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Diary

Page 5 - 3/3/06 to 3/7/06
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3/3/06

Went back today with Randy to all three vendors. The body is over at Santos and completely painted. I paid him the balance in full. I went to Scott's in response to a call that the rear axles were NOT the correct bolt pattern. Turns out I signed off on a Chevy pattern but the HUGE Convo Pro rear wheels

 are Ford pattern. The fronts are Chevy pattern. So I had to pull the axles, no biggie, and make up a carton to ship the 50# they weigh to Colorado. Bret at Mark Williams agreed to split their normal fee of $220 to modify the axles and charge me just $110. These are heat-treated, so must be UN-treated, re-drilled, then RE-treated. This is a majorly technical process requiring serious facilities. Anyway, when I arrived at Scott's the rear end of the frame had been cut and moved in 2” on each side, about to get welded and boxed. So the rear WAS too wide, as I suspected last Tuesday. More of the chassis was boxed, and Justin said they had filled 191 holes in the frame. I've eaten Swiss cheese with a fraction of that number of holes. They should be done mid-week, but without the axles I can not roll the frame away. So I may ante up a bit on the shipping, depending on the costs, to expedite things. I have two Chevy bolt pattern wheels, but that will do me no good without the axles in place. The major challenges at this time are money and space. I‘ve had several false interests in the 47 Stude Champion, the sale of which would solve much of the money and space problems. I still have HUGE amounts of stuff in the garage to clear, and some strategizing to do on where to store the body parts while I work on the drivetrain. The cab is going to be going on and off the chassis many, many times. I'm thinking the engine hoist will be the ticket for the cab.

3/4/06

Well the sticker shock has begun, as I hinted a bit ago. Scott's is charging me a MERE $6160 to do the boxing, narrowing, and filling all the 191 holes in the frame. WHEW!!! He claims to have had one guy working 8 hours a day for over 10 days on that frame (88 hours @ $70/hr). 

But wait, there's more. Read on.

He has credited me about $1000 for things included or not being done. But a whopping $8254 (read on, it's more) for mounting the front and rear suspension and modifying the frame. I may need some FK Bearing stainless steel heim joints for 3/4” wide spacing on the MW rear end to mate up to Scott's 4-link bars. Apparently Scott's makes their own ends, which are 1.5” wide, and incorporate bushings. I had several conversations with Bret at MW regarding this very issue, and Bret was supposed to have called Scott's to verify these dimensions, but did not. No matter now, gotta just go find the right parts, for a few hundred dollars more. MW may have their own heims as well. We want stainless so they can polish up.

The front and rear suspension should be mounted by the end of the week. So the labor portion of this stage of work is over $8000, the actual parts for the front and rear suspension about $6K, the rear end and MW front calipers about $7K. The soda blasting and primer paint work was $2650. So at this point in the job with just a rolling chassis on the wheels and tires (which were another $1200), we're talking around $24,000. When I add in the cost of the Missouri non-existent motors at $8500, Randy's THUMPER BBC at another $3300, the 3 LS-1 engines, transfer case, and some misc other stuff, we're closing in on $50K, and the work is just beginning. Granted, all of the above were critical to getting here, but make no mistake, this will also be a MANY times KILO-buck truck. When I off the THUMPER motor and hopefully get the dough from the Missouri slime, that will bring the total down perhaps $11K. And if I get lucky Ebaying some of the misc parts described above, I might have another few hundred. But there remains a TON of fabrication to do, such as X-membering the frame, creating a subframe, fabricating the engine connections, building the transmission, etc.

To quote Bob Frye: “Oh baby!”

I'm having Justin email me his digital photos so far of the frame work to include here.

You can see the pinched right side frame rail to the welder's left, where the boxing stops. The offset is 2” each side to clear the big tires.

This is a closeup of the 2” offset before the angled plates are installed. Note the nicely rounded upper edge of the frame where they boxed it.

3/6/06

It gets better (WORSE). Justin forgot to add in the MATERIALS of about $700. So his framework alone is pushing $9000. I find this, at the moment, to be outright thievery. There is virtually nothing I can do about it, and I'm a classic example per the article I just received from ClassicCar.Com about this very thing. In the article the author quotes his own “getting screwed” story, and cites some other horrific examples of this kind of conscience-less fiscal f---ing.  I had been warned by Marty Schulman, head of the Rodfathers Car Club, that this is the kind of thing to expect from Justin. No bitch about the work, absolutely top notch. But 88 hours in a week and half to do framework at 8 hours a day for 11 days? Utterly not believable.

So my next step, after somehow finding a way to pay Justin, is to take the frame to two other fab shops and get estimates from them to do the work done by Padfield. This will be my reality check. If I'm wrong, then I just have to breathe slowly and be VERY careful from here on out. Actually, I must anyway. My bad for not getting it in writing. Believe me, I asked REPEATEDLY for an estimate, and Padfield cleverly avoided any such numbers. As the article quotes, if you can't get a firm or worst case price, WALK AWAY. The author also noted an example VERY close to home: contractors must give fixed price quotes, and eat it if they go over. I know this firsthand. I find it a little sad that a guy does this, insuring he won't get repeat business, at least from me if I confirm he gouged me. I will have to be careful, and I am not going to completely alienate Justin as I have service considerations with his parts for a while. Remember on 2/18/06

I noted how tough it was to reach Justin?

He called 4 times today, looking for money! A little salt for the wounds.

3/7/06

I spoke today with Joe Montalto, who resides about an hour away in the Lake Hughes area, WAY out in the boonies. He runs his hot rod restoration business out of there on 10 acres of RURAL land. He has done some paint work for me on the Gremlin and Regal, and I asked him about Scott's bill. He thought it was right in range. Well, one for Scott's, 3 against so far. I suggested he ride with me up to view the work, and he might do that. I also discussed bulging the side of the pickup to bring the front and rear fenders together. He is interested and capable. But as above, cost REALLY comes into play here.

I spoke with Bret at Mark Williams who said shipping would be about three days each way, and that their work would require another three days. That puts the axles back at Scott's late next week. I doubt I'll have the $9K by then, so that's just fine.

I consulted Ollie Hellert nearby (machinist) regarding how to do the coupling on the motors. He was in favor of Randy's idea of a short piece of axle protruding from mounting plates and providing some relief from end play, but expressed some uncertainty when I mentioned the lubrication aspect. He said he could do or arrange all the fabrication of the coupling plates, etc. I have him lined up to do some O-ring work on the FC manifold.

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