Will post links to pics later
Hello Fellow Bolters
Well I made it back .4,933 miles total round trip.GA to AZ and back
1948 2 ton ex fire truck 216 engine top speed 45 mph 3500 rpm's
No major problems other the fuel problems on the way out.(I talked about before)
Except for small near diaster in TX.
This truck is amazing .
The 6 mods I did to the truck for the trip really worked.(just pm me if you want more details of my mods)
HEI ign correctly installed
1985 dodge truck Slant six carb jetting is perfect,the mileage seemed to be realy good
3/4 inch thick rubber horse stall matt and insolation combo I cut for the floors.You can drive bare foot no heat at all through the floor even in the desert temps "4'x 6' horse stall matt tractor supply $39.00" Contact me I'll tell you how I cut it ,it's real easy to cut if you know the trick.
Dual circut mastercylinder and 7' dual diafram booster ,works good but runs out of vacum,needs a vacum tank and check valve.
12 volt conversion real nice to have tunes in the truck
KIA bucket seats
Sorry I didn't do a day by day trip blog,I didn't have time.
The 2nd day I did 526 miles 3rd day 400+ miles
Start Kingman Az
Day 1 late start 4:30 pm picked up a hitchhiker he looked like a mass murder with prison tatoos but I didn't get any bad vibes when I talked to him.We got only 136 miles to Williams AZ ,he managed to curl up in the cab and sleep,it sure looked painful.
Next day made it to Summer Lake State park in NM on 84 ,526 miles,a no frills camped on the beach real nice,I gave Will my hamock to sleep in ,but fate struck him again about 1 hour a wicked wind started and the hamock was going up and down 3 feet at a time ,he went and slept in the cab again .
3rd day another long day 400+ miles.Wichata Falls TX ,Will was going to Oklahoma City to see a lady so I drove him to the first service area on the OK turnpike about 20 mile into OK.
Next day back on 82 in TX stoped at an antique mall in Muenster TX with a 1.5 ton sitting outside. Lots of suface rust but all in all not bad the floors looked good and they said it runs it had a 2005 sticker on the windshield .They said it was a 51 but it had wing windows .
They wanted $2,500 you'll see it in my pics I will post with contact info.
Onward ,stoped later in Bonham TX went to the same named state park. nice park with a lake,then the trouble started.
My near disaster background ,while I was still in AZ I came upon a inboard outboard boat full of garbage out in desert that sombody had dumped ,well being from FL ,I know they can have a aluminum tanks ,so when I smelled the filler ,it still smelled of gas,moved a bit of garbage and I found a tank"ALUMINUM". Came back with a firmans ax next day to cut the deck away.Great luck the tank is about 4' long ,16-18" wide and 10" tall the sticker was still on it 46 galons!!!!Spent a whole day chopping it out of the foam that encased it.But it wouldn't move so a friend came and cut it out of the hull with a chainsaw.
Back to my near disaster at Bonham St.park ,the aluminum tank had a small weeping leak at 1 end on the bottom so I got some gas tank patch repair that you knead together ,well I couldn't read the directions because I couldn't find my glasses so the kid a O'Rielys ap. read them to me,BUT not the important part about what to do if it's wet with gas.Well as soon as I wiped it off ,it became a small gusher,so after a few frantic tries I went through the whole pack of patch before it stoped,well at least I thought it did and went swimming.Came back 40 min later gas was every where.I quickly unhooked my camper and got the the truck away from the campfires around me.I drained 10 gal out and stuffed one of my drive up car ramps under one end leak stoped.Drove it on this tank and when it got low I had a body shop to grind off the old patch with an air grinder ,then repatched it pefect 86 gal total for both tanks.
The rest of the trip went pretty much uneventful ,well a couple of hicups .Ants !! I hate ants ,I stopped at Crosset Harbor campground again ,I had picked up a cooked chicken at Walmart earlier in the day,Now it's 10 pm late dinner.So I crawl in the camper to eat because the mosquitos are real bad .
NEVER LEAVE ANYTHING!!! on the ground leading to your camper,like a tiedown strap.
So I didn't have to mess with my electric cool box trying to keep the chicken cool the next day, I decided I would eat it for breakfast.I woke up to an army of ants trying to carry my chicken away.So much for my early start,1 1/2 hours of an ant killing spree I hit the road,oh I was so [censored] off I brushed them off my chicken and ate it.
Later just as I get on I-20 in AL the truck starts it's fuel starvation problem again well after a couple of baths in gas, cleaning filters .1 hour later I realized it was my electric fuel pump ,then I found the problem, it was 1 of the cheap harbor frieght jumper test wires I had used as a tempory hook up for the fuel pump ,the ground wire had melted.
Back on the road and was home a few ours later.
