Hey guys Well this little story begins a few days ago when I decided I was going to undercoat and sound proof my cab and undercarriage. I couldnt even talk on the cell phone it was soooooo loud in my truck. I was road noise mostly but I could hear my BFGs rumble a little. Anyhow yesterday I took off the plastic piece that goes over the door lip and carpet area. BOY what a suprise was waiting for me. Lets just say there must be 1/4 to /12 bondo in some spots. I had an idea there was an issue since the passanger door wasnt original. I am tryin to get some pics to post but all I have is my phone camera and it rather sucks for the most part. I have chisseled some of it away to see how bad it really is.
Lets just put it this way. I could fix it some what for little money but a lot of time or do a cab swap with a straight one. The side impact it took was good enough to push the rocker panel in around 3 inches as well as getting into the subframe. Most of the subframe I can repair with a little pounding and a slide hammer but the rocker panel is still pretty much unknown at this point since I have not got all the bondo off to see what is what. Man this is not what I needed right now. I had a set of 4" lift rear springs from marlin crawler and a flex-a-lite 15" fan. The springs are used but in good shape and was going to get them for 125 bucks. What really kills me is the fan is brand new and cost 250 new and I can get it for 100 bucks brand new. Guy never installed it.
I will post pics from phone soon. Gonna call a few places to see what a donor cab will cost me.

 

can you cut away the bad and weld in a good section from a donor?

 

use your phone to email the pics to yourself, than upload them to a free service like photobucket.com.

sorry to hear you ran into somebody's idea of a good way to fix things...sad when some of these trucks have had probably 15-20 owners over 25-30 years and some of them just cobble crap together to dump a truck...good luck...
I would buy the springs and fan now, I have seen cabs as cheap as $50 or even free on craigslist...

 

Ok here are some pics of damage. My phone is nice in that I can put it in mass storage mode and it comes up as a hard drive in windows.

Anyhow the damage is worse then I thought. I have a few options I can do.
1- Get a donor cab from a wrecking yard and swap everything over. Bad part about this is that every cab I can get a hold of has a bad front end. So all I would get is cab and I would have to cut my front clip off and weld it on donor. I dont have a welder atm so im pretty screwed there. I might be able to barrow one but not sure.
2- I can wait till I can get a full cab and front clip donor and prob pay about 500 for it which is a little much for me right now. I might be able to get a free donor but my bud tells me he has no clue on what shape the truck is in. Its been parked in a field for a while now I guess. This worries me since they rust and well if they are parked like that then its for a reason besides just motor most of the time.
3- I can use a puller and pull the subframe back out as close to original as I can, then cut away the bad rocker panel and weld in some new sheet metal. Would take a little fabbing to do it but the end result would be much better then what this idiot did before I got the truck.

When I got this truck 8 yrs ago I never drove it so I really didnt worry bout the body and noise. Heck it was suppose to be a trekker. Anyhow it DOESNT have a salvaged title which amazes me. Im starting to think this wasnt an auto vrs auto accident damage. I think this was no rock sliders wheelin. Either or im pretty screwed. As for cutting out the bad section and putting a diff one from a donor in is a great idea which I wanted to do in 1st place but for me to get the rocker panel and part of floor I would have to buy the whole cab so going with idea 1 seems to be a better end result imo. Heck I dont know.
Ok heres the pics. Oh and if I do fix it right I would bet this thing would be 100x's more quiet inside.






Dang it I should have just Ignored it !!!! Damn me and my OCD !!!!!

 

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! thats allot of filler....thats seriously not cool....too bad your not closer...im good at making rockerpanels and cab corners LMAO!!!!!! did all of my truck

 

I can make all the parts I need but without a welder and some money im kinda stuck. Still have to pull it out which isnt an easy task.
I think I am gonna go take a drive to sacramento and see what recycle road has. Who knows. Nice 1+ hour drive for me.

 

Well my trip to sac turned out to be a waste of time. I did find a factory replacement rocker panel for a good price. It should be here towards end of next week.

 

Wow.

 

All I can say now is ********************************** I am pretty sure this truck has been rolled or laid on its side. I decided to look into the right side more and above the door and roof are bondo HELL. I pulled down the headliner and from my best guess is there is 1/2" of bondo up top. The gutter looks fine but im guessing its not original gutter or something because where the gutter meets the cab there was about the same amount of bondo. I took it all off and discovered the part just inside where the gutter attaches to the roof is dented in about well 1/2". Not sure if it was layed over on its side or what but I cant see myself spending the time to fix it. I would have to cut pretty much the whole right side of truck off to pull it.
Ive looked really hard for a donor cab but there isnt one out there that I can find atm. Gonna just spray paint the rocker panel blue and underside of gutter. Maybe fill in some voids with silicon to help seal that side of truck until I can find a cab.
I wish 8 yrs ago I actually looked more at the truck. Heck it looked straight as heck. Drove well so I guess I didnt second guess it. What a bummer to find all this now when I need a daily driver. The noise inside the cab is aweful, time to turn stereo up loader.

