I’m changing things a bit–the Tremor plans don’t give directions on a wagon build, and I’ve made the floorpans true to the 7-inch tall door-sills as found on the Hummer. I’m also not going through the series as outlined, I’ve started with what I could afford and had steel for and continued on from there. This latest work completed the two floorpan frames that will eventually house the seats for the driver and passengers, along with mounting the rear fenders, finishing the rear wagon door frame, starting the center tunnel frame, and repositioning the rear body in proper position over the wheelbase.

The hardest part so far has been keeping it all level and square. The problem is my front right tire is flat. Because of this, the frame tilts down that direction. I’m not going to weld the assemblies together until I know the chassis is level and true. Actually, I may end up doing it anyway and wheel the chassis outdoors to save space. My shop is kind of small. But that would mean constructing another assembly on which to roll the Tremor frame out in order to combine the two later. It would also mean finding some way to lift the completed frame onto the chassis. Neither of these sounds like much fun or possible without more money. So, I planning to keep as much of the frame level and square as possible before welding these major assemblies together. You may notice this as you see cinder blocks and paving blocks holding things roughly in place.

On to the build diary:
Here’s a wideshot of the rear of the wagon. As you can see, I’ve put a chair in about the placement of the driver’s seat… I know it’s not exactly right, but I had to try it out. Also, you may be able to see the rear driver’s side fender had to be chopped. I mistakenly cut the wrong angle on the two pieces that come down to the floorpans on this side. They were both square to each other, but not to the passenger side. I’ll redo these before fitting to the floorpan.

Another few shots of the mock-up of the assembly.

This is a shot of the passenger’s side floorpan. Also visible is the temporary assembly to keep the tunnel level.

From the front, i began placing the firewall pieces, not welded, or even tacked because the floorpans need to be in place first, but just for a guess as to the finished position. Also clamped the windshield on for looks.

With the progress comes silly photos time. Here’s our three crazy drivers’. The older kids have become less enthused with the length of time this is taking. The younger ones are just happy to be part of it.

All in all, this has been a good year for the build so far.

After cleaning a little, and “mounting” the windshield, I got to work.

It took most of the day just to clean, but finally I got to welding. First, I cut all the pieces for the fenders and rear rail for the bed and found myself lacking one rail for an inner fender. I took that from my first welding project ever… my old welding table that was too wobbly to hold anything. Freed up some room in my shop too. That table was becoming a “catch-all” or “junk pile” and wasn’t much use anyway. It’s that mess next to the welder in the above photo.

Next, I made the rear bed rail. That was too easy. So I started on the passenger rear fender.

Just because my kids like to build with me, and my wife wanted to see, but didn’t want to come out into the single digit temps, I brought it in to show her “her fender”.

With the Passenger fender and rear bed rail done, I placed them on the frame rails for temporary placement. I placed a piece of flat stock on top and was tempted to stand on it to test out the strength, but decided it wasn’t stable enough yet. I’ll make sure to do that later. And yes, it does look like it isn’t welded to the truck bed rail…because it isn’t yet. I want to get more pieces together and make sure they’re all square before tacking together.

I like the look, but I think I need bigger tires.

Then, after dinner, I started on the driver’s side rear fender. It was slick and quick because I figured out all the issues with keeping the other square already, but then I ran out of wire for my little Lincoln welder, and it was too late to get more.

The first two pieces of the frame header welded together.

Three happy travelers in our pretend Hummer

In the meantime, I made a little stand for the steel I got, to keep it off the floor, because I get a nasty leak in the spring…not a moment too soon, there was a puddle on the floor right next to that wall the next day.

Of course, my helper thought it was fun to just be out in the shop.

I ran into a little snag though, I’m in a tool issue again. I need to clean the frame, but it’s Idaho in February. I can wait until it gets warm enough to wash it proper

Or I can try with a brush on my drill

So I sanded it a little. I think I’ll wait to clean it. But I will go ahead with relocating the body mounts to between the frame rails. This will allow the body to sit on the outsides of the rails without raising it.