Today was a good day and nearly a really bad day!Last couple of weeks been to budy to do much to the RWI until the last week or so, last weekend went to Summit Racing and purchased a set of Billet Aluminum wheel adapters/ spacers because I switched the 14" wheels and tires from my old tear over to the new and the wheel was touching the wall! So I dropped $99 for a set of these:
and I got them installled correctly I thought!
This weekend Sheri had a meeting and her friend in a town on the other side of Atlanta (Newnan), her and her husband were going to be around their shop so we could bring the tear over and he would help me do some mounting of some stuff that needed welding. Well we got up early and on the way I had something either blow or stop working either on the truck or the trailer on the right side because my turn signal was going crazy. So I dropped Sheri off at her meeting and went to a near by parts store and checked and I had a block buld in the front turn, no biggee! This is where I had first person to walk up with her son and ask if this was something for my dogs to be carried in
, oh yeah they may have gotten that idea from this our new decals I installed Friday night!
Well I explained what it was and showed them around the tear and no sooner than they turned around another gentleman stopped by and asked me what it was! Well 30 mins later I could finally pull out and head over to HF to get a new jack for the RWI, I wanted one I could weld on and that you just pulled a pin and mover the jack so it didn't hang down to drag on the road when you leave somewhere. So picked it up and headed back to pick up Sheri and get on the highway headed to Newnan. We got there in an hour and half and arrived at Sheri friends husbands shop, I knew he was a mechanic but did not realize he owned a hot rod shop!!! No pics as the vehicles were not his but customers that he was working on at the time, 31' ford coupe, 50',52', and a 55' chevrolet trucks and a 62' chevy step side and a 64' ford galaxy 500 big block car! Yes I was drooling! Kelvin helped get the tear backed in and we started looking at ideas to mount the fenders to the trailer and settled on using square tubing weleded to the bottom of the fenders and then welding them to the trailer, hour later we were done!
Sheri wants me to clean them up and them clear coat them and I will but first I will primer the tubing we mounted and the frame and paint them black! From there we moved to the new jack and 20 minutes later it was done
Top wind and a foot plate but it is rated for 2000#'s and I can pull the pen and set in the truck or the tongue box. Kelvin then showed the new tubing bender he bought this morning and we started out with the square channel tubing I had purchased to use as trim on the galley wall, 2 hrs later and we had both sides done!
It came out really well and from the pic you can see where I removed the angle I used on the hatch, well we tried and unfortunately we couldn't bend it with the dies he had but he took templates from both sides and I left him the 2 new pieces I purchased and he is going to bend it when he locates so old square dies he has somewhere and I can pick the up next week!
So sounds great so far you say right! Well we left them there and headed to a restaurant where they were to meet us at and as soon as I got a mile away I could feel something was different and could hear a noise from the trailer, Sheri swears at that time she didn't hear a thing! 3 miles further the noise grew and she could hear it then and I pulled into Wal-fart and pulled over so I could look the tear over and didn't see anything as I walked around. So I has Sheri pull forward as I watched and I about had a heart attack the drivers side wheel was flopping!! I had her stop and I got the truck jack and four way and pulled the wheel off and had a lug nut that was holding the adapter on land on the ground! That stud was missing and the rim was holding the lug nut in the hole in the adapter! As I check I found 3 of the other studs almost completely loose from the nuts and only 1 was still tight!! Long storie short our friends were called and brouht me a bi wrnch to hold the hub and I was able to tighten the 4 nuts and get the studs reseated,and adapter firmly attached to the hub and then the wheel remounted to the tear. Our friends drove their beautiful 55 Chevy 210 to help and we all went to a nice dinner to pay them back for their troubles. Funny thing about it all had 8 people stop to offer help, froma 50 yr old woman who offered to run us any where we needed for parts to a nice guy named Randy who is building a squared kind of weekender and stuck around helping us after getting a tour of the trailer from Sheri. I had to pull out the jack stands and keep the trailer stabilized because my sweet wife nearly collected my life insurance when I was trying to tigten the huts into the adapter using a small adjustable wrench and a socket and she slammed the passenger door and about knocked the trailer off the jack, thanks too my new fenders my head was under tem and my legs [artially under the frame!! Enough rambling except the rest of the bad evening, on the way home I was pulled over twice and 2 warnings issued, license plate lights on tear and the truck were blown and then while back the tear into the driveway, it went to ar to one side and I cruched the tongue box and the lid won't close! Well thank fully we're home and the tear is in the garage and I had to take some coug syrup with a lil pain relieverand now I can relax till tomorrow!
Cliff
by S. Heisley » Fri Sep 14, 2012 5:42 pm 
