Coco's Mods: Recessed fuel cap & filler neck, P. 14

[66horse]

Sweet. Nice work dusty. I really dig the way it continues the cage look. Makes me reconsider my plan to switch from floor shifter to column shifter.

Cheers,
Reno

 

[66Bronco]

Very nice Dusty! It's looks great and very functional.

-Terry

 

[BanditBronco]

I dig your skills and DIY fab processes, nice to see someone still building stuff by hand even though you are surrounded by lazer cut plate all day!

 

[matt w]

Yes that is just great! Being a former machinist I love the whole custom fab work!;D

 

[SSDDBRONCO]

Dude 805 is bomb ass beer!! I lived in the 805 and would get them from Costco. But now i live in the 909 area and no dang 805 beer in those Costco's lol. Also awesome center console!

 

[GrillMaster]

How many beers did that take you to finish? . Looks bitchen! Great work! Am I going to see it in person at Calico? Bringing a batch of hardcore cider.

 

[Dusty]

I dig your skills and DIY fab processes, nice to see someone still building stuff by hand even though you are surrounded by lazer cut plate all day!

Thanks! Actually if you look close, my skills aren't really all that great. I'm no Jesse James LOL. And there are many Broncos on here that are a thousand percent prettier than mine. But I'm proud that I have very few "bolt on" mods. I make my living selling bolt-on parts for Jeeps, so I can't knock it. But there's a lot of satisfaction in building something yourself with your own two hands.

Looking back I think there used to be a lot more of this kind of DIY fab here on classicbroncos. I think as the Early Bronco has become more and more of a collector item than what people use to actually wheel, this site has become more and more weighted toward people doing stock restorations, period-correct builds, resto-mods and such. In short, the Big Money has become more influential in EB's, where those of us who just like to wheel, like to tinker, and would rather throw time and elbow grease at it rather than money, are fading. That's why I've been doing a lot of WIP photos and explanations of procedures in this thread. I think if some of the new blood see it and get inspired, that's a good thing.

Dude 805 is bomb ass beer!! I lived in the 805 and would get them from Costco. But now i live in the 909 area and no dang 805 beer in those Costco's lol. Also awesome center console!

Check BevMo, I think that's where I got it. There's a mixed 12-pack from Firestone-Walker that has 805 in it, along with DBA (one of my old stand-by favorites, which I home brew a clone of) and a few others.

How many beers did that take you to finish? .

Hey Kirk its all about quality not quantity

Looks bitchen! Great work! Am I going to see it in person at Calico? Bringing a batch of hardcore cider.

I'd like to make it out there. Last year when we went I was in the middle of a bad episode of back problems but I'm feeling a lot better these days so if we make it I should be more into it than I was last year. I'm thinking of making a trip to the desert for New Years, we'll see how that goes.

 

[ntsqd]

Dusty, you really ought to drive up to Buellton & Paso and take whatever tours they have. While you're in Buellton check out Tilton Engineering and the motorcycle museum.

Was hoping to get the NV swapped in before Calico, but due to AA parts availability it's not looking good.

 

[Dusty]

Dusty, you really ought to drive up to Buellton & Paso and take whatever tours they have. While you're in Buellton check out Tilton Engineering and the motorcycle museum.

Was hoping to get the NV swapped in before Calico, but due to AA parts availability it's not looking good.

I toured the Paso brewery many years ago when it was SLO Brew but I haven't been to it since Firestone took it over. I'm sure its quite a bit larger now. I'm actually more interested in their barrel program in Buellton, and do look forward to stopping in there some time. Last time I was up that way they hadn't opened it up yet. We were returning from Pismo year before last.

 

[reynard101]

That center console looks terrible.

Just kidding, looks awesome.

 

[No Hay]

Looking back I think there used to be a lot more of this kind of DIY fab here on classicbroncos. I think as the Early Bronco has become more and more of a collector item than what people use to actually wheel, this site has become more and more weighted toward people doing stock restorations, period-correct builds, resto-mods and such. In short, the Big Money has become more influential in EB's, where those of us who just like to wheel, like to tinker, and would rather throw time and elbow grease at it rather than money, are fading. That's why I've been doing a lot of WIP photos and explanations of procedures in this thread. I think if some of the new blood see it and get inspired, that's a good thing.

Same thing with old Corvettes. I quickly learned after getting a driver, and joining the NCRS, I was in the wrong club! It's scary Big Money!

Keep inspiring.

 

[garberz]

.......I'd like to make it out there. Last year when we went I was in the middle of a bad episode of back problems but I'm feeling a lot better these days so if we make it I should be more into it than I was last year. I'm thinking of making a trip to the desert for New Years, we'll see how that goes.

I hope to see you two out there. Did you add that third seat to Coco yet?

 

[Dusty]

Coco's Mods: Center Console, P. 8

I hope to see you two out there. Did you add that third seat to Coco yet?

Why ya gotta be like that LOL...

 

[garberz]

Why ya gotta be like that LOL...

I do tend to twist the knife a bit, as I'm pulling it out.

 

[Dusty]

Thanks guys for the compliments on the console. Here's the start of another project I started on not long ago: Trail Doors.

