Yep, its that time of year again. and I've abandoned the fiberglass. Its just not turning out right.

Anyone want a half-baked homemade mess of fiberglass, steel, and factory F-series dashboard? Free for the asking LMAO.

Anyway, I've started doing this over, maybe the next time I head to one of our chapter meetings it will be fully operational. I started welding together the support structure out of steel. I prefer steel over other materials even though its heavier because if you drill a hole in the wrong place, or cut something short, you can "fix" it by welding the hole closed or extending the piece, then grinding the beads off and reusing the material. Compensates for my many mistakes

Anywhere, here is what I have so far... thunderbird digital cluster and 13" LCD touchscreen mounted...

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/s...d.php?t=359736

 

trying to understand the screen. metal is much more flexable agreed.weld the hole or weld it bigger.

 

Oh, the screen, well, that's a XVGA LCD touchscreen monitor. It attaches to a small-form factor PC that i built that I will mount behind the touchscreen, giving me a full linux desktop in the truck, complete with wireless, PCS dial-up, GPS, online display-while-you-drive maps, dvd/cd/mp3 playback (250gig hard drive), FM Radio, climate control and eventually, EEC diagnostics, tuning, and chip burning capability.

All right in the dash.

Basically, I'm replacing the factory radio/AC controls with a computer, and adding more features than one can shake a stick at. The climate control part is already soldered together and tested.

It just goes slow....

 

it's great work man. hope it all works out for you. how is the baby doing

 

We'll see how it works out, this is my fourth attempt at shoving the t-bird cluster and the touchscreen into the truck. The first attempt was fairly easy - I got the t-bird cluster to fit behind the surround, by taking out all the electronics out of the cluster shell, then using a bandsaw to make the shell smaller

The baby's good... he likes me truck... on the rare night (well, early morning) he refuses to go to sleep, I put him in the baby seat in my crewcab, and we go for a ride to the quickcheck.

Though I have to admit it's very strange having a baby seat in my truck... lets see... in the back seat.... powerstroke intercooler, pair of ported 460 heads, an alternator, a tool box, a not-connected subwoofer enclosure, a cardboard box of plastic dashboard pieces, another box of connectors, two EFI harnesses, and a baby seat!!!

 

great fred. sounds more like my garage before the dumpster thing inside and all my blown up race motors got heaved.