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The door panels and interior look fantastic. Great job!

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Hey Chris, what's the story with the blue truck in last pic?..Jim

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could you give us a run down on your hinge set up for the bed floor Thanks

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Most of you know that Chris was injured very badly in a shop fire a couple weeks ago. I have set up a GoFundMe campaign to help Chris (AKA SKYMANGS, Ole Sarge) and his family with medical expenses. Please share this with as many people as possible. Chris was the first to help with any questions, lets see if we can help him out here: Chris Klapp, AKA: SKYMANGS, Ole Sarge

Re: 49 ls1
 

Chris' wife posted this on his Facebook page yesterday:

"Chris had surgery today and he did well. They did a trac and cleaned up some of his burn areas. He is doing well this evening other than a slight fever."

Chris loves working on these trucks, when he was building my truck it was hard to tell who was more excited, me or him. Chris was always the first to offer any advice to the forum members here. Pleasde help him and his family via the GoFundMe campaign that I set up to help Chris (AKA SKYMANGS, Ole Sarge) and his family with any medical expenses. Here is the link to the campaign

http://www.gofundme.com/c49h5mjx8

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I talked to Chris' wife today, and received more info or more of their beat guess until Chris can tell us. He was finishing up the 54 for Bob R (pics on his page). Working on the filler neck or the fuel door and there was a flash fire that totally consumed the inside of the shop. I will post pics later but it is bad. Chris was trapped inside the shop for a while, but at some point got out and was able to call 911 before he passed out outside.

His burns are all above the waist, mostly on his arms and around his left ear. But the good news is that several of the burns are starting to heal on their own. If he can just fight the infection they are hopeful.

By Jennifer Klapp — 9 hours ago


This week started on a good note, with Chris really responding to questions and moving his head and limbs. But things took a turn for the worst on Tuesday morning. Chris spiked a 106 temperature and it took all day to get it down to 101. So Michael and I stayed the night with Chris that night and it stayed down all night, so home we went at 5:30am on Wednesday. Wednesday was a quiet day with a temperature still hanging around but not going over 102. Thursday was a quiet day with nothing real big happening, which is okay because Tuesday was quit exciting. Through the week Chris's urine output has gotten better. So this morning when I was visiting the kidney doctor was around and told me that if he continues on this up slope that they will stop dialysis and take out the stint for the dialysis. Tomorrow he is going to have a feeding tube put into his gut to make it easier on him. Right now the feeding tube is going through the nose, so I am sure it is a bit bothersome.

Chris is slowly climbing the hill of recovery and the prayers and good vibes are greatly appreciated.

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So for those of you who have asked for some photos of Chris' shop here they are. As you can see it is basically a complete loss. Two trucks destroyed, Chris son's TF truck and a customer Bob R. Currently we are sitting at about $2500 in donations, so please lets get the word and help if we can! Donate Here!

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dang, he is very lucky. I'll be the first to say I can relate heavily to his situation. I'v been through two home fires, a work fire, 2 relatives fires and last year a good friend got heavily burnt and is still recovering. Its a shame and something a lot of us think will never happen. I really hope he has shop insurance. a lot of guys doing business's out of there homes, don't realize home owners don't cover a lot of things. Also doing any work on someone's vehicles, I'd tell them A. they aren't insured through me or B. get builders insurance so its covered. I hope this is the case for chris, its just bad enough he has to worry about recovering, property damage is last concern but it will be faced. Its something a lot of guys might not know. So just putting it out there, if your helping out a buddy or doing side work etc, just be cautious cause a few hundred dollar repair could cost you thousands in the long run. I'll def be donating and will spread the word.

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Here is an update on Chris from his wife:


By Jennifer Klapp — Aug 15, 2015 9:10pm


Chris is doing well this week. His dialysis catheter was removed on Wednesday. He has still had a slight fever, but keeping down the upper 90's to 101. He tracks you with his eyes and tries to talk to you, but gets very frustrated when you can't figure out what he is trying to tell you. But the doctors are happy with his progress. The burns are healing well and the two places that they will have to do some reconstruction on they have vacuum packed right now. This procedure will cause the body to send extra blood to those areas to help stimulate growth on it is own. Next week he should be getting a feeding tube placed in the gut and removed from his nose.

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Jennifer posted another update

Busy week

By Jennifer Klapp — 49 minutes ago

this week has started off busy, in the aspect of Chris being rolled off to here and there and everywhere. Yesterday he went for a CT scan and today he is going to three different places, one being MRI. Right now they are putting in a filter to stop blood clots from going to the lungs. Later he is going to go down to have a drain tube or re put in to get some fluid off the lungs. Tomorrow or Thursday he is going to surgery for skin grafts on elbow and maybe hand. We meet Dr. Grossmen on VTC yesterday , a meeting about what they are going to do tomorrow or Thursday.