I've always had the intention that Coco would never have a full top again, so I wanted to make a set of trail doors for it. These are basically a copy of what my brother Matt did on his Bronco a few years back, and a couple others have done similar ones. These Trail Doors are basically just a stock EB door, stripped down to its shell. I cut the window frames off of Coco's doors a while back, but just this summer started working on the rest of the project. Now that the center console is done, I'll get back to work on these this weekend. But here's a few photos of what I've done with them so far.

The cleanest Trail Doors have the door handles shaved, IMO. A few years ago my brother discovered that the AMC Gremlin exterior door handles made an excellent replacement, mounted to the inside of the door where its easy to reach from in or out of the Bronco. So I headed to the yards searching out Gremlins:



This beauty was at the first yard I went to, but one of the door handles had a broken latch on the inside, so I moved on to the next junkyard, where I discovered that not only do AMC Eagle wagons share the same door handle, but they have TWO pairs so you have spares or a bonus set for future projects or trade bait.





Getting them out is pretty simple. The latch rods disconnect the same way the EB's latch and lock rods do. Then simply remove two Torx screws and the handle pops out. Note that the Torx screws can be a pit of a pain to get to. I had a cheap ratcheting angle driver bit from Harbor Freight that worked great for this.



The other thing you need to make these work is a Lokar door latch cable kit. This is the most expensive part of the mod. Those of you handy with cables, cable clamps and pullies can probably piece a kit like this together a lot cheaper.



One of the things I really liked about Matt's Trail Doors that I wanted to emulate is that, once the window glass and all the internals are removed, the door shells are extremely light weight. You can save even more weight by removing the sheetmetal that the door panel had covered. This has a couple of other benefits too. It gives you better access to the inside of the door for working on the latches and cables, plus the finished door is now a huge storage receptacle for things like tow straps, extra coats, lunch, etc. Anyhow the trapezoid-shaped ridge that surrounded the door panel makes a great perimeter for the cutout, so I started by using the hole saw to punch a hole at each corner.



Connect-the-dots with a Sharpie, then go to work with your cut-off wheel.





Clean up the edges with a file and you now have a light weight half door with a huge door pocket

 

[Dusty]

The Gremlin door latch fits perfectly between the top of the interior ridge line and the top of the door. Use it to trace its own footprint, then measure and make the cut marks inboard. The same technique of drill-the-corners and connect-the-dots works here.





The handle assembly needs a small bracket to hold it in. I simply used the remnants from cutting the hole to fab this simple bracket to hold it to the door using the same Torx screws I removed at the junkyard.





The bracket needs to be tacked to the inside of the door to hold it in place. Install the handle into the hole, then the bracket on the backside, inside the door. Fair warning: its a bitch to get in there with the tip of a mig gun to tack that bracket in place. Having cut out the door's interior panel really helped for one side of it. For the other side, I could barely reach it with the mig gun through the window slot in the top of the door. But I got it done and cleaned up.



Looks pretty clean...



The door latch is easy to remove with 3 large screws, to attach the Lokar cable clevis to. The other end attaches easily to the actuator arm on the Gremlin door latch.





One tricky piece of geometry you have to work out is the placement of the pulley that comes in the cable kit. My first configuration simply attached it to the inside of the door panel, but its not at the optimal angle so I need to re-do it. I don't have any photos of that right now but I'll grab some when I re-do the pulley placement.

 

[Dusty]

Next job was to fill the window slot. I used a piece of sheet metal that I had sheared to the correct width by the guys at the metal supply store. Had to do a little fitting around the remnants of the window frame.









That's it for now. I'll get some photos of it all ground down and smoothed this weekend when I get back to work on the doors.

 

[Dlish]

My christmas present to myself was a used pair of doors for the same thing. That door handle idea is epic, they look similar to older jeep door handles too, but you did grab the other handles right? What you want for them?

 

[INPHOBIC]

Dang those were good looking doors too! We don't have anything that looks that clean here. Even the junk yard cars are rusted out.

One thing that might make welding that easier is to bend another 90 where it meets the door. Then drill a couple of holes to "spot weld" the metal. No need to get behind it then.

 

[Dusty]

My christmas present to myself was a used pair of doors for the same thing. That door handle idea is epic, they look similar to older jeep door handles too, but you did grab the other handles right? What you want for them?

I'm keeping them for my other Bronco. Sorry! BTW you might be right about them being similar or the same as Jeep door handles, as these are from the same era when AMC owned Jeep. I doubt you'll find many Jeeps in the yards but I'm sure there's no shortage of AMC Gremlins, Pacers and Eagles to grab door handles from.

Dang those were good looking doors too! We don't have anything that looks that clean here. Even the junk yard cars are rusted out.

One thing that might make welding that easier is to bend another 90 where it meets the door. Then drill a couple of holes to "spot weld" the metal. No need to get behind it then.

I realized that after I made the bracket and decided to just roll with it as-is on this one. I'll probably do as you suggest when I do the other door.

Yeah I have a small collection of doors I've been gathering over the years. They don't get too rusted out, out here.