Resumed work on Ol' Blue. Began with the rear springs. After a good scrubbing, cleaning and prep, on went the self-etch:


And then the paint:


Then left them alone for the paint to cure. Won't touch them for at least a day. Moved on to the rear calipers. They aren't in horrible condition, but not the best I've seen either:


They aren't leaking and the boots aren't ripped or torn. The sliders move freely as do the pistons. Therefore I opted not to rebuild them. After some Brakleen and elbow grease they looked a tad better:


Then post-prep I covered up some stuff:


And did the primer:


And paint thing to these as well:


Decided to go with aluminum for the calipers. Considered blue for a bit but tipped the scales towards aluminum in the end. That was mostly because I don't have any of the Dark Blue Pearl in the spray can form from a while ago. And at $26 per, nah, aluminum will do. I set those aside to finish their dry-cycle too.

At that point I wanted to revisit these lower ball joints. But let's rewind things a smidge. You might recall that I haven't finished the installation of these critters. So last weekend I decided to give it a think. I mean why were they giving me so much grief? Sure, they are the toughest to press in-and-out, but they aren't *that* difficult. Usually. Provided that you have the alignment properly configured these ball joints should press in with some effort required. However it isn't (and shouldn't be) the cataclysmic endeavor that I was experiencing. Something was amiss; I knew that it had to be the alignment, but how? And what is it about the alignment of these, or about *this* one that was off? I'd tried a variety of configurations to include shims 'n such, but every last one of those resulted in the joint becoming out of alignment with the control arm at some point during the pressing-in, usually early on. You wouldn't notice it if you hadn't seen that type of thing I suppose, as it was rather small. And as I mentioned I've only done less-than-10 of 'em. That said, I can tell when things are out-of-whack and it was a-happening routinely. Sigh. I was screwing something up...but what was it?

To find out, I decided to take a step back. I took a closer look at the passenger side lower control arm (or "A arm"), which is the one I began with by random choice. That's when I noticed the issue: the lower lip of this arm was bent! Aaaarrrrrggggghhhhh! For whatever reason I hadn't noticed it previously. I mean how do you bend one of these things? What the hell did the previous owners *do* with Ol' Blue anyway? Sigh. I won't start. Anyway this bent half of the arm, though not prevalent in stature, was enough to throw the alignment of the ball joint press kit's bits-n-pieces off just enough that completing the process would have been a rather complicated configuration indeed. Grrrrrr...

So this past salvage yard run I snatched the pax side lower control arm off of a 2007 CVPI and brought it home. I attempted to find some low-hanging fruit at the outset of that visit to the yard. That is, a Panther that already had some of the front suspension components removed such that grabbing a control arm would be cheese. But nope. Unfortunately the assortment that they happened to have on-hand that day were relatively new to the yard and so it was a full disassembly job. Oh well.

I also ordered a larger ball joint C-frame press, as the one that came in my kit had a smaller working area (termed "throat size" by some) than I recall when I did these back in the day. That showed up during the week. With the new part and the new tool I developed a plan of action. I seem to recall mentioning this, but no combination of the bits-n-pieces from the kit would really work in this scenario. Look past the repeat if applicable (lol). What I really needed was a single piece of tubing that was just the right length, diameter and wall thickness. With that in-hand, the likelihood of things becoming misaligned would be reduced. Therefore after taking a few measurements, I sourced some thicker-ish wall tubing from the local steel supplier. The son and I fetched that yesterday. I bought plenty, figuring that I'll find a use for it at some point in the future. The ball joints that I purchased for Ol' Blue fit snugly into this tubing. Thus there would be no movement on their part during the initial stages of the pressing event. With a cap on the end of the steel tubing and a receiver and a cap on the other, the new C-frame had just enough working area to do the job. The original would not have worked in this configuration, FWIW. And as I mentioned in my previous post, this seemed like it would be a winning combination. So that was the plan...

