good. Where have you been, Tino!




Well, the discs were effective to remove paint and rust even in the very bad shaped support of the mudguard. I would need three or four days, working full time, to clean the rest of the cabin, and a week to clean the frame of the truck, or maybe more, but I would need to work only in one subject at a time instead of the potpourri I was doing until now. Also, I would probably need to work alone not to disturb anybody in the shop with the noise and the heavy dust that spreads all around when using the grinder.



I decided to finish with the front winch installation and then I would switch to the cabin. The idea with the later was to remove paint and rust and spray it rapidly with washprimer to avoid it to rust again and to leave it ready for the plaster work. Hopefully I would find someone to do it.

So, I went on with the set up of the support of the winch, using every little piece of steel scrap found anywhere around the truck. The metal shone like new when cleaned with the new discs, and I hoped that the weldings and the geometry will do their job and hold the winch when in use.

[pairospam]

As said and showed before, every piece of steel can be a potential donor for completing any kind of spare, supple or piece of art. It is just a matter of width and length, not of location. It was too hot to go out to get new steel from Verardo or elsewhere.




Saturday morning I was not in the mood of working at the shop so I stayed at home and thought about how to solve some of the problems I was facing with the Merkabah.

The winch is a pretty heavy bastard and, because of the proximity of the radiator, it would be very hard to bolt it if the case was bolted on its own to the support and to the frame. I had to make up a whole procedure to assemble the winch, the case and the cover, step by step, to get it through. It would need two men, maybe just one, a rope, a couple of roller sheaves and a lot of patience.



We spent some time in the afternoon at the pool of Carmen’s cousins to get rid of the heat. It worked.

Sunday morning, an unbearable heat menaced to devour San Felipe again but, notwithstanding, I went to make some dirt-riding. The trails were extremely dry and rocky, and the sun made me sweat like a cow, but the Yamaha performed brilliantly and I felt that my riding skills were getting better every time. It was a glorious moment, until the rear tire got flat. God, just in the top of the mountain, kilometers away from San Felipe, and, guess what… yes, I forgot the puncture-foam can at home. Ops.

I was too sweaty and tired to think of getting angry with myself so I sighed, laughed and said something funny for the record. Drunk a lot from the bottle I did take with me and called Carmen to tell her that I would probably be late for lunch. She didn’t laugh.




Another lonely rider passed along, a young guy with a lot more experience and skills than myself -he actually flew over the crests-, and encouraged me to go on with the flat tire, paying attention to the big rocks. He accompanied me and we both descended from the mountain following the less (!) rocky paths.



I thanked him a lot and made it home but ended up destroyed for the effort of taking all my weight on the front wheel and maneuvering on the tricky trails with the woobling rear tire. Eduardo was ready to go help me on his Yamaha, with not a single chance to arrive not even closer to where I was. Great guy, also, my brother-in-law.

Monday afternoon. I continued to think and to build the supports and the case for the winch. It was the time for drilling holes. Oh… I hate drilling holes! In the morning I ordered a 500 watts pedestal drill that would be delivered in a week or so, but I could not wait that long so I measured it all again and started with the basic four holes for the winch itself, then I was able to situate the best possible location for the holes to bolt the case to the cross support and so on.



I said that it would be difficult to manipulate the winch because of the proximity of the radiator from behind, but it would be impossible to do it from below because of the trestles that stood the frame. If I wanted to make it right I would have to take those trunks and trestles out and liberate some space to manipulate and fit-test the winch and the winch-case.




I slightly modified the four-legged stands I built some time ago and put them under the main rails of the frame, uneventful. The frame twisted and squeaked a little before lifting up under the power of the mighty hydraulic jack, though. The replaced trestles and pieces of wood went back to enhace the chaos of the working space around the Merkabah.



There was some trouble locating the new crossmember/support for the winch because the bolts that had to be removed were heavily stuck by the rust of the centuries, so I could not place the case properly to see if it fitted as good as expected. I used a lot of rost-off and momentarily forgot them and went to modify the superior plate of the case to allow for the trapezoidal reinforcement of the tow bracket to go inside.



It was late so I quickly made the cuts, relocated and welded the piece to make room for the 6 mm plaque while Carmen finished her work in the office. We then went to have a little coffee and a sandwich in a nice place out. It was still hot at ten in the evening.

[pairospam]

Hello guys:

I have been busy working and surviving San Felipe’s summer heat, as every year. I heard that there is much cold there in Europe. Hope it soon gets warmer for you and fresher for us.

So… after just a couple of days I received a big and heavy package. I couldn’t resist the temptation/necessity of buying a pedestal drill to drill holes bigger than 13 mm in the metal. Yes, I know… the brand was not my favorite but there was not too much from where to choose.

