1957 Chevy truck re-rebuild

[Kim57]

The seam came out nice.
Kim

[ChuckDriver]

Looks much better with the seam!!

[Stepside Jim]

Ahhh, some seam likers just like me. I understand the idea of smoothing lots of stuff on these old trucks, but for me, it's the '50's, body lines, bumps and bulges, were a big part of the character of these old vehicles.

Although I'm taking care of many of he odds and ends, I've still been taking pictures and since I've got pictures, I'll keep posting them.

The hood is gonna be clear coat black top and bottom, I wanted to find a way to paint it all at one time. The very front edge will have a touch of silver but otherwise glossy black.

It would be huge plus if I can paint all at one time, no extra taping, no overspray, ect. In this case I attached to the front hood latch then a spacer between the chain and hood so can prime between the hood and chain. I plan on making a hanging bracket for paint day.

Hood after sandblasting and cleaning.


I understand the troubles of warping sheet metal such as this hood. It does such a great job plus, the last paint job was also stripped to metal. Problem was, they used no metal etching primer, they used lacquer based primer, it comes off very easy. This makes the sandblasting process go real fast, by going fast, I can eliminate most of the heat caused by blasting.

Now with one good coat of epoxy primer. After this primer dries about an hour I got 2 coats feather fill applied. All done in one evening, great.


To help stabilize the hood I also ran fine wire from the lower edges of the hood to the legs of the engine hoist.

[Roadkill58]

Looking good.

And one more use for the cherry picker

[Baldeagle SR]

I just had to replace my hood due to sandblasting. I did find a good 57 hood for $100 . I thought was a good buy. I like the 57 hood better than the 55 anyway.
Rich

[Kim57]

That came out nice.
Kim

[_Ogre]

Originally Posted by Stepside Jim

I wanted to find a way to paint it all at one time.

i'm always amazed with your shop, one of my favorite shops

we paint a lot of stuff big and small on both sides by hanging everything with paint hooks
they are made of spring steel and very strong, we have 1000s around the shop of assorted sizes

you can hang a hood with 2 hooks going into bolt holes





in back of the bed you can see all the bed strips hanging from the ceiling



you'd probably have to buy 1000 at a time, but this site has free samples

ebay has 50- six inch hooks for $10

[Stepside Jim]

_Ogre, ahhhhh, I like those hooks. Gladyou like the shop, I don't remember letting it get this messy, I've been creating so much dust I refuse to clean it til I'm passed the heavy dust stage of the build.

Baldeagle SR, it's a learning curve, good thing you found another hood at a good price. I destroyed my first hood, it was for a Chevy Nova, that was back in the early 80's.

More pics tonight...

Sometime back in the early 80's this truck and a front clip installed. I've been told it was from an el-camino, I'd like to find numbers or something to identify it.

It looks like it's not the first one they've done, I like how they blended the frames together, and when my dad took it in for an alignment, it checked out ok and the shims in the alignment are only the midlle of adjustment.

My only issue is a cosmetic look to a couple areas, there's no time like the present to get at it.

My first area is to get rid of the 90 degree look at the end of the front frame.


Gotta love the sandblaster. I first cut the weld that attached the 90 to the front frame. The 90 came out about 3/16" beyond the frame and made a good weld zone. I want to get the 90 degree lower than the front frame and create a 1/8" gap. The gap is going to give me a great way to get deep penetration on the reweld.


More to follow.

[Stepside Jim]

Moving forward on the frame upgrade.... I got all the pieces cut and shaped how I wanted them. I allowed gaps to help weld get deep penetration also.

Here's the pieces. Since I allowed the gaps, I had to use a magnet to hold the top piece, otherwise it wanted to fall into the cavity below it.


Then came the welding. Where I showed the 90 degree piece and the gap that I cut into, I welded that gap first. Then went back over with another weld that covered the new tapered piece, then covered the gap weld, then to the frame. This attached all the pieces together when done.


Now the final clean up. I got the look I wanted. I wanted to get the new and old frame to at least blend together and not look so obvious that there had been work done.


Aaurgh, look at that rolled up edge from the original frame. I suspect that's where the original steering column passed by the top of the frame. That's the next thing to change.

[Kim57]

Looks good.
Kim

[Stepside Jim]

This is my first post with high speed internet. WOW, before I waited about 8 minutes to up load a picture, now..... about 20 seconds, this is great.