Tonight was the night to put that plan to the test. I laid the tubing down on the chop saw and cut off just what I'd need and no more, as there would be limited room even with the larger C-frame press:


The strongest vice you can utilize in this scenario is typically the frame of the vehicle itself. And so I mounted the new-to-me pax side control arm from the 2007 CVPI onto the frame of Ol' Blue. However, due to the physics of performing this operation on the frame of a non-fully-assembled vehicle, I elected to reverse the configuration: I wouldn't press directly against the shoulder of the ball joint, as that would mean that the applied force would come from below, which would tend to raise the frame off of the jack stands. Not an issue on a fully-assemebled vehicle, but at present Ol' Blue ain't that. Nope, instead I'd reverse the C-frame and press from above, thereby pulling the ball joint into position. Thus:


I also applied a smidge of grease to both the ball joint and the control arm. And fellas that worked a treat:


The alignment that this configuration yielded even resulted in the 1/2" Dewalt battery-powered impact pressing the ball joint in much further than I anticipated. Manual intervention with the breaker would only be necessary later-on into the process. Even then I didn't need a cheater nor was I required to apply that much torque. This amount of effort was approximately what I remembered needing the last time I did this, and thus based on experience I felt comfortable with what I was doing. But I digress.

So that's one side done, save the installation of the grease zirk fitting. The driver's side would have to wait though, as it was time to bounce inside and help get the lil' un to sleep.

Y'all take care, hope all is well!

So did you pop the new bushings out of the busted arm first, or is that still to do?

Good nitpick Stu, thumbs up on that one!

The short answer is 'no'. I mounted the new-to-me pax side lower control arm onto the frame of Ol' Blue solely for the purpose of installing the ball joint. The bushings that were on this control arm from the 2007 CVPI remain in serviceable condition. However the rear bushing/mount is starting to show its age; small rips 'n tears 'n such. That said, you could just leave the control arm in place as shown in the above pictures and run with those bushings. That's a viable choice, especially in a budget build, which we have all done at various points in our automotive travels. However that's not how I roll. At least not on this build. Nope, the wife-eee and son will be the primary occupants, so she's a-gettin' all new stuff. Besides I already have the new bushings. The plan for this new arm was to install the ball joint first. I wanted to see if my installation plan was a-gonna work. And there isn't much need in spiffin' her up if she won't work. Thus with the ball joint installed, I removed the arm again (as well as the front bushing):


And went to cleanin', scuffin' and more cleanin'. Then went the usual route of self-etch:


And a couple of layers of gloss black:


I'll install the new front bushing tomorrow after the new coat has had sufficient time to dry. And of course the rear is just a slip-in & bolt-on, so that'll be easy enough to polish off as well. Speaking of installation after a good dry, while the fresh paint was doing its thing on the lower control arm, I installed the rear springs:


Although these springs appear to have come without isolators on the lower end where the spring mounts on top of the axle, I had several of those isolators on-hand, so I put one on the lower end of each spring as well. I then turned my attention to the Watts link. I did a more thorough comparison between the new guy and the one that came off of the CVPI. I noticed that the bushing at the frame end of the driver's side arm was worn. So after weighing the two systems and finding no appreciable difference, I decided to proceed with the new guy. That would mean removing the pivot from the stud. This is no small affair but not crazy-difficult either. With a 1/2" breaker and a cheater I was able to remove and separate both components:


The FSM states that anytime you loosen or remove the nut that you should replace both the stud and the nut. With that in mind, I don't see a reason why I went to the effort to separate them, but hey...I did anyway. So now I'm on the hunt for a Watts link stud kit. The new stuff appears to be of decent quality:


So we'll just have to see how it performs. TBD.

And having said that, I am still working on the shocks business. The prices have increased at the dealership over what I purchased for The 5-O in 2017, so I'm disinclined to take that route again. There was an entire slew of options for the rear shocks on Rock Auto. There were options for the front struts thought not quite as many in number. I noticed offerings by Sachs and by Gabriel. Fellas, I don't have any experience with either of those brands. An Internet search of each revealed mixed reviews, like everything, so no surprise there. Does anyone have any experience with either Sachs or Gabriel?

Hope all is well!

Made a few calls and surfed a few websites today during lunch. In the end, I decided the following:

1) I didn't need any new stabilizer bushings, as the ones on the front bar are fixed (2003 CVPI) and the ones in the rear are in good shape.
2) To purchase Motorcraft for the front struts and rear shocks, as I did with The 5-O in 2017. This time however I would not source them from the dealership. Amazon had an identical price to Rock Auto for the front struts, but with free shipping. So I went with Amazon. Rock Auto had the better deal on the rear shocks, so I gave them the nod for those.
3) Rock Auto also had the best deal for the drop links, both front and rear. So I bundled those in with the shocks. Not that we're dealing in much money WRT the links, but...
4) The dealership had the best offering WRT the rear differential stud for the Watts link, mostly in terms of availability (ergo the quickest at my door). They also had the isolator and nut for the rear Motorcraft shocks, which you must purchase separately (or else re-use the old stuff). So I'll source both from the dealership.

