1980 F150 4x4 Flareside Project

[Gary Lewis]

Wow, Cory, that looks excellent!  You are moving right along.  

[ArdWrknTrk]

'least you have a couple of copper plated clamps for welding that up.

It looks like you took good measurements and your sheet metal guy made what you asked.
That panel should be good as new when you are done!  

[Rembrant]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

'least you have a couple of copper plated clamps for welding that up.

It looks like you took good measurements and your sheet metal guy made what you asked.
That panel should be good as new when you are done!  

I actually don't have any copper plates, but was going to look for some today. I do have some aluminum plates 3/8" thick....

Ha! on the measurements! I first cut the rusty lip off, then laid the new piece of top of the panel so I could scribe my line on there. I then went all along my line, and drilled 1/16" holes on my cut line every couple of inches, so it gave me a pretty good guide.

I bought this same panel new from Mar-K for the other truck, but I was ordering a bunch of stuff at the same time...and this truck I'm trying to keep under some kind of budget. That panel is $277 USD new, so about $360 CDN, plus shipping and tax it would be a $500 item for me, so it was worth trying to fix the old one.

[Rembrant]

By the way, I'm ordering a fuel tank and sending unit today, and I remembered that I actually have a brand new set of fuel tank straps here from the 1985 F150 that I junked a couple years ago. Problem is, the straps I have are for a 19 gal side tank, and the ones I need are for the 16 gal tank.

Would I be crazy to modify the 19 gal straps to fit the 16 gal tank? I know new straps are only under $20 bucks, but still...I have these new ones here I'd like to repurpose (and I have my 1984 to measure for correct length). Should be no big deal to lengthen and/or shorten them where required, ya?

[Gary Lewis]

I think shortening is easily done.  Lengthening might be more difficult.  

I'd go for it were I you.

[1986F150Six]

Wonderful work, Cory. You are very talented!

[Rembrant]

Gary Lewis wrote

I think shortening is easily done.  Lengthening might be more difficult.  

I'd go for it were I you.

Right?
Gary I can see you rolling your eyes...I've welded the frame together, the body, the bed, and everything else and now I'm concerned about a couple gas tank straps?...LOL. Get 'er done the man says, and carry on!!

[Rembrant]

1986F150Six wrote

Wonderful work, Cory. You are very talented!

Thanks David, but I think it's less about talent and more about necessity!!

As part of my offshore survival training, I've learned a lot about the Oil Rig "Piper Alpha" that burned/sank in the North Sea 30 or so years ago. The few men that survived jumped off the side of the rig...90 ft to the water, in the pitch black night, 120 miles from land. I was watching an old interview, and a reporter was asking one of the guys how he summoned the courage to jump. He looked at her kind of funny, and in his thick Scottish accent said that it wasn't all that hard to find the courage when the whole rig was on fire...lol.

This poor old truck, if I don't weld it all back together, it will never get finished by me or anybody else, so we need to figure out how to do these things!!

[ArdWrknTrk]

I meant the threads on your clamps won't get all mungged up with spatter.

I do have a few bits of 1/4, 1/2" copper and a collection of washers that I use, for heat sinks and free from welding over when all that matters is that there is steel there.

[Rembrant]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

I meant the threads on your clamps won't get all mungged up with spatter.

Ahh, OK, gotcha. I borrowed the clamps from work, I'm going to need them for my stake pockets this weekend as I weld them on the box sides. They sometimes have to clamped in about 6 places to keep everything square.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Well, I hope your weekend goes according to plan.  

You'll have another truck when you're done with this Covid project.
You can keep it, or you can flip it and find another one.

[Rembrant]

ArdWrknTrk wrote

Well, I hope your weekend goes according to plan.  

You'll have another truck when you're done with this Covid project.
You can keep it, or you can flip it and find another one.

Funny you should mention that...lol.

