I refinished all the related sway bar end link hardware and installed them on the suspension.  The next item on the list was the steering box.  I have been stepping over it while it sat on the floor next to the parts washer for a couple of month.  It was covered with a lot of years worth of crud so a good scrubbing in the washer was necessary.  I was a bit hesitant to just leave it in the cleaning fluid to soak for any real length of time due to the fact that it is aluminum and my fluid is new and is the "good stuff".  After a short amount of soaking and a good 45 minutes of scrubbing I had it to a point where I could clean the balance of the crud off in the bead blaster.

Being an aluminum box I needed to decide just how much restoration I was going to do with it.  I wasn't planning on any kind of rebuild so I really didn't want to disassemble the thing any more than I needed to.  In the past I have painted the housings with aluminum colored paint.  This time I thought I would just hit the whole thing with the miracle media... crushed walnut shells... and see how the original finish would look after all these years.  With the blasting pressure turned down to around 70psi (my normal glass bead blasting is at 120psi) I changed out the media to the walnuts and gave the steering box the once over.  I was happy with the results.  I can't say it looks like a brand new unit but it definitely still has that original cast look along with the variations in color as original.  You could never get close to that with a paint can.  The only other detailing I did was to blacken the 3 main top cover bolts and paint the giant lock ring at the rear.  I started to remove the ring for painting but the whole center portion started to turn and I didn't want to mess up the adjustments of the box as it sat.  I elected to tape off the whole box and paint just the ring with the phosphate colored paint from Eastwood.  With all this done I mounted the box to the K member and stepped back to admire my handy work.

The only pieces left to add to the front suspension were the pitman and idler arms.  I didn't have new ones so a pair was ordered from Jim's auto Parts.  They have been installed and the front suspension is pretty much complete except for the disc rotors and related items.  I will save those for when the car is actually ready to be put back on the ground.

With that little project out of the way I stood at the bench looking for something else to screw up...errrr... assemble.  I thought I would take inventory on what I might need to get the doors put back together.  The first thing I put on the bench was the vent glass and the chrome channels the the vent glass fit into.  I knew there was going to be an issue with this back when I took the glass out of the channels.  The black seal that the glass fits into in the channel was destroyed as I was picking it out when I was prepping the channels for re-chromeing.  I really wasn't sure what I was going to use to replace this sealing material.  The original stuff was like a plastic that looked as though it was molded in place.  There was no way I was going to replicate that.  The whole time the channels were out being re-chromed I never really came up with any ideas about replacing this seal.  I was a bit worried.  While the parts were sitting in front of me I thought about possibly getting a seal out of another vent assembly, taking care not to damage it.  I had one extra vent assembly so I gave it a shot.  This seal pretty much popped right out of it's channel undamaged, but wasn't co-operative in going into place on the assembly I was working with.  As I literally looked up at the shelf over the bench for some inspiration, I spotted a replacement bicycle inner tube in a box up on the shelf.  A 500 watt light went off in my head.  I cut a section of the inner tube off and checked it for a possible replacement seal.  The thickness couldn't have been better.  I just laid a wide section down the length of the channel and forced the glass in place.  It was a very tight fit but not so tight that I couldn't make adjustments with a bit of force.  with the glass exactly where it was suppose to be, I just used a razor blade and trimmed the excess rubber at the base of the glass.  It was a super clean installation and I believe a better seal than the original.  I am documenting this as an official "good idea".

After looking at the parts I have for the doors and determining what I needed, it was clear that the stainless vertical portions of my vent frames were not up to the quality of the rest of the frame parts.  I will need to get some good, ding free replacements from my parts guy.  I will plan a trip to his place very soon.

Since I was very happy with the silver "steel" colored paint I had used on the control arms, I grabbed up the parking brake and brake/clutch pedal assemblies with some refinishing in mind.  The parking brake unit had little to be removed without cutting some stamped rivet type connections.  I wasn't going to get into that.  I just removed the plastic handle, light switch and footpad.  After cleaning in the bead blaster I coated it with Oxi-Solve and set it aside.  The brake/clutch assembly was another story.  I initially was going to leave the whole thing intact and paint it all at once.  The more I looked at it, the more I kept removing and the bigger this sub-project got.  Did you know that the clutch rotates on a bar that use roller needle bearings?!?  I didn't... until I slide it off the shaft and a few of them fell onto the bench.  Well now I had done it.  I then went into Forest Gump mode, you know, "I've gone this far... I might as well keep going".  After I finished taking the whole thing apart, I couldn't believe just how many parts were involved.  Another 45 minutes spent at the bead blasting cabinet netted me all clean parts.  I sprayed them all down with Oxi-Solve and set them aside with the emergency brake assembly.  I went ahead and blackened the few bolts and miscellaneous pieces of hardware that went along with it.  The shaft that the huge clutch return spring rides on had a badly worn groove in it.  I plan on welding up this grove and re-cutting the correct profile groove before putting it all back together.  I'll save that little experience for the next update.