Now I need to decide if I want to (finally) invest in a wall-mounted spring compressor or just rent from Advance again...a wall mount unit is kinda pricey. TBD.

Anyway. 'Continued progress (albeit slow) tonight after work. Since the drop links will arrive soon, I gave the stablizer bar hardware a bath and the usual prep, followed by gloss black:


Then in went the driver's side lower control arm ball joint:


Which didn't put up a fight whatsoever BTW. The impact drove it all the way home. Interestingly enough. So I then dropped on the uppers on the driver's side:


And pax side:


Along with the new rear bushings and new front bushing on the pax side lower control arm. Saved various bits-n-pieces for final assembly, such as the ball joint nuts. 'Careful to cover the threads until then dontchaknow. Everything is cinched up snugly for now. Will torque it all down when the struts are installed. 'Had to leave it there for the night, as family duties beckoned.

Hope all is well!

Well fellas unfortunately I've spent a considerable amount of time this weekend doing the work that puts food on the table. Between that and family stuff, there wasn't much available time for project business. However I did manage to sneak in some quickly-had tasks. I'll take any progress, so no complaints!

First, a minor update regarding those rear calipers. The ones I painted aluminum were the ones that came on Ol' Blue. I took a closer look at them and noticed that they are aftermarket. Not Ford calipers. With the relative abundance of the latter being available, I decided to put the now-silver-colored ones in a box as backups. Instead I found the ones that came on the 3.27 axle that I sourced a short while ago. And of course that axle was from a CVPI and just-so-happened to still have its original Ford MoCo rear calipers installed. Seeing that I decided to run those. I pulled them out of the cubby hole into which I had stored them, cleaned them up and then applied the usual primer and color. This time though I chose to go with Satin Classic Navy. It's somewhat-kinda-sorta close to Dark Blue Pearl (meh ...) and who knows, if I have leftover paint perhaps I'll give these a spritz with that later on. Anyway I did all of that and then set them out to dry:


Then installed the parking brake along the rear axle to each wheel and mounted it along the driver's side of the frame:


There is a spring that holds it in position near that same point along the frame, but the spring clips into the body so that'll have to wait. The good news was that I managed to not lose that spring; it remains in the "Rear Axle" freezer bag. Thumbs up.

Finally I filled the rear diff just prior to having to close-up shop for the night:


I went with Castrol 80-90 gear oil that is specifically designed for LSDs (or so they tout). It had good reviews so we'll see how it performs. The FSM calls for 2.37 liters of the stuff, which is 5 pints or 2.5 quarts. These bottles were 1 quart a piece, so I would need 2.5 of them. The FSM also states that the fluid level should be located ~0.25" below the fill hole maximally. So I put in the 2.5 that it calls for and watched to see what would happen. Very little came out of the fill hole. I put a 90-degree pick inside and noticed that the tip of it was wet, so I think all's well that ends well.

As a side note, I decided to just go with some heavy-duty spring compressors for the upcoming strut changeover. I also purchased a set of regular compressors (the type that I used when I did the springs on The 5-O) and will try to use those as an extra safety margin. The wall mounted variant was just too pricey for a tool that I'll use relatively little. Who knows, if the tax refund is large enough perhaps I'll splurge and make a little project out if it. 'Prolly not. Have mouths to feed.

Anyway y'all take care!

Couple of questions partner.

For the calipers, why did you go for the junkyard calipers and not just buy new sets? Only reason I ask is because I have come across a couple of sticking calipers found in the yard(maybe from sitting too long?). They are relatively cheap on RockAuto. Just wondering is all. Great work nonetheless.

For compressing springs; not sure about your location but I have a local garage that will put in a new set of springs for 10 bucks a pop. They will assemble it for you on new struts, they have the nice wall mounted tool also haha. Less dangerous than doing it yourself with CVPI springs.

Hi CableGuy! Long time no talk. Hope all is well with you and the other half!

Questions? Sure, I enjoy the feedback/interaction; it's part of the reason I attempt to maintain currency in regard to this thread.


