• Welcome Visitor! Please take a few seconds and Register for our forum. Even if you don't want to post, you can still 'Like' and react to posts.

86 GMC squarebody, my introduction to bodywork.


saving money to buy the parts always seems to to take much longer then putting them on…..

Thats the problem, especially when you have project adhd and constantly jump around between a few lol. Doesn't help that I needed to buy a few expensive tools as well... progress would of been happening much sooner if my 'shop' had all the necessities to begin with.

You could put a fancy rattle can paint job on those. :whistle:

I might try corroseal on them. It says it works best on rusty metal but will still work on clean metal. Either that or they'll get slapped up with some tractor/implement paint.
 
Alright alright alriiiggghhht... progress! Good progress! Monumental progress! Yuuuuuuuge amount of progress! Feels good.

Spent the better part of 3 hours today after work removing the 28 rivets that hold the shackle hangers and the spring hangers to the frame. Tried to slice up the heads as best as I could with the grinder, and then hammered on them with an air chisel. Really gave the compressor a workout.

20220915_150915.jpg


20220915_175228.jpg


20220915_182405.jpg


No way am I gonna get this thing back on the road this year like I had hoped... but I've set myself the reasonable goal of at least getting (most) everything that's behind the cab taken care of and finished before it's too cold to want to be outside for the year.

- Remove spring hanger support brackets
- Fix frame
- Clean, corroseal, and paint the frame and brackets
- Reinstall brackets, install new springs, new shackles, and place it all on top of the 14 bolt full floater axle I got a couple months ago.

Now please excuse me while I go wash all this grinding dust off me and smoke a celebratory doober 🥰 I'm pooped.
 
Great progress! But did the shocks really need to have their life cut short?

If you want to have something to aim for... take a look at this thread.... '78 K30 Brushtruck Build - The General Purpose Rig | Pirate 4x4 Definitely a beautiful truck when completed.

They did lol, wanted to get as much done as I could since the weather was perfect yesterday.. didn't wanna waste time trying to undo their fasteners. The fasteners are probably just gonna get cut too haha, the plan is to fabricate my own upper shock mounts so I can use 'regular' shocks that have eyes on both ends.
 
Alright... all that progress busting rivets was wasted lol.

Bought myself an absolute cherry of a frame earlier in the week. This is gonna make things soooo much easier.

20240730_173701.jpg


I do NOT reccomend transporting an 8' bed truck frame on an 8' trailer though.. even if it's cheap as chips.. and even if it's a first come first serve type deal. 48mph is far too slow to be white-knuckled 😶 I'd have to slow down to stop the trailer from dancing every time a semi came barreling around me lol.

.. I mean.. id totally do it again... just not for 150 miles 😆

Work will resume on this once the ranger is back on the road.
 

Sponsored Ad


Sponsored Ad

TRS Events

Member & Vendor Upgrades

For a small yearly donation, you can support this forum and receive a 'Supporting Member' banner, or become a 'Supporting Vendor' and promote your products here. Click the banner to find out how.

Latest posts

Recently Featured

Want to see your truck here? Share your photos and details in the forum.

Ranger Adventure Video

TRS Merchandise

Follow TRS On Instagram

TRS Sponsors


Sponsored Ad


Sponsored Ad


Amazon Deals

Sponsored Ad

Back
Top