I started with the sheet of aluminum screwed over the top of the
carryall. For those of you unfamiliar with the truck, most of the roof was
a wood and fabric based insert. Over the years most carryalls receive an
"improved" metal top either welded or screwed on.) Mine was the latter.
I grabbed the step ladder, and a cordless drill with flat blade screwdriver
bit installed. Lots of screws, but with the drill it should go quick
right? Wrong. Drill wouldn't budge the screws. Found my BIG
screwdriver... not looking forward to doing this by hand, got to be 100 or
more screws. Still quicker than grinding the heads off them. Guess
what? I couldn't turn them by hand either! I contemplate the right angle
grinder... this is going to take forever. Even after I got the heads all
ground off I'd have to go inside with a pair of vice grips and pull all the
pointy ends. Gads.
Wait a minute, vice grips... just what the doctor ordered. I clamped a set
of vice grips to the BIG screwdriver and by resting my weight on the
screwdriver to keep it in the slot, was able to gain enough mechanical
advantage on the vice grip "handle" with my other hand to break the screw
loose. Once out a turn or two I could use the cordless to pull the
remaining inch of screw. Great! Now just repeat 100 times.
It was cool for Southern California last night, about 45 Degrees F, but I
was soon in a T-shirt. I ended up with 10 screws that wouldn't budge and
had to use the grinder on them anyway, but in 1 hour 45 minutes I had the
top off. No rust in the channels, all the insert retaining clips seem to
be there. Very good.
I had 15 minutes left on my shift to work my way around the truck with WD40
and hit all the nuts and bolts I'll need to remove to get the fenders and
running boards off. I started in and soon encountered my first
stowaway. This is a problem you probably don't have to deal with Gordon,
arachnids that can do you bodily harm.
I knew there where black widow spiders living in the truck. My 5 year old
son had found two of them while playing hide and seek in the garage. You'd
think the kid would be traumatized... he knows what they are and that you
don't want to get bit by one, but he only informed me after we found
him. He wouldn't give up is hiding spot even when he found out he was
sharing it with two poisonous spiders.
Anyway, as I worked my way around the truck I found one, then two, and
finally a third shiny black spider sporting a red hourglass. Here's the
mechanics tip for the post, Carburetor cleaner is BAD for black widows (and
even less deadly spiders). Hit them with a little of this stuff and in 15
seconds they are doing the funky spider dance and in a minute or less it's
all over. Allows you to kill at a distance and keeps your gloves and shoes
clean.
Chris Davis
MVPA# 20000
Lake Forest, CA
'42 WC53 Carryall
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