The short answer is "personal preference". And if that's all that anyone reading this post needs to hear, feel free to skip ahead. The longer answer is that whenever/wherever possible and reasonable, I prefer to run OEM parts. That's just the way I roll and always has been. Granted, there are times when that is not possible, practical or even plausible. And there are times when you opt for a non-OEM variant for other reasons such as cost or availability. I did just that on this build with some of the suspension components, such as the front lower control arm rear bushings/mounts. To name but one example. That said, whenever it makes sense I run OEM stuff.

For that reason, in the case of the rear calipers I went with the ones that came on the axle from the CVPI because this is stamped into their side:


The CVPI from whence they came had relatively low miles on it, the pads still had plenty of metal to be consumed prior to needing replacement, the pins moved freely and didn't leak, as did the pistons. So, like the ones I painted aluminum-silver, I didn't see the need to rebuild them. 'Kinda surprised that Stu didn't nit-pick the bah-geebees out of me on that one actually.

In the end I may return to those calipers and rebuild them anyway because this one:


Was in need of a rebuild. The parts that I ordered at the dealership last week are supposed to arrive tomorrow, so I plan on checking in with them to see if they have a rebuild kit to include pistons on-hand. If not, I'll source elsewhere. TBD.

Quick side note regarding the above caliper: it is for the front right (pax side) and also has "FoMoCo" stamped on it. However, the two that I pulled off of Ol' Blue eons ago are - as you might have figured - not OEM parts. And so I won't use those; might keep 'em as backups or just scrap 'em. TBD. 'Prolly the latter now that I think about it; and the aluminum-silver ones while I'm at it. That was a waste of primer/paint. lol I shoulda noticed that but had little time and was pushing through. Like usual. I digress.

So if the one in the above picture didn't come with Ol' Blue, then where did it come from? Good question. Several salvage yard runs ago I came across a 2003 or 2004 CVPI. Someone had removed the entire front end but (for whatever reason) left the calipers dangling by their hoses. The yard charges about $10 for the entire lot: caliper, carrier, pads, hardware, everything. Since it was what I refer to as "low hanging fruit" (in the sense that they were easy/quick to remove) I brought them home as backups for The 5-O. I was on the way out of the yard at the time I spotted them, so I took no time for an inspection or anything of the sort. Just zapped them off with the impact and kept on moving. I should have looked more closely.

I say that because I decided to run these two that came from the CVPI instead of the ones that came on Ol' Blue. The problem was and is that one of them (the one in the above picture) is a Ford OEM part but the other is NOT! Sheesh! LOL! How funny is that??? Bought them with the thought being that I could quickly snatch two OEM calipers for The 5-O but one isn't even an OEM part! That'll teach me! Yeah. So anyway I won't use this non-OEM front caliper either. It'll go to scrap with the others. That means that I need to head out to the salvage yard this weekend to find a driver's side OEM caliper that is in decent shape. I've already informed the wife-eee to that effect...

In summary, I prefer to run OEM over aftermarket. In the particular case in question (calipers), I prefer to source OEM parts and rebuild them if necessary. Which I will do on the front two regardless. And by the time all is said and done on the rears as well. Finally, I did find some cheaper Dark Blue Pearl (DX) paint-in-a-can online the other night. I ordered two of them because they come bundled like that. And so these calipers and various other bits stand half a chance of matching the car dontchaknow. Emphasis on "half".


Well all I have to offer as a reply is to request that the shop you have locally there closes and moves here. That'd be a welcome change, because none of the shops I've spoken with around here will touch such a project. They all want to do "all of the work" or none of it. Don't know if it is a liability thing or a profit thing or both or something else or bits of all of it. But whatever the reason, the option that you have is not an option here. Consider yourself lucky. If I had such an option available to me, I would take it. Alas no, that isn't the case. I did the front struts on The 5-O with stuff that I rented from Advance; what I've purchased are two sets of compressors. One is "heavy duty" and the other is akin to what I rented in 2017. So between those I should be ok. And with that I hope that I didn't just jinx myself!

Thank you again for the feedback, take care!

If it ain't broke...

'Never stopped you before ...

Ah gotta enjoy the banter.

Well fellas work has been crazy-busy since the new year and it hasn't slowed down as of late. I found time to get to the dealership the other day; made it a daddy-n-son outing, so that was the highlight of the trip, since I didn't have sufficient time to actually work on Ol' Blue that day. The lil 'un is always the highlight anyway dontchaknow.

