"Pinché Caliché" '57 StepSide/LSx/CrownVic

[yossarian19]

I found the best method of rivet removal was grinding the head off with a 4.5" angle and using an air hammer with punch tip to drive it out. I'd tried torch, chisel, BFH & profanity before I came around to grinding the heads & air hammer out the stub.

Also: tack a brace into place before you remove any cross members. The trans member you might get away with it but in the rear, the cross member keeps the frame straight. The leaf spring hangers will torque the rails pretty far out there if you don't have it braced.

[t-tung]

I appreciate the help. I like the grinder method too but there's a few holding the spring hangers on that I can't get to with the grinder. ...and I don't have a n air-hammer YET. Looks like I'm headed to Sears tomorrow to get one though. The ol fashioned hammer and punch method sucks! Not to mention, layers and layers of petrified oil and dirt make using the torch a little adventurous. Thanks for the heads up on the rear...it will be next. For the front, the bumper kept everything in check.
I checked out your project. Nice work. It helps with morale to see that others are suffering along with me haha. Keep up the good fight.

[OneOffStroker]

Originally Posted by t-tung

I think boxing it is going to be a SOB with the way the frame tapers slightly from back to front and dips down a little. Then the bottom "rail" of the frame is wider in places. I think I'm just going to take a straight edge and a torch and square everything up as much as possible. Going back in with 1/4" diamond plate because I have half a sheet left over from a bumper project from my jeep.

If you know anyone with a CNC plasma or Waterjet, I will give you the CAD files that I just drew up for front boxing plates. Just load them into the machine and slice that sheet that you have. I'll be drawing rear plates with a 2" notch this week to cut out for my own project. I cut the fronts last weekend, and they fit like a glove. They are 40" long and go from the front of the radiator support bracket back to about where the trans crossmember used to be.

[t-tung]

Originally Posted by OneOffStroker

If you know anyone with a CNC plasma or Waterjet, I will give you the CAD files that I just drew up for front boxing plates. Just load them into the machine and slice that sheet that you have. I'll be drawing rear plates with a 2" notch this week to cut out for my own project. I cut the fronts last weekend, and they fit like a glove. They are 40" long and go from the front of the radiator support bracket back to about where the trans crossmember used to be.

That would be amazing. My buddy runs an oilfield machine shop. Let me see if he has either piece of equipment. I've already straightened up the area that dips for the front of the front crossmember but I could definitely make it work. It'll save me at LEAST 3 hours with cardboard and scissors

[t-tung]

Well my buddy has a waterjet and a CNC plasma. All it's going to cost me is a fishing trip this winter.
Oneoff: what did you do to the frame where the steering box was? I'm not exactly sure how to tackle flattening it out.

[t-tung]

On second thought, notching the ends, flattening it out and welding it back up wouldn't be too hard at all. I'm just not sure how your CAD drawing addressed it. Don't want to make more work for myself.

[OneOffStroker]

I haven't addressed the little flare for the steering box with the CAD drawing. I am just going to cut out the flare and weld in a flat piece. Seems like the easiest way, since I'm going to be there with the welder anyway.

Here are the plates that I cut for mine. The files are on my computer at work, but I'll grab them before the Thanksgiving holiday. I cut mine into two 20-inch pieces, because I had a metal remnant that was only 21" or so. I will redraw them as one piece and attach that as well. I will also do versions without the little semi-circle cutouts at the front. Those are access holes that I designed so that I can get to my sway bar mounting bolts.

After they are cut, you will still have to do some slight fine tuning with a grinder to dress the edges for welding, obviously.

BTW, if anyone else wants these .DXF files, I'll send them out. Heck, I think this site needs a sticky for open source shares of .DXF files.

[t-tung]

Originally Posted by OneOffStroker

I haven't addressed the little flare for the steering box with the CAD drawing. I am just going to cut out the flare and weld in a flat piece. Seems like the easiest way, since I'm going to be there with the welder anyway.

Here are the plates that I cut for mine. The files are on my computer at work, but I'll grab them before the Thanksgiving holiday. I cut mine into two 20-inch pieces, because I had a metal remnant that was only 21" or so. I will redraw them as one piece and attach that as well. I will also do versions without the little semi-circle cutouts at the front. Those are access holes that I designed so that I can get to my sway bar mounting bolts.

After they are cut, you will still have to do some slight fine tuning with a grinder to dress the edges for welding, obviously.