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Let's see if we can get this ball rolling again. We need about $1900 to get the $5000 goal. Please share this and lets help out Chris. He is making some progress but is still facing a long recovery battle. Please donate here: http://gofundme.com/c49h5mjx8

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Any news? Nevermind.

The links above are broken but I found it by searching Klapp.
http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=676217

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I am back, and posting again. Thank you Sean for setting up the gofundme site. It really did help. Thank you again. I'll be calling later today. I hope you're still happy with your truck.

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Welcome back! I hope all is well and that you and the family are healthy.

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Man I'm glad to see a post from you! I was following the project, then the tragedy and updates. I was afraid we wouldn't get anymore. Welcome back.

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Glad to see you back Chris. I've got a lot of help and ideas from your posts with my '51 S10 swap project.

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Welcome back! Hope all is well as can be!

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Chris, good to see you back and posting!

Chris it was so good to hear your voice today. You truly made my day! Cecil is great and I promise someday I will bring him back to you and we will go drive him! God Bless you and thank you again for your service to our country!
Posted via Mobile Device

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And a big thank you to Sean sparks for starting that gofundme page.

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Welcome back!

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Glad to see you getting back. Glad your doing better.

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MAN! Glad to se youre doing better. Sorry to hear about the mishap. Hope all is good with you.

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Chris! Glad you're posting again. I saw you in Ottawa, glad you made it out. You haven't left our thoughts. Leevon

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Just been reading your thread and did not expect to see what happened as I came up on your last 2 pages. God bless you and your family Bro and wish you complete recovery.

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I bought a 59 pickup dash for my 51 today, because I was impressed with your adaptation, and I have a few questions. I love the AD pickups, but the dash doesn't really appeal to me, and I love the 55-59 dash, especially with the ends wrapped onto the doors.

It appears that you have welded the wrap around ends to the door panel, which then makes the window surround trim impossible to remove. How did you engineer that so the window surround can be removed?

Are you eliminating the rubber weather stripping that seals the inside of the door to the door jamb?

Thanks,

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Hey Skymangs,

I wanted to check with you to see what the track width is on the front end of your frame. I have read that a camaro sub is about 2.5 inches wider than the stock track width and I wanted to see if you had to do anything different to get those wheels to fit. Thanks again for your help! You have always been amazing and willing to help everyone!

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not sure what the track width is, trucks in mo and i'm in ia. just don't make it to low and you'll be fine. no rub as long as the suspension is aired up. i run a 17x7 up front.

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i welded the dash ends directly to the window trim, there is one sheet metal screw in the bottom half attaching it to the actual door. for exactly that reason. be advised this mod is not for the faint of heart, it's a whole lot of work but man does it look cool when finished.

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Thanks!!!

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what radiator did you use? I have same combo but also want dual elect fans and not finding anything that I think will fit. my firewall is not cut but the motor is very close.

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I used speedway’s 19x22 universal rad w/ pass inlet/outlet. For the fan I used a single hayden 16", that’s one thing I’ve learned, not to skimp on fans. I only use hayden 16" now.

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That dash is very cool! You said you useded a speedway universal 19 x 22 radiator? Those are 22 wide it looks like, I did not think that would fit. Did you remove the flange of the support on the inside to fit it?

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It is 19" wide, you’ll have to trim the backside of the core support.

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not to disagree, but the speedway rad is 22" wide and just barely fits in the (trimmed) core support. its listed at that width on speedways site.

one thing I dont like about the speedway rads is that they use the same end tanks as wider (32-40") rads, which on a wider rad needs the lower hose pointed at the water pump. but using it on a 22" rad, that angled hose fitting points at the harmonic balancer.

I used an aluminum rad on the last 41 I did and the 19x22 was just barely too wide for the 41 core support, searching on ebay I found a 19x21 rad, and another benefit was that the lower hose outlet was straight and not pointed at the lower pulley.

if you think you will run a stock mechanical fan, it will be very tough to get the rad in a good spot to do that, the way it mounted in mine the fan would have cut the lower hose in half. I used a 16" electric puller on that truck.

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On the Compressor, my kids truck has been running an R4 pancake for 8 years and one of my other builds uses the stock denso compressor and a Vintage Air compac and he reports no issues in 5 years! I think that myth is definitely Busted! I think that’s just something Vintage Air says to sell Compressors.

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What length is this column? What brand is it?
Great job by the way.. Love all that you have done...

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It’s a 30" Gearhead motors from eBay

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Soooo happy you're back bro.

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Thank you, I’m so happy to be back! The alternative is unthinkable! Almost got me, but I managed to squeak by!:metal: