COE Salvaging a 38 Ford COE

here is the reshaped cowl with the fender on.

Before...


After...

I think it looks better now....



Making a patch for the left side now.

Here is just a flat piece with a few lines drawn where it will be trimmed and where I need to tip the metal to form the arch. You see two different arch lines drawn on the panel. This is needed to form the 3-dimensional curve.



Next I use the tipping dies of my bead roller to start the edge of the curves. I tipped from the back side for the upper arch ( which is the actual arch that follows the fender) and then I tip the front side from my ZERO mark to 3/8 down from the upper line.



I still need to wheel more shape into the piece so it matches the contours of the side cowl.





Next phase is front fender restoration. Not going to easy considering the condition of them.

I started restoration of the right front fender. The first thing I needed to do was make a new mounting flange for the fender. It was too rusted away to hold the fenders shape and hold the fender on.

Here is the start of the new heavy gauge flange.



After making the whole flange, I tacked it to the fender and bolted it on the truck.
Then I worked out the big lumps and bumps, plugged the step pad screw holes, and got it shaped the best I could with what I have to work with.

Here it is shaped and mounted.



Next, i marked out where I wanted to make new patch sections. I decided to make two new pieces to repair the damaged area. The metal was just too thin from previous repairs to save.

Here is my layout for the two new pieces.



the first step is to make paper templates of the patch panels.

The first paper template. Just fold the paper over to get it to the shape of the panel.



Same thing with the lower patch panel.



Then transfer your paper templates to your metal. Here I am using cold rolled 19ga.





Then cut out your pieces leaving a little extra metal around the edges.



Now get ready to start shaping....

I started by beating the panel on my stump to get some shape.



I like using the carved out stump to shape metal because I can stretch and shrink very fast with it.



The first round of shaping involved the stump and Ewheel. Now I test my progress on the fender.

Here is the first panel after the first round of metal shaping.



It's not bad, I still need to raise the middle more to get the panel to fit without clamps.





Next, I will start to shape the second lower panel...

The start of the second panel.






And after the first round of metal shaping.






Not bad considering that this piece has a lot of shape in it.
Now for round two....

 

Impressive fabrication work and a very cool truck, the 50 dash matches the style perfect. Keep posting

 

Concave stump is more useful than a leather bag!
I built a solid bench, and used a 3/4" thick conveyor belt rubber 'pad', 12" X 24", for rough shaping. Got used to doing it that way, 20 years or so.

I'm gonna grind out my wooden stump now. Ingenious, Tony! Thanks for all the pointers.
This project thread has been more useful than a weekend cl***room!

 

Any updates, I can't get enough of these threads?

 

Awesome work!

 

I got the first patch panel fully shaped now and welded in. I still need to planish the weld some more, but I want to get the second patch panel in first.







More to come.

 

I got the second piece fully formed.



Trimmed and tacked in. Also repairing the headlamp mount area.







I still have a lot more work metal finishing the new panels, but I want to make a new patch panel at the running board area of the fender. Get it shaped and welded in, then metal finish the whole fender after all welding is done.

 

Unreal, man. I have been too busy to be on the hamb much lately, and this is the first thread that pops up. I just successfully put off working for another 45 minutes. Too cool.

 

Great work - I love this build.
One question, though - on that right front fender patch I see you welded it and then rolled the wheel radius after. How did you roll the edge? Or did you weld on a tube? I need to radius some 38 Ford fenders and was wondering how to roll it... Thanks, and keep it going!

 

Great work, looks awesome!

 

Thanks,enjoying this.

 

awesome work, really coming along nicely

 

Working on pancaking the roof about 1.75". M***ive amount of trial and error to get the look I envisioned. I really never cared for the high crown roofs these COE's have. I'm going for the leaner look of the 1938 pickup truck roof.






The side view is the worse part with the roof being too vertical over the doors. I will taper these to get the look of the pickup.






It's going to take some time to get this roof all back together, so bare with me while I progress with it.

 

You are a brave man.....Looks like a good plan. I hope you take some photos that show how you get those sides to line up with the roof line.

