A WB Ute called Mrs Marsh

[OldDog]

Or how not to buy a ute off ebay! I thought I’d share this amusing little story about my quest for a half decent parts chaser / tow vehicle.

So, I’m looking for a good Holden HQ-WB ute or one tonner to serve as a general work car/parts chaser/tow car. I’ve had a total of 23 Holdens of this era so know em pretty well. I started looking through ebay for a suitable car and found this amongst em all http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI....=STRK:MEWNX:IT Looks a bit tatty but it has all the good gear and how hard’s a broken starter motor bolt to fix? So I ring the guy and yes it has a few bubbles of rust and the starter motor is not in the car. Yes it has a CD player and an alarm and the gas tank is ok and all up its a great ute that needs a coat of paint to look good again. Easy to fix I think, so I bid on it....and win! Maybe a little higher than i wanted to go but not too bad.

I send my mate round to pick it up for me, he knows cars and doesn’t mind an argument if things aren’t kosher. He gets there before the owner turns up and does a quick pre inspection and finds its an absolute pile of crap, heres a few pics










As you can see way more rust than the "just a few bubbles" mentioned. Old mate the seller got a bit cranky but my mate talked him round and the guy dropped the price by a grand. I figure its worth that in parts if it turns out to be a complete pile of rubbish. So, Mick (me cranky, talkative mate) drags its sorry arse home to his place.



So Mick has a bit of a tinker and finds that the starter motor is still in the engine , so what the hell he hot wires it and BAM fires straight up and runs like a charm! Its got a bit of a cam and sounds great, no smoke etc so it may be okay. The box drops into the different gears okay so it may be fine too. Later in the day he calls me to say that he’s broken the ute, he got it running off the ignition switch and then the starter motor fell out . He has a quick look and finds that it had been installed with a metric bolt on one side by just a few threads, on closer inspection not only does it have a broken bolt but some butcher has tried to drill it out and managed to drill into the block, so when i get down there the first thing i'll do is pop out the motor and drop in some thread inserts.....



back to the ute.... while sitting in the car seeing if everything works he hits the stereo, which falls out.....it was never mounted in there and its got no wires in the back anyway....wtf??? This car really is a strange machine, it was loved once but has really been left to rot. Clearly the bloke I bought it off has absolutely no clue about cars.

I’ll have to re-body it I think and my luck is in as the bloke right over the road has a WB ute shell for sale! It has a few good points though, it has a 1974 Canadian 350 ex cop engine and TH 350, pacemakers and a full gas system,



recaro drivers seat, Statesman front with no rust!!! and a statesman dash, a full set of Hotwires (early series Aunger fronts and late series Aunger rears).......and the seller left half a load of fire wood in the tray

Oh and why Mrs Marsh? Well when i was a young tacker back in the 70's there was this toothpaste ad.....the decay gets in just like the liquid gets into this chalk........and i think she did an ad with a car load of lemons too........

Cheers
OD

[elmaso]

looks like its going to add some fun in your life mate, sounds like the previous owner was a bit of a dip #### lol, and i dunno if its just the camera angle, but the front looks odd...

[ari666]

Oh and why Mrs Marsh?

AHHHHH!! i get it!!!

"like this liquid gets into chalk" lol.

nice score. keep the pics flowing

[Blown V6 Hatch]

Not a bad score really. Just a shame it's a WB and has to be on gas to have a Chev in it....

[OldDog]

Thanks for the replies,
what looks wrong with the front elmaso? I hope its not bent, thats one of the good bits on the car!
ari, i'm enjoying your 66 thread, i used to own a big block powered 4 door pillarless one back in the 90's, the old man used to call it 21 feet of American bad taste LOL but i didn't care. Good to see you have a sticker from a proper motorcycle on the back window
And yeah the gas is a bummer re: power loss, but at least its cheap!

So anyway, heres the next installment of the saga.

