How To: Ford CMP "Blitz" miscellany

[Jacques Reed]

Good Day,

I have been a bit quiet on here but still plodding away at my passion. I've had problems uploading photos to MLU for a long time. I deleted my saved password in Edge and that may have fixed the problem.

I addressed something this past week that has annoyed me for years.
A previous owner of my truck attached the GS body to the chassis with long bolts and drilled steel bars top and bottom. I had noticed years ago that the bottom flanges of the chassis rails at the mounting points had been bent slightly upwards about 3/16" by the bolts on the inside of the rail. There was never any crush blocks fitted to back up the bottom flange of the rail so any overtightening of the bolt would bend the flange.
I knew this was not original but kept it as a temporary solution. To me, there are too many bits to move and work loose by this method of attachment.

About 4 months ago I took measurements and had 5/8" diameter U-bolts fabricated as per original method of mounting the body.
First up I had to straighten the bottom rail. That was done as shown with a small button jack and scrap I had laying around to back up the top flange. The channel was an offcut from a retainer wall and the 1" threaded rod and nuts came with some other junk I acquired and kept "just in case".
A bit of pumping and checking and rechecking got it back to shape.

I have seen wooden crush blocks here on MLU and they looked like they were one piece and had the groove routed out. Not having a router, I decided, however, to fabricate them by laminating three pieces of hardwood with glue and screws. Of note, is that to have full contact with the bottom flange, the blocks have to have a taper of 1:16 at the bottom and have to be mirror images. I set my circular saw on 3.5 degrees which is 1:16 slope to cut the bottom of the blocks. I cut the top of the blocks square and about 1mm larger, then test fitted and adjusted by sanding so that they were a tight fit between the chassis rails.

Maybe not 100% original but ten times better than what I had before.

Hope this is of some interest.

Cheers,

[Jacques Reed]

A bit more miscellany:

A discussion with a fellow member about the hose from the radiator to the overflow tank on our cab 13 Fords got me interested in finding a solution. Any hose, original or even NOS if you can find one, is probably too perished to put into service.

The first thing to determine is what threads are on the tube nuts. Using my thread restoring file as a thread gauge, and taking measurements of the male end of the elbow showed it to be ½-24 TPI with parallel threads. In Machinery’s Handbook ½-24 is listed as a UNS thread (Unified National Special). With the olive on the tube I could reasonably assume it was a compression type fitting. The brass elbow has 1/8 NPT threads into the tank and ½-24 threads to the tube. A rare fitting I would say.

I searched various hose company catalogs to see if Pirtek or Enzed might have any hose ends with those threads but didn’t find any. I then tried hose fitting catalogues. Finding the actual size threads on the compression fitting nuts was not easy. An American company, Dixon Valve, did show their 5/16” tube nuts had ½-24 threads. As always, in Australia sourcing parts from the US can be problematic however.

I revisited an Australian fittings catalog and by chance I saw their 5/16” tube compression nuts were listed with ½-24 threads. Surely then their 5/16” compression fittings would have the same threads. Interestingly, that was the only fitting part in the catalog that specified those threads.

I obtained two 5/16” female joiners and a two barbs to match with 1/8 BSP threads on them. A bit of 5/16” radiator hose completed the connection.
I considered putting OTK type clamps on the hose but I don’t think it is necessary. The hose ends had to be put in hot water to fit onto the barbs with a fair bit of pushing to get them home. After it cooled there was no way I could pull the hose off the barbs.

Also of note is the cab 12 and Cab 13 hose are different based on parts catalogue numbers.

I am sure there are other ways to plumb it in but this works for me as I like to keep as much as possible of the original fitment on my truck.

Thanks, Tony, for the original photo and measurement.

Hope this is of some interest.

Cheers,