I assembled the drill in between this and that and the truth is that it was not tooooo bad. Besides, I always wanted to have one.




And the story of the winch went on, with lots of test in situ to avoid making mistakes on the position of the bolts and nuts. Of course putting the heavy stuff in and out is not free and my back and my arms had to pay the price. When I hung the box up for the fifth time to ascertain some measurements and to prove others wrong I felt it particularly heavy. Every help at hand was welcome.




Some pieces of steel already used, more than once sometimes, were used to complete the winch support. Cut, clean, weld, grind… the typical. And the time flew by.




So many shots and so much dust ended up making the camera ask for a rest and at a certain moment it refused to work. The lens did not go out, blocked by maybe a couple of kilos of sand, dust and rust. I took it immediately to the technician trusting that all it needed was a little cleaning, but the girl at the counter looked at it closely and stared at me for an instant, making me doubt of my previous trust. We would see after a few days. Hmm…

Some of the pictures I took with the phone; I hope they are not too bad.

The first holes made with the new drill were quiet difficult, as always happen when you do not know precisely how the mechanism works and the lever is pretty, pretty long. In the end Pairoa’s will prevailed and the support, after some retouches, was ready to be bolted to the frame and to bolt the winch case on itself.




Then, more drill holes, mount and dismount the case, more holes, more tests. I preferred to do it a hundred times instead of being wrong once. Even if it was pretty heavy, with practice I learned how to do it each time more easily, but I would never be able to do it with the winch on, obviously.



Once I was sure of the dimensions, shapes, location, etcetera, and when I was done with cutting little pieces of steel, I grabbed the MIG welder and finished for good the welding of the case. To avoid deformities you have to weld by alternating segments, but this does not help to make the weldings look good. Anyway, in the end they were not too bad and the power grinder would give the final touch.

[pairospam]

A few maneuvers and cuts to complete the superior brow and it was already time to think on the cover. To do that, I had to put again the winch on and measured it all again. I planned to use a curved portion of the auxiliary frame rail from Spare and weld to it two pieces of new steel sheets but, looking for in between the boxes and the garbage around the truck I found a nice piece of frame rail that could prove to be a better solution. It was filled with holes but they all coincided with the perforations that needed to be cut off to allow the winch to go through. Moreover, I would have to make just one additional welding.





Cut, refine, adjust, drill, weld the nuts, grind, clean, test if all is okay. After a few hours the box had a cover. It was hard to believe that the making of that little steel box could take that much time, but then I remembered that for every little new piece that I invented and fabricated before it was the same story, and the same complaint.



Being aware that I would have to cut some curved shapes off from the cover I had ordered a powerfull jigsaw a few days before, but it never arrived from Santiago. As I wanted not to waste time I took a jigsaw, almost a toy that I had bought some ten years ago for a few bucks, and put on the best metal cutting saws I could find. I waited it to burn out at any moment, instead, it stood the effort pretty good, cutting millimeter after millimeter without even getting too hot. Good.



I was on it, almost finishing the working journey, when Irmi and Frieder showed up. I waited them the day after but they did faster than expected in Argentina and so they were early, what was very good for them as their ferry boat back to Germany departed two weeks early than previously scheduled, leaving them only one month to explore southern Chile, Patagonia and Uruguay.

The NG 1017 4x4 from 1982 looked very nice, and Frieder had made some interesting and practical modifications himself, like the homemade snorkel. The Yamaha on the back rack also attracted a lot of attention, a rare model, and the manual mechanism to lift up the rack was pretty simple and reliable.




I helped them a little to work out Eduardo as he had no time for servicing the truck the day after, and finally he accepted to change a spare of the brake system that Frieder had brought with him.

They waited for me to make some order and then followed us home where they parked in the place reserved for the truck travellers. We had dinner together and the evening prolonged until midnight. It was a very nice evening.

Next morning, just after finishing with the replacement of the spare, they went on. We had already said goodbye. I just hoped that they had a safe travel and enjoyed as much as possible all the beauties that Chile had to offer them in such a hurry.

At midday I went to get my camera back and, in effect, after cleaning some kilos of dust off of it, it worked again. It was not cheap, but at least I had a three months guaranty.

In the afternoon, at the shop, my only interest was to leave all the stuff ready for priming. I wanted to go on with the truck because the construction of the case for the winch had taken a lot of time.

The CSD discs did their job, as well as the laminated discs, and the sparks and the rust dust filled the workshop. Curiously, I heard not a single comment from the mechanics or from the guys in the office. Could it be because I wore the earplugs all the time?




I profited to clean some other parts that would be necessary when assembling the front axle and the bumper, and then I left. Someone had to work to pay for Merkabah’s expenses.

