Hey guys, I figured that with the work I have done to my truck I may as well post some pics and get some ideas on what to do next. I have asked a lot of questions about the truck on here and done a lot of reading. This site has helped me a lot and I figured I would show my progress to possibly help others. This is a picture of the truck when I bought it almost a year ago.
Not the greatest pic but as you can see it had rusted out rear wheel wells and a dented bumper. This is a current picture of the truck.

As you can see it has had a bit of work done to it. My dad and I welded patches in where there was rust and painted it with gloss black Tremclad(Canadian branded Rustoleum). Not exactly a great way to paint the truck I know, but this way it is easy to touch up scratches or fix any new rust. For 50 dollar a gallon paint I think it turned out great. Here are some pictures from the process.


This is the cab coner I patched, I sanded it down more after this picture to line it up with the door better.

This is a picture of the bedside primed after we welded in the patch panel.

The paint job finished with all the pieces back on the truck(minus the mirrors). It is much shinier in this pic then it is now.


After that I started on my bumper build as you can see in the first pic(yes I am stuck and don't worry we made sure not to yank the chain). In the second picture you can see the rest of the paint job(silver tailgate strip, not sure if I should change that) and the "headache rack" that I built. The headache rack is really more just for the knockoff KCs on the roof.
After that I finished the bumper, it is built of mostly 3/16 steel with some 1/4 mixed in around the brackets. The grill bar is only 1/8 steel. The shackles are mounted to flat bar that goes through the bumper and mounts to the frame in addition to it being welded to the bumper. I also tinted my tails and head lights. They arn't as dark as in this pic(the ranger is my dad's btw) as the paint faded, the headlights are dimmer but still light up the road well. These past two days I bedlined the box and the bottom section of the truck to help prevent chips. I don't have any pics at the moment but I can take some. I am not sure what I want to do on the truck next I was thinking maybe a small lift or some engine mods(302). Thanks for reading guys, let me know what you think of the truck and feel free to ask any questions.

 

Nice job keeping an old truck on the road, looks like you're enjoying it. My thoughts:
1. Purchase a recovery strap, store behind seat out of sunlight. Chains are for logging.
2. 33x10.5 tires if wheeling frequently and winter driving. The improvement in off road capability over stock sized tires is substantial. That mud hole looks like something my truck would walk right through now but be hopelessly high centered with stock sized tires. Might need a little taller spring up front to clear and gearing won't be fun with the 302, so consider this carefully.

 

i run 33x9.5 and heavy duty front springs. Fits pretty well. Very little rub. I just have 3.55 gears and iy seems to work fairly well. Will drop the cruising rpm by about 100 rpm from my 32x11.5. The heavy duty spring picks up the front end by about 1.5 inch or so. Camber will be ouy a little but not bad at all.

 

I finished putting beliner in the box and on the lower part of the body. I used dupicolor bedliner and rolled it on. It didn't come out super thick but it seems to handle rocks well. Thanks for the suggestions for 33" tires but I think I am going to stick with these for right now. The tires on it are almost brand new and it rubbed with them a lot when making full right turns. I got a set of wheel spacers(yes I torque them regularly) for the front to stop this, being as they are 31" I dont think 33" would fit very well without a bit of lift. Based on what I found out today the motor is going to have to come first anyway. I compression tested two cylinders quickly today and the results were not good. They were reading 75-80 pounds of compression. My dad said that it should be up in the 100-120 range so clearly I am missing out on some power. This surprised me a lot because the truck runs great and doesn't burn any oil(leaks though). So I am thinking about building another engine to drop into the truck.

 

Like i said i run HD front springs and it brings my front end up higher. My original springs were so worn i rubbed with stock tires lol. My ranger sat up higher lol. Also i am running only 9.5 wide. Yours are prolly 10.5. But they are a little skinny for my liking. In the eventual time you start to pull your engine, use the time wisely to rebuild your TTB. Whatever you do, do not forget to swap out your axle pivot bushings. They can be a pain but in my experience the culprit to death wobble. But it gives you perfect access to the axle pivot bushings, rad arm bracket and bushings, and your u joints and ball joints. Just makes the job a whole lot easier without an engine in lol

 

Thanks for the tip on the bushings I will have to do that. It will probably be a little while before I can get another engine to drop in as I am 17 and have a bit of a limited budget. I think I can probably have the money saved up before the end of summer. I think that if I am going through the trouble of changing the engine I will go with a rebuilt 351w.

 

Well, i can give a cost approx on the suspension.
Springs are about 90, axle pivot bushings are about 15 for both, rad arm bushings 30 and brackets if needed 70. Ball joints for all 4 about 100 or less depending on what you go with. They are starting to have non serviceable ball joints. Make sure you get greasable ball joints. AND THAT YOU GREASE THEM. And at this point might as well replace tie rods for 80. That there i belueve is the whole front end. Except shocks. And that is also all stock lift. I have learned that the front ends really appreciate new parts lol

 

So that happened. The truck broke the flexplate. When I pulled the transmission I discovered that somebody screwed up when the trans was pulled before. The two little pins that are supposed to align the transmission were pushed in so that they didn't go into the holes on the motor. This cause the transmission to be able to wiggle slightly and slowly loosen the bolts(two were missing when I pulled it). After I changed that I had to do an exhaust as I cut mine off to get the trans out.
Currently it is true dual straight pipes to the back of the cab but I plan to run tailpipes some point soon. What should I get for a muffler that would deepen the sound but not sacrifice much volume?

 

Got some more updates!


So I decided that I wanted to paint the interior of my truck black. I did this using Krylon paint and I think it turned out pretty good. I also put door handles and window cranks out of an 86 in as the plastic ones were getting cracked.


I took the headliner out and painted the roof with stripes to match the hood.
Also replaced my reverse lights with led cube because the halogen ones burned out. These make it much easier to reverse at night.
I also might have a motor to go into the truck(this one has low compression), as I bought a parts truck(86 f150 302). I have to run a compression test on it at some point to see if it should be rebuilt. Would the 86 motor be a roller cam like mine? If not how much power would be lost with a flat tappet? Thats about it for now, if I get a chance tomorrow I'll get a picture of the underhood lighting I put in today.