On the rear section, I decided that I would follow the old body lines left after the window was taken out. I cut off the window seam section and welded it flat 6" at a time. Then followed the body line back and up.
THe last section in the rear had to be made and turn the corner then on all the prior builds I saw, I never liked how the rear was filled in. Originally it is really wide and it does not match the body line. I decided to cut it short (near where the rollbar goes down) and fill the section in. Lots of work, but looks better to me.
As you saw above, I made the two north / south pieces of the roll cage go into the section above the doors. The next project was to take those and get them to the floor of the rig. For this I brought in the heavy hitters Erik and KCChevota to do the heavy lifting. Thanks to them, it looks great.
Pics of the rollbar done and then comes the tube doors.
After an exhaustive search, tube doors could not be found, so out came the coloring book. My 11 year old son, Josh was lead designer and finally came up with something that I could build.
He wanted the spiderweb and "got foo" sign on it, but that was out given the timeframe.
Pic of the door painted and the rear tailgate mounted up for cutting. Finally got some good help from my 9 year old daughter. Check out the custom skull cap.
Alright, before you say anything, no the dino inspired tailgate does not stay.
What happened was that I started cutting the tailgate and found that it was really floppy, so I bend a T fence post to match the original shape of the tailgate and then tackwelded it to the tailgate. This will retain its original shape while I add the top, then I cut off the tacks.....
I had some 16 gauge metal bent at 90 degrees for another thing that didn't need it, so it became the new top and back. Really stout stuff. I ended up adding several inner structure pieces too, so this baby should put up with some abuse.
We did not have time to paint it up as planned, so the kids came out and on their own came up with the stripes paint scheme and the "FF" Foo Fighters hood.
Quick rattle can black went everywhere else......
RobKC came and put the seats and interior back in and we loaded up and went to SMORR.
I vividly remember our first and only trip there: in the section I was driving, we ended up diagonal with opposite tires in wet deep ruts with no steering or traction whatsoever; so I had no other option that just sliding along at a 45 degree angle in a locked Chevy Blazer - WTF I just kept on the gas pedal sliding along until finally I hit some solid ground somehow
this experience was the second to convince me that I really H8MUD - the first was in Moab on a wet and snowed-in shelf road close to the abyss at Easter Jeep Safari 2005 in my then new-to-me 40
Next on the list was sliders. I saw the great work that trail gear does and decided that the value they give you for the product cannot be beat.
Unfortunately, they don't make one for the 80 series. The pictures I found show about 2 to 3" of extra straight tube on each end of the inner tube. I measured and decided that the extra cab taco length of 74" less some cutting could get me to where I wanted to be.
Well, they came via UPS and looked awesome, unfortunately, the outer pipe went all the way to the end. I could only make up about 2" and at minimum I needed 4".
I cut out 3.5" from one end of the slider (basically all the flat section on the outer band past the reinforcement. On the opposite side I used the plasma to cut out the side that is cut to fit around the inner pipe. Cutting basically in the middle of the weld. Worked awesome.
Then bent a 1.5od DOM .120 wall pipe to match the existing bend, then cut out plug weld holes. Slid the outer pipe around the inner pipe.... slight adjustment and done.
Overnight it got down to about zero degrees. With the windchill it was a solid -15. So you ask, why is this a good thing???
Sound deadener mat removal.
That's right.... that gooey tarnish sound deadener when frozen can easily come off with the mallet to shake it loose.
Last summer I was going to do this using dry ice, but never had time. Someone has remarked that when it gets really cold he parked the car outside and then did the work. So, thank you to whoever posted that advice, as this works so well. Took about 15 minutes to get all of it off ....mostly in sheets.