Well it's been prime, sand, prime, sand, etc.







I'm not doing a show truck restoration, but it looks pretty straight for a garage door guy.


Well this gets me caught up through the end of October, and have been

working with my buddy Jon getting the shop cleaned, and organized, and

getting his greenhouse ready for the cold winter of N Ga.

Now I can get started on the bed repairs.

 

Well it certainly looks good.

 

Thanks Jeff, you know there's a lot of work. The compliments help, as well as getting the wheels back from getting powder coated.



I guess after 48 years, they could look worse





Hard to believe how they turned out

 

Very nice! Can definitely tell you're putting in a lot of work. Keep on keeping on Brother

 

Started on the bed last week. got it bolted to the rotisserie, and that makes it easier to work on it.





Cut out the repair panel from the donor trailer







Once the panel was cut out, realized the repair panel will require a repair panel itself. More on that later.


The first of what I believe will be many adjustments for the proper fit.

 

As you can see, I have the same problem as probably 90% of us. The front

of the bed, and bed floor are rusted out. With nobody making replacement

panels, and fewer beds being available I have to thank Theastronaut for

showing us how to repair the bed. I am no way the quality body man he is,

but I'm willing to give it a try, this is going to be a DD not a show truck.





Also thanks to Resonateur for sending me a section of the floor from the

truck he had offered up for panels to possibly get this job done.



Here's what Eric sent, and after I was able to trim one edge.



I'm working on the front cross member from the donor that you can see in

the second pic, and I'll post more pics on it's progress later this week with

what I used to make to repair the bottom of the panel.

 

nice, i need to get a small section on bed like you. Keep it up

 

Thanks Ranger, I lucked out contacting Resonateur about the bed piece.

 

where the hell do you guys get garages that big? I'm jealous!

 

If it makes you feel any better, all i have is a 9 ft wide carport to work under. Which has my 67 Mustang project protected so, yeah...My truck stay halfway parked under a tree lol

 

makes me feel a little better!

 

If it wasn't for a friend of almost 40 years, and helping him with putting in garage doors, framing the office, and bathroom 20 years ago. Jon always said if I got a project there was room for it at the shop.

If not for that, I would be under the deck behind the house in the dirt, and nowhere near as far along as I have come in a year.

 

nice truck,if you are looking for any parts I might no were to get some,its nice to restore a family truck I still have my 59 f100 my dad gave me his truck when I turned 16,still have it today 33 years later,

 

Started to fit the front replacement panel for the bed. This is going to take some time, but will make bed stronger.



[I sand blasted the section from the red donor bed, and steel Z brace that was left over from when the shop was built, Jon keeps things because you never know when you might need it. Glad he did.[/I]







This is where I got to on Saturday. Not bad for the first time trying this. Theastronaut made it look easy. Needs a lot of grinding to finish the fit, then weld, still learning and practicing my welding. You can see the rusted areas in the old piece I cut out.

 

It's been a few weeks, but have the front crossmember of the bed, and the

bottom edge of the repair panel for the front of the bed welded together.




With several trial fits with the other half of the repair panel, maybe I can get the two pieces welded together this weekend, wish me luck.