As usual, things around here progress in spurts and fits. A couple weeks of working nights on the holidays and family in town slowed progress to a crawl. I found an IHC manual for the Loadstar trucks on eBay and bought it out of Idaho, shipped here to Michigan for $10, such a deal. Of course, not quite updated enough for some of my truck systems. I was able to locate some of the stuff posted on the box app and download and print some of the pages of the updates.
From one section about the truck VIN, I think mine should actually be a 1974 model year, build date was 10/3/1973 and the chassis number is DCA10785- also designating it was built in Canada, I believe.
From what I read, the main question I now have is whether the rear axle bearings should be grease-packed or lubed by the axle fluid. The apparent answer for an RA-187/14187 aka Eaton E15201, is determined by the type of hub nuts/holders. The type I have is the bend-over tang locking ring, not the doweled nut/ring combo. Mine should then have the outer nut with integrated axle seal (52 753 HA) to hold the lube in the axle tube and not allow it to the bearings, thus I need to pack my bearings. Of course, neither of my outer nuts has this seal, nor can I find one, so maybe I'd be better to leave it open and lubed. Crap.
I had my neighbor stop over, a retired county Road Commission driver/mechanic, he ran quite a few similar plow trucks and worked on them, he says I can reuse the bearings I have, they hardly look used, get new oil seals for the inner hub and pack the bearings, not to worry about any lube coming out. I'm leaning toward this. I also saw a post about forming new seals onto my outer axle nuts with appropriate tube product, not sure about that.
So today I made it over to Valley Truck parts to retrieve the brake parts I ordered- the pack of all eight rear return springs, a pack of four hold-down bolts, nuts and washers, and a four pack of new adjuster star wheels, in my hand for $68.57.
- Cleaned up brake shoe for 16X5 rear brakes 04210
- New Euclid brake hardware
- Back side of backer plate installing cleaned cylinders
- front side
- All the goodies return
- Kinda finished product
I bought and ran new brake lines from the tee at the rear axle, at least ran one to the right side wheel. I was in process of putting the left side shoes and springs on when the backer plate decided to fall out of the bench vice, and I decided to try to break the fall by putting my foot under it. Caught the brunt of the blow just above my ankle, duh. But, when I crawled under to bolt it in and realized I needed to jack it up and move the jack stands around for clearance, I decided I had had enough for tonight.
I need to get two new inner oil seals ordered tomorrow and figure our what to do about the outer axle nut. Then, I can think about beginning to explore the front brakes and the hydro boost unit, where the real problems may lie...
Oh yeah! What lube do I use in the rear? My glove box doesn't spell it out, sure looked thicker than 10W coming out.