Page 2, for your viewing pleasure...

Needs some TLC

Hosed out the interior. Headliner was FULL of mouse crap, as was just about everywhere else. Found a couple of dead mice in the panels too. Nice. I know this is a 'plane jane' S-code, radio-delete is one thing, this is ridiculous! : )

Nice... Right wheel well was hacked out, right seat platform cut out, and frame rail ripped open alien-style in two spots so, I assume, some bonehead could cut some stuck spring bolts. Whatever. I've since welded in new metal.

After welding up yet another hole the size of a silver dollar in the firewall, it was time to finish prepping the surface. All painted surfaces were given a scrubbing with a course pad to roughen up the surface. A washing down with alcohol and it's ready for priming all the bare metal surfaces.

Ah, the way every red blooded American likes to spend his evenings. Well, most of them. OK, maybe only me. My folks got me this Miller autodarkening helmet for my birthday, how cool is that?! Love you guys!!

New coat of undercoating and paint after the old was scraped off.

During the suspension build, I modified the upper A-arm mounting points, lowering them 1" (Shelby Drop). You can see the factory holes right above the upper arm. 4-piston Kelsey-Hayes calipers and stock rotors will do braking duty up front, stock drum in back (for now).

Rebuilt the factory 9" with 31-spline Moser Engineering racing axles, a rebuilt Traklock diff clad with 3.50 gears in the third member. All new hard brake lines were bent by hand. Stainless steel rear flex line required me to fab this bracket to hold both it and the axle vent fitting.

Here's the empty bay. Full suspesion sans springs has been installed. Since I made all the hard lines by hand, I could custom mount the adjustable prop valve for the rear brakes and bend lines to it; it can be seen right above the brake booster.

Next page to drivetrain install...