With the rain staying away for a few days, I booked it over to Renton for a few days to work on Rusty. Here are a few of the things I did today.

I did a little more straightening to the body. This time I wanted to remove a bow along the top back. I’ve mounted a board as a straight edge. You can see the cancer in the rear.

You can see there’s a gap between the board and the back.

After some clamps and some sweet talking with a 5lb sledge, I coaxed the back into line.

Then I played doctor and removed the cancer.

For this rebuild, this body will not be perfect (unless someone else takes over doing it). I don’t think I’ll have that time. But, as long as the cancer is removed, I can make the body work for the trip.

My next task was to remove the body. It’s important to know that I’ve never worked on a stock early jeep, so I’m learning a few things on the fly, such as how to remove the steering column. Removing wheel was pretty easy, but I did discover I was missing some of my bearing pullers, so I had to combine two different pullers to remove the wheel. That poor wheel is in terrible shape. It was no longer round, with lots of plastic missing. I will have to get another one.

While removing the wheel was easy, I couldn’t really tell how to remove the steering box. The main problem was that the whole area (the box, the master brake cylinder, and the frame) were caked with a thick mud that may have formed over thousands of years (that part of the jeep hadn’t been cleaned in a millennia for sure!). It didn’t come off too easily. But, after consulting several online videos, I learned what I had to do. (remove the three bolts holding it to the frame).

After removing the bolts, I discovered (after view additional videos) that I had to unscrew the drag link cap. Naturally, I didn’t have a drag link tool and I couldn’t find one for sale at Harbor Freight (online anyway), so I made one using a piece of steel and a nut built for cotter pins. But, the bolt had to be positioned near the top of the socket, so I stuffed some washers and another bolt down in it.

This is how it looked as I was unscrewing it underneath the jeep.

Here’s a good photo of the crap all over the steering boxy. I might just have to use a pick-axe to get all that off!

With all that stuff removed, I almost have the body off. I am three bolts shy (most likely all three will have to be cut.

I should have the body off by tomorrow morning.