I live in sunny Cobar, central NSW and Mrs Marsh is in Hamilton, Vis, so i'll ride my trusty Super 10


down there in a week or so, pop the engine out and fix the starter and the oil leaks, the drive the ute home with the 10 in the back. I've been lucky enough to pick this up from the bloke across the street from me



for a grand! All he wants is the GTS dash and the A/C compressor off it. Its a 253 and 4 speed and the body is in much much better condition than Mrs Marsh. I've started stripping this shell down ready for one of my patented fast rebuilds. This one i plan to have done in a week



Before i leave i'll have the under body preped and driveline, suspension and steering finished and waiting for that 350 heart transplant. Then i'll wheel the chassis back under, drop the shell and hook everything up...... Thats the plan anyway LOL

[ari666]

ok, one week it is!! *stopwatch out*


GO!

TICK TICK TICK TICK

[VK SL 3800]

ok, one week it is!! *stopwatch out*


GO!

TICK TICK TICK TICK

LOL ARI, thats barely enough time for a Dulux rebuild

[OldDog]

Ummmmm......ahem....i meant a week after i get the grey ute home.....ohhh this pressure is killing me!

[ari666]

lol, im only having a laugh as the impala was meant to only be a "quickie" still not finished

[OldDog]

Ah yeah i know that feeling, i have one of those that keeps ending up on the back burner,



Its a 1942 Jailbar truck body and i'm adapting it to a Toyota Landcruiser chassis.

[OldDog]

What a complete fiasco!
I rode down to Hamilton last week to get the ute running and ended up putting it on a trailer and towing it home! I got the starter in and even managed to drive the ute down to the servo and fill it up and then everything went downhill. The (new) starter died and then the wiring decided to fry itself. It looks like it has had two different alarms in it over the years as well as the bodgey wiring to adapt up the statesman dash things were never gonna be easy. The previous few owners have done very little preventative maintenance, even something as simple as a pressure wash underneath occassionally was beyond them. Despite the signs of abuse the motor and gearbox still look to be in good shape, the salisbury diff is in bad shape with the pinnion bearings almost completely shot, and amazingly still working fine! Still i got to drive it for a bit and its seems to have a fair bit of grunt (as you expect from a 350). Heres a few pics

A bright early start


Engine out and man is this thing grubby! This s after the engine was degreased 3 times!



Retapping the starter motor threads and fixing the work of the previous butchers


Repairs done, internals inspected (still looks good in there) some new gaskets etc fitted and a nice coat of Chevy orange then shes back in the hole


All wired up but its not turning over, turns out it was the alarm module playing up



Having owned a few KTM's and not being impressed i couldn't resist




And here it sits in front of the shed at che Olddog, i'll have it stripped down in another day and have the new suspension arms etc fitted

[VK SL 3800]

Didnt you say the 350 was going into the other ute?

Looks good though, great work.

[OldDog]

Yeah it is but the grey utes chassis is in better nick too so i'll drag it out from under the rust bucket and slot it under the blue shell.

[OldDog]

Well its been a busy few days, while stripping the shell i found 3 funnel web spiders that had made homes in various spots. Scared the crap outa me as i'd never seen one before and these were big black mothers. So i ended up going over the whole ute spraying poison into all the nooks and crannies, i had visions of sticking my hand up into some difficult spot and getting bit.
Anyway after that little distraction i've pushed on and now have the gas stripped out, the chassis out


I've cleaned off the rust and preped it and the diff is now out and i'm rebuilding the spare and the tailshaft is getting new uni's, it should be ready to go in tomorrow with all new suspension bushings and shocks and then i can paint the lot and push it under the blue body.

