Barn Find Restomod Build

Pretty Sad. Haven't had a chance to work on the Bronco for some time - November of last year...Yikes!!!! So I started up again, at least things I can mostly do inside since it's hot now. Designed the dash, picked up a nice blank from BC and went to town. Drilled all the holes using a drill press and 4 different sized hole saws. Measure 5 times, then test with paper cut outs, measure again, used a compass to mock up, and a center punch on each gauge hole to line up the pilot drill. Finished off the holes with a grinding bit to get rid of the rough edges. Utilizing Autometer Pro-Comp Ultra lites for gauges and Vintage Air A/C louvers. Autometer is non-consistent. Their 5 inch speedo and tach need a 4 5/8 hole, while their 2 5/8 Oil/Water/Volt needs a 2 5/8 hole. Some of their paperwork was wrong on the sizes. The fuel gauges need 2 1/16. I checked everything with a micrometer first. Speedo is a GPS type unit with an engine run time as well. Now I don't have to worry about gearing for the speedometer based on the 5 speed, transfer case, and tire size. They're 5 inches because I'm old and need glasses to see anything. Fuel gauges are programmable so that should help dial in the BC 23 tank and the 12 aux tank. Louvers required a 2 1/2 inch hole. Their trim ring is polished aluminum, but I'll be media blasting them to a matte finish to match the Autometer trim. All the gauges will have their lamps swapped out for LEDs.

Switches are on order from Otrattw.net. Going with the Contura 14's with white on white leds. Paper marks the 6 under the oil/water/volts switch location. There's 2 under the louver to the left of the fuel gauges to run the pump and switch tanks. Under the louvers in the center will be the 4 knob control for the BC vintage air system.

It will have a push button start under the oil gauge. And, of course, I still need to drill the holes for the turn signal lights, bright light, and brake warning light. 2 will go above each 5 inch gauge.

Yes there are some problems with this set up. The left center louver is very close to the defrost input for the dash, but I'm modifying the louver and the defrost to fit. The Louvers on the ends will be more than 1/2 way behind the roll cage, but the distance from the face of the dash to the roll cage should allow enough room to have the rotation direct the air past them. BC's blank has the offset for the glove box.

Good to see you back at it, dash looks great.

Dale

Loving the dash layout

Wow, that dash is sharp. I always preferred the original style, but that looks great! I could convert to that.

Finished glass beading the A/C louvers to match the matte finish of the gauges. Came out just like I hoped, and i was able to use my homemade blasting cabinet outlined in another post! Will coat them with a special clear to protect the finish. I may still glass bead the column cover, but I'm not sure yet what I want to do with it so for now, it's still polished. Painless indicator lights showed up so I added the holes to the dash for those too.

Dash and gauges looks super!

Picked the hottest Aug 15th on record to spend 4 hours working on the Bronco. Picked up a small section of 4" OD 16 ga exhaust pipe, and re-purposed the round metal pieces from dashboard cutouts for the tach and speedo, and made these "cups" to hold the Aero gas caps. They're going to be recessed (Frenched) since they're flat and the quarter panel is curved. Will need to cut new holes for the main and aux tank, weld these in so the cap is flush and cut/grind off the excess. Also also spent the day marking and drilling the holes for the Warflairs. I want to mount the Frenched caps without notching the flairs. Thanks to Nick's Tricks and Hozr for the idea.

Beautiful build AZ73! You are truly an inspiration. At least the 115 degrees yesterday didn't soar to 122. I spent the day preparing little items for installation (rear wheel seals etc.) then scampering into the garage for a few minutes to install. If you're going to work on your Bronco in Arizona during the summer, make sure your dental records are available for identification of your remains.

Yeah, Murray, it was HOT. I started earlier in the day and my Bronco Garage was shady in the front and tolerable, but didn't give up until my neighbor drove by and said, uh, it's hot out here. Then I grabbed my welding mask, solar powered so I had it charging in the sun, and it was too hot to touch. On the plus side, the cutouts from my BC dash for the oil and temp gauges are the perfect size to fill in the old gas filler hole in the rear quarter so they'll be re-purposed for that. I was hoping I could JUST use the original holes closest to the flairs as part of the new holes, but I have to move the aux opening over about a 2 inches so the old hole will have to be filled. I think I can still use the main tank hole as part of the new one. Ran out of argon/CO2 so no more work on it this weekend.

Crap, time flies. Weather's nice and work is not as demanding so I'm back out. Stitch welded in the old gas filler holes with the handy disks cut from the dash, and ground flush. Looks like I'll have to touch it up when I put the cups in, but I didn't want to warp the metal. Measured and temporarily put on the Warflairs as I don't want to cut them to fit the new holes. The self tapping screws came in handy to make the holes for the future button head bolts. Taped paper 4 inch round disks on the outside to measure and line up the new fill holes up and fit the old filler tubes in to check. The rear one fits fine (although I'll probably make some custom ones) but the front is tight with the space that holds the old emissions tank. I like the location on the outside so I'll have to modify the inside space. Hopefully I can just cut a little material off. Worst case I'll have to fabricate a "bump" in the inside. Cut out the new 4 inch holes. Test fit the the "cups" I made to hold the new gas caps. It's tight in front but I might be able to make a custom filler tube and just bend little metal. Another day for that. Pop the caps in to see what it looks like. Will weld them in, trim flush, and drill the 6 hole for the cap screws.