Anyway we picked up the new diff stud:


And the rear shock hardware, which was overpriced, but it's the dealership so whichever. The front struts came from Amazon as well. Here's the part number if you were curious:


Tonight I found some time at the end of the work day to resume work. I gave the one front caliper and carrier/bracket the usual bath and primer job:


But no paint yet. I am still waiting on the $15-per-can variant of Dark Blue Pearl to arrive. Maybe this weekend. No rush. Gotta pick up the other front caliper at a salvage yard this weekend anyway, so I'll paint them simultaneously. And if you've read much of this thread you likely suspected that I wouldn't be able to leave the rear calipers alone. I half suspect that good-ole Stu was using some kind of reverse psychology technique in his previous reply (well not really but it sounds funny ... kinda). Anyway if you suspected that, then you'd be correct:


These do NOT want to leave the nest though. Suprisingly more difficult than the front pistons were. Air pressure does nothing, etc. I'll remove them somehow though.

After wrestling with those for long enough, I decided to table that for the time being and move-on to the struts. Here are the pieces-parts and tools (which finally arrived today after being "lost"):


Would prefer to use a wall mounted spring compressor, but these did the job. Sorta. The ones on the far right in that picture are the "heavy duty" ones. I found them clunky to use even after a judicious greasing/lubing of the threads. Anyway this was the configuration that I went with:


And the backside:


This configuration worked, I mean I removed both shocks safely (for the most part):


But I gotta admit that I wasn't too happy with the "heavy duty" variant. One slipped off as I was nearing the end of the release cycle. The other was still under slight tension; enough that you could see a bow in the spring (not a huge bow, only slight, but a bow just the same). By contrast the cheaper, run-of-the-mill compressor did a good job, holding its own with the "heavy duty" guys. To speak openly I didn't think that any of this was "heavy duty" per-se. Meh...

So hmmmmmmmm. Even after a good bath in the parts washer, the springs retained their "I'm tired" visage. Their counterparts followed suit, thus:


And so I gave everything the usual scrubbing, primer and gloss black:


With the customary interruptions (no complaints 'just sayin'), this is as far as I would progress tonight. Gotta let the paint dry anyway and no time to finish off the rear suspension now that I have the center stud. Perhaps tomorrow.

Thanks, take care!

Those pistons are trying to protect the new paint!

Same story, different week fellas ... too much work, not enough time for other endeavors. I squeezed in a trip to one of the salvage yards this weekend. However I had to bring my son along with me, which meant that everything would require more time. It also meant that I could only visit one of the yards, as it is the only one that allows entry to minors. No complaints though, anytime with the son while he still thinks that mom-n-dad are cool is welcome. lol BTW, overlook the repeat if I have already mentioned the minor-in-a-salvage-yard tidbit, which it somehow seems like I have at some point in this thread. Anyway I don't typically visit this particular yard because the turnover is slow and new inventory is infrequent. However we were lucky this outing, as a relatively recent 2007 CVPI was there for the pickin'. It had the driver's side OEM caliper/carrier that we were primarily seeking. While there I snatched the rear calipers as well since they were also FoMoCo. Unfortunately the pax side was missing a few components so I passed on it. A 2009 GMQ was next door that also had an OEM driver's side caliper/carrier, so I snatched that as a backup. One for the pax side remains outstanding, but I'm sure I'll come across one in a future trip. No heat on that, as it'll just be a backup and these things encounter issues rarely; don't even need a backup really, but hey ... for $10 why not?

I digress. This is what we brought home:


Funny side note: do any of you recall the engine block plug that I struggled to find? It is located on the top side of the engine at the rear of the valley. Well, the previous owners of this 2007 CVPI thought that it should be plugged too, however they went about doing so in a rather peculiar manner. Take a look:


The stuff you see sometimes. Pro wrench-turners must see a lot more cruft than we DIY types do. Shudder at the thought of dealing with this on a daily basis. Ol' Blue has been a sufficient adventure.

