From a $150 beater to pretty decent.

[holyford86]

yes, i do have a body lift, its a 1" lift to clear the air compressor. If its decent out tomorrow, I will get you some pictures of the front bumper. FWIW the bumper was made before the body lift was put in and it is hard to tell the difference.

 

[87Rangerdude]

very nice flatbed, what size wood did you use? also did you make the rollbar/rear fenders?

 

[Destroyer000]

if i remember correctly the wood is 2x6 an the rollbar/an rear fenders were made..

 

[holyford86]

if i remember correctly the wood is 2x6 an the rollbar/an rear fenders were made..

yep, its 2x6s, the frame is 1.5 inch angle, the fenders are 1/8 inch plate. the light bar is 1.5 inch square tube.

 

[87Rangerdude]

did you have to treat the wood? im just wondering to get ideas for my flatbed

 

[holyford86]

i should have but I didn't, I just used some untreated 2x6s from lowes. Cheap, easy to work with, light, easy to replace. I'm going to put some sort of preservative on there this year to keep the wood from drying out. I might use motor oil or I might buy something, not sure yet.

 

[holyford86]

Still building this thing, little by little. I haven't had much time to wheel it recently, It's a pain to find legal wheeling spots around here unless it's mud which I don't particularly care for. The truck has a XRC8 winch on it now as well as a 200 amp alternator and as soon as I sell my old coopers it will be getting some 63 inch Chebbies, to correct the negative rake that it has and hopefully get a better ride than the explorer springs in it. Just installed a better CB in it along with a better headunit. I also installed power windows and locks because I could, no other real reason. I still drive it daily but I have been working on collecting some spare parts for the D28 I have 3 complete sets of axleshafts for it, along with 7 spindles, 9 hubs, 2 centersections and 2 sets of beams. I have found that the D28 moves into marginal territory if you weld the Ujoints into it. I'm making a kit that will contain all of the parts to repair the front axle for when I go on wheeling trips, if I ever find time to do it. I fixed a couple of small electrical problems that resulted in it running much better than it ever has, I also swapped to a Saginaw style power steering pump recently as well.

very nice flatbed, what size wood did you use? also did you make the rollbar/rear fenders?

What looks like a rollbar really isn't, it's only function is to hold up my lights and give me a good place to mount my airhorns and antennas, the angle iron struts were added after the fact to prevent the bar from slapping the back of the cab, I now have a HI-Lift jack and shovel mounted to them.

 

[riverviewcontracting]

Recently, a friend of mine has been prompting me to post up a little bit of the transformation process my truck has gone through in the past 6 years that I have owned it. It's still not done, it probably never will be.

This is what I started with, more or less:

That is the earliest pic that I can find of the thing, its still about 5 or 6 months after I got it. it was rotted really bad, the driver side floor was about gone, and so was about half of the passenger side, there were no cab corners left and the radiator support was pretty much gone along with the fenders, doors, and the factory bed, which I tore off and scrapped as soon as I got it. It had no brakes either, but it ran pretty well for having 234,000 miles on the clock and not being ran in 5 years. It was pretty bare bones as far as options, it had a vinyl bench seat, AM/FM radio, power steering, 3.45 gears, an FM145, 1350 T case, 225/75/15 tires and the tow package, supposedly...

Now jump forward 6 years and this is how it sits:

It took quite a bit of work to get here, I swapped the cab sometime in 2005, the rust was just too bad to fix. It now sports a Skyjacker 6" class II lift, Belltech 6400 shackles, Explorer 4 door leafs, and 33 inch Cooper Discoverer LT tires mounted on Cragar wheels. I swapped out the stock 3.45 gears for 4.10 geared axles, I'm still running the Dana 28 at this time but it's going to be thrown on the scrap heap as soon as I can find some gears for the Dana 35 I have for it. The rear axle houses a lockright locker. I added York onboard air, a 130 amp Taurus alternator, and another battery. The FM145 died along the way and it was replaced with an M5OD. The original motor still ran strong, but at 279,000 miles it was smoking and eating quite a bit of oil but strangely had no lifter tick, I installed a lower mileage 89TM 2.9 around thanksgiving of last year, along with an Explorer radiator. I just recently converted it to MAF and I am very happy with the result. Both of the bumpers along with the bed were custom made and welded by a friend of mine, who also happens to be a member on this site. The factory radio was replaced by a sony headunit, sending power to Pioneer and JVC spealers, along with a Cadence Q3000 and Cadence Mallet.

Most of the things I did to it, I learned about right here, I learned lots along the way too. Some of you may remember how ignorant I was when I started posting here around June of 2004. I thank you all for your patience and all the info I have learned.

this truck has been my DD for the past 3 years and it goes great, it just turned 284,000 miles yesterday, There is still more to be done but overall I'm pretty happy with the results. I doubt I'll ever get rid of it, too many memories and too much time invested now. I'm going to post up some more pictures as I find them.

that looks good

 

[holyford86]

and some more recent pics:

 

[ForOffRoadDriving]

i like it, its kind of what im going to be goin for with the rescue ranger when it goes under the knife again. any pictures of the OBA set up?

 

[882wdrngr]

i think your truck is sweet and thats why i nominated you for OTOTM but i want to see some more pics of that thing wheelin

 

[holyford86]

i like it, its kind of what im going to be goin for with the rescue ranger when it goes under the knife again. any pictures of the OBA set up?

I have to give you a pat on the back for your work, the quality of your work and attention to detail is top notch.

This is the most recent one I have:

And the bracket:

 

[jhammel85]

I know the thread hasnt moved much since Dec but, Nice work man

 

[Boggin]

i love this truck she is just awesome.she has been my desktop background for a nice while now lol