UPDATE: I had a work session at John's today. My plan was to get the good, used treadle valve swapped in and then get the hood mounted.
I started out the day pumping gear lube into the front end for about 30 minutes. While I was doing that I discovered that one of the u-bolt ends had been sheared off! I don't know what they hit with this truck, but they really fubar'ed a bunch of stuff! After tiring out both arms, I walked around the truck spraying Kroil on whatever I was going to work on. While that soaked in I went over and scoped out the hood that I was going to use. It had spent a good bit of time laying face down in the yard and actually had quite a bit of grass growing in the insulation. I had flipped it over a few weeks ago to let it drain and dry out. Today, I removed all of the insulation and sprayed oil on all of the fasteners that would need to be removed in order to install the hood.
I went back to the treadle valve after that. I labeled all of the lines so there wouldn't be any question about where they went. After that I removed all of the lines, fittings, and mounting bolts from the front of the valve body. Then, I went inside the truck and removed two more lines and the return spring. When I removed the bottom supply line fitting I found a huge mud dobber nest in the hole. No wonder it wasn't working right! I removed the valve and pedal assembly from inside the cab and prepped the "new" valve for installation. I transferred the pedal assembly and fittings from the old valve and then bolted the "new" valve back into the cab. I wrestled the lines back into place and tightened everything down.
I retrieved a deuce from John's inventory to slave the truck off so I could test the new valve. Once I got it started, the air pressure came up quickly. It reached 120 psi in no time and the expeller valve on the air dryer blew a bunch of nastiness out right on cue. I tried the brake pedal and it seemed to be working ask expected. Time for a test drive!
I pulled out onto the gravel road and took it for a spin. I was pulling up a hill next to the county road and all of a sudden the truck lost power and died. Dang, now I have to walk back and get the deuce to jump it again. I pour 5 gallons from a can into the tank just in case it's getting low. I started the truck again and it sounds good. I pulled up to the top of the hill and it died again! Argghhh!! I drove the deuce up and slaved it again. This time it stayed running and I got about 1/4 mile down the road. Uh-oh, losing power and sputtering! Dang it! It died again! I had to call Pete on his cell to come slave the truck. While he was on his way I followed a hunch and removed the inline filter. I tapped it out on a paper towel and it was dumping out black gook all over the place. No wonder it wouldn't run! I cleaned the filter out a couple of times and finally got the truck running smoothly. I managed to get it up the hill and parked without it dying again. I'm guessing there is a little sludge in the bottom of the tank and I stirred it up by driving around the farm. Hopefully a couple of filter changes will take care of it for good.
I finished the day by removing a couple of rusty brackets from the hood to get it ready to install. It will have to wait until next time since I ran out of time today. It shouldn't be too bad of a job since I have access to a wrecker. Thanks John!
Overall, it was a good day. I am very pleased with the brakes and the air system in general. I think I am about 2 more big days of work away from a serious road test and maybe even driving it home. Woohoo!!