47-55.1 Interior firewall brace

[51 3600]

Long ago I removed everything from under my dash and now can't remember the purpose of these two braces other than acting as stiffeners. Would someone clarify what other purpose these two braces serve. They have holes top and bottom for a reason I suspect. I may have to remove a bottom portion of the left brace to attach my accelerator pedal assembly and I'd rather know what I'm cutting off before I do it. Thanks for the help.

[joedoh]

just stiffeners. the holes are probably for the jig that held them in position

[duramax55]

51 3600 i would only remove part of the bottom for carpet and accelerator pedal, The upper portion would be handy to run self taping screws in to secure something without going through fire wall.

[mr48chev]

Looking at the 51 Cab and the 49 cab I have sitting on the trailer out back the braces are quite a bit different between the years. Blue being the 49.

[51 3600]

Thanks all for clearing that up for me. If I remove any of the stiffener at all it will be just a small section of the bottom. Good idea to keep it for fastening other items without piercing the firewall.

[whitedog76]

My best guess is that they help stiffen the firewall so the fenderwell/rad support braces don't buckle it.

[mr48chev]

The fire walls need every bit of reinforcement that they can get

The 47 / Early (at least) 49 firewall was flat with no ribs stamped in it.


51 at least as I don't have images of a 50 or late 49 had stamped ribs in the firewall. This being a 53 cab.

[MiraclePieCo]

I removed them from mine. They were in the way of everything. I never noticed any difference. I did add 16 gauge to my firewall however. Here you can see the holes where I drilled out the spot welds that held them.

[youngrodder]

I used mine as an attachment point for my a horizonal support that I attached the fuse panel to. I used nutserts to bolt the horizontal brace to. The other wns attached to the hinge bolts.

Thanks
Marc