[ari666]

aw man! i remember those days. i am hell jealous. i love getting right into the teeth of the car. and your lifting frame is UBER can i post these pics to 'create a bond'




are you sticking with the cast iron intake? which pattern is it, i.e. can it fit a quadrajet? or is it one of the early holley patterns?

so low rocker covers, not going roller rockers? any plans for the engine

TELL MEEEE thanks for the updates btw

[OldDog]

LOL thanks for the pics of your small block, its inspiring! Is that in the Impala? Details wise its an 010 block so its a great base, but it has -883 heads which is a bit ordinary, plus that standard cast iron quadrajet manifold. Has a mild cam and the pacemakers you can see plus a regraphed Scorcher dissy. The bores are in good nick so i won't need to do anything there. I'm going to keep the gas so i can get it engineered and open rego. The gas carb thats on it is a 425 Impco which only flows about 460cfm, so i need to run two....so i'm forced to run a tunnel ram At ths point i'm just going to get the ute o the road as i need it for winter (tired of riding to work in the cold). Once i'm ready i'll get another gas carb and run both on Holley bases straight onto the fattest tunnel ram i can find as, with gas you don't have the bad low end issues you have with petrol. Guess i'll have to find a bonnet scoop to hide it from the cops But with the ram i'll also be able to get the intake up into the cooler air which will help it perform better....and rev! Heads wise i'd like to stay old skool and get some good 64cc cast iron heads and go over to roller rockers as well, i'm surprised at how cheap they are.

[OldDog]

A quick update, rebuilt diff installed, new nolathane bushes fitted, did a quick tidy up of the chassis and a coat of paint. Stupidly i fetted the new back shocks before painting so they're now black too.


Tomorrow i'll fit the new starter and refit the drivers side header pipe, finish a few mods to the blue shell then wheel this under. If all goes well i will have the blue shell bolted down tomorrow night then i'll start on the interior and try and sort out the crazy wiring.

[ari666]

Heads wise i'd like to stay old skool and get some good 64cc cast iron heads

double hump fulies FTW

[OldDog]

Another busy day. Today i tidied up the chassis finished off a few under body mods then slotted the chassis under the ute.







Bit dissapointed as the extractors hit the air conditioner, so i'll have to lift the body up a little and modify the box. While i was in the mood i roughly nailed the old chassis together and slotted it under the grey body. All this will be disposed of (i think the bloke over the road wants it for parts) so i havn't assembled it perfectly.



And now i'm gonna sit down and drink some beer

Cheers

Bill

[V-ahhh]

Love your work mate!! she's gonna be a nice ride when your finished.

[OldDog]

Thanks mate, yeah it'll be a nice "old skool" type WB (well thts the plan anyway)

Bit cranky this morning actually, a few weeks ago as part of my planning i spoke to a local exhaust bloke and asked whether the Pacemakers would fit in the ute with the A/C in place, he reckoned yeah, plenty of room.......well there ain't!


I'm thinking he got mixed up with the different heater unit shapes,ah well. The rear two pipes touch the A/C unit as you can see, so its a toss up whether i get the headers modified or fit extractors which should clear. Only problem there is i lose the better flow of the pacemakers

[OldDog]

Well heres the latest round. We've started modding the Pacemakers, i couldn't bear to replace em with something less, i just love those mandrel bends Heres a pic of the chop



I've also stripped out Mrs Marsh's interior and got to work on the spaghetti that is the wiring I managed to pull out the alarm, the old dual fuel gas system plus quite a bit of just redundant wiring.



And while i was there found the source of the burnt wiring smell.



The melted wires are a dodgey joint whre the alarm splices into the original harness. Its going much slower than expected but i'm getting there.

[VK SL 3800]

Mmmm i love being able to just watch projects coming together but not having to feel the heartache that is attached with doing it.

Good work.

[Jonno]

awesome thread mate well done

[OldDog]

I've had to take some time off working on the ute as i had to build a dirt bike for a charity ride. Back into the ute today and so far i have the gas tank in at the tubing run to the front


I've sealed and preped the fllor, fitted sound deadening, the old carpet for the moment and installed the guts of the B&M shifter


I've done the mods to the Air con box so that it clears the headers, i just cut apart the base of the old box the redid it in the new shape using fibreglass


And while the fibreglass sets i'm now working on the horror that is the wiring harness, and splicing in a 4 speed fan and Ais conditioning which wasn't in the old car.


All going well i'll have the dash and wiring, windscreen and door mechanisms / glass fitted tomorrow.