It's too far gone!

[shift1313]

haha, yeah its alot of rust. When i got the truck in 99 the fenders were already gone and there were holes just behind the door jambs that were already patched(the patches fell off at some point). It was my daily driver from 99-2004. before that it was my brothers hunting truck. He had 150acres and he left the truck at his property and drove it around while hunting. So it never got cleaned and sat caked with mud. Before that my cousin used it to commute with and it was very rusted then as well. I remember riding in it before i had a drivers license and thinking how cool it was(never knowing i would own it someday).

joe, a gallon of resin wouldnt do it the motorcycle in my sig i built last year and the back half of that is hand crafted fiberglass. I would be looking at about $500 worth or resin atleast to fill in all the holes. Whatever i do to this truck it will be metal, unless i do some flares or something. I have a mig welder that I can do all the sheet metal work with.

I was thinking a little about it and i think i can get replacement bed panels from jcwhitney cheap for a pickup truck and use that to patch things up. one bed patch panel or two might take care of it. Its really the seams that im worried about. I still have more gutting and stripping but im pretty deep in another project at the moment that i really cant get sidetracked from. Only a month left until finals then i will have some more free time to get some of this stuff out of the way /emoticons/[email protected] 2x" width="20" height="20" /> im just planning ahead.

edit, the reason the floor is so bad is because the padding under the rubber mat was holding water. when i pulled it out the mat was wet in alot of places.

 

[madmax]

well you cna get the complete rear floor pan for the 87-91 bronco here, might need slight mods to make it work, the rear sill you can replace with a piece of 3" channel and some 1" band iron. alternately you could find a decent body for pretty much any 80-96 and just cut out the parts you need to patch it together.

Or you could use a cheep 87-91 body and just move over your whole interior, dash, seats, headliner etc and drop it on your current frame, the quarters aren't too bad to swap and the front just bolts on. that's probably the easiest way to replicate your current truck sans rust.

 

[shift1313]

thanks for the link max. i dont think ill go that route for $300 though. For that price i could buy a couple 4x8 sheets and a bead roller I think im going to spend about $50 and get some truck bed patch panels from jcwhitney and start patching in my spare spare time. I probably wont have any time until after the begining of may /emoticons/[email protected] 2x" width="20" height="20" /> I dont care if the floor pan is "factory" but if i could find a stamped replacement part for around $100-$150 id probably go that route. I still have a few to check out in the local yards.

 

[madmax]

You could also just weld in a flat piece of steel, my father had that done to his 78 F150 back in about 91 and it turned out great, plus you'll throw carpet over it anyway, so what's it matter, padding will cover small imperfections. the rest of the inner body i'd just grab a big hammer and some 18 gauge sheet metal and start pounding out new pieces, alot of it can be a good bit off from stock and not be noticed, theirs the quarter skins on the outside and the plastic panel on the inside anyway.

First thing to do though is pull the rear seat and cut out the big flat part of the floor, then work from there, the curved parts you can get 6" exhaust pipe and cut out what you need, I'd not worry about it looking ugly if it's getting completely hidden anyway. might be cost effective to buy a 4X8 sheet of 18 (maybe 16) gauge sheet metal, grab a cheap circular saw and fit it with 7 inch chop saw blades, makes cutting large pieces of sheet metal real easy and fast.

 

[shift1313]

thanks for all the great tips max. The floor in the center of the truck is still really sound. the pic i posted had alot of padding material stuck to it still so it looked worse. Pretty much every place a bolt went through the floor is done for and all the seams need to be addressed. im going to do what you said and start cutting out the bad spots and go from there. Im going to concentrate on making the back floor tough because i have a few cool ideas i want to try. right now i use my truck to haul my stand ups to the lake, dirt bike to the track and street bike wherever i need. Id like to make some way to haul these things in the back of the bronco so im going to make the bed area stout with some interchangable bracketry that locks in where the rear seats goes. I have a 4x8 tilt trailer but i think it would be cool to haul them in the back of the bronco. ive hauled bikes in it before with the top off ofcourse ill be sure to take lots of pics and updates when i get to it in a month or so after i had this 71 im doing now off.

thanks

 

[shift1313]

i was thinking a little more on the topic of cutout fenders and i really dont like to loose distinguishing body lines so ive been thinking about getting a few junkyard fenders a piecing together a few oversized fenders. This is just a crude chop done in paintbrush but what do you guys think about the looks of it?



i think it would allow for 35s with no lift and still have the stock appearance. I know of a few decent fenders that i can use to get enough of the fender flare to create an oversized version.

 

[BroncoJoe19]

i was thinking a little more on the topic of cutout fenders and i really dont like to loose distinguishing body lines so ive been thinking about getting a few junkyard fenders a piecing together a few oversized fenders. This is just a crude chop done in paintbrush but what do you guys think about the looks of it?


i think it would allow for 35s with no lift and still have the stock appearance. I know of a few decent fenders that i can use to get enough of the fender flare to create an oversized version.