Anyway I removed the pistons from the new fronts, ran them through the parts washer then set them out to dry. Thought I'd see if the rears were a-gonna be stubborn or if they'd depart easily enough:


'Jest all kinds of caliper fun dontchaknow. These were just as onry, so I decided to revisit the forcing-by-air business. I mean that shoulda worked, so what did I screw up? Turns out that I had the compressor set at 90 psi. That should have been sufficient in retrospect, but it wasn't. So I bumped it up to 120 psi and tried again. That popped all 4 pistons out of their nest:


So in the end I just needed a tad more motivation in the form of pressure. Hmmmmmm...interesting. Anyway the bores on all 4 look good. I'll likely just scuff up/clean up the ones I've already painted Satin Classic Navy, then paint them with the recently-arrived Dark Blue Pearl. Speaking of that, just as an FYI in the event that you weren't aware, these spray paint cans run approximately 3 times the price or more of a coventional can, but are half the volume. Thus:


That said, if you need 'em you need 'em. Just be prepared to pay. And sigh, I've already used most of one can on the front calipers alone:


So I'll need to order more soon. Good times!

While the paint was drying on those I decided to install the front struts. This time I decided to forego the connecting bar on the "heavy duty" set in favor of using all 4 compressors. This was the configuration I went with:


That worked well. Soon enough one strut was finished:


And then there were two:


Factor in a little touch-up gloss black to mask the marks from the compressors and time for that to dry, then these will be ready for installation on the vehicle. Ahem ... well ok frame is more like it.

Alright, gotta run. Work awaits... hope all is well!

When real-life would allow I have been making progress on the Ol' Blue project as of late. Bit-by-bit kinda progress, but no complaints. Up first in this post-o-updates is an item that I forgot to mention in my previous instantiation. While in the salvage yard last weekend the son and I snatched the front stabilizer/sway bar from that same 2007 CVPI from whence the calipers originated. We did that because after the passage of time, during which I could take the occasional glance at the front stablizer bar from the 2003 CVPI, the notion of installing that on Ol' Blue full-well knowing that I'd need to remove the entire bar if one of the bushings went South ... yeah, that concept wasn't sitting well with me. With that in mind and while I was under the front of this 2007 CVPI I took a rough measurement of the stablizer bar diameter. It seemed to me to be of the greater value than the one that came on Ol' Blue. Ergo, it seemed to be of the same diameter as the one from the 2003 CVPI. However, this one from the 2007 CVPI has the bushings that can be replaced without the need to replace the entire bar. Sure enough, when I brought it home and applied the digital caliper to it, it was/is indeed of the same diameter. Thus it is larger and sturdier than the one I removed from Ol' Blue:


I'll need to give it the usual treatment of cleaning, scrubbing and paint, but I like the idea of switching horses to this one. I might retain the one from the 2003 CVPI as a backup or send it to the scrap yard, TBD. I certainly wouldn't break even on it that way, however the son and I are making trips to that scrapyard in order to instill values of work and financial responsibility, so it would serve well in that role. Thus not all would be lost. The non-OEM calipers went to their metal grave today in fact, so this bar will likely follow suit. TBD. I digress.

Mostly due to time availability, I decided to do something easy next. That would be the rear shocks. Part numbers if you choose Motorcraft:


With these you need to either re-use the existing securing hardware or buy this:


To cinch them down:


Cheese work. 30 ft-lbs is the torque value there. My only feedback would be to ensure that the rear springs are oriented such that when the shocks are torqued into position you can still install and remove the Watts link lateral frame bolts. I failed to remember to check that on the pax side. Thus I needed to loosen that shock, rotate the spring and re-torque it. 'Was fortuitous on the driver's side. FWIW. Speaking of the Watts link, that is now fully installed and torqued as well:


Those lateral frame bolts are 66 ft-lbs, the center stud (into the diff) is 199 ft-lbs and the retaining nut is 184 ft-lbs. That done and the pistons removed from all 4 of the rear FoMoCo calipers that I have on-hand, I decided to repaint the Satin Classic Navy ones to Dark Blue Pearl:


And since the front caliper carriers/brackets are also painted in DX, I decided that I would need to revisit the rear carriers. I painted those black (after they were painted some shade of blue that I don't recall at present), so I scuffed, cleaned, covered and then painted those again but this time in Dark Blue Pearl:


Have a suspicion that Stu will be pleased with that change of course. TBD.

