Dang no offense to area but sounds like area is a hell of an illusionist. From the way you describe it you bought a nice piece of scrap metal. From his build it looked really good condition but your describing sort of a hack job build. Since your plans are so far away from the way the truck build was going why did you even consider buying it? Your taking off slot of the things that he has done to it. Mind sharing what you paid for it? Surprised I haven't seen it on Craigslist when it was for sale in always searching

 

I think you mean the speed of income.

 

My plans actually aren't that far off from what he advertised. I wanted a 67-72 short bed F100, and I planned on doing the crown vic swap, custom rear suspension, and then shave all the trim and smooth the seams. The truck was advertised as a resto mod that originally came from the south. It listed the crown vic swap, NASCAR truck arm rear suspension, new floors installed, shaved drip rails, antenna, etc. On the phone he indicated the bed floor was rough but otherwise everything was good. When i got there I found it did have a crown vic front end, but the frame is just sitting on it. None of the rear mounts had been fab'd. It did have brand new floors, but they were not installed properly at all and in the process the firewall and one of the cab mounts got butchered. Apparently the truck rolled backwards into a telephone pole which smashed the rear corner of the bed beyond repair and pushed the bed forward into the cab denting that in. I probably should have asked for more pics, but I would think the rear corner of the bed being smashed in, along with the drivers side cab corner would be something worth mentioning. Or at least include a link to this thread because you can see it if you look close at the pics on the first page. Had I found this thread first I wouldn't have purchased the truck. After reading through I found where he said he was building it to be a driver, which explains why a lot of corners were cut with the body work (massive amounts of bondo). Aside from the front sheet metal and tailgate that he purchased from California, I would say the truck was more along the lines of a rat rod as opposed to a resto mod. But it is what it is, I've got it now and I'll make it right. Just going to take more time and effort then I wanted.

 

I know this is a beating and I feel bad for u. As I watched this thread in the past I really wondered what the body work was like. I have been doing a lot of body work on mine and have learned a ton from my friend who does 10 to 20k paint jobs. His body work is damn near perfect before he skims any filler on. Sounds easy but it is actually very difficult and a art at that. It takes TIME, a lot of time, to weld on sheet metal. The heat kills it, so widely spaced tacks over a long period of time is best. If you don't mind, post some closeup pics of what he did that you would consider bad. I'm curious about the bed and cab damage. Did he "fix" that or is it still in the same damaged state as the beginning of this thread. Too bad for all this; Area seemed to be a hero of sorts on this board.

 

Sorry to hear it is so rough. I read that as you feel you paid too much. I have 1 1/2" drop coils from Eaton on my CV holding up a 460. Good luck with the build. It's been 4 yrs with mine so far and hopefully I am about ready to start on the body.

 

The damage to the bed and cab corners hasn't been touched, still in the same damaged state. I'll snap some pics later when I go out to the garage. And you're right, it takes a lot of time and patience to do body work correctly.

 

Here is crown vic swap:
And the cab corner and bed damage:
This is the drivers side floor. Notice how hacked up the firewall and mount are. The floor was cut out and then the replacement floor pan was set in on top and plug welded.
Another good one, this is the passenger side cowl after my girlfriend spent about a hour chipping off bondo. It was over 1/4" thick in spots.

 

WOW! Sorry man. Looks like there was a lot of "unmentioned" things there. I guess it is what it is; so come up with a game plan and move forward. The tail light housing on the bed won't be too bad and the back of the cab can be hammered / pulled out. I just grafted an entire rear corner of my drivers side bed. There are pics in my thread if u care to look.

 

wow, that bondo looks like what I will have to deal with on my truck. I haven't done much body work to mine at all, but behind the pass rear tire and on the drivers side of the cab look very similar to your pics. luckily no one's tried to do any panel replacements on it, so I'm good there. good luck with all of that and definitely keep updating the thread.

 

Holy caved in bed batman!!!! I think it's funny how on the first page he was saying how the previous owners used bondo that he needed to remove. then you look at his body work technique

 

Cave and pave! Not the real way to do it but so many do. Plastic filler should never exceed 1/8"

 

How is the ride/handling with the Eaton/460 combo? I'm trying to decide if I want to just throw in some stock crown vic springs or go with the stock height or maybe 1" lower Eatons. The squat from the 460 plus the coils already being cut out of the springs that are in there will be too low for my liking. Eatons website shows their springs as having a higher rate so I don't think I would get as much squat as I would with the stockers.

Like I said, once I get time to actually start working on the truck itself I will start up a new build thread. Right now I'm just focused on gathering parts so I can put together the big block and also tying up some loose ends with other projects so I can get them out of the way and make more room in the garage.

 

If you are doing a 460 you might want to frequent 460ford.com and/or 429-460.com. One is preferred over the other but I can't remember which one. Regardless, great info over there.

 

I'm a member of both, and you're right there is a lot of good info there. Seems to be a lot of the same people are on both.

I've got a prepped block along with all of the parts to put together my rotating assembly. Just trying to be patient to find the best deal I can on heads (plan on using the aluminum Ford Racing Super Cobra Jets, but would also go for the Kaase P-51s if the right deal popped up). Once I have the heads I can start massaging those along with the Victor intake manifold over the winter. I would like to be putting the long block together by spring if all goes well.

 

If you are not too far into parts you might want to consider the new AFR's. They flow stupid #'s on the intake and exhaust side. Been compared to larger BBC Big Chief heads.