Plan for spring is fenderless, maybe no hood. Long term fenders, and no hood sides just a 1 pc hood top leaving sides open. Obviously with cab wider a stock hood wouldn't fit anyways so it will be custom built. Thats part of the project using the skills I do already have, and push myself in other ways and acquire new skills. Like I said before I really do plan to drive this thing, rain, shine, to work, grocery store, etc. I don't and won't have a ton of money in it nor will it be a show car, nice yes, but if it gets a rock chip it will be a battle scar to be proud of. The fuel injection thing I learned to love from my GMC Typhoon world. This will be different though as I want to hide the FI inside the carbs so nobody can tell, yet the truck should purr like a kitten, start up and get 25+ mpg. Thats my goal, looks of the old, engine of the old with just a touch of my own adaption nobody else has done that I know of.
Sounds cool man, I'm interested to see how you rig up that fuel injection. Maybe you should get a grille shell and mock it up as your mocking the cab position, just so the heights and lines will match up when you do put a hood on there. There's nothing worse looking than a hood that looks like its going uphill or downhill in relation to the shell. knowwhatimeanman
Well progress still being made even though I have not updated this lately. My dad spent last weekend out here and him and I were able to put 4 days into the truck. We worked almost the full time on the body widening/lengthening. I knew it was a lot of work for just 3" more room inside but long term it will be worth it. It was good to be able to spend those 4 days with my dad. I also was never 100% happy with the seat I did before. I sat on it for awhile but came to a few ideas I wanted to change. My dad and I came up with the plan and over the last 2 days I built a new seat bottom. I think the "tuck/roll" in the center gives it a much more hot rod flavor, as well as a few seam changes I did. Being new to sewing I learned a few things in regard to what order to sew everything and making sure the panels all line up. Not 100% perfect job but I am still very happy because it was built and not bought.
Worked on seat a bit more, they started as basically s10 seats. (92 GMC Typhoon) I was looking to cut them down to a low back, to my surprise the cutting down part was VERY easy. There is actually a top bow, 4 welds to cut off and bam, low back seat. Now the trick is developing a pattern from scratch -vs- the lower I was able to mostly copy. I think its coming out well so far, very happy even with a few "mistakes" in it as I go.
Here's mine, Started with rusty (not as bad as yours) cab and doors '34 frame - removed cobbled corvair front and 55 chev rear 4" chop, 3" cab setback, 3" channel, bed shortened 3" front,13"rear dropped axle front, 57 f-100 rear, f-100 brakes all around, f-100 steering. This will be a fenderless car (don't have 'em, don't want 'em) with temporary, inexpensive SBC/T-350 awaiting Y-block???? someday. I have tried to build on a tight budget with the idea of keeping it as simple as possible. The H.A.M.B. has been a tremendous help for me. Thanks everyone. p.s. the middle seat from a chrysler mini-van works perfect in these cabs.
Oops. I think that I may have inadvertantly tried to hijack this thread. I don't do a lot of posting, so I sincerely apologize for doing this. I'll mind my p's & q's in the future. Sorry.
Still here even though the project hasn't moved as fast as I hoped (what project does) I am still moving forward and plan to drive it this year, and a big road trip next year. This weekend I had some time to work on the truck and figured I would try to get the cab a bit more robust. With the top off, and all the chopping, etc I have done it has been a bit flimsy. Made some good progress on extending the floor bracing 3" in both direction, adding a small trans tunnel hump, and the big part was remaking the rear cab section, now 3" wider than stock and not all cut up and rusted out.
I made it, being I have widened the cab 3" nothing off the shelf would fit anyways, plus I like to stretch my skills in order to progress them at the same time. If you look close it isn't an exact copy (can't be with 3" wider cab now). But the indent spacing is not the same, reason is I have the "horrible freight must rework in order to work at all" bead roller. The throat depth is 18" so getting to the middle of the panel is not so easy. Obviously I am not building a 100 pt stock show car so being exact wasn't a huge priority to me, along with it will be hidden behind the bed anyways. Had a couple minor mistakes but overall it turned out well. It was nice to see also with that panel being put in, the cab now has almost twice as much steel on it. GRIN
I sure hope it does, being 6'4" doesn't help. With my plan to actually drive this thing a LOT added in the mix. In the end I want the extra 3" to not be visible otherwise I would have done more. My goal is that it blends in and 99% of people never notice. That being said its a lot of work. The 3" stretch will be through the doors, so trying to hone my skills for when I work on the doors. I suspect they will be 90% new metal when I am done.
The Jalopy Journal
