Wow, I think this has been the longest I've been away from the forum. Work has been all consuming and I've been super tired after that and physical therapy for my shoulder. And as of yesterday, I'm in my last year of my 50's. Geez...where does the time go?
COVID issues are keeping me awake at night lately trying to keep things running at work. There were no Veterans Day parades or get togethers this year. I had a little local newspaper contact me regarding a story since nothing was happening for Veterans Day. They wanted to write up a little story about Veterans Day. Since it was a slow news day...or month they contacted me. If anyone is interested, there's a little blurb on the front page and a little snippet on page 12 here:
http://www.northstate.news/Archives/After5/20-11 AF.pdf
Other than that, I've been hitting physical therapy for my shoulder which is going well. About seven weeks out from surgery now. Amazing how fast it has come back in most movements. A few movements will take a bit. Basically, anything down low I can lift whatever I want. Above my shoulder I can lift about two pounds. Weird.
So, I've been slacking a bit. Skipping my morning workouts...really need to start back on that. I have slipped out to the shop for a few minor projects when I can. One little thing was finishing up some oil canisters for some of the flatheads. Cleaned a couple more canisters a few days ago. I had three, but found two more that I liked better:
Applied a few decals:
Then started bending up the oil lines and fitting the oil canisters to the flatheads:
I also was trying to figure out how to clean up a couple of brass 1940's fire extinguishers that came on all WWII military vehicles:
Tried to buff them up and get a shine, but nothing I tried worked, so I put them in the bead blaster and worked them over:
Then wire wheeled them on my bench grinder. Good enough for government work I think:
Installed in the Carryall and the Command Car:
Also received back from a restoration shop three early Dodge WC speedometers. These are fairly valuable. They are called Slat Grill speedometers as well since they came on the first Slat Grill Jeeps before Ford developed the stamped iconic 9 slot grill of the WWII Jeeps. How do you tell if it's a WWII Jeep...it has 9 slots. After the war...7 slots.
Anyway, I had a rusty Slat Grill speedometer that looked like it needed to be tossed a few years ago, and ended up selling it for like $600. Pretty amazing.
The three speedos I sent in were really rough as well. I sent them in around January and just received them back. They called and initially said they couldn't be restored, but I sent a couple of other later Dodge WC speedos and the were able to harvest enough parts to restore these three:
Changed out the one in the Carryall to the early style that it would have come with. This is the late speedometer I removed to install the newly restored early speedo:
Early speedo installed:
I neglected to take photos before I sent the speedos in for restore with the exception of the one that was in the best shape:
Also found a little time to do something about the Command Car regulator. Just wouldn't seem to charge the battery and let me down a few times. So decided to convert a vintage regulator over to the circuit board and gut the mechanical relays out of it. Lucky donor:
Figures, one of the post's threaded end was broke off:
Used a bolt to rectify the issue:
Ground down the head of the bolt to fit the stud after I cut a bit off:
Little welding:
Finished welding and ground it down to look somewhat original:
Painted the base and added some new cork:
Removed the original relays and cleaned up the original board:
New 12 volt circuit board:
Now time to remove the one that was installed. Not too easy. Lots of extended reaching as the nuts are under the dash inside the cab. Reminded me of physical therapy for the shoulder:
Cleaned up and and painted with wrinkle paint the cover:
All back to normal:
Nice to get that done.
Since I really can't do too much, I figured I would get cracking on the gauges for my next project, the 1940 Dodge VC1 Command Car. I have a set of original gauge clusters for the early civilian style gauges. On the second series Dodge WC in 1941 they went to the military gauges which are the round ones like above where I changed the speedo. The 1940 gauges are rectangle:
Had to soak them a while to get the little screws to loosen up. PB Blaster:
I actually have all new 1940 NOS gauges to replace the Oil, Amp, Heat and Fuel gauge. However, the originals didn't look too bad. May just sell those as they are hard to find as well. Had to pull the gauges out of the clusters:
Tried to buff off the red/orange paint over spray on the stainless bezels, but gave it up. To the bead blaster they whet. Not sure how to add the shiny stainless look back on. Used to be a chrome shop in the area, but I don't think they exist any longer. Thinking there is some chrome paint or something like that out there:
The clusters had white paint on the inside, so shot that. Also the black:
Next, I eyeballed the speedometer. Needs a bit of work. The pointer has fallen off:
Must have been a replacement as it appears to be dated December 26, 1944. Evidently, Rosie didn't get too much rest over the Christmas holidays. Well, I guess there was a war on:
Figured out how to take it apart:
Well, haven't really been able to get too much done of late. Hoping in a few months to be back to normal.
I did find an industrial sewing machine that a women I know has. Need to check it out and see if I should buy it in order to do my own seat covers. We'll see.
It is Amazing what one man can do by himself. 
