TA_C10: Stage 1

[TA_C10]

Went to Home Depot the other day and picked up some wood to build a jig to hoist truck in the air with a cherry picker and while I was there I bought a couple more flap disks. When I got home I noticed a big difference between the harbor freight brand vs the diablo brand. I think the diablo's are going to last a little longer






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[TA_C10]

Cherry Picker Jig


I really needed to be able to lift the cab by myself and I found this new jig on the interwebs. My old one picked up the cab from the bottom of the cab. This wouldn't work to drop on frame. My new jig lifts the cab from the under side of the roof. The cherry picker simply jacks the arm up into the jig and lifts the cab.

Here is the jig:














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[TA_C10]

Jig works!


Time to bolt on the cab to frame and finish up the rest of metal work. Pillar support, rockers, cab corners, radio panel, inner roof header.


























I am loving the way its looking so far. It's pretty low with the 4.5 / 5.5 drop kit. This is the first time I am seeing it and I can't wait to see the rest of the truck together

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[TA_C10]

LS Engine Swap - LM7 5.3L


Well I don't think I need to worry about space, plenty of room to move the engine forward so my speed engineering headers will clear the clam shell mounts. Here are some pics of the clearance. I plan to move the engine to the front holes instead of the rear holes where it sits now.















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[Rickysnickers]

Nice work there Spanky!!!! I also like, what appear to be, homemade dollies under all wheels.

[TA_C10]

Originally Posted by Rickysnickers

Nice work there Spanky!!!! I also like, what appear to be, homemade dollies under all wheels.

Thanks man. Those dollies are from harbor freight actually and I modified them to hold jack stands so I could use them under my cab while I was working on it. Worked pretty good. You really have to home engineer sometimes when you have limited space to work and you don't have a team help out 👍

[TA_C10]

Originally Posted by 68Gold/white

A bunch of your pictures in post 65 did not show up...

Are you grinding the welds down with the flap wheel? or just using the flap wheel for final smoothing?

What welding technique has worked best for you? What heat setting has worked best for you? Welding rust is sooo much fun

Here you go!

The dials are at 5.5 arc volts and 45 wire speed.




A review on the Lotos 140 on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X08bq_qniY0


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[68Gold/white]

I have a Miller Mig welder. It runs on 110, bought it like 30 years ago, has little time on it. Not sure if they even make it anymore.

Posts 65 and 72 are fully populated with all picyures...LOL, I was looking through entire thread a little earlier.....some other posts are missing a few pics....nothing important.

I could not find info about your tires and wheels, sizes and brands...
GM put a similar wheel on their half ton pickups in the 80's. Looks real close, yours are obviously wider, I like them!!!

[TA_C10]

The rims and tires came with the truck when I bought it. I plan to use them for now.

Cooper Cobra - Radial G/T
P275/60R15





And I will go back and fix those pics too, thanks for the help
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[TA_C10]

Dash Repair Panel - Radio


So the PO cut out the radio panel to fit a modern single DIN radio, like many do.... And I like the original look with a modern radio setup. I plan to get one of the new radio's that look like original.

So here are some pics of my fix. I almost screwed up cutting out the new panel and how I cut the old panel. I was trying to be strategic so I wouldn't have to weld or grind on grooves or bends. Hard to do. I ended up figuring out that only the tabs were cut and so I just cut the tabs out of the new panel to fit the old but on the left side I didn't cut out enough and went through the left knob button with the cut like an idiot..... Don't know what I was thinking....


Here is the only pic I have of the old cutout radio.








And my new metal going in...















Tool depot I used to get this radio plate fixed.... Took a lot of time to go slow and make sure all the metal was grinded slowly and correct.





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[TA_C10]

More Dash Work - Ignition Hole

The PO also took a screwdriver or something and hammered under the bezel of the ignition I guess because he didn't know how to properly remove the ignition bezel.... So I filled it with metal and tried to straighten the hole best I could... Cut up with large gouges basically. Are there supposed to be 2 or 3 tabs in the ignition hole?




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[OL SKOOL]

Your welding looks really good now nice work on your cab. Next time on that radio/ignition panel you can get a patch panel. Most of the welds will be hidden a lot less work.

[TA_C10]

Originally Posted by OL SKOOL

Your welding looks really good now nice work on your cab. Next time on that radio/ignition panel you can get a patch panel. Most of the welds will be hidden a lot less work.

Yeah I bought the replacement panel and cut the tabs out. It's one of those things I was kicking myself after I cut it up...

