Awesome work

 

Got the cab and bed on the frame for final fitting. The engine had a power steering reservoir relocation kit mounted to the driver side but it interfered with the inner fender, so I had to remove it to fit the inner fender. After talking with the owner we decided to hide the tank under the inner fender, with the lid coming through at the front.






I initially was just going to cut a hole and have the lid pop through, but that looked out of place/unfinished, and the metal at the front edge was pretty stretched and loose, so I made a recessed circle on the Pullmax and welded it in which shrunk the loose metal and it looks way better.




To make the recess I used a set of dies I already had that were meant to roll the edge of a panel. I took the backstop off and made a shorter flat piece to bolt in place of it, and set up the circle cutting clamps in the throat to make a perfect circle.










To roll an inner flange I tacked an old bearing race on the back and used a mallet to fold the flange in.




Welded together.

 

The radiator support is a reproduction '65 support that needs some mods to fit a '66, no one makes the correct '66 support. The original support and inner fenders were rusty and had crash damage so I used the inner fenders from the same parts truck we got the roof from. '65 inner fenders and the mounting flanges on the rad support were different, so I needed to rework the flanges to fit the '66 inner fenders and have more room for the '66 radiator.





Difference in angle of the lower flange.








Spotwelds drilled to remove the '65 radiator brackets.




New lower flanges.








The donor inner fenders were better but not perfect so I had a few areas to straighten out.








I slightly rounded off the sharp corners on all of the edges.




On the back of the mounting flanges, I ground the outer edges at about a 15* angle to bevel the edges, once it's painted the edges won't dig into the firewall and chip the paint underneath.




This area was dented and I couldn't really tell what the original shape would've been, and after knocking the dent out the area was floppy/loose. The rest of the inner fenders have sharp, straight bends with flat areas in between and this area was rounded so it looked out of place. I made marks with a straight edge and hammered in creases with a chisel and hammer over a sandbag, then used the shrinking disk to bring the rounded areas down until they were flat.






After-






All of the original wavy edges were flattened, and I trimmed back the areas around the new crossmember to make more room for getting in there with tools to align it, and room for the power steering reservoir hoses.




Extra holes welded up.

 

Amazing work!!!!! I wish I had a 1/4 of your skills. Doug.

 

Hello, very good work. It's fun to watch. What kind of machine is that you used to work the sheet metal? I still have to work my sheet metal with a hammer. Best regards, Bernd 61 HD

 

Slightly off topic, did you by happen just pick up a nice '68 Flareside on BaT? I saw the winner's avatar name, and it reminded me of yours, so I thought I would ask. Oh, and to post something relevant to this topic... Mad skills, simply mad.... Thanks for sharing.

 

Thanks Doug!


Thanks, its a Pullmax P7 from the 1950s, it's super handy for stamping details like the filler recess.


Wasn't me, I bought a '66 C10 back in '22 that scratched the personal truck project itch for now. We have the '69 Ranger that my granddad bought new stored in a barn, I need to drag it out one day and get it back on the road.

 

I never was able to get the front bumper fitted due to the old frame being bent too badly for the bumper and filler panel to bolt on. The bumper that was on the truck was a later 67-72 style with squared ends, but the parts truck had a painted 64-66 bumper with the correct angled ends so that's what I started with. It had been hit on both sides so there were some buckles and bends to work out.







The overall shape was way off after getting the buckled spots worked down flat.







I used a come a long and vise plus heat, hammers, and a 24" adjustable wrench to get it back in shape.









Linear stretching a spot I over-shrunk.





Decided to use an aftermarket filler panel, the factory one I had was rotted, so I got the overall shape pretty much matched up with the new panel.

 

Hello, very good work. I like it a lot. It's 6 a.m. here, and reading the report has given me the motivation I need to go straight to the workshop and continue working on my truck.
Best regards, Bernd 61 HD

 

Starting point of the front bumper/filler panel fitment. The corners and outer flanges of the splash panel were so far off that I just cut those off completely to get them out of the way. The rad support, fenders, and filler panels are all aftermarket and nothing matched up. The mounting flanges on the filler panel were supposed to be vertical but were angled around 15* on each side on the new panel, so the outer mounting flanges also had to be cut off just to get the filler panel to fit in place. The bumper stuck out too far past the detail line on the filler panel, and the whole thing stuck out way too far from the body.













I double checked the rad support/filler panel fit with the original filler panel to determine which part was shaped wrong; neither fit correctly so the rad support isn't shaped correctly.









The rad support had metric threads so I drilled them to the next standard size up and retapped the threads.





The bumper normally mounts directly to the frame with no ability to adjust it, but we asked No Limit to make shorter frame stubs with bolt on bumper brackets so the bumper could be moved around easier. The holes they drilled didn't offer any adjustment, so I cut the whole rear edge off to make room for moving the bumper back farther, welded up what was left of the holes, and drilled/slotted new ones once I had the bumper where I wanted it.







Filler panel mount brackets removed from the original panel, blasted, and straightened to fit the fenders and rad support better.











To fit the bumper closer to the body, I split the filler panel down the middle and initially overlapped it to do a test fit to see how far in I wanted to bring the bumper in, and settled on taking out 1".

 

With the bumper straight and stripped, the filler panel split and shortened/welded, I wanted to capture the front edge of the filler panel by adding tabs on the inside of the bumper. Originally the splash panel floated under the bumper, unattached so there was nothing to keep it from sagging or to hold it in alignment with the bumper. I spaced the front lip down off the bumper 5/32" to get the top edge of the bumper flush with the top of the filler panel. I'll find the correct size metal stock and weld narrower permanent spacers onto the edge.












I cut and bent 1/8" strips 90* and welded them to the bumper to hold bottom of the filler panel at the correct height. After the bumpers are plated I'll brush on Plasti-Dip to keep this from rattling.




Test fit on the truck.











Both corners of the bumper need to be trimmed to clear the body better, but now that the bumper and filler panel are in their final places I can start remaking the flanges and edges of the filler panel to mount correctly and fill in the gap around the bottom corners of the grill. I expect the bumper to slightly move around when the chrome shop does the final straightening, so I'll wait to get the filler panel fitting any better until after the bumper is back. I'll use the finished bumper as a guide for skimming the top of the filler panel to make it perfectly level with the bumper.

 

Excellent work. We restore old Mercedes Benz vehicles to this standard.
Best regards, Bernd 61 HD

 

I have been watching this build and cannot wait to see the finished product. Amazing skill and attention to detail.

 

Just awesome work! Thinking of looking a a good driver quality 66 in my area. Your details are way beyond the norm! Thanks for posting. These will provide motivation for some of us to keep moving!
Regards,
Chris and Cheryl;

 

Got started on the rear bumper. The original has a deep offset in the middle that prevents it from being tucked in closer to the tailgate to close up the gaps, so I started looking into other options. Decided to use a front bumper and take the curve out of it, so I ordered a cheap repop hoping it would be thinner than the original to be easier to reshape. It ended up being 14g, much more workable than the originals.





I used a reverse gear from an old transmission to linear stretch the top and bottom flanges until the curve was gone and the outer face of the bumper was flat.









There were weird bumps stamped into the top flange of the bumper above the license plate mount area, I hammered those down then used a sand bag and mallet to bump the surrounding low spots up.







Once the overall shape was roughed in I started picking/filing to prep it for chrome.









The peaks of the stamping around the tag mount weren't consistent so I used a rounded over punch from the backside to tighten up the radii where needed, then filed it smooth and blended the transistions.

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Clamped in place for the first test fit. It still needs the ends reshaped to match the width and shape of the bed, and the brackets need to be modified for it to bolt up.