[pairospam]

Saturday morning the wills to use the paint gun almost burned my hands. I displayed the stuff to have the right amount of room, light and ventilation, and prepared enough catalized washprimer, at least what I judged to be enough.

I started with the components of the case of the winch and then added other parts and pieces that were waiting for their turn in the piled boxes everywhere. I also finished to prepare the zone that would be patched in the front of the cabin and then applied three hands of washprimer on it. Better safe than sorry.





Some other parts showed up, like the steering knuckles, the supports for the front air springs, etc. I primed them all and then had to wait for them to dry up to manipulate and prime them the other side, wait again and repeat it all one more time for two hands of primer. It was a slow job, as always.



Once the washprimer covered all the pieces I started applying the primer. In the beginning I found a few little empty cans only and I was starting to worry because the store would open only next Monday, when I finally found the big can that I had bought some months ago, buried under a ton of dust, spiderwebs and dog hair. I prepared a lot of primer to avoid preparing lesser amounts each time. Error.








Lots of parts and pieces and lot of time to prime them all. Unfortunately the catalized primer became thicky before I could finish and had to throw to the garbage a non-negligible amount of it, then cleaned meticulously the paint gun and prepared more primer. Lazyness doesn’t ever pay back.

[pairospam]

Anyway, finally, I primed all I could that afternoon, and there still was a little primer left that I had to discard as well. I hate to have to discard things and it was late enough to be tired and pissed.




Looking the winch case ready, primed and shiny, though, I felt better again. Then I thought: where the hell am I going to put it? It was heavy and bulky, and I wanted to leave it covered and out of the way. It ended up on the tail of the frame, just above the rear winch box, conveniently wrapped in paper.





The last sunrays lightened the working place when I was about to leave, tired but happy. While I was spraying and waiting for the primer to dry up, I thought for the eleventh time about how things had to proceed, and decided that I would finish with the frame and the front drive train to allow the truck to stand on its own feet and only then I would occupy myself of the cabin. It was quiet obvious, I know, but I like to change my mind from time to time, that way it looks I have some control over something.

Sunday, late morning, hot as always, I went to buy some goat cheese to a town near San Felipe, on the mountains. Of course at that moment of the day there was no more cheese for sale and I had to conform myself with a cold Coca Cola and the pleasure of riding the Africa Twin.



Later on, when it was far more fresh and comfortable and you did not feel the need to shot yourself in the head, I went out for a little ride on the Yamaha. It was just a short turn, but soon became a long one because the hills and the trails were too much invitating and the afternoon too much auspicious. Yes… I was alone.



On Monday, at the shop, I knew that I could not make too much progress as I realized that I had forgotten a very important detail. I had to fabricate a little device to hang the winch case from over the crossmember, to raise it up with a rope and bolt it easily and safely to the support. It seemed very simple, but it always does in the beginning.

The method was the traditional one: the idea of what you want in your mind, kick up a couple of steel pieces on the floor, select the best looking one, cut, weld, clean and… voilà! I used 5 mm-thick steel pieces of frame and profile, a worn out long bolt and a link taken from the chain that guarded the tool boxes. In the end, I had a pair of hooks strong enough to handle the winch and the case. When I finished it was time to leave. I was right… not big progress.

[pairospam]

The next time I went to the workshop I did not know what to begin with; there was so much to do! I made a little tour around the chassis and picked up the tiny pieces of steel sparse everywhere, the dirty papers, the boxes, the spares and a never-ending amount of stuff that impeded or limited the access to the front part of the frame. When did all that arrive there, I don’t know, but the time had come to get out.

It took me quiet a long time to make a little order, and then I fought against the wires and the pipes that were still attached to the frame and to the steering pump. They were there from the beginning of times and I needed them to get out of sight so I disconnected and unbolted what was necessary and then I put it all into a box. I would see later how to deal with the mess.



The steering pump was exposed, and all the dirt it was still covered with. I would have to clean it up before the rest of the chassis. Hmm…




I went to work and came back the next day to clean the pump but I got distracted for a while putting in order the parts that were around, and I realized that one of the supports for the auxiliary front shocks was missing. I found it later inside one of the dozens of boxes, halfway prepared, but I also realized that I had not finished with the front suspension issue and the holes for the bolts of the supports had not still been drilled.

As sincerely I was not on the mood of playing with gasoline at that moment I grabbed the drill, a little oil and a big bunch of drill tips and began to make the holes por the supports on the frame rails. Trying to take care of the drill and the bits makes you not very fast so it took me quiet a while to drill both rails, and I got pretty tired.



