Mad Max - Galaxie Tow Rig

[Suicide77]

I think I'm gonna cry.

In this entire post, he hasn't said the word "sensor" yet.

Tell me, does the brake booster have the beer can holder option?

No brake booster, manual brakes Also, got the rims painted! See what you think?

 

[Bobmbx]

Batmobile. Love it.

 

[Suicide77]

Batmobile. Love it.

Hell yeah man! We are gonna have a fun time with this build

 

[easymc]

I think I'm gonna cry.

In this entire post, he hasn't said the word "sensor" yet.
?

priceless

 

[chefduane]

Nice looking wheels! First car I ever remember was a '55 Fairlane Vic w/ the 351 Cleveland. My dad loved that car. Wish I had it now.

PS: Hey, what's that clippy thing on the right side of the photo?!

 

[Suicide77]

PS: Hey, what's that clippy thing on the right side of the photo?!

Hey chefduane, a few years back I cut my hand slicing hamburger and had to get stitches. When the guy was putting my stitches in he had this sweet sterilized tool kit of different small surgical instruments (scissors, pliers, tweezers, etc...). When he was done he asked me if I wanted them because was just going to throw them away after we were done. I said heck yeah!

Very handy for pulling the tape off of wet paint! And lockable to boot!

In addition to getting the 'bat-wheels' painted, I've also since finished the last corner of the car in need of brake hardware!

I love the space in the wheels wells on this thing! I can just about sit up straight while in them running the brake lines.

Now, all the wheelcylinders and lines have been replaced, last part of the system is the mastercylinder:

Out with the old, in with the new

Looking good like a snake in the grass!

 

[adamsbro2]

Anthony your hauling ass bro....keep up the good work

 

[chefduane]

So cool to see and old car come back to life again. Still some good miles left in her!

PS: We used clips like that for other, uh, purposes. (!)

 

[Suicide77]

Anthony your hauling ass bro....keep up the good work

Will do man! Thanks for the support!

 

[Rick]

Great build, looking forward to following along.

I've thought of using my '60 Dart as a tow rig for the '70 Dart. It would definitely look cool pulling into the track like that

And yes, they used to tow a lot of stuff behind, cars... but that doesn't mean it always worked well

The Galaxie's drum brakes would probably be fine in most flat land conditions, but add rain or hills and you could be really screwed. I had a '70 LeMans which had no brakes at all after driving through big puddles. I learned to ride the brakes to dry them off every time I drove through a big puddle

I would definitely wait until you have the discs in front to tow.

 

[chefduane]

^ Looks like Lucy & Desi in The Long, Long Trailer! Heh.

 

[Suicide77]

It's been a whiles since I posted, but progress hasn't stopped on this rig. I'll do my best to fill yall in with the details, but at the moment here is how she sits

 

[shucker1]

Body off?

Are you going to redo the entire frame?

 

[Suicide77]

Unfortunately the frame is totally shot!!! So I'm doing the right thing and fixing it...

 

[Suicide77]

Alrighty! Time to get y'all caught up on the madness! Here is where we left off:

I had diverted most my spending money to school and was left with just enough to buy sand paper. So I decided to start knocking out some of the minor cosmetic problems, such as the tanked paint job.

In about a week I had gotten a decent chunk of the back end done.

Fast forward about a month and I had gotten the better part of the hood done.

The hood is bigger than our dinner table! I grossly underestimated how damn big this car is!

Even worse, I still had a whole lot of car to go!

I just kept at it after getting home from work/school and found myself closing in on being ready for some actual paint!

Then mother nature showed up and we went from 70 degrees to 30 degrees. Into the garage she went for a long winters nap:

 

[Suicide77]

Well last month finally saw a warm spell in temperatures so I rolled Mad Max out of the garage and decided to crawl under the car and take a look at the frame. I recalled that it wasn't perfect and might have been in need of a little TLC so I thought I'd get a closer look:

Who the hell was I kidding??? The frame was totally SHOT

So I sat down, meditated, and came to terms with reality. T-minus 2 months till Moab - - - and I've got some serious magic I'm going to have to pull off!

