Projects Scratch building a 26 Model T Pickup, everything starts with a buck !

The next task will be to take the templates and place them over the fresh sheet metal and cut them out.

This process will really be slow as I am making up two sets of bun panels at the same time.
In order to save time, I’m thinking of making them in several sections, if this idea sounds counter intuitive, it will certainly be quicker.

The amount of time I spent forming the upper flange which has two folds was more than was spent wheeling up the contour.

 

that part about 'inside the house'........

 

Nice work! I'm in the middle of one from fiberglass for my wife. The Tee on A frame is a natural design progression.

 

Hey Guys.

Another update is in order. Due to the difficulty in getting measurements for the turtle deck, I have resorted back to the original plan of building it as a roadster pickup.

The idea is to use the second cowl which is the better of the two cowls as the basis of the roadster pickup body and then sell off the completed body to
buy the remaining panels to complete the first one as a roadster.

Lucky I didn’t change the title, I have been lucky enough to get measurements for the bed from fellow Hamber Blake 27.

I now have measurements of the inside dimensions of the width and depth of the bed.

The game plan as it now stands is to complete the two sets of bun panels and four pairs of doors.

As much as I would like to use original doors, I don’t have the money to buy any at the moment, and the original ones I have are junk.

 

The door in the background is far more solid but unfortunately it’s a tourer door so it has the dog leg corner. Between the two I should have enough to make up the patterns for the new ones. But for now I will continue with construction of the bun panels.

 

Hey Guys.
A long overdue update. It’s been on the back burner for a couple of years, but I restarted earlier this year when I started making up some new doors.

 

I’ve done three so far, all with mixed results. I found the half round dies, gave the best profile but pulled in the material to the point where the door on the right was smaller than the original. To remedy the problem, I made a larger pattern for the door on the left and it ended up slightly over size, so a re-think was needed.

 

I went back to the drawing board and did a fresh pattern, this time rather than using the half round dies, I instead chose a pair of step dies to do the inside perimeter, which meant less distortion, I then used the half round dies to finish the profile. This seems to have solved the problem.

 

Since I have two cowls, I’ve decided to get rid of the second one, I will make up some doors skins and a roadster pickup cab section I can sell off with it as the cowl on its own isn’t worth much.
After removing the flaky rust with a wire brush that attaches to my angle grinder, I was left with this.

 

Both sides are damaged along the bottom, with the right side the worst. Here is how it looked when I first got it in 2017.

 

Here’s how it looks now.

 

My welding skills have improved dramatically since then. I used a compact $200 gasless Mig to add in the patch panel to the cowl. I use the same welder for all my repairs, proving you don’t need a top of the line TIG to weld thin sheet metal. This was the section before it was cut out.

 

Here is how it looks now, I choose to butt weld most of my panels, it’s more time consuming, but the advantage is that I can weld both sides. There is still a bit of welding to finish at either end, but once that is done, I will do the inside.

 

Making up the roadster pickup cab has proven to be a little more involved. Whenever old scrap sheet is being thrown out at work, I make a point of bringing it home. This is the test unit for the cab sides. It’s been made out of old shelving as the inside reveals.
View attachment 6516391

 

The other thing I repaired was the bun panel, this has been a particularly challenging process as I had to figure out how to recreate the bottom missing one and a half inch flange without an intact one to take a pattern from. This is how it looks now.

 

looks factory!(of course,neither of us has seen such)...