How to gain 3 inches in an afternoon

[Ackattack]

Get your minds out of the gutters, I'm talking about tubbing the rear.

So basically I'm going to be running 315/35/20s on the back of my pickup. Guess what, they won't fit with the stock wheel wells. So I set out to tub the wheel wells. The idea here is to add some extra width while maintaining the stock look. Hopefully you won't be able to tell unless you know exactly what you are looking for. Here is my progress.

I first started by removing the wheel well. Of course the square holes didn't hold the bolts to prevent them from spinning, I cut a slot in them to hold them with a screwdriver, and that didn't work, so I cut the heads off of most of them. The two in the corner next to the fenders, I tack welded them and just took off the nut.

Then I drew out the plan on the floor with a sharpie and then taped up some lines to cut along.



The cross hatched area is the area to be removed.

I had to do a little drilling and prying to get the floor off of the cross members that they're spot welded too. So here's what it looks like after being cut out:



I cleaned up the cross members a little and sprayed a little spray paint in there while I had access to it.

Then I cut out some sections of my parts truck bed. To fill in the missing space.



After some cutting and grinding and a little bit of trial fitting, I got to tack welding all of the pieces in.



Overall, this will gain me about 3 1/4 inches of extra tire space. I may also try modifying the the piece in the wheel well that connects the inner fender with the outer fender so I can really set the tires at the edge of the wheel well.

For the wheel well themselves, I'm going to get new wheel wells and then splice in a section of the original wheel well (the originals are banged up a little.

[Spray-Bomb]

Sweet, I need to do this on my truck & Im only running 295's

[1971c20]

looks good

[c10crazy]

Originally Posted by Spray-Bomb

Sweet, I need to do this on my truck & Im only running 295's

Really??? I thought 295's were easy to fit?. What backspace are you running?

Ackattack- nice work!

[Riveted1]

Nice work. I have a feeling this mod will be in my future.... geez I'm psychic!

[big_al_71]

the will and desire take over,,, I also see my self doing this in the near future.

Good Job!!

[Big Block]

Very nice work.

[Ackattack]

A little more progress tonight:

First I cut the wheel well in half and bolted them in place.



Then I took my old wheel well and figured out what section of it I'd need to use, and cut that out. Then I slid it in place, and marked and cut it to fit in between the two halves of the "new" wheel well. Then started welding in the mid section. It was mis-aligned ever so slightly, so I had to make a few relief cuts to the everything to line up the way I wanted it to.



Then I took out it out so I can finish up the welding (another day). I snapped a pic next to the stock one just for comparison.

[bad6772]

Looks killer........Great job........

[d10s69c10]

looks very nice. Im sure final product. will be 10 fold.

.02 might want to remove paint before you finish up the welds.

[Andy4639]

Cool mod. I have also thought about this. My tires rub just so slightly on the inside of the wheel well. Only when I hit a real bad pot hole though. Cool idea though.

[Frizzle Fry]

Looking good man. Here are those pics we talked about at the meet:

[FRENCHBLUE72]

Yep I had to do that too... Looks good though..

[GREASEMONKEY72]

i like it

[Ackattack]

Originally Posted by Frizzle Fry

Looking good man. Here are those pics we talked about at the meet:

Thanks for the pics, I tried searching for them, but couldn't find them.

[68 short step]

great mod

[VA72C10]

Looks great...makes me want to go a little "meatier" in the rear

[2nd_wnd]

not trying to be a butt. Wouldnt it be simplier to just cut the two different tubs in the loactions to make one tub 3 inches wider? That way there is only one seam to weld.

not trying to offend you

[70short]

2 sets of wheel wells is how I did mine. However I will have A wood floor when complete. I elected to go 6" wider. You never know what I want to stuff under there in the future.

[Ackattack]

Originally Posted by 2nd_wnd

not trying to be a butt. Wouldnt it be simplier to just cut the two different tubs in the loactions to make one tub 3 inches wider? That way there is only one seam to weld.

not trying to offend you

You could do that, but in my case I don't think the bolt holes in the wheel wells would line up with the holes in the floor. (Not that they couldn't be re-drilled)

Also, my old wheel wells were dented up pretty good, so this worked out best for me.

[big_al_71]

They look great, I am wating to see those meats stuffed under there!!!

[67dragtruck]

Nice work. I'm just about to dig into my first fleetside so I'm not very familiar with that inner piece yet. I'm much more familiar with the stepsides. Great work.

Tom

[QKENUF4U]

kinda like mine with 33x18.5x15 on steel rallys w/ 10" bs

[QKENUF4U]

big fat tires...........

[grayw0lf]

Nice work!