BTW, if anyone else wants these .DXF files, I'll send them out. Heck, I think this site needs a sticky for open source shares of .DXF files.

That's sweet. I appreciate it. One idea I had was leaving another 4" of metal on either end of the plate and bending them at a ~45* into the frame so that the boxing wouldn't come to an abrupt stop and it would give me a little more strength (in my mind). Not sure if this is a good idea or not. I'd have to cut access holes in the end to run brakes, fuel, wires etc but that is easy. I also plan on welding in a length of the 3/4" sch80 inside the bottom corner of the frame from the firewall back to the rear to run wires in and help strengthen the frame (somewhat) between the front and rear boxing. I had to buy a 21' joint and only needed 2' of it to sleeve the frame.

[OneOffStroker]

I attached a .zip that has 3 files in it. They are for the boxing plates. One file has the rear 20" section, and it actually has a mirrored image on it so it will make the plates for both sides. The other two files are for the front 20" section. These contain only one at a time, and one has no cutouts for sway bar mount access, the other one does. Cut 2 of whichever one you want for the front part, and then jam them into your frame for 40" worth of boxing plates!

Your buddy should have some sort of editor like Autodesk, MasterCam, Solid Works, or something and should be able to connect both parts together if you want one solid 40" piece or want cutouts somewhere else, or want to add extra to the ends for the 45-degree thing you were talking about. The possibilities are truly endless. Enjoy!

[t-tung]

Thanks OneOff. That's solid. Hoping to get it cut this week. Currently working on mocking up the rear end so I'll have a roller again. I sold the wheels so it was sitting on jack stands. Need to be able to roll it around to put the motor in....using an A-Frame and chain hoist in a caliche driveway to pull the motor out of the donor and roll the 57 under it. What rods did you use welding the plates in? The frame seems awfully soft.

[dubie]

What's the track width on that crown Vic front end?

[t-tung]

Originally Posted by dubie

What's the track width on that crown Vic front end?

62" I believe. I plan on running some high offset wheels designed for a ford mustang up from and some 0 or very low offset wheels in the rear because the 8.8 came out of an explorer and is only 58.5" if I remember correctly. The stock steel Crown vic wheels fit inside the fenders as is, the high offset mustang wheels should fit nicely.

The only tough part was situating the mounting holes on the frame. On the bottom of the driver's side, they are just round holes. This put the holes for the sleeves very tight to the outer edge of the frame. The passenger side had all elongated holes so I was able to center the sleeves in the frame.

[t-tung]

Well got a little work done this past weekend. Got the old rear suspension and axle cut out and the new one mocked up.

Just waiting on the rear shackle hangers and Jeep YJ shackles to come in. The pinion angle as is is a little high but I plan on correcting it with some shims. I also had to drill and weld up a couple of unforeseen cracks behind the front spring hangers.
In the meantime, I got one of my other toys sold to free up some $$$ and get some goodies ordered. Found a seat on ebay at a steal of a price. It turned out to be one of my few GOOD drunk ebay purchases. It already came in and is going to fit nicely.
Finally found some wheels with the correct staggered offset I needed and liked. Going with TSW Nurburgrings in the rear and these 18x7.5 in the front
Dropping the plate off this week to get cut so I can box the front end. Headed to Georgetown on Thursday to Texas Speed and Performance have them program my ECU and pick up some hardened pushrods, springs and longtube headers. I'm going to be running either of these two depending on which ones match up to my measurements the best. https://www.texas-speed.com/p-3410-t...evygmc-v8.aspx or https://www.texas-speed.com/p-4150-t...8-2wd-4wd.aspx I figure it's better to get the headers bolted on and fit the motor than to get motor mounts made and hope they make some that fit my one-off project. Here's the 228 cam I'll be running. Should be fun and sound pretty mean with some dumped Magnaflows. https://www.texas-speed.com/p-1148-t...-camshaft.aspx

[t-tung]

I ended up plating the side of the frame before welding the square tubing to the side. It's been a while since I've welded and those 7018s were a little finicky to get started and even harder to restart, hence the burnmarks on the spring-eye. I wire-wheeled the hell out of the frame before welding it all up.

