55 make over

[dsraven]

I would assume the lighting requirements would be a provincial or state jurisdictional law. I always like to opt for whatever gets me seen better by other drivers. Then the cool factor after that.

[nvrsatisfied]

Originally Posted by slammed57

great fab work. all lookin REAL good!

thanks. your setup is coming along nicely also

[Kevin_C]

Any updates on this build?

[nvrsatisfied]

welllllllll i guess here are some up dates, long over due. so I'll try and keep in order. and yes we are still chipping away at it but feel like the down hill slide is going.

since we raised the fenders as high as we could, it in returned raised the step. i lengthened the step which means the step bracket needed to be lengthened. once those were done i then added some length to fender(s). when said and done the truck will do a 20" in the front and a 22" in the rear. i'm trying to be able to run a good tire on it since we have such lovely paved roads in oklahoma

[nvrsatisfied]

we got her mocked up and ready to get some sun on it and see how good she'll sit. not looking to bad! overall about 9" of lift, so it should still have decent ground clearance..

[nvrsatisfied]

next she was moved into the booth for the first layer of high build primer....TAMCO HP-5311 DTM is what we like to use. it blocks off easy and is easy to show the low spots. i think with setup we did two stages of primer on everything, using a combination of Big Kid blocks, Linear and basic foam blocks until we get it to hash out as nice and flat as we can.

[nvrsatisfied]

and then it was ready for color. the base color is Tropical Glitz "Abyss Black". this is one of the blackest blacks you can get, no browns or blues are used. Colt went in and applied 3 layers of it to give it a good dark cover. then 7 coats of Tropical Glitz "Lucious Green" was applied to give us the green tint we were looking for. the Green is basically a candy coat. the lesser you apply the more black it'll look in our case, the more you apply the greener the truck looks. i think we nailed the color, you have to see it in person to really see how this thing flops through a variety of greens and black! i wanted to break up the amount of green so i wanted a two tone of gray applied to the back of the cab, we also did the visor and engine bay in the gray (Nissan Precision Gray).

[nvrsatisfied]

what you see here is a clear laid with NO CUT AND POLISH PROCESS YET. i forgot to mention we use TAMCO clear HC-4100 Glamour Clear. overall truck has roughly 4-5 coats of clear. this clear does settle thick which i like cause we can knock it down and still have great coverage and depth.

so then the real fun started. once the clear cures out a little we get into more blocking. the entire truck is gone over in this process...wet block sanded in 600grt, 800, 1000, 1200, 1500, 2000. then is trizacted using wet 3000, 5000, 8000. once that process is finished out the tedious t process of polishing comes in. is it over kill, i'm sure it is, but it looks damn good when we're done.

[nvrsatisfied]

next move was into the engine bay. the ol Lt1 was yanked and our freshly overhauled 5.3 was put in. so with the motor in the Holley Terminator X harness was dropped in. the one thing i can't stand is wires, it's just my OCD thing, so wanted to build some basic covers i thought that would be simple and not over cover the motor like a few i see on the market.

[nvrsatisfied]

once those done we shot the gray on them. also to make things pretty we went with the CVF LSXM-WRAPTOR mid dressup kit. its a tight fit for sure with the electric fan so we'll see. also installed a Champion radiator CC5559-LS

[nvrsatisfied]

next up was the electric fan cover that was sent. i'm not b!tching, cause i get it that things are made and out the door, but some times modding everything to fit gets kinda old..lol. but the cover was about and 1/8" off from being "squared" and making able to drop on. so i took some 1/4" tape and went around the opening to help fit. once that was cut it dropped in but made a tapered gap across the top i didn't like. so i made a trim piece to help hide that taper.

then the intake tube was the next "fun" part. i will say the big intake opening and pipe look cool but once it came to fitting it the way i wanted those dreams were dashed, so i took another route...lol. the original idea was a 90 down over the alternator and build a ram air box around the breather but it was going to look to clumpy. so i decided the best way to get fresh/cool air was out of the engine bay. long story short the breather will be in/under the fender with a ram air box i'll build around it..

[nvrsatisfied]

next up and making more work for myself, i did not like the way the radiator and overflow canisters looked. so i made some covers to kinda dress up the area and allow for some of the gray to wrap on around the engine bay to help tie it all in. these have a push button latch to open and close and are hinged off my radiator cover piece.

[nvrsatisfied]

painted and going on...this is pretty much the look i was going for was just seeing motor only and not over done with beauty panels. as for the A/C i did hardlines that go down and come up inside the fender well. they run high along the fender with a cover panel i built to help shield them from road use.

