1953 Awakening

[1956cameo]

I have a little more progress to show. I finished putting all of the new metal into the passenger side cowl / door area.

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I had to cut about 3 inches out of the repop kick panel in order to get it to line up properly for the heater box opening.

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It needs some grinding and filling but everything is back into place and lining up great.
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Since I am getting to the point where I am going to start needing donor pieces from a parts vehicle versus just using repop panels I drug my 1949 parts truck around to the back of the shop. The truck has very little rust but it has a lot of body damage across the roof.

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[1956cameo]

Next I finished up all the work in the passenger side cab corner.
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I didn't get a picture of the panel before putting filler on it.
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The last thing to address was the door itself.
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[1956cameo]

There was quite a bit of putty on the cowl vent so I assumed there must be some rust issues. So of course after I removed the putty there were small rust holes all around the cowl vent.
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I was able to use the cowl area off of my parts truck since it had no rust around the cowl vent. So the next step was to remove the rotten area from the cab.
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Then I simply cut out the donor panel and welded it in.
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[1956cameo]

Before I could remove the original cowl panel from the truck I had to remove the windshield. When I took the windshield out I found some more rust.
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I took the windshield out of my parts truck to see if it was solid in the windshield corners. I lucked out and both sides of the windshield were good so I was able to remove the patch panels and put them into the 53.
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The new panels in place and the welds ground down. I will admit that I should have melted out the lead before trying to weld in the new patches. It kinda made a mess while welding. I knew better but was being lazy. Next time I will do it right.
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[1956cameo]

Since that was all of the work that was going to be needed on the firewall we decided to go ahead and paint the firewall. Right now we are only planning on priming the outside of the truck, but if we decide to paint it in a couple of years we didn't want to take everything apart in the future just to paint the firewall.
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The firewall came out very well. We started thinking about going ahead and painting the rest of the truck now, but we are going to try to stick to the original plan and just primer it for now.
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That's all of the progress I have to show for now. Next I will strip down the inside of the cab and get it painted, clean up and paint the engine, then re wire the cab and get everything lined up to get the truck running again.

[dwcsr]

Nice resurrection on this, keep up the good work....

[1956cameo]

Thanks! I wasn't planning on this turning into such a project but it kinda ended up that way. I am hoping to get it done by New Years but realistically I will be lucky to have it done by next 4th of July.

[dwcsr]

It always turns into more. I have to ask customers often. Where do you want to stop? A lot of money is spent on things that don't really show but if not fixed will turn a good looking truck into an unsafe pile of junk. Get the body and chassis done right first and you can always dress it up later when money or time is available

[1956cameo]

I completely agree! By the way what part of Houston are you in? Do you ever get out to the Pearland cruise night?

[dwcsr]

Originally Posted by 1956cameo

I completely agree! By the way what part of Houston are you in? Do you ever get out to the Pearland cruise night?

I'm over between Barker Cypress and Fry rd off 10 at the Houston/Katy line. I have never been to Cruise night there. Its a bit far for me.

[1956cameo]

Plus all of the traffic!

[tleeGMC]

1956cameo: where do you buy your patch panels? I am building a 1953 GMC and have the exact same rust issues if not a little worse than your truck. I have looked at classic industries and topbananaparts.com. Just trying to find the best quality and cheapest price. Thank you.

[1956cameo]

tleegmc, We buy most of our parts from The Truck Shop in Orange California. They have a huge selection and are way cheaper than places like LMC. From what I have been told The Truck Shop makes most of the parts that the other popular parts suppliers sale. Might explain why they are cheaper than almost everyone else. Overall their stuff is good. They even have a page or two in the back of their catalogs where they compare the quality of their stuff to other manufacturers, showing how much better their stuff is.

[tleeGMC]

Originally Posted by 1956cameo

tleegmc, We buy most of our parts from The Truck Shop in Orange California. They have a huge selection and are way cheaper than places like LMC. From what I have been told The Truck Shop makes most of the parts that the other popular parts suppliers sale. Might explain why they are cheaper than almost everyone else. Overall their stuff is good. They even have a page or two in the back of their catalogs where they compare the quality of their stuff to other manufacturers, showing how much better their stuff is.

Ok thank you!

[Marte_Mcfly]

Sure do miss seeing the progress on this truck! Hope all is well!

[1956cameo]

Hey Marte,

Sorry for the lack of updates. I have been steadily working on the truck I have just gotten lazy on posting updates on the forum. I will try to upload some pictures soon of its current state. I am doing body work and hoping to paint the cab and front clip soon. By the way I take it from your Handle that you are a Back to the Future fan. If so I wanted to let you know that if my research is correct next Wednesday (10/21) is the date that Marty goes to the future to where Biff steals the sports almanac!

[iowaboynca]

Originally Posted by 1956cameo

If so I wanted to let you know that if my research is correct next Wednesday (10/21) is the date that Marty goes to the future to where Biff steals the sports almanac!

And my Cubbies win the World Series!!!

[1956cameo]

iowaboynca,

Thats Right!! Although I don't think the world series will have actually started no less be finished by next Wednesday;but the Cubs could win it all like in the movie. Since the Cubs haven't won it in 107 years if they were to win it the same year that the movie predicted that would be pretty amazing. My Astro's got bounced out of the playoffs after coughing up solid leads in games 2 and 4.