1972 Duster Build

[Jhenry70]

And thanks for the encouragement guys, hope I can do her justice.

 

[Jhenry70]

Got a little bit of time to work on the project today. Making some progress.

 

[Jhenry70]

Painting a few parts

 

[Jhenry70]

K frame, LCA's, UCA's, caliper brackets, spindles, and strut rods done

 

[Jhenry70]

Cleaned and primed the UCA support frame. I've got some rattle cans of Sassy Grass Green in the mail. Gonna clean everything up and spray the support frame and give everything else a good undercoating.

 

[Jhenry70]

Soaked all the front end hardware and torsion bar adjusters in eVaporust over night. Cleaned them all up and coated them with some gloss black.

 

[Jhenry70]

Test fitting the 73 and up ball joints and caliper brackets on the 77 Aspen spindles. Almost ready to start putting all back on. Need to get my control arms back from getting the bushings and pivot shafts pressed back in, clean up the steering box and steering link and get all new tie rod ends, and either clean up and rebuild my calipers or swap them for some loaded ones. Plus spray some color on the frame rails and shock supports. Supposed to rain this weekend:wack:

 

[Jhenry70]

Got all my bushings pressed back on and ball joints attached to the control arms.

 

[71340Duster]

The front end suspension components look great. Mine looks like I poured POR 15 on them once everything was assembled. Keep the pics coming, love it!

 

[Jhenry70]

Started cleaning and degreasing the steering box and centerlink.. About two hours worth of scrubbing so far. Who knew it wasn't just black? LOL

Anyone know if you can get just the dust boot for the pitman arm? Joint seems pretty tight but the boot is torn to hell.

 

[Jhenry70]

Hoping for a warm, rain free day tomorrow so I can do a bit more cleanup on the frame rails and maybe throw some color on them so I can start the reassembly soon. Still need to get the inner and outer tie road ends and trade my calipers in for a set of loaded ones..

 

[Jhenry70]

Well it rained like crazy so no work on the Duster but we got some good shop time working on the body mounts on my buddy's Ram Charger project. 1978 body on a shortened 94 diesel frame and drive train...

 

[Jhenry70]

Got the day off and spent it cleaning and sanding the frame rails, radiator support, and engine bay. Sprayed the radiator support with some truck bed liner and got the Sassy Grass Green on the frame and shock supports. Tomorrow I plan on taping everything off and spraying the wheel wells so I can finally bolt up the K frame.

 

[Jhenry70]

Pic

 

[Jhenry70]

Pic 2

 

[Jhenry70]

Pic 3

 

[Jhenry70]

Some more progress today. Taped of the shock support and lower frame rails and sprayed the inner fender wells. Bolted up the K frame, control arms, torsion bars, and spindles... I'm a dumb **** though... Forgot to bolt the strut rods onto the LCA's first! Guess I was excited to see it coming together. Good time to go get some strut rod bushings since I had forgot them as well... Tomorrow is another day.

 

[Jhenry70]

Painted

 

[Jhenry70]

Uca

 

[Jhenry70]

All together... Strut rod is just sitting there. Gotta pull it apart to install them.

 

[Jhenry70]

Went and picked up a front strut rod bushing kit this morning and dropped the LCA's to install them. Got the centerlink and tire rods all in place, greased and keyed everything.

 

[Jhenry70]

Pic 1

 

[Jhenry70]

Pic 3

 

[Jhenry70]

Pic 4

 

[cosgig]

WOW!!! Tony and I agree, that looks Grrreat!!!! Keep up the good work, that cars really gonna pop!!! Geof