Projects Rusty 47 Ford Reserection

Well I have been stalling so long about starting this thread I have about a year and a half worth of pics to post to get up to date. This began as a low buck beater that I could enjoy year round if I wanted to , that the ol lady could take anywhere and get it fixed if it broke , and my budjet is around $3000. Thus the S10 chassis planned for it, because I dont have the 3 grand or so to build a nice original chassis for it, I have other projects to spend money on their orig frames . I paid $400 for the car which had been pretty well picked clean by the previous owner , it has been sitting outside since 1980 ...so please dont tell me I ruined it by the use of the S10 frame, as I get caught up with the pics you will see how the original intention kinda veers off coarse ( haha bet that never happened to you eh!) now lets get on with some pics!

 

Heres where I started, in an unheated shop for the first winter dont need heat to cut and weld steel and theres more than enough rust to keep me busy for a while...you can see in the pics above the pass side rear fender had fallen off the car due to lottsa rust. Figured I might as sell patch up the front clip before I pulled it off.

 

Heres where I started, in an unheated shop for the first winter dont need heat to cut and weld steel and theres more than enough rust to keep me busy for a while...you can see in the pics above the pass side rear fender had fallen off the car due to lottsa rust. Figured I might as sell patch up the front clip before I pulled it off.

 

And the drivers side...last body job it had ( only one lol) they just filled any rot holes with lead...and there were a few pop rivet patches over the non existant rocker panels.

 

The front splash pan was missing in action I got this rusty twisted to shit one and after too many hours had it bolted on the front clip, notice the mint grill !

 

With all the rust repair ahead I figured I should do a little customizing , then the front clip could come off for a while

 

The original center part of the floor is remarkably solid for something from around here...but the last owner took all the carpets out which helped alot I am sure, of coarse he left them in the trunk which had no back window so there wasnt much left of the trunk floor.

 

I stole 416Ford's idea for rocker panel repair that he used to fix his 46 more door , by using some 2x4 1/8th rect tubing, sure makes for a super strong body once it was all tied in.

 

I decided I wanted to be able to remove the rear fenders if need be so I began the oh so fun task of rebuilding the rotten quarter on the pass side.

 

Since I dont have any fancy metalworking tools I decided to repair in sections , usually I butt weld pretty well everything but decided to lap weld parts of these, with the 18 gauge it would have been easier to butt them...oh well there is always the other side to do!

 

With the quarter panel solid I could go back and make the running board / step area , I wanted it solid and welded to the body.

 

This work was from the winter of 09 ...I didnt work on it that summer but in the fall I got the donor S10 stripped down to the frame , spent a weekend grinding the ructy shit off it and the S10 body mounts and brought it to the Green Goblins to blast it then home to prime it, when I am done with the frame mods, mounts etc I will just have to spot blast the areas I worked on then it will be ready for paint. I made more than I paid for the S10 sellin parts off it, and I sold the orig Ford frame for 300 so at this point not counting welding supplies and steel I have $100 into it....

 

These pics are a bit out of sequence but I made a rear fender for the pass side outta 2 crappy ones and got it bolted up , did a bit of sandblasting and got some epoxy on the pass side, I also blasted the drivers side before I began to work on it.

 

Then later last fall I began to fix the drivers side.......usually I fix the worst side first...but I think I got fooled this time .

 

So I made up the" rocker " panel and started burning it in...

 

I also repaired the inner part of the cowl (same as the other side) and tied the rocker panel tubing into it and repaired the rot on the outside bottom of the cowl.

 

Now go cut the top off.

 

Drivers side running board...

 

Starting the quarter panel and dogleg area...

 

Had to make a new flange on the fender so I could mount it to the car again.

 

Man I thought my tudor body needed work. looks grat thoough. lol I bought e rear doors from a guy that cut up a cherry rust free body! I've since used those rear doors for patche panels. not many guys would puth this much effort into a forgor. congrats

 

Looking good Steve. If you are going to chop it I have a spare set of door tops and some extra garnish molding if you want them. If so shot me a PM.
Are you leaving off the drip rails? They look better on then off in my opion (Not worth $.02). I used HOTRODPRIMER's idea and installed a 3/8 rod on mine. The chop really messed up mine.

And I subscribed so I have motivation to finish up my buddies Galaxie and get mine done.

And thanks for the credit.(unless it turns out bad)

 

lol they turned out great so you can take all the credit you want ! Its gonna get chopped but there has been a bit of a change in plans , you will see it has the pics progress ....suffice to say I picked up the remains of a couple of really rusty parts cars ( yes rustier than the parts car I am fixing !!) That have veered me off coarse somewhat , thanks for the offer but I got lottsa spares for my evil plan bwa haha !!

 

Thanks this car was pretty much a piece of shit , ya all my friends think I am kinda wacky for putting this much effort into a more door but I toyed with the idea of putting 2 door sedan doors on it if I found some later on ... at least thats how I kept justifying it !

 

While I still got a bit of energy I figured I will add a few more pics.... lets start with the rotten dogleg and the bottom of the cowl drivers side.

 

Its all this work that people dont realize we do to these old cars that makes ya wonder how sane we really are eh ! Drivers side pretty well done.

 

These pics are kinda boring...managed to salvage the tailpan and had to rebuild about 75% of the rain gutter around the trunk opening...what a tedious job so I wont bore you with all the pics I took ok I will bore you guys but just a few of them

 

More of the trunk area and some door bottom work...one of the things that sucks about 4 doors is ya got two more shitty doors to fix!

 

I found a local guy who had a bunch of 46- 48 stuff that I could use and even more that I didnt need but I had to buy it all...when I was gettin ready to leave he told me to take the six nice original wheels he had and was never gonna use , no extra charge...I was able to sell them and made most of my money back that I spent ! This was during the first winter I had it 08-09

 

Heres a bit more work on the cowl it was kinda punky where the fender bolts on and I welded up the lousey factory seam at the top of the cowl.