I mentioned the small flared section of the frame last post. Here's a close up.



I cut off the flare then beveled the edge, than made a matching piece.


Then the welding.


Looks much better and should be stronger also.

[Kim57]

Nice mod.
Kim

[_Ogre]

Originally Posted by Stepside Jim

This is my first post with high speed internet. WOW,

welcome to the 21st century stepside

[Stepside Jim]

Originally Posted by _Ogre

welcome to the 21st century stepside

Oh, this is great, I merely think about doing something, and it's done. I was talked into Verizon, of which we don't get Verizon cell phone service down here, the Verizon jet pack. It's nothing more than a device about the size of your mouse. It creates a WIFI hot spot where ever it is. They said it gets, or has a different technology to obtain a signal. It works great, very pleased.

I just up-loaded this pic, 10 seconds, wow. This means I'll have to move out of the Flintstone age and not use my feet to stop my truck now. Go Fred.....

It's a long story, but somehow the old bed took some bad turns along it's life time. Somethings I could see, somethings I decided to not see. Problem was, by not seeing (or ignoring), I wasn't facing reality to know this bed was not ever going to look as good as the rest of the truck.

So I turned to Mar-K products, through Classic parts company. New front panel, new sides, new rear cross sill and I already had the tailgate.

Once again, near perfect parts from Mar-K. The front panel was not Mar-K, it is nice but not quite the quality of Mar-K.

[Kim57]

Nice looking bed.
Kim

[Stepside Jim]

Thanks Kim, this new bed will save me alot of time and give me a better finished project.

The tough decision was saying good by to the some of the work I already did to the old bed.

I went a slightly different route on the end cap design. I also had to cut off the chain hooks off the new bed.






Before I welded it shut I gave it a protective coating of weldable primer. I was concerned about it holding water also. So I put a small drain hole to drain any moisture.

[_Ogre]

bed mods look good stepside
are you using hidden latches and folding tailgate supports?

[Stepside Jim]

Originally Posted by _Ogre

bed mods look good stepside
are you using hidden latches and folding tailgate supports?

You are correct, I only have a couple pics of the hidden latches so far.

I got these about 3 years ago, they are nice and they are stainless steel. However, I do see the ones advertised that when you open, or pull back the mechanism to open the tailgate, they can stay in the open position, those would be nice. In my case with these, you have to commit both hands every time to open or close. Both latches have to be operated at the same time.

What the latch looks like.


Once it's installed into the tail gate.

[Stepside Jim]

Finishing up on more of the end caps.

Just stitching along with the mig welder, I'm looking for both, fill and penetration.



Have I mentioned how much I like my 4 1/2" grinder along with flap disc grinding wheels.

[Russell Ashley]

You had some lovely tail light mods on the other bed. Are you going to duplicate that on this new bed?

[Kim57]

Looking good.
Kim

[Stepside Jim]

Originally Posted by Russell Ashley

You had some lovely tail light mods on the other bed. Are you going to duplicate that on this new bed?

Good question... The tail light modifications on the old bed made me have second thoughts on getting the new bed. When it came down to it, I removed the flap disc and installed a cut off wheel on the 4 1/2" grinder. Shortly after that I had the taillights cut off the old bed. The change over went pretty well.

Marked and cut the opening for the tail light.


Trim and fitting for the change over.


Finishing up the second side.


All welded up.


Sure it took some time to do the change over, but in the long run I'd still be messing with the old bed trying to straighten out some of the rough areas.

[Kim57]

It came out real nice.
Kim

[Stepside Jim]

Originally Posted by Kim57

It came out real nice.
Kim

Thanks Kim, you're very kind.

With so many different ways to direct a build on these trucks I decided to go for more of an aggressive/racy overall approach.

This means getting rid of the bench seat for some bucket seats. I wanted some that fit snug around my body without any extra seat. I opted for some from the Jegs catalog.


The toughest part was getting the height set right. This pic is close but I think I dropped them down just a bit after this picture was taken. What I did want was to use the original seat mounting holes. I already welded shut all the extra holes from previous installations before I got the truck.

[papastrk]

I like the one piece base for the two bucket seats. Make the mounting look cleaner to me. Very nice! Are you going to box any of the frame rail behind the rear lower control arm bracket?