The next day I rolled the Galaxie out and began the tear down. A couple pictures under the hood and a few bolts on the firewall to begin:

Next was the 8 bolts holding the bumper on. Naturally these bolts ended up being a real pain in the neck, ribs, fingers, and wrists. I broke 4 of the 8 bolts trying to get the bumper off!

Finally after a few bloody knuckles I was able to free the chromy carcass from the front of the car.

I had this weird theory I could just pull the whole front at once. This was mostly due to how long it takes to completely disassemble and reassemble a front end. Maybe my theory was more wishful thinking, but hell, this isn't a show car!!! I don't think my Galaxie would mind if I tried something new, I mean, at least it made it this far without ending up in the crusher, right? I started by wrapping a tow strap around the front:

Then I slowly began lifting, tracked down two bolts I missed, and continued slowly lifting...

"I love when a plan comes together!".... or was it 'apart'?

Ah, nothing like the sweet smell of freedom and victory, both of which were lingering in the air All that was left was to find a spot to put 'er down!

I just tucked the front end back in the nose of the garage for safe keeping while the rest of the mayhem continued.

 

[Suicide77]

Next it was on to the rest of the body and what holds it on the frame.

Now the nice thing is that all that holds the rest of the body down is 8 body mounts and 1 bumper. Or is the bumper a nice thing? Maybe not... but leverage will fix that!

Now that's my kind of leverage! With a good jump or two I felt the bolt finally break off:

Oh, just kidding! It was a cruel, cruel joke to bend down thinking I finally defeated the bolt just to find that my socket adapter broke instead I got a full size socket and one heck of a hammer and went to town!

Muah-ha-ha-ha! The bolt was mine... well, close enough. If the bolts weren't enough of an indication what came to follow made it painstakingly clear: everything was completely rusted on! In fact, with no bolts at all even touching the bumper I still couldn't pull it off the car! The amount of rust that 'grew' around the brackets made a rust weld that only the engine hoist and pry bar could break off!!!

Note the amount of rust on the cement below the bumper. Definitely a junkyard special!

 

[toypaseo]

How dare you... risk a case of Patron to support the front end

 

[Suicide77]

How dare you... risk a case of Patron to support the front end

What better than a really stout drink to hold up your hopes and dreams? And speaking of supporting things with shaky ground, here is how the fateful day of the body pull went:

Now, these boats are big pieces of metal that are low to the ground. I found starting with floor jacks is the way to go. I have the remains of a floor joist which have also become essential to getting the body up in the air. I'll just stick the boards on the floor pan in a way that common sense agrees with and pop the front half of the body up!

Then I go around to the back and do a similar thing. Sadly my floor jacks don't go quite as high as I need, so some creativity usually gets involved at this point.

Then wooden beams go under the body mounts and handyman jacks get involved. I have pulled a body with it just resting on the beams (6x4's), but now I bolt the body to the beams to avoid any 'tippyness'.

After a little sketchy lifting on each side of the beams I hoisted her the rest of the way into the air just as it got too dark to see:

 

[Suicide77]

The next morning I took the tires off the frame so I could slither it out from under the body.

Now that the rusty bones were out in the light for the first time in 49 years it was time for an inspection. Let's see what we find?

Hmmmm.... that's a fail. Or a win for not breaking under its own weight?

At this point I finally had what I needed for my buddies Robb and Dustin over at Orion Off Road. They have a couple good Frankenstein frame builds under their belts so this was just up their ally. First though, I took it to get a sand blast to see if there was any good frame worth saving or if the whole thing should just get thrown away! It survived getting towed down the road to the blaster, and even survived the blasting booth. From there I took the Swiss Cheese'd frame over to my buddies and cutting ensued the following day. I showed up a bit after they started and just held stuff in place and B.S.'d more than I helped, thank goodness it went alright despite my presence!

Here is how the skeleton looked after all was said and done:

Not too bad despite having 18 feet of frame taken out!!! Here is a close up of Dustin's fantastic weld work:

And of course who could forget the cutting and boxing of the rear end to accommodate a receiver??

Upon the arrival of the surgically sound frame my cousin Tommy came over and we got to work sniffing POR-15 paint fumes in the garage.

After 3 days of painting every nook and cranny we were left with a hell of a good looking frame!!!

I'll admit it was hard not to smile at this sleek piece of metal that just a week ago could have given tetanus to even the most reserved onlooker!