Restoration Write-up..what it takes

powerstroker66 · Dec 4, 2012

All right guys im going to start a thread here on my truck restoration project. It should be a wake up call for some of you guys that are considering in doing the same thing, this should put in perspective what it takes to do these trucks the right way and not paint rust!

Truck started out as a 95' ECLB truck that had 200k on it and living in the NE its life it certainly saw its amount of rust.

Truck doesn't look terrible right? WRONG check out what i ran into when the bed came off....

Once i saw this it was no longer going to be a quick job...at this point everything had to be gutted from the frame...

once it was down the the frame where the bad rust was it was time to tackle the front end. Once again it wasn't going to just be a "replace the fender" job..after seeing the condition of the Rad support, i decided i would strip the front end as much as i could.

alright so now that the truck was as striped as i wanted to go in order to sand blast the rust i decide it was about that time.

After 6 hours of sand blasting in 98 degree weather the truck was basically rust free for the first time in 15 years. everything got blasted including cab corners, inner fenders, tanks, leafs, all misc. brakets etc. etc. Then i started the task of painting, a 2 part PPG epoxy primer is the way to go for bonding the best. The from the cab back where the frame was pitted u used 3M shutz to coat it and give it texture. For the rest of the truck i used a 3-part urthane. I know all of you guys love POR 15 but when you break down the science of it its still a single stage paint that has limited durabilty in relivance to a 2 or 3 part activated system.

once it was curred it was time to start assembling. New leafs and all new shackles, brakets and lines were done.

powerstroker66 · Dec 4, 2012

now that the rear end was basically done it was time to tackle the front and that meant the Rad support had to be reconstructed since ford no longer offers a powerstroke rad support...after sand blasting i found out the areas thats needed to be adressed. And the cutting began along with welding and forming all new pieces.

after 18 hours the rad support was done and ready for paint

here is a pile of cut out rotted pieces

here is the rad support all painted, came out sweet

now came time to put it all back together

powerstroker66 · Dec 4, 2012

next came the over welming task of paint and body work..the whole truck was ripped down with 400 on a 5" DA that i did and i got the body work close. My dad's friend owns a boddy shop so he helped me with the fine tunning body work and paint.

here is the truck all sanded....next its time for sealer

Time to go to the body shop for final paint!

once at the body shop both doors and hood had to come off and james had to be painted.

Now it was time to paint the outside it was based with 5 coats of Dupont GM code 6004R and 3 coats of clear.

and the final product

now its time for the bed...i did all the body work myself along with reconstructing the inner wheel wells out of fiber glass..oh yea i found a rust free bed of a 97' gas job for $350 with a straight tail gate!!

then it was loaded up and shipped to the body shop aswell.

luckaly i had my dads toolcat to help me fork the bed in and out of the paint booth.

i forgot to take pictures but here is the bed painted and on the truck

they needed the truck out of the shop so the bed buffing had to be done back home

and here it is all buffed out

after finding a tire/wheel combo on craigslist i put them on the truck and drive it in the light to get a good pic of the blue with the wheels and it looks F*** sick!!!

it needed a new exhaust so i went with a 5" system

now i just had to put the front end completley back together

FINALLY the truck was basically done minus the tail gate and visor

About a week later the tail gate was done

and finally the visor

finally after 4 months and $7,000 and 100s of hours of time the truck was done and i was able to drive it.

I hope this put it into perspective at what is involved in doing these trucks. In my case i went with the best you could buy and doing everything but the body work myself saved me alot of money. Feel free to ask any questions you may have.

akf250 · Dec 4, 2012

That's a sick truck! Mad props on the resto and good write up!

Buffalo444 · Dec 4, 2012

Excellent job. Now never take it outside again. Lol

sent by the beard

davey99ps · Dec 4, 2012

I commented in the other thread, an I'll say it here, the truck looks amazing. I'm half-way down that path myself with mine, it's a lot more expensive an time consuming than most people realize. Yours turned out really good, an I hope mine turns out close to as nice as yours.

Can you pm me the info on the color and paint you used, an also what you used for exhaust? Thanks in advance