E-tek Restorations - Classics, Rods and Customs

August 29, 2015

1956 International Harvester Series 120 Restoration: back from sandblaster!

The IH is back from the sandblaster! Seems $2000.00 doesn't go as far as it used to, but we did get the entire frame and running gear done, plus the worse of the body rust: cab floor, inner fenders, running boards, plus the worst spots on outer cab and box. Everything that wasn't done will be sanded to bare metal and treated with Metal Ready Rust prep.

Check out these before and afters:

Cab floor:

Cross members:

The sand gets EVERYWHERE! It needs to be carefully vacuumed

and blown out so it doesn't get in the paint down the road. Looking back, the 1956 Chevrolet 3100 truck I did last year went to a paint shop who did a little blasting prior to painting and they left sand in the cab - only to have it show up in the finished product!
The truck was still a show winner, but I knew that it was there - and it still bugs me.

Inner fenders - will all get the POR15 or Rust Bullet treatment

Underside of running boards - they where real bad:

Underside of fender. 60 years of crud and rust gone:

Frame was blasted end to end. Factory fresh!

Running gear and suspension - much easier to rebuild without all the grease, mud and tar:

Some bits will still require some more manula labour....

Could NEVER get that crud out without a high pressure industrial sandblaster.

Thanks again to Jackson's Sandblasting!

Don't forget to check my website for lots of great info and photos of other builds:

www.E-tekRestorations.googlepages.com !

August 9, 2015

International Harvester 122 series restoration

Summer in beautiful Saskatoon is a time for outdoor fun, hanging with the kids, festivals of every sort and of course, time to enjoy the cars that can only be enjoyed in the summer-time!

But, even with all the fun-in-the-sun, it's not like work in the E-tek Rod Shop grinds to a halt. I've been plugging away at tearing down the International Harvester, the Comet Caliente and even managed to get the 240Z off the rotisserie and continued tweaking on the 1968 Camaro.

Of course with all that extra activity, something has to take a back seat - right? Of course - and what has suffered is my blog postings! Who wants to spend time on the computer with all of that other stuff to do?! So, my apologies for getting so far behind in the posting of my work, but let's catch everyone up here:

After removing most of the body, including fenders, hood, inner fenders, running boards and the rear fenders and tailgate, it was time to tackle the engine and tranny....

....which you'd think would be fairly straightforward....but in a 1956 IH 4x4....it was not to be so....

The front mounts, no problem:

But the rear mounts - under the bell-housing of sorts - where a bear to remove...

Largely due to the way the trans mounts in the cab,

including a toe-pan and several cross members being in the way-

The 3-speed gear box was separated from the bell-housing....

Then - with a ton of pulling, prising, yanking and hammerin'..... finally.... out she came!

Then I hooked up the Pullz-all to the tranny and yanked it in the opposite direction, setting it on its own trolley to be pulled apart and inspected later:

The 4-wheel drive linkage attaches to the levers you see here (now flipped upside down):

The right tool for the job (steering arm nut) -

And here she is - the 227 Torque monster straight - 6. First produced by American Motors, they also sold their straight-sixes to International Harvester for powering International's "Light Line" of trucks, as well as their Scouts and Travellalls.

But before I can tear into the engine, the body - including the cab, what's left of the box, the fenders and inners, tailgate as well as the frame and suspension components, will have to be sent off to the sandblaster. And I can't wait to see them back - as clean as the day they left the foundry! And so everything was loaded up and the entire mess was loaded onto a flatdeck hauler from AstroTowing.