Trying to help a friend find some sheetmetal for a 56 F250 project. Budget is an issue so the costs involved with shipping from places far from the midwest can be a deal stopper, especially when you are buying pieces that need work in an effort to keep the cost down. (i.e. doesn't make sense to pay $100 shipping for a $75 damaged fender). From say OK-TX and east to GA-FL, where is the best chance to find decent parts? I'm assuming the coastal regions are out due to the salt spray. Does the humidity of LA, MS and AL kill parts? Most of my good F100 sheetmetal finds were from western KS and CO, which surprised me at the time. I didn't realize they don't use road salt heavily everywhere it snows. Need about everything, but cab is the first priority, and I expect that will be a tough one when the budget matters.

 

Don't know but I'll bump this back up for you! I'd check Craigs list and E-bay.

 

There is a place just out side of Stillwater Ok with a ton of old cars and trucks. They are open by appointment only and I would be glad to help.

Hauf Auto Supply
405-372-1585

On to the subject. Oklahoma has a rediculous obsession with salting the roads in different places. Not everything would be affected of course but I have seen quite a few rust buckets here, more than in Texas.

They use sand in the Texas panhandle but I had trouble finding parts as there were guys with too much time and money snatching up everything. I have heard of a place in Amarrillo with tons of vintage trucks. Oh, Bob Douthit Autos, Pampa, Texas (806)665-1331, they had a '56 F-???. May try them.

I do keep seeing lots of stuff in Kansas both when visiting inlaws and on ebay. Lots of farms and few trees to hide stuff. I'll keep an eye out.

Clayton

 

Finding good body panels and cabs is all a crap-shoot....till you get some leads. I have found great parts in the weirdest places.
Alot are parts that someone started and brought from somewhere else and quit on.

53Ford has a nice cab and hood with doors for 1200 and already primed.
He is in Indiana.
Alot are on craigslist.....and good luck

 

Hey DeWayne, these parts wouldn't happen to be for a certain well-known '56 F-250 from the Ohio area that sounds like it was named after a truck driver, would they? If so, I'd like to get on board and help that project out however I can. In any case, the best stuff I've found came from the far south and the far west. And aren't you hanging out amongst the pyramids at the moment?

 

I've found 56 F-250 items on craigslist out here on the west coast fairly frequently. The cab and hood are the same as an F-100, so they shouldn't be so hard to find. I'm pretty sure the fenders are the same deal to fit normal size tires.

The long bed sides, tailgate, and running boards are tougher to find, but again I've seen them come up. The big 54 inch wide F-250 tailgate was around on stepside trucks through the 60's. I bought a NOS one on ebay that is date coded 1968 but fits my 56 perfectly. Mar-K in Oklamoma reproduces the front bed side panel for the long bed.

Let me know if you need help with this. I can go look at parts in person if required. I'd love to see your friend finish his project.

 

Maybe


That's next May. Right now I'm in BubbaNiolonVille, Alabama (Fort Rucker) for a month. I'm coming home in Mid-November and may come by your place on the way home if it works out for both of us.

We need a 56 cab bad. It doesn't have to be perfect, just affordable and not in need of divine intervention to make presentable.

 

Does Mar-K make the bedsides? Or just the front panel? Somebody please tell me we don't have to stretch shortbed bedsides to get a good longbed. The fenders are going to have to be correct. This is not a rod project.

 

Just say when! We'd love to have you! My shop's still in the same place. I just happen to live next door, now.

I'm just working from pictures, here. It looks like the worst of it is in the floor, cab corners, and rockers. Is the rest straight and solid? What about the "visor" over the roof and the drip rails? If the roof and drip rails are in good shape, I think patches are available for the rest of it. I can see that it's a pile of work, but the patches might be less expensive than rounding up a decent cab and getting it shipped. You've seen it in the flesh, so it may well be much worse than what I can see. If the roof is in good shape, there doesn't seem to be a shortage of '56 cabs that have rotten visors or drip rails. Maybe one of those can be found that is in better shape on the bottom and the roof from his cab can be transplanted. PM me your schedule. I've still got your number. We should chat.

 

I shot you a PM. A new cab and doors in more restorable condition are needed. The current cab is outside the capabilities of anybody that isn't highly skilled, with nothing else to do for the next six months. Add in a dozen aftermarket patch panels that aren't quite contoured correctly, no good sheetmetal to measure and compare them to. It would take a stupid amount of hours to make it decent. When complete, you have all that welded to an upper half that was heavily pitted. It's just gone.

 

Mar K makes just about everything for the long bed except the left and right bed sides and the running boards.