Alright. So if you've read much of this thread at all, you're likely aware that I have difficulty in leaving well enough alone. It's a personal trait that I've always possessed. I consider it both a strength and a weakness. But whatever it is, it prevails in my decision making most of the time. This has relevance to the thread and this build in that I this trait caused the ship to turn in a slightly different direction as of today. I did something that I previously told myself (and the forum) that I wasn't a-gonna do. That said, fellas I just couldn't abide looking at it any longer. The cruft, dirt, oil, stains, discoloration and grunge became more than this old body could bear. So in that good-ole Forrest Gump fashion, if I've come this far, well I might as well go a little farther. And so I did. It's not much further mind you, but it is something that I had previously said that I wouldn't touch and that I would live with. 'Cept I couldn't live with it and thus couldn't leave it alone. Enough of the preamble???

Well since I hadn't yet torqued any of this down:


I removed the lot of it, new parts 'n all. I did so for the purpose of this:


The removal of the friggin K-member. Fellas you can see the grunge on the thing, so I would suspect that perhaps you could understand my rationale. I mean "I'm here so why not? It'll never be easier than it is right now." continued to echo with me on a daily basis. And so out it came. It is surprisingly light-weight I might add. Easily moved around by one fella. And if you've never seen 'em, these are the 4 bolts that primarily hold the K-member to your Panther frame:


And the one on Ol' Blue was now more bare than it has been in quite a while:


Which is a good thing actually. I mean the amount of dirt, dried-oil and other kruft that came off with the 4 retaining bolts was appreciable. The underside of the frame can now get a more thorough cleaning and painting. I'll likely address that in the AM tomorrow...

Those bolts are 21 mm and can be a pain to remove, depending. Two of mine were, two weren't. I threw them in the parts washer for an overnight soak. Then headed to the local car wash to give this ol-girl a right-thorough cleaning:


The high pressure, hot soap did a decent job of eliminating all of that mess. 'Brought it back home, did more cleaning, more scrubbing, hit it with acetone and then masked stuff off:


Gave it the usual coat of self-etch:


And will let it dry overnight. I plan to go with aluminum tomorrow for the color, mostly because I don't want to spend the $15-per can Dark Blue Pearl on the K-member. I'd need at least 3 cans of that given their reduced size, so aluminum it is.

That's where I had to leave the build for tonight. I do plan on revisiting it sometime tomorrow, family stuff willing. Anyway hope all is well!

About time you tackled that filthy crossmember

A bit of a correction to my last post ... I mentioned that the torque value for the rear shocks was 30 ft-lbs. That's correct, but it is for the top retaining nut only. The bottom bolts are 66 ft-lbs. I omitted that by chance, but now corrected.

Onto the build progress. Yeah Stu, it was/is time I dealt with the crossmember. I'd glossed over it far too many times. Tried to stomach it but in the end to no avail.

We painted it yesterday, then left it to dry overnight:


I considered powder coating it but opted to pass on the notion ultimately. The primary reason for that decision was simply the typical lag time associated with that process. I've found it to be anywhere from 1-2 weeks or more. No thanks. This is an improvement over what was there and that'll have to do. We coated it with approximately 7 layers of paint in order to aid its ability to withstand the abuse it will likely see. Or so the thought went. While that I was drying we noticed that the crossmember ("K-member") brackets were slightly lacking in their overall visage too:


So we gave them the usual treatment. I let the lil 'un do most of the priming and painting, as he was insistent that he do so. In the end they came out well:


He received a thumbs-up from daddy.

Speaking of these brackets, here is an interesting tidbit for you: these are a part of the means by which the crossmember is held to the frame (secondarily). There are two bolts and two nuts involved. When torquing these, the FSM calls for a specific sequence, stating that a different sequence might damage these brackets. Hmmmmmmm...interesting. Thought I'd pass that sequence along as an FYI:


First is the rear bolt, then the front and then the nuts. Both bolts are 76 ft-lbs while the nuts are 148 ft-lbs. Back to the business at hand. We decided to install the crossmember tonight. The lil 'un again insisted that he be allowed to take-on that task. So I put a shop towel on top of the floor jack, rested the crossmember on it, maneuvered it into rough position and then turned the reins over to him:


With a little guidance he did a good job of aligning it and raising it into position. The first agenda item was the 4 primary bolts. Those received a tad of blue loctite and went in without incident. 184 ft-lbs is your torque number there. And speaking of those bolts, the son insisted that we (he) paint those too, so we (he) did:


Stu, he's taken over the role of assistant nit-picker, I must inform you. He told me that we couldn't leave this as-is:


Because it was "too dirty." I told him that it would clean-up rather easily with a good pressure wash. However that wouldn't suffice. "What have I created?" I thought to myself. And so out came the ABS/HCU. I told him that he'd need to do some of the work if we removed it and he obliged. To be fair, there was a fair amount of kruft in there, some of it sandwiched between the bracket and the frame. So we cleaned that off, scuffed it down to almost-bare-metal, acetoned it and then applied the primer:


He insisted on applying that dontchaknow, as well as the paint:


And that was a noticeable improvement. So thumbs-up to the lil 'un again on that call.