The chassis number would be half covered by the support so I took many pictures of it. I hope the guys of the local TÜV will never ask me to take the support out to check the number, as it is printed in a plaque on the cabin. I hope…



I had to go out to by some bolts and nuts for the shock supports and when I came back it was already late to continue. There was something that left me with an uneasy feeling as I stared at the supports for the last time before leaving.



Soon as I arrived the day after I opened the big wrenchs box. I decided to take all the supports out of the frame to clean appropriately the rust and the dirt off. It would be too hard to clean in between them. Particularly between the supports of the cabin and the mudguards. They had to go out.

The firsts to fly were the supports for the bumpers and for the head lights. I would clean them for good while they were out, then I would paint them and finally assemble all when ready. I would also flatten out the support of the right bumper that was a little bent.



The coolant reservoir, mounted on the mudguard support, also got out after a brief hesitation. I was not keen on manipulating it but I said to myself that at this point of the story it was of no importance to disassemble a little more. Out with it.



Free from the supports, the steering pump was completely exposed, dressed in dirt and oil. I grabbed the manual tools and cleaned it as completely as I could and then brushed it with solvent. After a while I was a little high, smelling heavy of gasoline, but the pump and the hoses looked much better.



I was going to replace the textile-covered hoses, they were so soaked in oil that they would never be cleaned, and they were as old as the truck.

The frame rail was almost ready, without the supports, almost naked and ready for priming and painting, but the hoses and the pipes of the steering ruined the landscape. I realized also that I would never get to clean the pump “comme il faut” if all the stuff was left in situ, and so, this was the next move before thinking on painting the frame.



The pile of removed parts and pieces was growing by the minute, and it seemed that it would never stop doing so. There was so much work waiting for the next days. Hmm…

[pairospam]

I removed the ATF reservoir and all the hoses and pipes. It was a mess, but at least I would be able to clean properly all the surfaces and replace the hoses.



There was still a lot of dirt behind the support of the reservoir, impossible to clean with the thing on. Fortunately it was just oil-mud, and I began to clean it manually and ended up with gasoline and then with metallic brushes. When I stopped, half poisoned despite the mask, it looked better, but it needed a little gritblasting to do a good job.




Pretty slowly… I was making some progress… but pretty slowly.

And again it was Saturday, and I was alone working at the workshop, for a change. The self imposed task of the day was to prepare everything for priming on Monday. Maybe I was aiming too high.

I took out a little support for the exhaust and another little dirt and a little grease were revealed in between the frame rail and the rear support of the spring pack. I got distracted trying to remove it all but it was impossible. Some of it will remain there forever.



With a combination of CSD discs, metallic powerbrush, laminated discs, manual brushes, sand paper and the teeth I peeled off the frame starting from the left side. I proceeded making the necessary pauses to let the forearms and the arms to rest and the powergrinder to cool down. It may seem easy, but it took me a few hours, and at every minute I was covered more and more with dust and old paint.







The steering pump was impossible to clean completely, like some other hard-to-reach spots, as expected, but I did my best, that way I would have to blast the less.

The frame, at the end of the day, was pretty clean, though the flash highlights the remainder primer. It was a really hard and dirty job, but it was worth.

As I prognosed before, Monday afternoon the truck was far from being ready for priming. I calmly wrapped again the engine with paper and sealed it as completely as I could, including the radiator funnel. There were only a few spots where the gritblasting was going to be applied, but the metallic grit gets to every corner and angle, even where you may not expect it to go.




One of the pending tasks was to remove the broken bolt of the support of the left springpack, until then impossible to take out because of its pretty difficult location. I made a last couple of gentle attempts and then I applied the very known resource of the big and heavy hammer with a long and strong stem. It worked. Good.

[pairospam]

The right springpack was still in place, I do not remember why, so I took it out along with its support and then I masked the rear portion of the frame starting from the middle crossmember. I would paint the rest of the frame later, not then.



I put the bunch of wires in a box and sealed it as good as I could and put my mask on again. I then swipped the place very carefully in order to remove any metallic debris that could be recovered from the the floor along with the grit. After one hour I thought it was clean, but I used the magnet and there were still many steel mesh hairs around. Hmm…



The camera failed once again and I took it to the shop to claim for the warranty. The pictures that follow are again from the cell phone, a little greenish but… WTF.

The next day the HI-TECH blasting chamber was deployed again over the truck, or what was left of it, covering the engine and the frame. During three hours I struggled against the blinding dust, the jamming gun, the pretty heavy grit container that broke and allowed half the grit to fall on the floor, the difficult spots that needed special contorting skills, and the never stopping air compressor. It was almost a disaster, but I made it through.



When the dust settled I lifted up the polyethylene sleeves and watched the results of the blasting under the direct sunlight; they were not too bad, in spite of the adverse conditions.





