I haven't posted much lately for a variety of reasons, cutting lots of grass, too dang hot, fte site won't load, etc....etc....etc...and maybe just a touch of lazy to go with the summer heat. Enough with the excuses.....

I've got 3 grilles to choose from for my build, a stock 55, a stock 53, and a 53 grill that was badly abused. I've got the stock 53 grill blasted and body worked and currently in primer, the 55 hasn't been touched, and the mangled 53....I've started some surgery on.





I'm still looking at the modified 53 grille and scratching my head as to where to take it. I'm inclined to cut out part of the lower portion of the grille and add a few thin aluminum bars. I'd also like to french the headlights. Any thoughts on the modified grille would be welcome.

The other two grilles are safe. Their condition is too good to cut them up.

I'm using a GM steering column, so I built a column drop out of 14 ga stainless. I fashioned several patterns out of wood to determine how I wanted it shaped, transferred the pattern to my stainless..........





I cut a 3/4" band to run around the perimeter of the drop and tigged it together.



And after a bunch of grinding and polishing.............









Now I gotta lose that key and make a cover for the lower portion of the column.

I've also made an attempt to start installing my bear claw door latches. I don't know if this is going to work, but I wanted to mount the striker bolt without performing a lot of metal surgery in the door jamb. (Probably sounds like an odd statement with as much slicing and dicing as I've done on this build.) I cut out a piece of 1/2" stock with the same shape as the stock piece.









A trial fit..........haven't countersunk the mounting holes yet.



By using the stock mounting system, I can adjust the striker bolt position by loosening the screws. If anyone has done this before, how did it work? It would be no big deal to go to "Plan B" if this is a bad idea. Or maybe "Plan C".

 

nice work keep us posted

 

Man you do some nice work!! I like the second grill you have pictured,nice clean and simple as to not take away from your other mods.
Brian

 

small bottom grill teeth would look killer on the center of that grille, they were used on some mercs and i believe on some`53 f100`s, Keithcruise has them on his grille.
Really like your door striker idea, saves you a lot of pillar surgery! keep us posted would really like to see the finished product!!

 

You had a pretty nice looking chromed 56 grille in one of your pictures in your other thread, what are you plans for it?

 

That grille was not as nice as it appeared in the pictures. It was sold to help finance the Fairlane fiberglass parts. I had a bunch of grilles when I first started on the 55. I bought a second 55 for parts that had a couple extra grilles. I wound up selling the cab and doors of that 55 for more than I gave for the whole truck. At one time I had 2 56 grilles, 2 55 grilles and 3 53 grilles. Now only the 55, 53, and modified 53.

Looking back with that 20/20 hindsight, I should have hung on to all of those parts. But realistically I had run out of places to store them and didn't want to leave them out in the weather.

 

NICE work Drewski 2 !!!!!! Been wondering were you went too. welcome back.

 

I've been here all along, just got really tired of fighting with this site to post anything. Seems to be working ok at the moment, but that's the way it's been for me since day one.

Annnnnnyway, it's good to be able to post something for a change.

 

[QUOTE=Drewski 2;10579073]I haven't posted much lately for a variety of reasons, cutting lots of grass, too dang hot, fte site won't load, etc....etc....etc...and maybe just a touch of lazy to go with the summer heat. Enough with the excuses.....

I'm using a GM steering column, so I built a column drop out of 14 ga stainless. I fashioned several patterns out of wood to determine how I wanted it shaped, transferred the pattern to my stainless..........





I cut a 3/4" band to run around the perimeter of the drop and tigged it together.



And after a bunch of grinding and polishing.............









Now I gotta lose that key and make a cover for the lower portion of the column.

Hey Drew you would have an "extra" one of them column mounts around anywhere would you?

 

[quote=tacson;10581492]Donald, I've probably always got one laying around, they just don't look like a column drop. Can you see that drop in the photo?



I always keep scrap metal around to build this stuff I dream up. I get a lot of various kinds of steel and aluminum given to my by people I run into. I had a guy give me a 4'x4' sheet of cold rolled steel just so he could get it out of his way. I was at his house looking at a car part he had for sale on craigslist.

The column drop stainless was another one of those freebie pieces that I picked up somewhere. My roll pans were made out of Mayline drafting table modesty panels.





I've seen some interesting pieces of steel laying in some of those salvage cars over at Auto Express.