| Intro || Restoration - Before || Restoration - During || Restoration - After || Modifications || My Life || 440cid Swap || Painless Wiring Harness|| A-518 Overdrive Swap|

|Restoration - During|

REPLACING THE DRIVER'S SIDE FLOOR PAN

I purchased the replacement floor pan from JC Whitney online for around $40. It was a pretty close fit, but a bit too wide to just drop in and weld up.

I ended up having to trim off about 15% of the replacement pan, which only took a couple of minutes with snips and an angle-grinder. Once I had the pan shaped how I liked, I traced an outline onto the existing floor and then sanded everything down to get a strong weld. I didn't trim too much metal back from the floor because I didn't want such a small overlap of the joints. Since many areas of the floor were in good shape, I simply cut out the rusted parts and left the solid areas alone.

Here's a shot of the new pan welded in. I coated the seams in grey seam-sealer (both sides) to protect the new floor and carpet from any water intrusion. Some people use silicon, but it just doesn't hold up. If you have to replace a floor or panel, use seam-sealer... save the silicon/caulking for the bath-tub!

After the seam-sealer dried, I lightly sanded and wire-brushed the entire floor. When I was done, I wiped everything down with a little soap and water to remove the majority of the dirt and grim and then did a final "wash" with acetone. Now that the floor was perfectly "clean", I coated it with two coats of Duplicolor Truck Bed-liner. I've done this on 2 vehicles previously and loved the results. This time was no exception. The coating is only lightly textured since I put it on with a brush and should protect the floor from rusting. It also adds a small amount of sound-proofing; definitely needed in ANY old truck, especially an ol' Dodge!.

BODY WORK

Here is a before and after shot of some body work I did on the driver's side door. In 1990's fashion, instead of purchasing original (or near-original) mirrors to replace the ones on the truck, the owner thought it would be a better to drill 15 holes in the door. Anyway, I spent about an hour filling in the holes, using what I call the "well method". It's pretty easy, it just takes some practice. I'll add a page and go into more detail on this fix in the future.

The inside of the bed is in good shape. I'm going to scrape the old seam sealer off, put some fresh sealer on, then coat the entire bed in 3-4 layers of Duplicolor's Bed Liner. I'm looking for some bed/tailgate rails in diamond plate to install. I'll also install a full-size tool box (diamond plate of course).

INTERIOR WORK
The interior in this Ol' Dodge was terrible. While the Arizona weather was great at preserving the exterior, the interior took a beating! Not only was the floor pan rusted a bit, but the dash and the glove box door were quite literally falling off. The gauges don't work, the speedo has a broken needle, and the seat is torn and filthy. There were no door panels or kick panels, and the paint that was on the dash/doors was faded and chipped.

A before pic of the driver's side door. It needed panels and was in desperate need of paint!

Here's a shot of the passenger's side door after I sanded and primed it. I then painted it with a Duplicolor T199 Cherry Red Metallic. I only did a single coat so I could see the color on the truck and decide if I wanted to go with that color (both inside and out). Diana and I approved of it so that's the color it will be!
Here's the same shot as the previous image, except this is the "completed" door. Actually, I'm still missing the new window cranks but I'll get to those soon

This is the dash after I sanded it and took apart all of the ventilation piping and all of the switches.

Now here's the dash after 3 coats of lacquer paint and 2 coats of enamel clear coat. It looks pretty good for doing it in a dusty garage in the middle of August!