The worse came later, when I had to collect the grit back from the floor using the very efficient but slow method of the magnet. I was left alone in the shop because it was very late and everybody was hungry.

I powerblew many times the engine and the frame and there was always some big or small amount of grit hidden somewhere, and when I thought it was enough I left the grit and the tools in order and went home. I was very, very tired…dirty... but happy.



Well, the idea was to rapidly paint the frame, so the next session I again powerblew the whole thing, making sure that no grit was left around, and then I set again the wrapping of the engine uncovering completely the frame rails. After making sure that it was all clean and ready I applied the washprimer, two hands and a little more on the more difficult places. Good.

[pairospam]

The following afternoon, of course, it was time for priming. I prepared the catalyzed primer, in small amounts this time, and gave three hands before leaving. I really don’t like to clean the paint gun from the primer; did I tell it before?




Saturday morning I went to pick the special paint I ordered at the beginning of the week. It had been not easy to choose the color for the frame. I initially wanted to paint it all black, but soon as I painted the internal side of the frame to quickly mount the engine I regreted the idea. Later on I decided to paint the frame in light grey, and the mudguards, the front grille and the bumpers in the original black. Finally, last Tuesday, I decided to paint it all in dark grey (don’t remember the code), like the new Mercedes models, keeping the black for the grille, the deflector and the snorkel.



Again, I blew the whole thing, repaired some defects of the primer, sanded a little where needed, and then applied three hands of the polyurethane catalyzed grey paint. Oh, what a feeling! The paint made the frame look like new, and if I was a little more lunatic than I actually am, I would even polish it to make it look better.






Fortunately I was right with the selection of the color, approved by all the people that watched the frame next Monday and, more importantly, approved by Carmen.

[pairospam]

Well, having done what was ment to be done at that point, I went on with the next step, meaning to disassemble and finish the cleaning of the steering pump stuff that was in the middle of the very rectricted working place.



After all the attention it has gotten before there still was a lot of dirt trapped between the pipes and the supports. It was a nasty job, but after some time, solvents, soap and patience, it was all clean enough to manipulate.




If I wanted to clean all the supports taken out from the frame myself I would spend too many days, so I decided to take them to the sandblasting shop for the old man do the job. I took out all the bolts and nuts from the supports, borrowed Eduardo’s truck and went to the very well known place, dropped the pieces and continued with the cleaning of the pipes, the ATF reservoir and some other things.





When I was about to leave, the jigsaw I had ordered more than a week before finally arrived. It was very nice, heavy and silent. It would be used as a poor but practical, and proven, imitation of the CNC or laser cutter. You will see.

[pairospam]

Well, I already said that it bothered me a lot having to clean the supports taken off from the frame and other parts because it would take me too long and I preferred to dedicate that time to do other things and, by seeing them, you would agree with me. After a few days the old sandblasting man had them ready and clean. He did a great job, and asked me to pay in accordance. Hmm…



As I went to pick the blasted parts I profited to look for the hydraulic hoses of the power steering and ended up in a local shop, specialized in this type of stuff, where they fabricated one and found the proper replacements for the others, in record time for a few euros. It was something really unexpected.

The hoses went into a box and I drove my attention back to the pieces to paint.



I displayed the blasted parts on the largest surface I could accommodate and, after blowing and letting the breeze sweep the dust out, I repassed the little defects of the sandblasting with the metallic mesh. Then I applied the washprimer. It was pretty long a job as I had to wait the primer to dry before turning sides and because there was not enough place for priming all at once. Anyway, they came pretty well, at last.






The primer was applied later, of course, with the same pace and patience. It almost made me crazy having to wait but it was not the first time nor would be the last. I primed everything at hand, including the hook for installing the winch and its case.

[pairospam]

When I finished I was pretty happy, but a look at the box with the bolts and nuts waiting for cleaning and painting almost made me have a heart attack; so much work still to do!



I arrived to the shop the next afternoon and I was aware that I needed a different system for painting the parts because the paint had to be applied in one session only; I could not manipulate the pieces at least for 24 hours. So, I went to the attic and used a roll of wire, that I had bought with no special purpose some time ago, for hanging the pieces from the roof. Everything comes at the right time, naturely. The attic looked like nonna’s basement, but in the place of salami there were lots of steel pieces hanging.





Once all the pieces were set, after a long while, I gave them a pair of hands of grey paint.

I picked the new drag link that was silently waiting since many months, wrapped, kneeling in a corner, prepared it and sprayed a few hands of catalized paint along with the other parts. It looked pretty good, in the end.





