New tools!   It isn't much, but I bought a 1/2" drive Hansen socket tray and a 1-1/16" deep impact socket in an effort to complete my set.

I'm at the point where almost every new tool requires a re-arrange of the drawer it's going in.  Here is the "before" of my socket drawer:

And here it is after.  I demoted a gigantic prybar to live outside of the box, freeing up 1" x 45" of real estate.  I also moved SAE sockets to the left and metric sockets to the right, which now matches my wrench drawer.  I'm not sure how my OCD didn't catch it earlier, but I've been living with mismatched toolbox drawers for over 2 years!

I forgot to take a picture after Lewis welded up my bulkhead fittings, but they were beautiful as always.  I felt like I shouldn't slap on my usual MIG boogers to attach them to the floor, so I tried my hand at TIG.  It's not perfect, but not too bad for an overhead job!

I bent up both of the front hydraulic hardlines.  Now the fittings from hard to flex line will be well protected in the gap between the frame rails and subframe mounts, since this stuff is riding 1/2" from the floor!  They're also well clear of any jacking points.

Last weekend I went to help my buddy Chris dig some dirt.  He rented a skid loader to widen his driveway.  If any ordinance enforcement officers are reading this, it's for "better visibility."

This weekend I spent the weekend in Virginia visiting my brother.  If you're ever near Blacksburg, check out The Palisades restaurant in Eggleson, VA.  It's in the absolute middle of nowhere.  Actually you take the "Nowhere" exit off of the highway and travel 10 miles further into nothing.  Just watch out for banjo music and don't make any wrong turns on the way!  I cannot say enough good things about this place; it's one of the best meals I've ever had out!  Just out of frame to the left was a parking lot full of $60k SUVs who have discovered this gem, and just out of frame to the right was an old 7.3 Powerstroke Ford pickup parked between a single-wide and a condemned barn.

 

New tools, Grandpa edition. 

Grandpa Fazz gave me some cool old work gloves and a vintage slide hammer dent puller.

I stopped to visit my buddy Dave, he's welding some new floors in his '67 Ford. 

I finished bending my brake lines.  The rears go into a custom tab I welded on a few years ago.

The front brake lines mate with the factory mounting point that I modified a few weeks ago.

Here is a shot of the front brake line routing.  The right front line has 18 bends in it!  This will be hidden above the heat shield and behind the suspension crossmember, so the only section visible will be the master cylinder area.

It's hard to get a good shot of this, but the four lines are symmetric and parallel until they diverge just below the firewall.

I'm ashamed to even post this picture, but I spent some time this weekend cleaning up some sins I had committed a few years ago.  Sometime between 6 and 7 years ago, I scabbed a few patch panels into the floor to pass inspection.  This work was no longer up to my standards. In the foreground you can see a lap joint which was welded from the top, and in the background you can see an angle piece welded to the frame rail.

In my defense, the angle piece was fully welded from the inside.  I was doing this repair work from above, with the carpets out, and I only laid a few tacks on the bottom.  I cut the offending piece out, and also ground away the bottom half of the lap joint.

I formed a new piece of the frame rail from 16ga steel and tried to match the factory curvature.

In this picture you can see I had to do a bit of shrinking and stretching to match the original frame rail.

When I was happy with the shape, I marked the final cut in the original steel with a scribe.

After everything was cut and trimmed, I tacked the patch panel in place.  This time I'm using butt welds instead of lap welds.

 All welded and ground smooth.  It's not 100% perfect, but it's considerably better than the old crap!

Next I have to build the hydraulic lines, which will require a few bulkhead fittings.  I made a bunch of bulkhead mounting points, I'm going to take these to Bill Lewis for some TIG welding.

Woody and I went for a cruise on some back roads.