Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Another small repair was on the lower hinge pockets.
Mine were kinda iffy so I made some new ones.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

The lower cowl on the passenger side was in real bad shape.
Being cheap again I figured I would try and make my own.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

As its in a place that will never be seen when the truck is done I think I can live with the results.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Once again good job, keep up the good work.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Doing great Kim, don't stop. Did you mount your hydroboost?

Tri5

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Nice work!!!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Nice work.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Excellant work looking good!!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Thanks for the compliments guys.



Still not mounted yet. I need to get some more work done to the cab before I take it off the frame. It's just to hard for me to try and crawl around under it to do the fab work.
Hope to get to that point in the next couple of weeks.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I am impressed. Your work looks great!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Just getting around to reading your recent progress. That is a really good idea. Also, I have used double stick tape or that sticky putty stuff for sticking posters to walls to hold hidden nuts like you had for your cage nut situation. Great progress and lots of detail for us a few steps behind you!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

And again more great ideas!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I need to break mine down and get the big nut off the front then I can mount mine.

Tri5

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

AWESOME!!!! Truck Kim...

Hey Kim it looks like you are going to radius the upper left corner on that door.....am I right??? If you do as always PICS please...

I am thinking of radiusing the corners on my doors, but dont know yet.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

There was a detailed post a couple of months ago by another member on that procedure. He broke it out as a separate thread after someone ask the same question as you in his build thread. Can't remember who it was, search might turn it up.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

looking good!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I've already started to do them. I will post pics on how I am doing it.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I removed the drip rail from the cab.
It was a bit of a pain for me as the roof skin was slightly off from one side to the other. I didn't want to remove and replace the whole top so I had to compromise on the look I wanted.
The pics are kinda boring but here they are.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Now for some more door fun.
These pics show the radius I came up with for the corners and how they look on the truck.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

These pics show how bad the door fits in the opening.
The drip rail hid some of the poor factory gaps but now that its gone I will have to do quit a bit of work to fix them.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Not sure if this is a common problem with others trucks and I haven't checked the passenger door yet.
This pic shows how the door lines up O.K. with the cowl but curves in at the A pillar. What you cant see is the cowl lines up with the fender in the rear but is low at the front. When I removed the paint there was almost a 1/4 inch of bondo to make the fender and cowl line up. I may have to cut a slice in it and raise the front of the cowl.
Has anyone elase had this problem?
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Nice fab work Kim!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Kim,
I have exactly the same alignment problem - don't exactly know how to properly correct it. I currently am experimenting with shims, dropping the front fenders / grille / radiator assembly, adding metal, or just brunt major movements with applied pressure devices (sledge hammer and short losses of temper!)
I wonder if raising the rear until it is level then bolting or attaching it to the cowl some way, then dropping the front might do it. Not much help but if something suddenly and magically works I'll let you know.
The other problem I see is that when the fender to cowl areas seem to get close to fitting, then the hood is all "wanker-jawed" as my granddaddy used to say.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Looks like you are going to have to weld some metal bar stock in places to get the body lines to look good. I think i would have all front sheet metal including the hood in place and adjusted as close as possible before i added or cut anything.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Thanks for the info guys.
My biggest concern right now is the fender and cowl alignment. I hate to have a 1/4 inch of body filler at the edge where they meet so I will have to think about how I'm going to tackle it.
The passenger side seems to line up a lot better.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Good advice, previous alignment discussion have said to align the cab/hood/radiator support first as the hood is the hardest to get it to sit right when closed. Then work on the doors/cab/fenders. Finally check the bed to make sure the horizontal lines match front to back. When I took my truck apart I photoed and counted shims, washers, etc. at all the connection points and bagged and labeled them. I do not think I found any place that was exactly the same. If you want those perfect door gaps you will have to trim or add to the doors or body, they did not match and were not perfect from the factory, these were working trucks not the family show piece. Good luck.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I had a problem with fender to cowl gap also . Mine was hitting the cab under the fender, theres a raised area right under the curve of the fender.I tapped mine in to get the fender gap closer. I also trimmed the mount on top the fender because it was hitting the cab not allowing the fender gap to close. Then welded a washer in the new location.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I posted about that in my build thread. I could not figure out how every 55-59 I saw with the fenders off was beat in that area. My fenders had never been off and one side was hammered a little the other quite a bit. I read somewhere that the inside stamping was drawn and tooled wrong, someone had not taken into consideration interference with the fender brace (or it may have been beefed up during design). Rather than retool they just issued the fender install guys on the line a 2# adjustment tool. So if yours is beat, don't work to hard making it pretty because you will probably just get to pound down your new paint again. Look close at my cab photos and you will see the dents still there on mine.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

you know I have always wondered how those dents got there one both of the trucks I have. It is all very clear now, thanks for the info.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Coming along very well Kim!
Haven't touched mine yet.
Just dust it and kick the tires!
http://public.bay.livefilestore.com/...ramerDance.gif

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Now that you mention it mine had those same dents, I just thought it must have be from an accident at some point in it's life. Sorry Kim for jumping in on your thread!

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

It's OK. The info is welcome.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Kim-
I'm going throught the same thing right now with aligning my doors. I thought my situation was unique. I had considered cutting my cage nuts loose on my upperhinges and relocating them more outboard so the top of the door could move outward and get the door's front edge and cowl more aligned. But, that would cause issues on everything forward of that gap. The fenders and the hood wouldn't line up, and you'd wind up having to add metal at all of your gaps in order to close them up. I'm an probably going to align the doors as best as possible, and then do bodywork to make everything look right. I did a shop tour at Boyd's years ago when he was in the old shop, and they were working on Cadzilla for Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. They got the doors as best they could by aligning and then closing up the gaps with sheet metal and welding rods, then they did a 36" sweep of filler from top to bottom at all of the door gaps and blocked the area until the gaps were consistent and the panel intersections were flat and even. I'm a stickler about panel gaps, and that amount of work that they did gave me a real appreciation of what it takes to make it look right.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I was talking to a body guy that took over one of the buildings that Boyd was in after he died (he's doing my brothers truck). He told me that these old vehicles are like that. Some things fit nice and some are way off. My passenger side is way better than the driver side. I took some measurements this weekend and it looks like the cowl was installed almost a 1/4" low on the driver side. I'm thinking about cutting it where it is supposed to line up with the fender and raising it. It's either that or lots of body filler in that area which is what was there when I bought it. The driver door is also wider at the top than the passenger opening. I guess the guy on that side was having a bad day.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Can you show a picture of the graft of your subframe up close and the rear part of your cab. It looks like you shaved it. My rear cab is alittle beat up and I like the idea.

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Hope these help. If you need any more just ask.
I used 16 gauge on the back of the cab.
Kim

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Monday morning assembly vehicle...

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

Here is a little inspiration for your 57 Kim!
Yep... I finally found a video clip of the Beast.
http://image.sporttruck.com/f/109429...side+owner.jpg
http://image.automotive.com/f/featur...cide_doors.jpg

1956 Chevy Truck - Double-Stacked Lightnin'
http://sporttruck.automotive.com/920...uck/index.html

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

I have seen this truck at the portland roadster show and it is awesome for sure..

Re: My 57 Pro Street
 

That's a very cool truck.
Kim