As I still had some paint left in the gun I profited to paint one of the mudguards repaired by Eddie long ago. I overestimated the amount of paint so the other mudguard would be painted with the rest of the pieces in a near future. I cleaned the paint gun in a hurry and got out of the shop; I was really done with it.



And then another Saturday arrived! The task was to clean by force of mesh all the little supports, the bolts and the nuts needed to bolt the supports back on the frame. I wanted to paint them before putting them on, even knowing that the torque would probably ruin the paint. I would see at the proper moment if re-painting or repairing was necessary. The thing is that there were many pieces to clean.



I spent a lot of time at it, testing my handling and my patience again. If I bought all the nuts and bolts it would cost me a little fortune, and it also was hard to find bolts of the same quality and duration like the original ones. As time was not a problem, I just had to put my hands at work.

[pairospam]

Sunday morning I convinced Eduardo to follow me to the mountains on his XT400. It was a pretty intense ride, following the less risky rocky trails. Nobody got hurt or killed and it was a great experience for my brother-in-law, but I suspect that he had to change his underwear soon after arrival, he, he.



The same day in the afternoon, profiting of a family meeting in the country, I went to the cattle and measured the supports for the front shock absorbers of the cabin of Spare. They had to be incorporated to the Merkabah’s cabin to allow the adapted suspension to work properly, and Verardo would turn the pieces for me.



Next Monday I had only a couple of hours available to work on the project but I reached to clean another dozen of bolts and I asked Verardo for the supports to be turned. I also made a fruitless search for steel pieces to complete the modification of the front suspension. The rest of the time was just working and caring for visitors.



When I finished with the first row of nuts and bolts I put them on display on an open cardboard box in a way that they could be primed and painted from every side without touching them; nice and cheap but slow-to-prepare solution.

I also looked for and (happily) found both the tie rod and the sway bar for the suspension of the cabin. The later was okay but the tie rod was not, as it was left without being primed before the trip to Europe, so I had to clean it free from some superficial rust… again. I left all the pieces ready for priming the next day because when I finished it was a little late.

And the next afternoon I washprimed it all, of course, and then I primed it all also. Good.






Movements at the cattle. Saturday morning we gathered at the countryside. The place where the paused Blazer 6x6 project was resting had been rented to another guy so it had to be moved along with a couple of trucks and a pickup that Eduardo had parked there.

Tito drove the old and reliable John Deere while I watched after the incomplete 6x6 not to fall from the forklift on its way to its new place in the cattle. It was an uneventful move, and the view of the stretched Blazer woke up many feelings and ideas in my mind. Keep focused, Pairoa! I had to tell to myself many times as I am easily distracted when there is a challenge ahead.



The cabin of Spare, the front half of the brown Blazer and the half-finished monster would keep company to the old truck of Eduardo’s father, almost hidden under the pile of firewood. It was a sad view, but there was nothing I could do then to make it look better. Time would come for every dream to be completed.

[pairospam]

I woke up early Sunday morning and decided that instead of taking the WR450 for a careless ride I would go and paint what was left to paint in the workshop. And so I did. I hung the pieces and parts from the roof after taking the already painted ones out and spent the whole morning spraying grey paint. I had two drips, only, and I felt good with that. The pieces looked very nice.





The bolts and nuts in the “folding screen” received their dose of paint too and, when I was done, I reached home at a pretty decent time for lunch, for a change.



At the beginning of the week, there was a lot of nuts and bolts waiting for me to clean if I wanted to be ready, at some moment in a near future, to assemble the front axle and to get the modified suspension working. I picked a bunch of bolts of the steering arms and spent a lot of time cleaning them off of rust and dirt with the power grinder and the metallic mesh. Boring, boring.

The turned supports for the shocks of the cabin suspension were ready, and Verardo gave me a great rebate, as always.




Then, it was the turn for the brake shoe brackets. I had cleaned them well some months before, but as they stood unprotected during wintertime they got dirty and some rust developed on the surface so I had to power and hand brush them once again. Not a big deal, but it took me some time to get them ready for priming, in better condition than after the initial cleaning, of course. Where the hell did I put the bolts and the nuts?




The sun was hiding behind the mountains when I reached the cattle again. I got a XXXXL cover for the poor Blazer to help her withstand the rest of the summer sun and the nasty conditions she would have to face during the next months. I hoped the cover would last longer than Merkabah’s did.



Actually, there was something I could do to make the view a little less sad after all.

[pairospam]

Hello to all:

I don’t want to bother you too much with details from the days that followed the last update because there were not much to see. Preparing pieces for priming and painting is a pain in the ass, but I devoted myself to do so for quiet a few afternoons, with no complaint. I primed some supports and also the shoe brackets, with which the boredness dimished, a little.




I wanted initially to take the air filter housing and its bracket to the sandblasting shop, but I decided to do it myself instead, because the last time I did save some time, but the old man charged a lot for the job, and I had been not able to argue for I wasn’t there to watch and count the hours. Hmm…

The bracket looked pretty ugly, like the whole truck did once. After a couple of hours, after a little love, metallic mesh and abrasive discs, it looked much better.





With the filter housing the thing was more or less the same though the volume was far bigger. I dedicated the whole saturday morning to it. The filter element was pretty clean, according with its little use, but the interior was a crust of oil and dirt. I washed and cleaned it up for good and then I cleaned the surface, which ended shining under the midday light.


[/img]



The shining did not last long because as soon as it was possible every piece was sprayed with two hands of washprimer. After this I went home for lunch… a little late but happy.

[pairospam]

Sunday morning I skipped the pre-flight check to avoid disturbing the neighbors with the loud sound of the dirt bike, so Eduardo and I departed quickly towards the mountains, but after half a block I realized that the front brake was malfunctioning. The level of the brake fluid was zero. Where did it go? We couldn’t find any leak and the brake pads were far from being worn out.



The ride ended up before beginning. The Yamaha was grounded so I had to take all the gear off and the helmet remained, frustrated, on my grand-grandfather’s travel trunk, waiting for better times. No riding, again.



The mowing ended up fairly even, though… you can count on it.

And the next Monday afternoon went on with primer and paint, to continue with this story. I did not make it to paint the filter housing because the primer needed more time to harden up. I did paint other parts and profited to repass other pieces that were not perfectly covered. The lighting was pretty deficient on the attic so it was not difficult to make some mistakes despite the attention you payed to.





Anyway, I also painted the shoe brackets, completely even if it was not necessary because only the part of the support for the air brake would be visible. But, as I was on the mood, I covered them with grey paint from every angle. How long would the paint last?… who knows.



I was a little overwhelmed by the amount of pieces and parts that were sparse all around, and I felt the need for assembling and making order as a priority. I prepared and painted a lot of bolts and nuts with the same boring procedure and after a couple of days they were ready to be used. I displayed them orderly to avoid any mistakes in the distribution though I could not remember exactly the place for every one of them.



Slowly, taking great care when manipulating the pieces not to damage the paint, I began to bolt the supports on the frame. It was nice to see them back in place, clean and shiny, and the new supports for the shocks and the air springs made it look even better.

[pairospam]

It looked good indeed, but if you took a closer look you could see the unavoidable damage of the paint on the nuts. A little retouch would be necessary later on, but at least this way I was sure that the bolts and the nuts would be as protected as possible by the primer and the paint.



There were some parts that were not completely painted, like the bracket for the filter housing; same problem… same solution: more paint, later.



Saturday, lazy and hot Saturday. I spent the afternoon at the shop working on the project, cleaning, polishing and preparing more bolts and pieces for priming and painting. I came back home pretty late without finishing the auto-imposed task for that day.




I filled up and tested endlessly the front brake before taking the WR450F to the dirty trails, and it seemed to work without any trouble, firm and smooth. But in the middle of a pretty hard and steep slope I had a millisecond of hesitation and the RPM went down, the engine stalled and my foot found no terrain to hold the weight of the machine. Typical. So, I went down along with the Yamaha and there was a bloody rock waiting for the brake lever, right there.



Nothing else happened, nothing else broke, just the lever and my proud. I was left with no front brake, again, so I did a pretty brief ride and went back home because it was very unsafe to ride like that. Maybe that was the whole idea; too weird to be a coincidence. It never is.

Yes, the bike is in the living room, the best place for making repairs.

On Monday morning I was at work when I got a call from Alejandro, the supersized Argentinian that works with Eduardo at the shop. I got hit by a car- he said. He sounded not bad, and fortunately he was not at all. Some guy was amazingly distracted and caught him on his bicycle. He was examined and X rayed in the emergency room and discharged home with a full recovery prognosis, but the worst was the tsunami of jokes that followed regarding his luck and the state of the little car after the hit. We all laughed out loud at him once we were sure he was okay. He laughed out loud too, but he said ouch! between laugh and laugh.



I finished what I left unconcluded last Saturday and applied washprimer on the pieces already prepared. Waiting for them to be dry and ready for priming I went under the frame and washed the electric bundle off all the dirt with soap and water. I had to re-route it to its original position up and front before installing the winch if I wanted not to do the whole maneuver twice. Fortunately I realized this little detail before going on.




At the last moment of the working journey I primed the other batch of pieces and bolts and left. We went to see Alejandro later in the afternoon and he felt better. We all warned him that it would hurt worse the day after. Thanks for telling!– he replied, ouched and laughed again.



