Took the bed off, chassis looks to be in great condition!

 

The engine bay is HUGE! Plenty of space for some interesting engine configurations in there!

 

Here's the engine and transmission I've bought, its not what I really want but it should get it on the road quicker! ...and with some decent headers and a short exhaust it'll still sound pretty good!!

 

Haven't had much time to play with this recently but squeezed a few hours in earlier today. Got the drum assembly off on the right hand rear, tried to do the left hand rear but the hub nut is different, 6 point on the right and 8 point on the left, any ideas why this would be? and any ideas what size this would be?

Got the drive shafts out so I could inspect the diff, looks very clean inside, backlash is around 0.007"




Markings on the crown wheel are 2 10 73 DANA 34808 B3D39X 39 8




Between the webs on the back plate which the crown wheel bolts on to I can see some strange looking holes, they don't look to have been machined as they are not very uniform, but it would be strange if they had erroded or corroded away considering everything is covered in oil, and there's zero sign of rust anywhere in here. Any ideas?





The drum brake assembly isn't in too bad condition, but having seen disc kits for the Dana 70 at around $350 I'm just going to convert it now and be done with it, I've always hated drums on my other trucks, and especially when it gets wet and muddy. I think I'll end up frustrated with the drums soon enough anyway.

So dually rear axle wish list looks like this:
1) Wheel bearing kits, bearings and races, Yukon?
2) Diff cover, Yukon?
3) Disc brake conversion, Ruffstuff? I'd like to go bolt on not weld on.
4) Wheels, to clear disc brake conversion.

 

I'm only guessing, but it's quite possible the left side hub nut will be left hand thread...

that might account for why it's a different nut, too.

 

Yes this could make sense, can anyone confirm this is correct?

 

I can't remember ever seeing a LH thread on a spindle or axle nut. Lug nuts, yes, lots of times. Quite possibly someone, somewhere in years past either lost or damaged one of the nuts. My guess would be it was stuck and they took it off with a chisel and had to replace it. It's been years since I worked on a full floating rear end but I would think the 6 sided would be original.

 

Thats great Ol'grouch, thanks for your help.

 

I've tried using the VIN decoder on the forum but it doesn't recognise my VIN, I have W33BB3S140536, is there anywhere I can look up these old VIN's?

 

W = 4 wheel drive
3 = 300 (1 ton)
B = 6000 - 10000 lbs
B = 225-1 series (engine)
3 = 1973 J series
S or V = warren (where it was built)
The rest of the #'s are serial #'s. Wow a 1 ton 4WD with a mouse motor(slant 6).