Just noticed a mess up on the wheels above. Rears will be 20x10 Nurburgrings and those 18x7.5 in the front

[Kim57]

Looks good.
What's the seat out of?
Kim

[t-tung]

Thanks. 07 King Ranch F150 crew. Measures 55" at the shoulder. Bottom piece measures 54". The inside of the cab measures 57" from doorjam to doorjam even with the bottom of the rear window. Just have to figure out mounting brackets. I'm thinking about mounting the battery under the passenger seat to keep the engine bay as clutter-free as possible incase I want to run the stock AC unit out of the Tahoe.

[t-tung]

Not much to report. Have been busy with the holidays and some family stuff. On top of that i the weather hasnt been cooperating much. I did have a few minutes to test fit the wheels and tires. It looks like theyre going to fit nicely.

[Kim57]

Those should look real sharp when you're finished.
Kim

[yossarian19]

Did you finish installing the Crown Vic stuff or is that just mocked up?
Looks real good - I'm scheming about doing the crown vic / explorer setup myself. Excited to see how yours turns out!

[t-tung]

Originally Posted by yossarian19

Did you finish installing the Crown Vic stuff or is that just mocked up?
Looks real good - I'm scheming about doing the crown vic / explorer setup myself. Excited to see how yours turns out!

It's about 90% done. I'm waiting on the bushings to come in for the trailing arms so I can make the brackets for them. In the mean time I have to get the frame boxed in. I'm just curious how much it's going to sit when I get the motor and tranny in

[yossarian19]

Me, too. Ride height & load handling are my big hesitations about IFS, though they are probably overblown.

[t-tung]

Well slowly but surely it's coming along. Got the rear end completely bolted up, rear of the frame boxed-in and braced. I removed some crossmembers and replaced them with some sch80 tubing further rearward to make room for a tank under the bed if i want to run dual tanks down the road. For now, I'm going to run a 19 gallon aluminum tank from RCI in the bed with an inline pump.

Got the control/trailing arm bushing in but they're the wrong ones. :headbang: Anyways, got the front-end boxed from the firewall forward. If I'm thinking about this right, there shouldn't be much if any torque from the motor up front since it will be bolted directly to the Ford crossmember instead of the framerails......which should eliminate the twisting effect (torque and twisting will still show where the transmission bolts to the crossmember & frame and at the rear springs.... I could be wrong though) Speaking of which, I went out on a limb and ordered these conversion mounts from Dirty Dingo out of AZ.

http://dirtydingo.com/store/product_...oducts_id=1375
4.6 is what came out of the crossmember donor. That's what they're made for, I'm just not using them in a M*stang though. Dimensions should be the same but you never know.....(see issue with control arm bushings) We'll cross that road when we get there.

Went ahead, bit the bullet, saved myself the cussing and high blood-pressure and ordered a plug-n-play harness and brakelight switch from PSI and I'm already glad I did. The guys were awesome to talk to..... answered all of my questions, made suggestions of what I may need but weren't pushy at all about it.... just really good guys to talk to.

Got the harness in the mail today, opened it up and felt pretty confident I could do this....especially after I flipped through the INSTRUCTIONS (yeah I know...who does that?) Everything is explained really well and everything is plainly labeled. Looking forward to getting the motor and trans out of the donor and bolted in.



Oh yeah, a little harware p*rn for y'all.... picked up some longtube headers from Texas Speed & Performance in Georgetown. Hopefully they play nicely with the motor mounts I ordered from Dirty Dingo. I'm hopeful because the mounts are tucked in close to the block and go straight down instead of outward to the framerails

[Kim57]

Nice looking parts.
I got my harness from PSI also. Seems to b real good quality. Wish I was to the point of installation.
Kim

[t-tung]

Thanks. It's always dark when we get done working so the pics don't come out to good of the progress. I'll try to get some today of the boxing and everything we've done

[t-tung]

Originally Posted by yossarian19

Me, too. Ride height & load handling are my big hesitations about IFS, though they are probably overblown.

Got the motor in. Dirty Dingo conversion mounts bolted up beautifully. Only problem is they set the motor about 3 1/2-4" too far forward. I could have swapped sides and moved the motor back ~2" but I'd have to get rid of my A/C because the mounts would hit the A/C bracket. I'm dabbing another mount to go between the aluminum pillar and the original ford motor mount to move everything back 2 1/2". Steering was doable where it sits now, but was going to be very tight. Also, I'd probably have to run a pusher fan which I'm not fond of. I've got pics I'll post this evening.

The truck didn't squat much at all with the motor and trans. From the bottom of the frame to the ground, with a 29" tire, I've got right at 15" of clearance.