[nvrsatisfied]

after and during that was the LOOOOONG and tedious process of wiring things up. pretty much boring to talk about i'm sure but air ride, running all the Holley and overall wire setup has been a chore. since I've located the battery to the rear it makes for a little extra work i was not really anticipating on as much..lol BUT, originally when the first shop ran their main harness, it was ran just wide open and NO loom what so ever over it. even under the driver fender was just open wire. now just about 98% is covered in loom and has been corrected. i have ran a power distribution up front to help shorten some of the runs that need battery power up front.

[Kevin_C]

You have really turned that truck around. It looked like a nice truck until you dug into it. I'm glad you could turn it around for the customer. Great Job!

Mine goes for wiring next month while my new garage is being built.

[youngrodder]

There are a ton of hours/labor in that paint and body work. It all looks really good.

Marc

[6DoF]

hot damn!

[nvrsatisfied]

Originally Posted by Kevin_C

You have really turned that truck around. It looked like a nice truck until you dug into it. I'm glad you could turn it around for the customer. Great Job!

Mine goes for wiring next month while my new garage is being built.

thanks! and yes originally the truck looked great, but it was the classic ol' make up on the pig. as for your wiring and i'm not knocking whoever is doing your work but when you get it back take a bit of time to look things over. i have overhauled the worse and the best a few times. I've doubled checked and have caught some of mine own mistakes. nothing worse than a pinched wire and then the worse happens. congrats on getting a shop put up, i'm spoiled and my boys are to with mine.

[nvrsatisfied]

Originally Posted by youngrodder

There are a ton of hours/labor in that paint and body work. It all looks really good.

Marc

thanks! and man you said it! but its the part we try and strive the most on and we learn something new on each job. a little more time on metal and bodywork goes a long way in the end. on a side note the belair we did bodywork and paint on just before this project, over the last weekend won a best belair award at a local car show in Colorado. he just decided to put it in the local show for fun. so that was cool to hear.

[nvrsatisfied]

next up is what I've tinkered with the last few days. with the new seats being a little wider than the old ones we loss the console and a quest for cup holders has taken. i'm not sure if i like what i came up with till we get it in paint. basically just a beauty panel i bead rolled the edge to help gimmic the rolled edge of the exsiting lower dash section. then a small welded support to bolt the housing down to. the cup holder comes as a whole unit from https://watsons-streetworks.com/ they have a variety of holders that i'll find handy for other builds down the road i'm sure. this one is spring loaded, press the center and it folds out on its own, easy push back in. I'll be making a cover plate for the front of it.

[nvrsatisfied]

i will admit its not very deep, but a can, bottle water will hold no problems. i'd be a little iffy about a basic 12oz/16oz tumbler, i'll test that during a drive and taking corners. defiantly no Sonic Route 44 for us okies...

the other fix was the section under the glove box. they had a piece welded to the glove box, that matched the lower section. problem was, is when you went to open the glove box, that lower section hit the AC housing, causing it open only about 2"...pointless i thought. the tricky part is that when these glove boxes open they drop so far down. my first attempt was a push button magnet to drop my filler piece. that was scrubbed because the door dropped down to far and hit the magnet. so i filtered through some ideas and came up a bracket that is rounded. that bracket is welded to the bottom of the glove box, it then touches the back of my filler panel pushing it outward. i then have a small tab that attaches to the bottom of the glove box and slightly extends pass my filler piece. once you open the glove the small tab tips the filler plat backwards, the filler plate falls backwards out the way and is caught by the back bracket. when you shut the glove box the back bracket pushes the filler piece back into spot. stupid simple works sometimes. (i can't get the pics to rotate correctly to here, so turn your heads..)

[nvrsatisfied]

left out yesterday with fitting the Holley harness through the floor pan under the seat. the Holley housing will sit on the hump partially under the seat, i figure it can sit there and not under the seat just in case the electric seat comes back to far. the seats are nicer than what was in there for sure, they are a little wider so we had to ex nae the console. which sucks cause it held the amp and 8" down fire sub, so now i have to build something for all of that. the seats are out of a Volks Wagon, not sure what VW model. I've got them wired to a relay and fused and all powered up. from their lowest setting they can raise up about 6" from there, they also power back/forward and power tilt. even have little fold down compartments under/front of them. they make a nice fit for me and my buddy (owner), we're similar in size roughly 6'1 250lbs..

our seats were done by Ashley Wright from https://distinctcustoms-439263.square.site/ the guy does amazing work and he also does engraving that looks amazing. give a follow on instagram also; distinct.customs