Minnesota Daily Driver

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Getting the inner rocker in:

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All metal not being welder to got cleaned and then coated with Chassis Saver. Welded surfaces got weld through primer.

Floor and outer rocker:

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Some more of the driver floor/ rocker:

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Next it was on to the passenger side.

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More from the passenger side.

[rusty76]

Looks good. The other day I was driving back to the shop and looked up in the mirror and saw something funny coming up behind us. I slowed a bit and waited. It was a pickup hauling a trailer of maybe ten beds, all kinds up the interstate. The truck was from Canada. I knew what he was up to for sure.

[tip]

Nice job with the rust repairs so far, I'm in the same boat. Did you just cut until you found good metal? For the floorboards and door sill, did you take any precautions to take to keep the cab square? Trying to figure out how I'm going to do mine the best way.

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Originally Posted by rusty76

Looks good. The other day I was driving back to the shop and looked up in the mirror and saw something funny coming up behind us. I slowed a bit and waited. It was a pickup hauling a trailer of maybe ten beds, all kinds up the interstate. The truck was from Canada. I knew what he was up to for sure.

Thanks. There seems to be more & more places popping up that sell "southern" panels.

The guy I got the box & doors had some boxes that were nearly as clean as when they came from the show room. He said those were barn finds that people had taken off when they got the trucks new to install flatbeds.

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Originally Posted by tip

Nice job with the rust repairs so far, I'm in the same boat. Did you just cut until you found good metal? For the floorboards and door sill, did you take any precautions to take to keep the cab square? Trying to figure out how I'm going to do mine the best way.

Thanks for the compliment. I was looking at your thread and luckily for you your floors don't seem as bad as mine at 1st glance.

What I did on the drivers was 1st wire wheel and do the screw driver test to start "poking" around to see how far the thin metal went. I started to cut away at the floor little by little but realized it was easier to fit the floor pan above the radius that goes around the foot well.

Knowing that I had good metal in the truck above that point I marked my new floor board about a 1/2" above the tangent point in that radius and trimmed it away. I then used sheet metal screws to "pull" the floor into place firmly against the existing floor and marked my cut line. I cut approx. a 1/16" of an inch below that line in the truck knowing with the existing floor removed the pan would drop in further. Then it was just a process of dropping the pan in and trimming were it didn't fit like I wanted. I trimmed either the cab or new floor depending on how the fit looked.

A tip is to locate and cut out the spot welds inside your cut lines 1st. This will help you establish were the cab support and floor braces are so you don't cut through them.

I got lucky on my drivers side and the cab braces/ supports were all still sound so I wasn't worried about the cab moving. I also left the doors on knowing that they had fit the factory rockers well and used that as my guide as I tacked those into place. Also any time the door didn't need to be open I kept it shut to not put extended periods of weight on the a-pillar just in case.

The floor support from my cab mount to the a pillar/ inner rocker on the passenger side of my truck was rotted away so I had to be more cautious on that side. I ended up taking measurements of were the inner rocker was located in relation to the cab mount before I cut it away. Also when it cam time to fit the new metal I ended up using a jack to lift the a pillar to where it lined up well.

Here's a pic of the jack and floor pan being held down with sheet metal screws as I fit it. After getting everything located I removed the doors for welding.

[y5mgisi]

Subscribed! Loving the story!

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Originally Posted by y5mgisi

Subscribed! Loving the story!

Thanks, I appreciate it.

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Been busy recently so hopefully I'll have some time to continue the story soon.

On another note I did have the carb rebuilt while I was working on the engine. Lately it has been running rough so I decided to take it back apart and look for myself. I found that there was a piece of paper towel under one of the primary jets. Got the top rebuilt and noticed the throte shafts have some play so now I waiting on bushings to get it completed. Hopefully once that's done all will be good engine wise.

[tip]

That's a bummer about the paper towel, but glad you figured it out. What rebuild kit did you use the second time? Do you have a Qjet manual?

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I used a rebuild kit from NAPA and bought Cliff Ruggles How to Rebuild and Modify Rochestor Quadrajet Carburetors as a guide. The book was very helpful.

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She's back on the road again. I ended up having to open up the idle mixture screws from .075 to .090, remove the soldered plugs from the idle air bypass, and recurve the dizzy. Dizzy set-up is now 12* initial, 20* mechanical starting at 800 rpm & all in at 3,000, and vacuum advance limited to 10* on ported vacuum.

Did a test drive and she ran well, knock on wood. Hopefully it'll be set for a while. I'm looking forward to using it for DD duty.

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So far so good. I've been driving the truck daily now for over a week. We've been in a cold snap here this week and she's been starting well. One morning it was about -3F.

Got some mud flaps on order & I want to get them installed soon before the roads get real sloppy/ salty.

[tip]

Daily driving it! any pics to share? I'd be interested to hear what parts you used to recurve your distributor.

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I'll post some pics later.

The parts I used for the dizzy were new bushings for the weights and the crane cams adjustable vacuum kit.

As far as setting it up, I made my own plate to limit the advance to 10* (stock is 20*) on the advance side. The kit comes with a plate to adjust it on the return side which requires resetting the base timing with an adjustment of the limit point. I set the timing can 9 turns out from being turned fully clockwise. Then I installed one medium and one heavy spring from the kit.

Also if your going to do this I recommend to pull the dizzy and clean/ lube it as well as replacing the electronics while its out. This will help to make sure that you get consistent results.

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Helped my uncle move his Mustang today. Truck pulled the car well.

[y5mgisi]

I bet it did! Looks great!

[Oregoon]

Man, that's a tough-looking truck! I love it. Great job!

I have nothing against anyone's projects whatsover--if you love it and make it your own, I am thrilled for you--but personally, my tastes run to old farm rigs, plow trucks, crummies, law-enforcent vehicles, military stuff, etc...

I love seeing a sweet 'bagger and a chromed-up show-truck, but what the thing that always gets me fired up is a truck doing what a truck is meant to do.

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Thanks y5mgisi & Oregoon, I appreciate the compliments.

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Here's a pic of moving a boat around. It's definatly convient to have a receiver on the front of a truck.

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Back on track with the story, I pulled the heater core and blower housing knowing they needed to be cleaned out and also I wanted to replace the heater core and blower while they were easily accessible. After pulling the blower housing I found some more rust to repair on the firewall.

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I also got the cab corners welded in. I had to get a bit creative on holding them in place so I could weld them. A ratchet strap and c-clamped worked out well.