Firewall work, battery box, miscellaneous stuff

I've been plugging away and now it's finally time for an update.

Over the last week or so I stripped the inside of the firewall down, pulled the old insulation down and took out the heater core/blower motor.  Next I wire brushed the floor of the cab in preparation for some POR 15.  No pictures, but I will post once it's painted.  

Then I figured out placement of the PCM and main cab wiring harness: 

Very tight next to the booster, but I squeezed them in.  Had to remove a brace from the driver's side hood hinge to get it to fit.  Once I figure out a substitute brace I will post a picture of the final hood hinge solution.  

At this point I pretty much ran out of things I could do without some welding help from Troy.  I didn't have to wait long, as he came over today with one of his welders and we really made a lot of progress. 

First order of business was installing a new battery box.  The old one was mounted up on the firewall and was pretty ugly.  Now it is next to the radiator, inset into the inner fender:

Looks so much nicer!

After that we moved onto the lower steering column mount.  If you recall we roughly placed the piece cut from the Vic firewall into place.  With a little more firewall work and some welding it's now a permanent part of the truck:

As you can see in the above picture the firewall was full of holes, most of which are no longer needed.  Troy brought over some sheet metal and we marked it for the brake booster mount.  I drilled that out while Troy cut out the firewall:

And here is the new piece in place:

This piece is 16 gauge and eliminates over 15 holes, so it is quite a bit stronger.  

These were the things that were really holding me up, things are really going to start moving now.  This was all the progress I had hoped for today, but since Troy was there with his welder and some spare metal we managed to knock out a few more bits and pieces.

Insert to fill the gap above the radiator, which will also add strength to the core support:

Access panel cover (this will be secured with screws so it is removable):

And finally, gas fill hole plugged up.  Will need a little filler to smooth it out, but pretty dang good considering he beat it into shape with a claw hammer:

It was a very productive day, what a great way to kick off the new year!  

Next on the schedule will be protecting all the new metal that has been installed so far.