Howdy Fellas! Found the website a month or two back looking for some ideas and whatnot for my project and here I sit. We were helping my uncle swap some parts and body pieces onto his truck and somehow ended up with a rolling frame with about 36 years of dirt/farm debris on it sitting in the garage. Was just going to cut it up and go sell it for some beer money but some ideas started floating around. If you have any questions or comments, ask away!

Cutting/prying the rest of the stuff off my beautiful frame!

Everything all sanded down ready for paint

2-3 coats of paint later

A few days of cleaning and painting the transfer case and tranny

Found some tubing in the scrap bin and thought this should work!

Picked up a 1989 F-350 (If I recall) to tear this beauty out of and use on my truck! Fuel Injected 460 with far too many extra wires!

Everything looked fine and came off with very little effort. I was quite shocked...

Taking out the 460 in the original trunk had a few problems but this was the first real problem of the build so far. Quite a few of the bolts holding the headers on just sheered/broke right off. This one was the hardest to take out. Must have spent 2 hours on it, used every possible means to get that little bolt stem outa there without harming the head. Finally got it out and sent it to the guy to drill out the other bolts that were still in there. Turns out the headers are garbage anyways so that was just a waste of a few days! I kept the bolt stem for my personal use, Might use it as a **** or something later in the truck - or throw it in lava.


Both of the exhaust headers had a hairline crack in them, Picked up some "new" ones off of an old RV. "New" rockers, rods, springs, bushings and all that jazz. SOMEHOW in the mix of things I threw away the sanded/painted engine mounts I fixed up so some another set had to be used. They were a two bolt pattern so I just cut one off and went with it. Attaching the engine to the tranny took about two hours too long. Nothing was fitting something just wasn't right.... Unbolted the tranny/xfer case from the fame (Duh) then it was in 20 minutes later.

 

One of the most beautiful things I've ever seen, It's a shame there's a body going over it.


Good ol Craigslist found me someone with a 73 body for a 100 bucks! Minimal rust and dents so it was a solid idea! It was fun finally pulling it into the garage to see what I missed while I was looking at it at from the sellers place.



Letting the two mingle before I put them together

 

Started to take everything off and inspect it much closer and it wasn't too bad! The firewall had a bad run in with someone with a new set of drillbits and bad aim. The bed had a 5th wheel bolted on there, Tool box and other random stuff. Lots and lots of dents of course...

The drip line wasn't properly done so it just went right into the cab! Great planning on that part huh? Everything was looking good though. Just two patches to be done.

Everything all welded, sanded, patched up ready for paint.

 

Fried ECU anyone? This was a sad day for me.

 

So that fried ECU just kicked me in the gut since I didn't want to spend 200+ for another or buy yet another truck for one single part so it's now carbureted. The cab all sanded and buffed naked, ready for primer! Also found another hitch so I added that on this week.

Cab in primer.

 

The junkyard gods smiled upon me today and gave me a new radiator. The other one I fit in there was too big, the damn hood wouldn't close! Yet another 'duh' moment.

The cab with some more black touch-up. Now I get to spend the next month getting every speck of paint off the rest of the truck. Happy holidays!

 

Nice work. Looking good so far.

 

Done hammering out all the dents and about ten pounds of welding wire later...

And just like magic, little gnomes came and painted it wearing safety goggles and face masks. Tomorrow should be fun getting the bed on the truck!

 

The human body can only take about 3 hours of holding a lapping wheel or a disc sander on a drill before you go crazy.

 

looks like its coming along nicely! keep up the updates!

 

Seat finally came in yesterday! The foam needs to release a ton but it should be just perfect! As it sits now you don't need a visor, that's for sure. Little tight getting in but once your in you're good to go!

 

Looks good.

 

Sweet build man. Few questions for ya, what are you stripping everything to bare metal with and what paint and primer did you use on the bottom and inside and around the cab?

 

Sadly... I lack a truck sized sand blasting unit. I'm to much of a **** to just sand down the rusted areas so I need to do every inch of the truck. I have held this drill for hundreds of hours! I didn't think it would make it for the entire truck but its like 90% there. Good little corded drill if I must say. The only downside to it is the air/vent/cooling hole at the very top is directed into your face/eyeball the entire time you use it. VERY poor planning on the tech team when they first made it.



You prolly know this all ready but the basic steps are, sand to metal, weld/tap out dents, clean with denatured alcohol and prime. The blood red is the medium grit and the brown is high. I've gone through maybe... 50-100 red ones and 25 browns.






Just basic paint/primer for the truck.

 

Finished the exhaust and carpet/heatshield/matting for the interior! Went with black for inside of the cab of course!



Not to sure where I'll put the license plate yet...