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[OL SKOOL]

Glad to hear i'm not the only guy with those special moments. Keep up the good work.

[TA_C10]

Inner Cab Roof - Header Panel

Guys I need some help. Do you think I should put some seam sealer on the inside of the roof seam since I have access to it? Or should I just wait and only use the self leveling sealer on the outside and let it seep inside on its own? I was thinking I would use the caulk tube stuff on the inside, then use the self leveling on the outside of the rain gutter seam. What do you think?

So, I'm working on my header panel obviously It had some rust holes so I started to cut little pieces out first and ended up drilling all the spot welds and replacing a lot of the panel.


Check out all the glass from sandblasting! Came right through the seams in the rain gutters. That would have never came out had I not cut out the roof. I stuck the air nozzle way up in the roof and blew out everything I could. Glass came out of everywhere...











Here is what it looked like after I cut it out.











I used the old pieces to mock up the new panel to cut. Ground it down with flap wheel to size and got it ready to burn in. Took like 20 times of clamping up and taking down but I got it close enough. I may have to add a little sliver of metal in one place cuz I took too much out but we shall see. I also had to cut slivers all through the header panel to make it fit properly. It made it a lot easier to fit.
















I used the old panel again to size up the existing holes so when I spot weld them back in then will go over the same holes I cut out. This will help fill back in any metal I cut out re-strengthening the piece. That's the idea anyways. Hopefully I don't burn through the panel!!







Here it is holes drilled and almost ready to go.






I used Eastwood fast etch to spray all the old metal and rust down after wire wheeling it. I sprayed it way back inside the cab panel as well. I did a couple different coats to make sure it stayed wet. It stayed wet for quite a while so its working pretty good. It's already turning colors. I plan to let it sit overnight and then I will shoot it with Eastwood rust encapsulator and then burn in the new panel.












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[TA_C10]

Brown truck brought me a gift today. Got my PCM back today from being programmed for the LS.

I used LT1swap.com, Brendan over there works fast. I sent the PCM in and got it back in 7 days. That includes round trip shipping. I sent it out ground on my end. Very happy with his service.

I'm going to do the harness myself using his videos and documentation. I'm ready to get this engine fired up!

[Kronald_70GMC]

Very nice work. I'm liking how your tackling all the rust. I hope I'm as far as you with the cab soon. It will be nice to get a floor back under mine.

[TA_C10]

Passenger Side Rocker Replacement

Finally got to a rocker. Got it completely installed. Wasn't too bad. I ended up having to massage the rocker quite a bit but got it installed.


After installing the new pillar cap the front of the rocker didn't fit very well just like the driver side so I had to make relief cuts, massage it to fit, weld it back up.












Back side fit good but had some odd extra material on the door seal end. Had to grind that off.












Coated with weld thru primer and the holes drilled and spots ground down for welds.












Hung the door and tack welded it in. The door gaps looked pretty good without having to do anything. But I noticed it narrowed in towards the front so I will have to modify it a little. For now, its ready to burn in.










HALT!!!! I forgot something. Forgot to drill the holes through the support and floor and put 2 bolts in to hold the rear cab corner together....

Look what the replacement panels look like. They are off... The holes that I needed drilled were off the support tabs just barely. Not sure if this matters. I may weld some additional material to the tab later and redrill the hole so they are all connected like it was from factory.










Got one bolt in there for now and now back to welding in the rocker panel. I started with the top spot welds. Tacked in the edges, then finished them up. Then I moved down the rocker and completed all the spot welds.



















Here's the gaps. Not bad. But I ended up relief cutting the front edge to pull it out and add material. It was narrowed in under the door pretty far. Did the best I could...














Here you can really see the narrowing.
























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[Southpaw69]

Good progress sir. I've been following along and you're making it happen. Keep it up!

[Rickysnickers]

You are really getting good at your welding skills, considering you said early on that you weren't that great! I don't mean that sarcastically either.

[TA_C10]

Originally Posted by Southpaw69

Good progress sir. I've been following along and you're making it happen. Keep it up!

Originally Posted by Rickysnickers

You are really getting good at your welding skills, considering you said early on that you weren't that great! I don't mean that sarcastically either.

Thanks guys, its really been sucking all my time everyday but its been so worth it. I was lucky to have to some time off between jobs so i've been able to work on the truck a lot, learn a lot, and I am still motivated as I can't wait to see it done. I'm building my own daily driver and what a feeling it is to have a chance to do this... I really thank my family for being there to support and being so understanding, couldn't do this without them.

