Tonka Truck Restoration
I have 3 Tonka trucks. A dump truck and a dragline excavator that I am positive that were mine as a kid. The 3rd one is a dump truck of unknown age.
I have not done enough research yet on these three trucks, but I know that I played with 2 of them in the early 70s. (The dump truck and the dragline) That would put them at 49 or so years old. They are made of real metal, not plastic, and you can see what quality they are. They have stood up to the elements and whatever was thrown at them. I really thought, when I was thinking about this project that I would be doing a lot of welding and or brazing on the metal but there is absolutely none to do.
I wanted to restore at least the dump truck for my nephew, Jimmy. I want him to have as much fun with that truck as I did.
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These pics are all before the wash
Next step is to take the trucks apart..
Navel Jelly on bed of truck
After Jelly
After Jelly
We tried a couple of things to remove rust and/or paint. Navel Jelly did remove some of the surface rust. The paint stripper that we tried removed some of the paint. We are going to go to soda blasting then if necessary sand blasting.
Since the paint striper did not work on that old 1970's paint, we decided to try electrolysis. For anyone that does not know, electrolysis uses low DC current and a mix of water and washing soda to remove rust and paint.
The 2 pics above and 2 below are before the electrolysis.
Here is a video of the process working .
Left the fuel tanks in for around 4 hours. Then took them out and let them dry off overnight. I put in the cab and left it overnight. About 10 hours.
After letting the fuel tanks dry off overnight I took a wire brush to it.
Still not liking the outcome I decided to get out the sandblaster and give it a little soda blast. I was happy with how they turned out but still need to spend some more time in the electrolysis.
Now we have 2 new pieces going into bath
Not a restoration project, but just had to post it. Joel found a Tonka fire truck that was mine up in moms' attic. Really good shape. Jimmy loved it. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.
We left both these pieces in the bath for about a week. Pulled them out and scraped them off. You can see the bubbling of the yellow paint.
After scraping both pieces, they went back into the bath for another week.
below is the 3 pieces after a week or two.
This 1970's paint is TOUGH!
We took all 3 pieces and ran a rotary tool wire wheel over them.
Before
After
While the wire wheel looked ok, we wanted to try one more thing. Ordered some Abrasive Wheels. Basically 'Scotch Brite' in different grits wheels. Used a couple of each of the 120 and 180 grit wheels to finish the 3 parts.
Removed 2 more pieces out of the bath today.
Hit it with a 'high" pressure garden hose attachment and go pretty good results.
The fuel tank was as clean on the bottom as it was going to get. I thought I'd go ahead and finish off. Since the bottom of the tank is totally exposed, I thought I'd try and protect it a bit better. This is not a show quality restoration, it is going to a 2-year-old, and I want him to have as much fun as I did with it so I chose to use some rattle cans for this part.
I had, for some reason, a can of Rust-Oleum Automotive Primer (grey) that I used. Put about 6 coats down of the primer.
I had bought some automotive under coating for the trailer I rebuilt so that was used as the topcoat. Used 2 coats for that.
The dump bed has been in the electrolysis bath for a week. It was removed today. You can see how some of the paint has bubbled up.
Gave it a quick spray with the 'high pressure' water hose.
It did look really good after the wash, but we know it can look better so I decided to hit it with the portable sandblaster. We are not using sand in this case. We are using soda. Also decided, while we were soda blasting, to go ahead and blast the hood as there was still some spots on the underside that needed to be addressed. Both pieces came out really well.
Wanted to have some fun with the blaster.
Now as long as we get some good weather, we will hopefully be spraying some primer next weekend.
We did have some great weather today (10-21-23) and was able to get the first pass of the first coat of primer on today.
We used Rust Oleum Clean Metal Primer in Flat White. There is very little rust on the pieces and after consulting my painting experts, (Thanks Bubba and Wayne) I was told to go with a white primer and the one I could find was the Clean Metal Primer. I have a few rattle cans of this primer in the shop, but I really wanted the best finish on the primer that a non-painter like me could get so I chose to use my HPLV gun from Harbor Freight.
I've sprayed a few things with since I got it a bunch of years ago. You do have the extra cleanup vs a brush, roller or rattle can, but the finish is SO much nicer.
By the way, Yes, that is a charcoal grill the parts are on. I found out years ago that it worked perfect were it sat in the backyard for a cheap paint booth. It is usually out of the wind and for items that we are doing for www.jdkddesigns.com it works well.
The cab, dump bed, hood and bumper all had the first pass today. Since I do not have a real paint booth I kind of have to paint what I can until I can't move it anymore then stop and wait until it dries. We are supposed to have one more good day before a chance of rain so I can hopefully get at least one coat on all sides of all the parts. I really want to make sure nothing rusts.
I was able to get the 2nd coat of primer on this morning. Because of the weather today I decided to go ahead and lay some black on the frame bumper and outside of the fuel tanks this evening. (Sorry about the frame picture. Not my best work.)
I want Jimmy to be able to play with this truck and have as much fun with it as I did. So, to protect the bottom from mud, dirt, and other things I wanted to use the undercoating again. I'm always shocked by how brown it comes out of the can and the amount of pressure it comes out with. I will be going over this with a nice coat of the gloss black.
Krista and I have been going back and forth about the black paint. Flat or gloss. I hit the fuel tank with a semi-gloss the evening and we think that that will be the black.
The Finishing color has proven to be a challenge. Ford did a Tonka Truck in 2014 but that paint cost more than a new car so we will not be using that. I have 2 choices and have sent an email to Rust-Oleum support to see if we and get a sample or a swatch.
11-04-23 I got the info from Rust-Oleum today. Decided that the JD Yellow, (well its actually John Deere Yellow but we got to love the JD thing) is close enough. The paint chip is on blue painters' tape and also been outside since 1975.
Nice work, great production. I love this stuff!!! Cory Gaines