Seeing as how common an issue these tailgates are, I figured it post up the 'revival' effort of my hurting gate,,
The rust was definitely starting become more and more apparent, as were the dents and bumps and scratches and holes,, the rear tire carrier leaving quite a mark when it left..
And being a balmy -25 I figured theres no time like the present, as its also my DD
Also, had enough of driving around with a multi colored truck, the blue was the whole reason i pulled the body out of a junkyard, so about time it all matches.

Step 1, tore it all down and sandblasted the heck out of it, man sandblasting is fun!
Step 2, cut off remainging bolts from carrier and put some weld around them and then ground those smooth and get it ready for bodywork!

 

Step 3, going over all the banged and dented areas,, pretty much the whole thing, with a heavier fiberglass body filler, then sanding that down

Step 4, going over it with a lighter filler to make up the small dents left, more and more sanding

As of now its niiice and smooth, and amazingly youd never even know the 8 or so ugly bolts left over from the carrier were ever there!

got booth time set for monday, also doing fenders and hood, to get a few coats of prime and then maybe even paint by tuesday! cant wait for it to actually be all one color!

 

-25.... just thinking about it makes me shudder...

 

another full day of sanding and bodywork,, filling ,, sanding,, and finally priming!!

 

a good 3 or 4 hours sanding the primer,, 220, 320 and finally a 400grit,, 400wet on the tailgate and ready for paint!! rockerguarded the insides of the fenders and tailgate, and along the bottom of the fenders

 

wew! and this is how they turned out!! just sprayed em a few hours ago so they'll be sitting untill tomorrow afternoon to be brought home one at a time.. :S
unfortunately the phone camera doesnt do it any justice
next.. putting the tailgate back together (shoot me)

 

Sweet looks good!

 

well aint that just perdy. aint nothin like some shiny new paint. now you gotta paint the whole thing so one blue wont be shinnier lol

 

Thanks! its amazing how much work is involved,, wayyyy more than i thought
haha yeah gonna have to polish the rest up reeeeeallly nice so it matches

 

Well compared to some of the temperatures you guys have seen this winter -25C isn't really all that bad! haha

We even had some -20's i believe!

But back on topic, that paint looks great. I'm surprised you don't have more rust on that thing

 

that's looks awesome. Impressive work!

just thinking about -25 makes my bones cold! It's 44 right now, and I'm freezing! haha! I'm such a wussy California kid

 

Thanks for all the compliments! Im super pleased with how it turned out,, the rust was definitely an issue though,, the fenders were from my old 4runner, so they were hiding quite a lot of rust under the chrome edge stripping.. or whatever its called.. :S

Which is why most of the flaring on the fenders had to be filled,, just due to holes showing up after sanding/grinding off all the rust,, also why the insides of the fenders got some pretty intense rockerguard treatment
Tailgate also had pretty deep rust along the top and bottom,, and had to be filled with the fiberglass stuff to make up the big dips and holes,,

but yeah now she should be pretty much rust free! the other reason i picked up that body, was cause i literally couldnt find anything on it,, which is amazing for here,,

haha and yeah im definitely not a fan of -35 overnight, even with the blockheater it cranks over at about 15 rpm and doesnt wanna shift into gear until you've driven a few blocks and the oil is actually moving,,

 

Simply beautiful!

Now do my truck

 

That looks great!!! How hard was the body swap?

Jeremy

 

Thanks! Well it wasnt really a body swap,, it was an everything else swap!

I grabbed the blue runner out of a friends junkyard, however it was only the body,, no engine, drivetrain whatsoever, tailgate, hood or fenders, no dash, no front seats, interior was pretty stripped,, and then i built it up from there,, swapped over the good stuff from my old grey 4runner,, tranny,fenders, hood, seats, dash, rear axle, my already once swapped tailgate, swapped the w56 and turned the blue one into a manual, it also had a bit of a wrinkle on the front drivers side corner so i cut out that section from the other 4runner and swapped that over,,
and also did SAS and put a 7MGE from a 89 Cressida in, because it was sitting in a yard the wiring was also pretty stripped and crazy to try and figure out so most of the wiring also had to be custom done, even for simple stuff, park lights, headlights, brake lights,, still havent figured out the reverse lights,, but it will come

As far as a body swap goes,, knowing what I know now I think it would be a lottttt easier to find a good body/frame and build up around that, thats what i did more or less its taken lots of time but its really worth it

haha (dont ask about my 'engine hoist') the single 2"x8" held it just fine!

Thanks again guys!

 

Great job on the resto. I personally can't wait to ditch the tailgate on my pickup...Repainted around 4 years ago and it didn't take long for the bubbles to come back around the lower part of the gate. Now it's starting to work all the way across again. I'm hoping to have a tiregate on there soon.