Bronco Project...July 2 - on the road again!

[taxx]

Well Barry and I spent the majority of the day today just cutting out years of layered crap, including a lot of flashing ??

Progress as of today is the floors are all cut out, both outer rockers and kickpanels are in. Here are some picks of the progress:

 

[taxx]

Here is where I am stumped. Its hard to tell from this pic, but this is the crossmember for under the feet part. The center section of it is too long and it doesn't mold to the floor right, so I guess I am gonna have to cut and weld. The really tricky part is getting the inner rockers tied into these crossmembers in the right place so that my sides are square and the doors line up. But is seems to be coming together fairly well. I'll post some more pics after I work on it some more sunday and hopefully atleast have the crossmembers in and it sitting on its own again.

Anyone else ever run into this cross member issue? And any tips on lining it up (I think I have it figured but help never hurts!??

 

[Flash69]

I had to cut mine to make it fit. I think they need to redo those. I ordered a second one and neither one would fit. They pretty much sucked.

 

[taxx]

Thats good to know. Cause I did think about ordering another

I think if I cut it at the bends on the center piece it will all weld up nicely. Did you have any problems getting everything to line back up? This is my first job dealing with major body work.

 

[taxx]

Just an update as for todays work. My budy Sam and John (trailpsycho from the boards here) came over today and we got a few things hashed out. Doesn't look like much progress but with dealing with that crossmember needing "encouragement" and the beer that needed drinking it took some time. I definately could not have gotten this hashed out without their help.

 

[MnkyBiz]

That looks GREAT!

Again....aren't Bronco Buddies the Bestest!

 

[taxx]

Trailpsycho and I made some good progress today. Crappy pics cause the wife took the good camera with her today to see the niece.

 

[Flash69]

That looks great. It wont be long now.

 

[Bronco Ben]

man that is awsome. I wished I had people near me that wanted to work!
keep it goin bro it wont be long now!
Ben

 

[taxx]

Ya I think that people are just setting me up for jobs on their toys :-*

I should get to spot welding things in place today, but not going to rush it.

 

[Bronco Ben]

taxx did you have any overlap at this seem or did it just butt up against the rear extension pan? Mine is looking like it is gonna be butt ended to the rear pan, Just making sure I havent or arent gonna screw something up?

thanks
Ben

 

[taxx]

My rear extension pan overlaps tht front one by like an inch maybe less. I'd have to go look at it. I can try and snap a pic of it better quality tomorrow. Hell I'll go do it now.... be back with a post in a few. ;D

 

[taxx]

here are two good pics that show those pans. The first is the floor pan from above. To the left on both is towards the rear of the truck. You can see how the pan that is under the seat on the pass side sits over the front portion of the pan. From underneath you can see how far back it goes for the overlap. Looks like about an inch total.

 

[taxx]

Todays progress is not as impressive. Didn't work real hard. Got the rockers lined up and screwed to the inner rockers and started welding the floor pans. The welds look MUCH better in person than in the pictures. As you can see in one of these pics I still have my intricate strapping system going on to line it all up. We spent some time (trailpsycho, sam and I) (well I watched) making some measurements to make sure the body was lined up. I believe it is. The cowl looks square, the door openings are the same top to bottom on both sides and we did a corner to corner measurement on the door opening top corners (pass side hinge post to drivers side stricker post and reverse) and the measurements are exactly the same so i am pretty confident it is all squared up.

Only thing I am not 100% on at this moment is making sure the rockers are at the proper angle. Meaning is the rear striker post up or down too far? Is the front hinge post up or down too far? My next step is tying the crossmembers into the inner rockers so once that is done it is all said and done and it will be sitting where it is going to sit. So I want to be 100% they are good to go but its hard to say.

 

[Bronco Ben]

taxx,
awsome work man. That thing will be back on the road quickly. thanks for the pictures of the pans as well. I took ya'lls advice and used self tapping screws to line up my front pans. Worked well. Only problem I had was my passenger side pan wasnt over lapped by an inch?? I musta made a mistake somewhere. I'll double check it and hopefully fix it tomorrow. the middle tunnel didnt quite move into place like I wanted but I believe everything else is ok.........more checking tomorrow after I get some more sheilding gas for my welder. thanks again
Ben

 

[taxx]

I have laid those all in there more than once. The screws are great. When it came time to lay the back pan saturday it took a while to line up. If anything else having more people there helps with the thinking. I get frustrated and only have a couple ideas then someone throws something else out and we put 2 and 2 together and get 5 and we are all set.

My only concern is nolike I posted above about making sure the front and rear of the door are where they need to be. I "think" it is right. I'll probably test fit my doors one more time but there has to be a way to measure it I would think.... I mean everything is lining up now and there can't be too many ways to line all this up.

But a note on those screws - c-clamps or a floorjack to put pressure on two pannels to start is a great help. And they are sharp and will drill through your gloves and into your skin if you let them too

 

[taxx]

I have an idea:

this should tell me if that opening is right shouldn't it? measure from top of one to bottom of other both ways and they should be the same?

 

[Bronco Ben]

mnkeybiz sent me this photo. see if its what you need! ;D


ohhhh man I found out where I'm off now, looking at my own picture I posted. For some reason I was thinking that the measurement from post to post was 39 1/2" in stead of the correct 39"!!!!

 

[MnkyBiz]

Yup,

Dat's the Holy Grail that got me through my resto! Thanks Blue71 & 2Badrotties!!!!

 

[taxx]

Ya I got that before I started cutting. its laying on my workbench as reference. I guess I should check all those measurements now that it is in and lined up. I didn't even think about the measurements on that sheet to the floor pans that will tell me if it is lined up! Thanks for the reminder. And yes that is the Holy Grail for this project!

I was using it for the width measurements but forgot about the others DOH!