I've got to say that this part of the project would not have been possible without the help of Dennis Sherman. Dennis, who knows these trucks inside and out, and having Dennis help, really moved this project along. He also sells parts, which helped me out tremendously, not having to mail order every time I needed something. He also makes replacement floor pans and runningboards for the Power Wagon that match the originals.
I decided to repair any worn or broken parts while I was putting the parts back together, figuring that it would be a lot easier to get at most parts of the truck while it was in this state. I started by taking the front and rear leaf springs to a spring rebuilder who replaced the center bolts, clamps, inserted new bushings, cleaned and bent the springs back to the original specs. I bought new shackles and pins, and had the spring shop make up eight U-bolts to replace the old ones.
The next step was to attach the leafs to the frame with the new shackles, pins and bolts. After that was done, the frame was lifted and the front and rear axles were rolled underneath, and secured to the leaf springs with the new U-bolts. Rear shock absorbers were optional on the Power Wagon, and the original frame didn't have the shock mounts - but the new frame did! Dennis had the correct axle mounts for this truck, so we bolted them on, added new shocks from NAPA, and had a rolling chassis. The frame was sandblasted, primed and painted black PPG DAR 9000.