1980 1/2 ton shortbed...

[bake74]

      WOW, is all I got to say.  You have more drive than I do anymore.  At my current spot, I would not of even considered to start with that much rust.  But I am glad to see you are trying, and like thirsty said, it will give you some great practice if nothing else.

[ralphhemi]

I wish i lived closer i removed a cab from my 78 k 30 ,i would give to you,  I bought my 73 New Jersey cab with doors for $300.   a trick an old guy taught me when working with fiberglass, buy a roll of wax paper, cut your screen or fiberglass mat and lay it out on a larger piece of wax paper , than mix  up your resin with hardener then spread the resin mix on the fiberglass ,know you can pick up the wax paper and apply your patch like a patch on an inner tube. Using a bondo spreader to smooth it out.

[hotrod24]

 WoW it has been a while. I have had alot going lately and the 80 is still around and I am still working steady on it and you know I had to take pics lol. Bake24 thanks for the complement and yea thirsty is right it will give me some practice.  Ralphhemi I wish you lived closer too, I have thought about it and I would like to just fix this cab so I can just drive my truck because its been sitting for a year just for now and then find a pretty good cab and rebuild this one. But like I said all this is giving me for now is practice.  I have not painted much or done very much body work and I have not welded since high school so this is just giving me lots and lots of practice and thank you very much for the tip. Ok now for a big update. To start with I sanded the top of the rocker and primed and painted so my floor pans front inner rocker and rear inner rocker will have a smooth surface to go up against.  After that I started drilling out spot welds on the kick panel getting ready for the new kick panel I ordered from chris.  After a day or so of attacking it, I received the kick panel and started trying to fit it and of course just like any replacement panel it did not fit quite right.  I just could not get it to fit so I asked on here and yall told me to trim it down but before I did that I came up with a new idea for my floor instead of trying to make it work with the floor pan and inner rocker separate, I made it together like you can get from chris and I also made a rear inner rocker to rivet to it and every thing seems to fit good together now. I just hope it holds lol. OK here is some pics injoy...





 



 























 


 
































 

[Bitzer!]

Fair play to ya fella - that's a whole lot of work. I'd have to question myself doing that even being an experienced welder.

Quick tip - to find rusty old spot welds - run a scraper under a loose bit and gently work the metal up and down. Eventually it'll stop moving up when you get to the spot. Even with rust, if you sand the rust away you can normally see an indentation.

Good luck & keep practising!

[hotrod24]

Thanks Bitzer! Yea it sure is alot of work lol. But the good thing about it I am learning alot to and having fun lol.

The spot welds was not that bad to drill out with my harbor freght spot weld cutter. I had some trouble with a few of them but it went pretty good and it was alot better then just using a standard drill bit that I used on my 78 k10 dash channel...

Thanks for the tip by the way...

[ItsOniiyx]

This runs, right? I mean, how many mechanical issues are you aware of?

[hotrod24]

Oh yea it runs great. Just needs a tune up and I need to swap the integrated head and exhaust manifolds from my 67 250 over to it...

[Bitzer!]

I've just started stripping my '75 Blazer - your cab is mint compared to what I have!! Good luck with yrs, your welding skills should be impeccable by the time you finish!

[bob75]

makes me glad i lif in calif

[hotrod24]

I've just started stripping my '75 Blazer - your cab is mint compared to what I have!! Good luck with yrs, your welding skills should be impeccable by the time you finish!

Yea I know what you mean lol! I have seen worse. Alot worse. Thats way I am giving it a shot. So far so good...