[scottofksu]

I've made some decent progress lately! Some on the truck and some on my confidence in working on the truck. I've managed to attach the new, drivers side, front cab support to the lateral support and the inner/outer rocker! In doing so I found the quality of the replacement panels fit to be, well, apparently normal for what everyone else finds! It barely fit at all! Sure, it looked like the original equipment, but the dimensions were off in a couple key areas. As a result, the mounting tabs that connect the support to the lateral support (i.e., the support that runs parallel to the frame) wouldn't reach unless I straightened them out completely... I didn't want to do this so I "fabricated" extensions to the mounting tabs (Pic 1) and welded these to the cab support and to the lateral support. (Note, Pic 1 was taken before I used the dremel tool to shape the mounting tab extension.) Best of all, my last welds actually look like welds (Pic 2)! Now I just need to replace the floor section that covers the cab support before moving on to the rockers! I'm starting to believe that I may be able to drive this truck before I start collecting Social Security (roughly 30 years from now)!