It was about this point that I happened to notice the interior end of the pax side front speed sensor harness:


Sheesh. Yet aother anomaly that has thus far escaped my notice. So I'm on the hunt for a replacement. Gheez but what this car must have went through. No wonder there were more TCs than you could shake a stick at...just when you thought you were finished with the discovery phase of the build. lol

I digress. At this point the fam went inside while I attempted to make some additional progress prior to needing to close-up shop for the night myself. I managed to get both struts installed:


And torqued down what I could. I need to check the spindles for their condition and then make a decision, so I left some torquing as future tasks. FWIW, the three nuts on the top of the strut tower are 22 ft-lbs and the three 15 mm bolts that retain the lower control arm rear mount/bushing are 66 ft-lbs. All others are in a holding pattern temporarily.

One item of possible interest/note. The ABS/HCU that I snatched from that 2008 GMQ is in better condition than the one that came on Ol' Blue. You might recall that I needed to replace the hard lines for it while I was there. Those needed to be bent into position; an operation that was successful. However I am considering switching horses WRT the ABS/HCU by installing the unit from the 2008 GMQ and retaining the other set as a backup. With that in mind, I found the VIN for the GMQ and called a dealership today. I wanted to verify that both this salvage yard 2008 GMQ and Ol' Blue had the same modules. As it turns out, they did/do. Both have traction control (TC) without AdvanceTrac. I had but a few minutes today to look into exactly what benefit AdvanceTrac provides over the vanilla traction control. They sounded like different animals really. Yet AdvanceTrac sounded kinda cool in its own right. For what it was anyway. I digress. I had already conducted a parts number check between the two units and those numbers looked good. However I wanted to verify-by-VIN through the dealership and that too appears to confirm that the systems were a match. As I understand it, the engine-based (as in only reduced engine power was applied when deemed necessary, ergo no braking) traction control didn't begin until 2009 in the Panthers, and so I am not too concerned with the 2-year age diff between the respective vehicles. From what I have gleaned the 2008s still had ABS involvement (braking). Feedback is welcomed, as always.

Finally, I am considering ditching the exhaust in favor of a stainless variant. 'No idea how much that would run though. That'll be the ultimate determining factor. Anyone have any feedback on the cost of that idea?

Thanks!

ps-The following is a summary of the difference between AdvanceTrac and Traction Control, if you are interested in learning more:

"...AdvanceTrac is yaw control, meaning that its job is to keep the car on the intended path around a corner. It intervenes and applies brakes individually at any of the 4 wheels when the steering wheel is pointed one way (driver's intention) while the car is heading a different way (like when it understeers and plows off a corner, or when it oversteers and the back of the car swings around).

Traction Control is completely different. Its job is to keep the rear tires from spinning so that you can get traction when accelerating - even in inclement weather. It uses the ABS sensors to detect the tiniest bit of slip, then will reduce power (pull timing and/or fuel), and even apply the rear brakes (if needed) to keep the tires from breaking loose."

I also read that AdvanceTrac utilizes small gyroscopic sensors to determine the yaw variance. TC alone doesn't have any of that, obviously. Seems like then that in simplest terms, AdvanceTrac does more stuff to keep you on the road than TC alone. I found this rough list of the items it monitors:

vehicle speed
throttle position
steering angle
side-to-side skidding

AdvanceTrac appears to reduce engine power and apply brakes individually as needed to maintain control. By contrast, TC simply reduces power and applies the rear brakes when the rear wheels begin to let-go (ergo lose traction). So AdvanceTrac can/will apply braking to all 4 corners as necessary but TC can/will only apply braking to the rear wheels as necessary.

Hmmmmmmmmm...interesting.

Looks like you're raising him right! In fact, you'll be able to hand off this project in another month or so Kick back and hoist a few while the little guy does all the work.

Skip the stability control unless you drive in snow all the time and don't know how. ABS is all you need, and honestly you don't even need that unless you drive like a gorilla.