Removing entire front end sheet metal - advice please!

[davepl]

I'm embarking on a frame-off resto of my '70 GMC, and I'm at the point where the front end needs to come up. While I could remove it as a clip, that wouldn't really serve my purposes because I would then need to blow it apart piece by piece to have the fenders painted, bumper rechromed, grill rechromed, all of that.

Since I assume even the inner fenders and rad support will be painted apart from the fenders anyway, I'm assuming its unavoidable that the clip needs to come apart.

One concern is that in the assembly manual they install the inner fenders to the fixture before installing the clip on the truck, that sort of thing, that I might not be able to do by simply reversing their steps.

In the factory assembly manual it looks like they build the front clip in a jig or fixture and then transfer the whole thing to the chassis. Not having such a fixture, the best I can do is reverse the steps. Can anyone spot an error in my list here, or tell me why this isn't the right way to go about it? It's my first frame-off of a truck (or a full-frame vehicle for that matter).

If I pull the clip, though, I lose the convenient "stand" of it being on the truck.