Busted Knuckles

So now I have had the truck for ... 2 months, somehow it seems like longer.  I have puttered about and completed quite a few 'short jobs' such as
replacing mirrors,
installing new locks for both doors, glovebox and ignition that all have the same key,
new tubing for the driver's side defroster vent,
seatbelts,
new retention chains for tailgate,
retention bolt and cables for a child seat,
de-rusted and painted the inside rear view mirror,
new spark plug wires and coil,
attach diamond plate truck box behind the cab

etc.

I have also installed new shocks which I probably should have waited to do because if I drop the truck I have to replace the new shocks BUT the ride was so completely terrible that I had to do something, now the ride is well ... trucklike but comfy and firm, before it was sloppy, loose and downright dangerous.  So.  The rear shocks are air adjustable and come with pneumatic line that I ran right to the rear bumper so changing pressure is as easy as attaching a bike pump to the Shrader valve right on the bumper.

The big job was replacement of the wooden bed floor which my nephew from NJ and I started while he was visiting in December.  He got a case of the lonely's and left early (first girlfriend texting him constantly and he texting back made conversation a little distracted).  That job took maybe four to five full days.  If I had to do it again I could do it faster but the first time was the typical 'can of worms' that snowballed the completion time.  Painting in December when the temperature was in the 40-50's was a challenge and we had to cure it inside the house which was stinky but worked (Erin was not here).  I made some mistakes and the finish is functional but still attractive: yellow pine stained with Penofin deck stain x 2 coats with Rust-oleum forest green steel strips.  Lots of Loc-Tite and time spent lying on a cold concrete slab with a ratchet and I finally got it done.  Turns out that the bed was designed to be bolted to the truck frame with TEN grade 8 bolts.  When we got the bed apart there were FOUR loose bolts of unknown quality holding the bed to the frame, no wonder the rear was like spaghetti: between the blown shocks and the lack of any torsional resistance from the bed the back end was loosey goosey.  After I got the finished bed bolted to the frame with larger than necessary grade 8 hardware the ride was much improved BEFORE I replaced the shocks.

I have another week in March when Erin and Gracie are going to be away and I am trying to line up an appropriate project.  The thing is that while I have the time to do some of the other 'medium jobs' I am balking at the cost.  A disc brake conversion kit that includes drop spindles, rotors, various hardware, new dual chamber master cylinder and lines, drop shocks and springs, etc. for both front and rear is $1500!! OMFG.  This all has to happen but ... I think that I am going to wait as the suspension and brakes work just fine now.  I know next to nothing about bodywork and I don't like working with paints, solvents and fillers as they make me sick but there is lots of this that needs to happen.  I think the next 'medium job' will be to pull the seat and de-rust the interior of the cab, paint the floor, rewire the gas tank sender while I am under the step-sills and then install Hush-Mat everywhere I can reach and then new jute mat under a new floor mat.  The cab sounds like what it is: a metal box.  The dash is steel, the doors are undamped and sound like a big can when you shut them, lots of room for improvement and it won't cost me 2/3 what I paid for the truck to do it.  I know this is all riveting stuff.

Last bit; I have admit that I LOVE working on this old truck.  So far I haven't really done anything that involved but I don't have a garage either so ... I was kinda sucking wind this winter: really feeling low and bored and without purpose (Gracie is great and I am enjoying her gobs but you know what I mean ...) So tinkering with the truck is oddly very satisfying for me and between getting back into Olympic weightlifting in the gym and the truck I am feeling pretty good.  So the reward here is really a sense of bootstrapping myself out of a funk and the satisfaction that I did not make a mistake and buy a project that I have no interest in working on.  When I drove the truck back from Washington State I drove very deliberately at 45-55 mph for 1600 miles.  There is no radio, there is no clock, there is no keyed remote in fact the doors didn't lock, there are no gauges except for fuel and speedo and idiot lights, there is no cruise control, the seats do not adjust, there is no air conditioning, there is no windshield washer fluid: just wipers, there are sum total SIX knobs on the dash: headlights, wipers, choke, cigarette lighter, heater fan lever, defrost ducting lever, that is it.  My long winded point is that driving this thing is a very deliberate experience and in the words of my good friend Geoff "almost mindful."  The thing I really appreciate about driving this truck is that it isn't easy.  It is not hard either but it is not a turn key, velvet smooth, light shifting, vehicle.  The clutch isn't a hard push but it's not like shifting a Honda Accord with a standard either.  When the transmission is fully warmed up shifting from 3rd to 4th requires a even hand and sometimes double clutching.  When this truck was released in 1963 it was the most advanced design yet for Chevy.  It had independent front suspension, trailing arm rear suspension, coil springs instead of leaf springs, the fleetside longbed was only 4 years old as an option, the bed on this truck is HUGE.  BUT~! Compared to todays pickup trucks this truck is a dinosaur.  Like I said 'It isn't easy" It makes you pay attention, think about what you are doing, I feel involved when I am driving this truck.  I have to think ahead and plan my strategy (especially in Albuquerque traffic).  I cannot afford to daydream, drift into that state of distracted, on the phone while eating gummi bears and listening to music consciousness that half the world seems to attain while driving.  I know this doesn't make sense to many (including my sweety Erin) but modern, everyday cars are too easy, we take them for granted, we take the responsibility of driving them for granted, we treat driving like a right not a privilege. We are warm and safe inside a hermetically sealed bubble of temperature and humidity controlled splendor smiling and shiny behind our crush zone and air bags atop a heated seat that adjusts in six directions and saves our personal setting.  Don't get me wrong, the art of conveyance has reached an almost ludicrously refined state here in the USA.  I am here to tell you that somehow I have missed the point.  I HATE new cars.

 I owned two Honda Elements and I have no pithy criticism, they are exceedingly well designed, well manufactured cars with excellent resale value. I bought them knowing what I wanted and I got it and then some. I hated them. I have no logical reason.  But will some one spend months looking for just the right used Honda Element 46 years from now?  I think not.