 

I've enjoyed this post. Your work looks first rate.

 

Wow. Absolutely incredible.

 

Getting the right side roof back together. I'm pleased with the new profile.





What I didn't want my chopped top to look like.

 

So I see you did it but how did you do it? Did you pull,push,bend or hammer that piece over or did you have to make some relief cuts to persuade it? I agree with you the pancake looks much better. Thanks for taking us along for the ride!

 

I just reshaped the flap that was there. I pushed to roll it down more, then used a ******* and dolly to blend the curve into the roof panel. Trimmed off excess so I could **** weld the seam. The corners were sliced at 45 degrees to aid in the tapering of the side to the front/rear. Once I had it tacked together, I used the dolley and ******* some more to get the blending just right. The right side is now ready to gas weld, but I will get the left side fitted before I weld it up.

 

Thanks for the explanation Tony!

 

Very nice Tony .

 

The truck is going to be too cool! Fantastic work!

 

Amazing metalshaping! So I ***ume you'll have to tweak the doors to get them to lean in and follow the new contour of the windshield posts?

Steve

 

After looking for a 1938-1939 Ford Cabover driver door for the last 18 months with no luck, I decided to build one. This is the last thing I wanted to do because of the amount of time it would take. The best choice for a donor is a 1939 Ford pickup door. Since I have a 1938 Ford pickup door, I'll use this. It is the second and only other choice for a donor. Yes the '38 and '39 doors are different as you will see later on.

The first thing I needed to do was make a template/pattern off the good p***enger COE door I have. Once I had the pattern, I traced it on the pickup door and trimmed off the excess metal.

And since the pickup door is about 2" too short and damaged already, I've decided to wheel out a whole new COE door skin.



The first major obstacle I started to tackle is the lower door hinge. The lower hinge of the pickup door is a complete reverse of the Cabover door. My cab has the COE hinge halves, so I only need to make the door side hinge halves. The lower hinge on the pickup cab jamb side will work for the lower hinge on the COE door. Simple fix. Next I needed to make a lower hinge mount on the door.

Here I cut a notch on the door's hat channel on the hinge side. I cut out the whole hinge side to fix this. Then welded in a 1/4" plate to mount the lower hinge.


Here you can see the new lower hinge mounted and where I removed the old upper hinge.


In order to test my new lower hinge I needed to mount the door to the cab. Before I could do this, I needed to cut off the window frame since I chopped the top.


I mounted the door. The new lower hinge location is spot on and the body lines all align perfectly. But now you can clearly see that the pickup door is too short at the bottom.


Normally I would start making the upper hinge, but I can't right now. I had to send off my oxygen regulator to get rebuilt. In the meantime, I will fabricate the arch to close off the cutout for the front wheel. I also bought the lower inner door patch from Northern Cl***ics to help me add the needed 2".

For the arch cutout, I brake formed a 2" x 4" x 30" angle out of 19ga. Then I started to stretch the 2" leg with a hammer and english wheel until I had the correct radius of the wheel arch cutout.



Then I flanged the 2" leg of the arch.


Just so you know where I'm going with this, here is a picture of the right door's arch panel. I am make this piece for the pickup door.


After a few more hours of metal shaping, I ended up with this arch panel.




To be continued...

 

Thanks for sharing another interesting sub project of your excellent build.

 

Simply amazing!

 

Wow!!! I just read this thread cover to cover. I'm spent.

Awesome job of transforming ****py old steel into your vision. And let me say, your vision is 20/20.

 

"I really never cared for the high crown roofs ...", so I just went and changed it. That right there is true hot rodding!, thank you.






The side view is the worse part with the roof being too vertical over the doors. I will taper these to get the look of the pickup.






It's going to take some time to get this roof all back together, so bare with me while I progress with it.[/QUOTE]

 

I'm on board! Beautiful work. I'd love to go to a metal meet one day.


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Amazing metal work and great inspiration for someone who is trying to learn. Thanks and subscribed for updates.