An embarrasing side quest.

[montanafordman]

While Ive been humming right along on my total front end rebuild, riveting frame crossmember swap and engine swap I hit an embarrasing snag. If you caught my previous post about the crossmember we got the engine installed and everything! We did fight getting the engine in between the mounts for considerable time because we didnt have a frame spreader and it just didnt want to slide between the mounts.

While cleaning and organizing things today I came across my flywheel dowel pin retainer... In my haste and excitement I forgot to put that under my flywheel bolts so the cavalry is coming back tomorrow to help me pull the engine (again) so I can take the clutch off and flywheel bolts to install the dowel pin retainer. I am an amateur after all - and prone to stupid mistakes.

I once used a frame spreader the Tacoma Model A club had when I lived in washington and wanted to buy a commercially made one for a while just to have, but it seems everyone has been out of stock for some time.

I've been working so many late nights I needed a break from the car so I switched gears and gathered some steel to make my own frame spreader so we dont fight the install like we did the other day. I loosely followed some plans I found but used some 2" square tubing I had, and got the rest from a local fabrication shop, farm supply and hardware store. (One more short piece of 2" square tubing, some 1/4 steel plate, 1" iron pipe, 1" all thread, 1" nut and washer.) Don't pay any attention to my welds, they were not that great but the dimensions and final product turned out pretty good! Just remeber - "a grinder and paint will make you the welder you aint!" 🤣 I'll clean it up more later and paint it - but its functionally ready for tomorrow.

I have no doubt we wont have trouble fitting between the engine mounts now.