Tuesday morning I woke up at 5:45 AM because of the thunders and lightnings of the first autumn rain storm that went on for hours and hours over the valley. I know it may have no special interest for you, but… it was raining in San Felipe! Guys, we needed so much the water and the little snow on the mountains. Two days before we had 31°C, though. The weather is crazy.

[pairospam]

Speaking of the crazy weather, as you can see on the news, yesterday and today it rained cats and dogs in the north of Chile, in the desert, and there were many floods. Many villages and cities were washed away by the mud and the garbage cumulated in the riverbeds after 18 years of one of the longest drynesses in the past century. It is a disaster. And, on the other hand, the rivers are dry in the south because of the lack of rain, the Huilo Huilo falls, for instance, are gone; it never happened before. It is a great disaster too.

We always go on the news because our frequent natural disasters: volcanoes erupting, floods, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc. Hmm…

[pairospam]

Many lives were lost and there are still today many people missing. My father is there, helping to rebuild the power lines. Some pictures of the affected zones from above show the quiet impressive panorama, especially if you think that it is the driest desert of the world. The services are being restored and lots of help are arriving, though.






Unaffected by all these events of natural power and human efforts and suffering, eight tones of steel, rubber and plastic stood still in silence, waiting for its slow reassembling to go on.



Also, far from all these disasters, our friends René and Karen had started their so delayed trip around the Americas one month ago and introduced the new member of the crew, Lucas, the big way. They went far south and met Irmi and Frieder at Hornopirén (do you remember from my last trip?) while they were waiting for a place in the ferry. They travelled by the Carretera Austral and found some pretty nice wohnmobiles on the way. They are currently going up north by the Atlantic coast through Argentina towards Uruguay where they will gather the Spanish couple that turned over on the dunes last year. Best wishes to them.






There were many bolts and nuts that needed to be painted before even trying to think on assembling more parts and pieces so I devoted the last days at doing that job. Not my favourite, of course, and I could not paint immediately because of the humidity.

[pairospam]

I was very proud of the finition of the filter housing but there was a little defect on the paint in the upper part. I profited to retouch it but the retouching ruined the former paint and I had to paint it completely again, without reaching the same quality. Hmm…



I had to wait for the paint to harden a few days so I spent the time cleaning the rest of the electric bundle, with a vertiginous pace of one hour for every 50 centimeters. That dirty it was.



When I cleaned the wires for the front lights I painted them in grey not to see the red ancient color of the truck. I profited to make some other retouches, not caring about the finition this time; no one else will ever see it apart from me. It went very good, in any case.




Saturday morning Eduardo and I went out for a little ride. The valley of the river Aconcagua looked splendid in its early autumn colors dressing, but the feeling was of uneasiness, thinking on how fragile we are when it comes to nature to decide our fate.



In the afternoon I went to the workshop and worked only for a couple of hours on the truck. I had to change the orientation of almost all the bolts that I had put on to hold the supports in place and tighten them for good. The paint on the bolts suffered but, all in all, the damage was not as bad as I expected, and it would be done a retouch when I painted the rest of the chassis. The filter housing was also put in place, I made some little order with the wiring, tighten some nut here and there and that was all.




I wanted to finish with the front chasis so I continued with the assembling of the most parts I could. The winch was the next on the list, of course. The big guy was pretty hard to handle. 58 kilograms always are.



According with its size and weight, this was one of the most difficult parts to put in place since the beginning of the project, but I will save you from that, for once. The rope and the roller sheaves did not work as wonderful as expected so I had to ask for help. In the end many hands helped the winch case to be bolted to the ad hoc crossmembers, and even then a little and gentle help from the hydraulic jack was necessary to complete the job late in the evening. But… I finally installed the bloody winch!

[waYne]

Really nice work!

I`m always excited to see new posts and I really appreciate that you let us be a part of your Built-Up!

Carry on!

Cheers

waYne

[landwerk]

Hi...


im looking forward to the finished Truck.

But why did you mount the winch that deep in the front.
It seems that it is located under the front bumper.

This may limit off road ability.


What kind of primer do you use for your work ?


LG

Oli

[pairospam]

Hi waYne: good to know you like this. Thanks.

landwerk: I am looking forward for the finished truck too! The position of the winch is the cheapest compromise I found; some degrees were lost from the angle of approach indeed, but I estimated that hard offroad use is not going to be the major use for the truck, so be it.

As shown, I use a combination of catalyzed washprimer (alchidic phosphate base, if I remember well), and polyurethane catalyzed primer. Seems to be the best way to proceed if you have no possibility to cook the paint or to apply electrostatic paint.

Cheers.


Pairoa