On a whim I put an ad up on the other truck a couple days ago, looking to see if there were any interesting "bucket list" trades out there. The truck is not for sale...but if something interesting were to show up, I'd be interested. I don't really need two Flaresides...

[Rembrant]

I worked on building the new bed for the old ‘80 all weekend. It’s starting to shape up! So many hours. 5am until 8pm yesterday, and another 8+ hrs today lol. I love it, but it’s still crazy.

[Gary Lewis]

That really looks good, Cory!  Those welds of the rolled edges are great.  Well done!  

[ArdWrknTrk]

Did you end up just tacking a piece of tubing to the bed rails?

It's sure a lot of work, but it's looking great!  

[ArdWrknTrk]

I think my old garage had the same colour floor paint.
In about the same condition!  


Home sweet home.  😊

[FuzzFace2]

Nice job on the bed

You going to seam seal the lower bed extensions to the main walls to stop rust like they like to do?
When I patched mine I welded and filled in the split so it would not rust again. Beside the fenders cover most of the area so you can see it anyway.

Also not having the "wheel well" on the bed sides how much clearance will toy have between tire and wall? At least you wont have to fuss with the wood.

Cutting out the squares for the stake pockets or leaving them covered?
Dave ----

[Rembrant]

Gary,

That little Lincoln welder works so nicely anybody could lay a nice bead with it. It sure is a treat to work with.

Jim,
Yes I used 1.5” structural tubing (0.060” wall thickness). It worked great because the bed walls are 16ga (0.060”?) and together they make an excellent copy of the factory curl. I had made a test piece originally and up against the bed wall end to end they were perfect.

Garage floor paint haha. Ya know, I painted it for several years in this Zodiac Grey floor enamel, but the motorcycles were hard on it between the hot tires and sliding kickstands. Not to mention the trolley jacks and axle stands, etc. I gave up after a while. If I build another garage I’d likely just leave the floor bare concrete.

Dave,

Not cutting the stake pockets square holes out, no. I don’t need them and they’re not easy to replicate so I just didn’t bother.

I have a set of fender tubs for it, but I don’t think I’ll bother with them. Don’t really need them anyway, and they’re a lot of work to install. They’ll be for sale soon.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Cory,  if you decide to 'go nude' I'm going to suggest applying sodium silicate as a hardener/curing agent/sealant/dust reducer.

It's cheap (as a generic crystal to be dissolved) effective, and actually synergistic with the curing cement.

Epoxy floor coatings are downright dangerous. And by the time you get enough chips that they aren't you would have been better off just painting.
Except.....

[Rembrant]

Jim,

Understood. You can see the cracks in the floor also...they've been there for 30 years and the concrete guys say that they all crack at some point. My wife wants me to do an epoxy coating or one of those, but in my own experience, its best done when the floor is brand new, not after 30 years of oil and brake fluid spills, cracks, etc. I totally get the coatings IF the garage is for parking only. My garage(s) have always been for working, so they see trolley jacks and axle stands, and dragging transmissions, etc across the floor.

I'm thinking of building a detached garage...nothing huge (24x24). I have room for it on the property, but currently no access. A friend of mine in the area that has a few excavators is going to put a driveway in for me this year and get an area ready for a floor pad (which in all likelihood won't get poured until at least 2022).

My current attached garage is small and a bit frustrating to work in sometimes (better than no garage, I know). When the house was built in 1990, they put the laundry room/bathroom stall IN the garage...so it is sort of an L-shape. It's fine, but the one side of my truck is almost always hard up against the wall. Of course there's always 500 other things piled out there (Bit of an ongoing issue between me and the Mrs...lol. The garage is the one room in the house I have even a tiny bit of control over, and it still ends up being filled with junk all the time). I'm losing the use of the big shop/warehouse where I work....which is fine, but myself and my coworkers have always had use of the space. We all keep our winter/summer tires stored at work (and some of us, things like truck parts, etc...lol). I'll soon be dragging all of this stuff home....and I think I have no room now.