Matt,

That looks so much better than the average guy who just cuts into the fender.

joe

 

[shift1313]

I got my hands dirty today(gloves, i know better). here are some pics of the destruction.

This things is a headache! the screws are rusted and because the windshield is in i cant get at them very well, i got one out, ones missing and the other two are soaking right now.



Structurally the firewall looks pretty good. Im going to patch a few places(parking brake pulled through the firewall) but all in all im suprised. the sound deadining was holding water so thats in the trash.





here are some wires i deleted. they were all added by someone else besides ford(some me)





Ac box looks like its not factory. It tied into the harness in a "non factory" way and has its own blower.



if anyone wants it your more than welcome to it. Im not planning on having AC and it frees up a lot of space.

Also something i found in the heater vents



kinda scarry. Im glad it wasnt sitting on the heatercore.

I stripped everything out that it didnt need off the wiring harness so there isnt much left. Once i get it back together i will rewire all the accessories(radio and lights). I also did away with my push button start and toggle. Its amazing how little there is under the dash.

I did find the ECU said EEC_IV on it. i thought it was odd since my truck is factory carb. Anyone familiar with this?

 

[dhpt99]

Wow thats alot of rust. Same thing happened to my dads 79 350 after it sat around.

 

[jsomedaysoon]

have you decided if you're going to restore this to an almost stock truck? if so you've got your work cut out! its kinda cool seeing the guts that you dont usually get to see. makes me want to get a pos from a junkyard just to take it apart and see how it all goes together.

 

[vincendebbie]

have you decided if you're going to restore this to an almost stock truck? if so you've got your work cut out! its kinda cool seeing the guts that you dont usually get to see. makes me want to get a pos from a junkyard just to take it apart and see how it all goes together.

Shift if you or J are interested, I have a green 94 that I am doing away with. Grab a trailer and some stock wheels and you can have what is left when I am done. I live on the Northshore of Lake Pontchatrain in Louisiana right off I-12. This would be perfect for shift with his reconstruction. I am pulling the 35's off along with the aluminum M/T wheels, the top and rear seat along with the rear seat belts are coming out. Ofcourse the motor and tranny are getting rebuilt for the 93XLT and the internals from the rear hatch are sold. Look at my avatar and you will see a small picture of it. If you are interested I do have other pix, just PM me with your e-mail and I will send them to ya.

The answer to Shift's ECU question is yes, I have seen this before. This was done in transition to the EFI and PCM run set up. Sorta working the kinks out kinda thing. You know the Guinnie pig study. We go through it all the time and don't even realize it.

Let me know what you guys think and if you are interested. --Vince

 

[shift1313]

thanks vince but i actually snagged an 89 not too long ago for that reason. i pulled the seats, doors, tailgate, cut some body up but it was a michigan truck so not much steel on it is good.





and j no this will not be a stock resto, im not crazy Im going to patch up all the steel on the floor as well as mod the "bed" area a little bit and then im going to make some fiberglass body parts. I plan on a little flare pre-runner style body but with the 80-86 style fenders. I havent seen that done on anything except the 87-96 style.

Vince. Do you know if the ECU only controls emissions gear? I didnt get a chance to start the truck and unplug it to see what happens if it controls something else ill end up rewiring around it if needed. Ive already machined a carb spacer that did away with the check valve, capped just about everything else off and disable the smog pump. This rig will be a daily driver but bare essentials

 

[vincendebbie]

Should only control the ECU, give me the year again and I will check all the Tech info I have at the shop. --Vince

 

[shift1313]

thanks vince, its an 85 4.9l 1bbl, np435 tranny.

 

[vincendebbie]

thanks vince, its an 85 4.9l 1bbl, np435 tranny.

No prob I will check tomorrow for sure. I do believe that it only controls the emissions though

 

[shift1313]

vince, did you happen to check on the eec thing?

Here are some pics from today. I spent some more time pulling(and taking apart) the tailgate and just cleaning up/pulling little things apart. It looks like im going to do more than just patch. the entire floor really needs to be redone otherwise it will bother/worry me

I went around the back poking it with a pry bar and everything is just too saturated with rust so i dont feel comfortable "fixing" it.







Ive got some thinking to do about it tomorrow on what way i want to go with the floor. Ill update you guys though.

 

[shift1313]

this afternoon i got out the angle grinder and cut-off wheel and started at it. After a few feet of cutting and two cutting wheels i had to go back to lowes. i didnt get back until about 5:30 so i didnt get a lot done because of day light but here is what i did remove so far.











everything looks wet because i hosed down the top of the gas tank before i began cutting. I dont recommend doing that but i had a fire extinguisher and a hose near by.

The main supports for the body are still structurally sound with some surface rust. I am cutting out the floor but leaving those supports to start rebuilding. Still have a lot to cut but after getting some of the floor out and getting down to the supports i feel a little better about it.

 

[shift1313]

didnt get a chance to work on the bronco this weekend(ended up having to work on my truck today a bit) but i did pull the ecu out of the truck and it starts and runs fine without so thats just another thing i dont have to put back in

 

[brad050]

are you still working on it??