 

Come to Alabama, I'll sell you mine. Sorry for the bad luck you seem to be getting there. I hope you can find the parts to fix it the way you want. Keep the updates coming.

 

I think I am just going to leave the roof alone and let the bondo crack off then fix that part. The gutter area is gonna get a slide hammer treatment to see if I can get it to come out some. If that doesnt work im gonna get a comealong and find a nice tree to tie to. If I get a think piece of steel and bolt it to the pushed in part I think I can get it to return back close to correct location. I had ordered a replacement rocker panel last night so when I get that I will be able to fix that area correctly. Should turn out nice. Gonna do as much as I can so I dont have to use much bondo. Hate that stuff.
If someone local to Pleasant Hill ,CA wants to rent me their wire feed so I can cut out the bad parts and weld in new steel that would rock. I have enough steel sheets here to do it all right but no welder.
I figure at this point finding a donor cab and then swaping it all over is just not worth it price wise. Unless I get it free. Well see what happens.

 

yeah i just found 1 inch of bondo on the door of my suzuki ahaha whats up with some people??

 

just wondering, if u can go eight years without noticing it, why you'd wanna rip it all apart now

 

i was thinkin that too!!!

 

Bondo and fiberglass resonate very badly and since I never drove the truck in all that time I never really heard it. Since I started driving it as my daily driver its SO loud in the cab of the truck I had to talk loud for the person next to me to hear me.
I was going to just put some sound dampener all over the cab but when I took the carpet up the rocker panel had seperated from the floor so I wanted to see the extent of the damage and see if I could repair it then dampen the sound. As soon as I started removing just a little of the bondo I got to a point where I said screw it and figured I would just fix it correct.
Btw read the instructions on bondo. Its not designed to be over 1/4 inch think. 1" is just bad news. Either or fixing the rocker panel isnt a problem since I found a replacement one thats brand new. What is the problem is the extent of how much damage is there. Without fixing it, it will be very hard and expensive to stop the noise. Ill do what I can afford and save the rest for when I have money or get another cab.

 

Here is a little update. Since I have more time then money I went ahead and worked on the rocker panel area today. Took a while to get it decent but I wont know for sure how it will look until I get the new panel in. Hopefully soon.
Everyone likes pics so here ya go.
Sorry pics suck so bad but my phone doesnt like dark areas. Wait it just take sucky pics.















Nice little pic walk thru of sorts on what it took for me to get it dang close to being done. Last one is a good inside shot of the gap between door and inner rocker panel. Looks pretty even to me. Once the new rocker panel is on it should look pretty good for a newb auto body guy without any real tools made for this sort of job.
One of the middle pics is where I got it straight or I think it is. When its brighter out tomorrow maybe I can get some better pics of what I actually did to the floor. It was the most work of all. Damn I wish I had a MIG welder here. I would have just cut it all out and made new pieces.

The roof and gutter is a whole diff story. I have a pretty good idea on how to fix it without a ton of labor. If it works it should be straight. Then its time to grind sand grind sand ect ect. Oh boy then I get to bondo !!!!!!!!!
Tell me what ya think. I know it doesnt look perfect but better.

 

dang, I did not realize it was that bad...your truck probably sits higher now on the passenger side

i know what you mean though about finding suprises, I ripped the headliner in my old '84...I was suprised when I found toyota parts stickers on the roof panel and windshield frame...it had been rolled and roof replaced but at least with factory parts...

do work is a definite improve on what you had to start with...

 

well i got bored today and decided to remove almost everything out of cab and prep it for some type of sound deadening. I cant afford the dynamat or anything like it atm so I am just gonna wing it and make my own. Its gonna end up being a few layers with rubber matting and undercoating. I am sure its gotta be better then it was. I removed almost all the old tar/asphalt stuff, which was bubbled and lifting so im sure it wasnt doing its job anymore. Ill post some more pics of what it looks like as I am doing it. Heck if it works well someone else can use it. It is rather nice to have the carpet out because I can really clean it well. Not sure if I should even bother but I prob will.











Dang I wish I had my camera back. This phone pics just suck.

 

The guy that did the work must be a plastic surgeon for it to have lasted so long…….

 

I would have been so happy if my interior was that clean when i stripped it.