Hey man loving the dash layout. I was wondering why you don't center the three gauges in the middle by switching the oil gauge with the air vent. Air vent, gauge, gauge, gauge, air vent?

Thanks. I played with that and it was an option, but in the end I decided keeping a closer eye on the gauges was more important than uniformity of aesthetics. It's not in the picture, but just below the oil gauge will be the push button start and a light which will indicate power on but engine not running. And the vintage air 4 knob control under the 2 center vents (mocked up here with paper) looked funny to me with one gauge and one vent above it. Boils down to personal preference. The gauges and the vents are ever so slightly different in size, but I would be happy to switch them and take another picture so you can judge for yourself.

I would switch them to that is a sweet dash

No it's fine and makes more sense after hearing more will be added.

Here's the digital versions of both.

I would switch the dash to be symmetrical. That will draw more criticism as it pulls the eyes to what is odd. I understand your reasoning but you are talking 3" in a vehicle that is less than 6' wide interior wise. I fought the same dilemma with mine and when visiting Super Cel year after year, I always noticed the odd, uneven dashes vs the symmetrical ones. Just a personal observation.


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englewoodcowboy said:

I would switch the dash to be symmetrical. That will draw more criticism as it pulls the eyes to what is odd. I understand your reasoning but you are talking 3" in a vehicle that is less than 6' wide interior wise. I fought the same dilemma with mine and when visiting Super Cel year after year, I always noticed the odd, uneven dashes vs the symmetrical ones. Just a personal observation.


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Thanks. I'm spending WAY too much time on a home rebuild and NOT enough time on the Bronco. When I install the rest of the switches and the A/C knobs I'll take another look at both set-ups and make the final call. Fortunately even though they're SLIGHTLY different size holes, they swap easy so whatever I decide, IF I ever sell, the new owner can change them pretty easy if they like.

Jesus, it's been a year! Well the heat died down, I finished the home rebuild, and got a business up and running so I have some free time to work on it. Finished most of the metal work although I'll need to modify a space right in front of the left rear tire so the fuel line can fit. Welded in the cups for the aero gas caps, cut the rear fenders to fit the new warflairs. Shaped the beads welded to the front of the left fender and both sides of the grill to get rid of the huge gaps between them (poor "factory" stamping job from the repo parts). This has to be done with a hand file to make its square and perfect. A grinding wheel with a sanding disk is tougher to control. You can see in the one pix I had to add about 1/4 inch. I'm satisfied with the gap now. Will cut the front fenders for the warflairs tomorrow (and put the pieces in the for sale section for those who like to graft to the back). Then flip the tub to finish up some minor work on the bottom before KBing it. Also swapped out the extreme motor mounts. I had to heavily modify them (cut and re-weld) so they'd fit the block and pan, and just wasn't happy with the results so I decided to go with standard mounts instead. Even those has to have notching cut in them. That meant re-leveling the block before tightening the mounts down.

Holidays are over and I'm back at it. Was working on it most of January trying to see if I could finish for the Stampede, but I don't know.....Work that pays the bills just keeps getting in the way. Spent a significant amount of time trying to work out a dual tank set-up for the EFI. A mid-90's Ford automatic dual tank switch (pump pressure from the tank sets it) looked promising since it was automatic, but it turned out the seals were rubber and degrade with ethanol. Decided on a Pollack electric switch designed for a GM I believe but what a nightmare. It's mounting point is at a 45 degree to the fuel lines, and it's huge. And it has a limit of 45 psi while the Holley sniper requires 60. After playing for days on where to put it I decided the best place was just in front of the rear brake bracket on the frame. Then came the problem of how to mount it. I finally just built a bracket/stone guard which will mount to the frame. The switch will slide up into it and mount to the bracket.

Body work sucks. It's not my favorite thing to do and I'm not a master at it so I have to take my time and just keep sanding, checking for low spots, and sanding again. PO had smashed the PS door handle in on a tree or something, and it looked like they smacked a shovel in front of the mirror. After working the metal as smooth as I could get it, layered on some Metal 2 metal first as it'll have to take some pressure, then finished with some Rage gold. Factory sheet metal has a lot of flaws, especially at the edges. DS door is low as it approaches the edges (circles). DS mirror was smashed in from a tree of something too. Worked the metal, metal 2 metal, then Rage Gold. It needs a little more work. Inside the doors looked like a woodpecker had gone to work. I'm assuming it was the seat belt getting jammed when they closed the door, but I can't explain the front edge of the inside door. I worked the filler back to take care of the spot welds too. Rear quarter needed some minor smoothing where I put in the gas recesses. The area just behind the door is another factory low spot, and the tail light housing wasn't perfectly lined up with the quarter panel. It had a tap to the rear bumper sometime in it's life which put a nice line dent under the tail light. I also welded in the holes for the reflector there as the new bumper will cover that spot. I haven't even started the other side, but it doesn't look too bad.