Brake pedal assy and booster

Made some great progress today!  Troy came over to help and we were able to get the lower steering column mount, brake pedal assembly, and booster all figured out.

I worked on the brake pedal assy some yesterday, it was a really tight fit behind the column.  I figured out where I wanted it, but there was interference with the shift linkage.  I had some ideas about how to resolve that, but Troy suggested moving the column out just a little bit further from the firewall would give us the room we needed and sure enough it looked good.  With that sorted out we set the pedal aside for the moment and worked on the lower column mount.  We saved the mounting plate from the Vic body and positioned that in the firewall.  It's just temporarily tacked in place with a couple screws until Troy can bring his welder over.

Next we mounted the brake booster, which required even more holes in my Swiss cheese firewall.  This area will all be replaced by new steel, now that we know what holes are needed.  Here's the booster in place.

The pedal assembly bolts up to the studs on the back of the booster, and here's the pedal in place.

The pedal arm may have to be lengthened a bit, we'll see how it feels with the seat in place.

This was really important progress today, as positioning of these parts dictates how much room I have to install other critical parts such as the PCM and the main wiring harness plug.  I will be focusing on those next, as well as the gas pedal.

Inner fenders and more steering column work

Not a huge amount of progress to report, just chipping away.  Had to spend quite a bit of time organizing the garage and making it a place I can work in, it's spent a long time as nothing more than a couple parking spots.
With that out of the way I got cracking on the inner fenders.  I needed those in place to start mapping out where all this Crown Vic junk is going to live in the fridge.  For those of you that don't know, the 1957-1960 F100 trucks are nicknamed "fridges".  This is because the blocky body style resembles the old Philco-Ford refrigerators of the 60s.  So there you you go, don't say I never taught ya nothin'!

Back to the fenders.  I tried a test fit but the new frame, and especially the upper shock mounts, sit a lot higher and farther outboard.  I couldn't even get them in position to make some marks for what to cut off so I had to trim some first... I used a yardstick and a long straightedge to try to make a sort of three dimensional measurement of where the inner fender would end up.  Decided i needed to take close to eight inches off the bottom of each of them, probably could have cut a little less but it worked.  Here's what it looks like with the inner finders mounted:

Next I worked on the column a bit. If you've been following my build you might remember we had the column mounted initially to get the car moving, but the angle wasn't quite right.  So, I pulled it back out and cut out the gussets we had welded in.  After some cutting and grinding I put the column back in and I think it's where I want it.  Here's a couple pics with the tilt column at the highest and lowest settings:

I'm happy with it, now to make everything else work around the column. It's going to be tough figuring out how to mount the brake pedal assembly(and booster on the other side of the firewall).   Besides the lack of room back there compared to the Vic I also have to leave room for the transmission shift cable.  I have an idea of how I can make the brake pedal assembly fit in there but I need Troy's expert opinion before I start hacking away.  More to come!.  

Day 6

Day 6 brings to a close the "fast track" week of working on the truck in a spacious shop full of tools.
We only had a half day before the truck had to be out and most of that time was spent trying to remove some old rusted components that were in the way of column and pedal installation.  That burned up so much time that we were only able to get the column initially mounted.

The column will need to come back out for further modifications to the mounting angle, but we were able to steer it to get it loaded on the trailer...

And here it is in my garage.

I am glad to have it home again.  A few more days would have been nice, but we easily cut 3-6 months out of the project timeline with all that got done in this hectic week.
From now on I will post when I have some measurable progress to report, rather than these daily summaries.  First I've got a full days work getting my garage cleaned & organized enough to work in, but then I will be back at it.

Day 5

Good day, and welcome to day 5!  Started at 3:00 today, finishing up a few things before we get this thing down off the table and onto the ground.
First up, front clip mounts.  These mount just above the front valance and to the front of the frame rails:

Next up was the gas tank and EVAP box.  Troy built a couple cross members and we hung the tank with straps.  This will all be concealed by the bed:

Now, finally, time to get this thing down off the table and see how it sits...

Whoa, sits pretty low.  I love it!!  Looks good but will ride like a big American sedan.

James and Troy posing for the camera....

We threw the hood on to see what it looked like, but it's not bolted on yet.

Wrapped up the day around 7:00 and headed home.  Only one more day of shop time left, we have Saturday until about noon before we have to clean up and trailer it to my garage.
Hoping to get the last few things that require major fabrication done-  Steering column, brake booster, and dropping the frame behind the rear wheels down so it's level with the front section.  Maybe front bumper mounts if we're super fast, but probably not.  Stay tuned!

Day 4

Back at it today, got rolling around 3:00.  Not a lot to see in pictures, today was cab mounts.  A lot of work getting the cab centered & straight on the frame, then Troy fabricated cab mounts.  These are based on the Crown Vic body mounts, but roughly in the original truck cab mount locations.

One of the rear mounts...

And a front mount tacked into place...

Tomorrow we finish up the mounts with the front clip to frame, mount the gas tank, then it's time to come down off the table.  

Day 3

No work done Monday, but back at it on Tuesday.  We all have to work during the day so we didn't get rolling until about 3:15.


Troy cut the front frame rails down to give us more room to move the front clip and bed back on the frame.

 Next we began the slow process of mounting the front clip.  There was a lot of trimming needed...  Test, pull off, cut, test, repeat.

Finally we got to a point where the fender to body bolts lined up.

Compressing the front suspension to get an idea of how it will look.

About four and a half hours for the three of us today, back at tomorrow.

Day 2

Deconstruction Sunday!!  Started off at about 8:45.  This is really the only full day of shop time so it was crucial that a lot get done.  Lots of pictures...

Removed the front sheet metal and stripped the firewall down.

Interior gutted...

Put the Vic up on a steel table.  Welded blocks under the frame to keep it level, safe, and at a comfortable working height.

 Removing the body...

Bare chassis...

Body ready to head to scrap...

Time to tear down the truck...

Bare truck frame...

Moving the cab into place...

Test fit...

This is where we ended up for the day.  About 11 hours for Troy and me, with James joining halfway through.

Day 1

First order of business to get the wiring sorted out.  With only one week of valuable shop time I don't want to spend a day messing around with wiring, and i need to have everything identified and trimmed where needed while it's still in the car.
Basically the deconstruction can't begin until the wiring is done.
Luckily I was able to take the day off work.  I got started at 8:30 and began by getting as much of the dash out as possible to reveal the wiring behind it.  There is a LOT of wiring in modern car!  Once I had the dash out I identified all the wiring I wouldn't be using and removed it from the wiring harness, re-wrapping as I went.

Once I was down to the wiring I would keep I temporarily mounted the column so I could drop it at Troy's work.  It took about 12 hours to get through dash removal and wiring reduction.  Very noisy ride with no interior!  

Here's some of the removed wiring and dash chunks.  

Column mounted for the last ride in the Crown Vic.