I think I have grown a lot with welding from all the experience i'm getting. I am really enjoying myself learning a new skill

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[TA_C10]

Update - Inner roof panel


Made a little progress today before super bowl. Started tacking in the inner roof panel. After using the eastwood fast etch I cleaned it up more and sprayed a couple coats of eastwood rust converter as well. Hope that stuff works. Sure seems to be a tough and durable coating over the weld thru primer I had been using. I got tired of that stuff it just rubbed off too easy for my taste.






Took a ton of magnets to hold this panel in but I decided to start by tacking in the top part of the panel first and then tuck it in and work the spot welds after. This was the best way I found to make it fit best and get it butted to the existing part of the panel straight and seamless. It worked good for me.







Started in the middle. I really liked the new panel and its rear-view mirror molding in the header so I used that to replace the original. The new piece was stronger and nice new holes pre-drilled. Let's just hope those holes match the rear view I buy My original appeared to be drilled a couple different times in different places so this was nice to replace.







So then I started working my way out on each side and down the panel towards the doors. I chose spots that were smallest gaps so it was easy to get a good starting tack weld without blow thru. I didn't exactly spend enough time grinding this panel very straight so your gonna see imperfections...








Like this area, I will have to cut a sliver to add to that gaping gap..








Then I started noticing that the relief cuts I made to form the panel properly actually made the underside of the panel accessible with a pick so I could pull or push the panel flush as I went along. I also realized that as I worked my way down the panel it worked to my advantage to tack the corners in quickly which helped the rest of the panel line up perfectly by holding it in from the start of the relief cuts.

Using all these magnets created enough force sometimes when needed to hold a stubborn panel flush so I could tack it.









Here it is pretty much tacked in and I started to work the spot welds. I started doing the spot welds from the ends first. I didn't think it mattered too much where I started here as the panel pretty much is clamped in and its not going to move so... We will see when I finish it up.








Here it is after the first set of tacks across the top. You can see all my corners of the relief cuts are tacked like I was saying earlier. It made it real easy to line up since I didn't have any access from the back side. I had to make sure it was lined up BEFORE I welded any further on each piece.

From LEFT to RIGHT:



















This is where I stopped for the day on this panel.





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[TA_C10]

Inner roof panel - continued:


Over the driver side door I found rust thru pin holes, both inside the cab and in the drip rail. So while I was working the front header panel I cut out and started making a replacement piece over the door.

I also decided to weld the drip rail over the old rot without cutting it out. It wasn't too bad just a couple spots. But I had enough access through the inside piece I cut out to stick my copper spoon/spatula through the hole cut out so I could have a backing while I welded up the rot in the drip rail. Hopefully that makes sense...

Here is the inner panel what I cut out. I used eastwood rust converter and sprayed all around inside the open panel.















Here is the making of the new panel. They don't make a replacement piece other than the whole roof skin(inner) so I decided to try my hand at metal fab. This was not easy to make the little zig zag in the metal to match the roof line and door seal plate. I think it turned out good enough. I used a hammer, my vise, a pair of pliers, and some time...









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[Scurry67]

Originally Posted by TA_C10

Dash Repair Panel - Radio


So the PO cut out the radio panel to fit a modern single DIN radio, like many do.... And I like the original look with a modern radio setup. I plan to get one of the new radio's that look like original.

So here are some pics of my fix. I almost screwed up cutting out the new panel and how I cut the old panel. I was trying to be strategic so I wouldn't have to weld or grind on grooves or bends. Hard to do. I ended up figuring out that only the tabs were cut and so I just cut the tabs out of the new panel to fit the old but on the left side I didn't cut out enough and went through the left knob button with the cut like an idiot..... Don't know what I was thinking....

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I was thinking the same thing for a radio. I actually recently purchased an original radio for the truck and plan on sending it in to get fm and aux. After reading this I went to see how it fit... Turns out I didn't realize the previous owner had modified the radio cut out... Good thing my parts cab has it. So I'll be grafting that in too

Awesome progress on the truck. The inner roof panel is looking good!

[TA_C10]

Originally Posted by Scurry67

I was thinking the same thing for a radio. I actually recently purchased an original radio for the truck and plan on sending it in to get fm and aux. After reading this I went to see how it fit... Turns out I didn't realize the previous owner had modified the radio cut out... Good thing my parts cab has it. So I'll be grafting that in too

Awesome progress on the truck. The inner roof panel is looking good!

Thanks man. And I didn't realize you could have an original radio modified like that. That's pretty cool. I was thinking about going with retrosound unit.


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