Bed and Front Bumper Installation

Yesterday was the two month anniversary of this project, and boy was it a long day.  At this point I can officially call the swap complete... there's still body work left to do and other improvements to be made but everything is put back together solidly and I the two vehicles have been merged into one.  On to yesterday's accomplishments...
I met Troy at his work at 8:00.  First we got the bed up on a table and cut out a section for the rear end/gas tank hump:

Next came the task of widening the fenders.  We needed close to an inch on each side to allow for the wider track of the Crown Vic.  The stock fenders curve in towards the tire, we needed to make them more or less vertical.  I'll let the pictures do the talking here:

There will be some further welding and shaping needed later, but this gave the clearance needed.

After some test fits we figured out where to cut the rear frame off and build new frame pieces.  Unfortunately I didn't get pictures of the new rear section, but I will try to get under the truck and add them later.

This all took longer then expected, so I forgot to keep snapping pictures.  After the new frame section was built we test fit the bed, got it square and level, and fabricated mounts in the four corners.  The bed was bolted into place and Troy got to work fabricating a front bumper mount while I wired up the rear lighting.  We probably should have saved the bumper for another day, but we were getting so close to done we had to push on.  Finally, at 7:00 in the evening, it was all back together:

So happy with how it sits, this project has far exceeded my expectations.  It's amazing how far it has come in two months, and it never would have been possible without all of Troy Jackson's hard work, knowledge, and skilled fabrication.

Today I did tie up another loose end, mounting the Vic gauge cluster in the dash (it had just been sitting in there).  I trimmed the cluster down, cut out the stock dash bezel, put a thin sheet of lexan behind the bezel, then secured the cluster.

Maybe someday I'll get some retro styled gauges, but for now it gets the job done.

I also added an extra touch, just something to hint at what's going on underneath this old truck:

This is the Police Interceptor badge I hacked off the trunk of the donor car.
That's it for now, I will try to get a walk-around video up in the next few days and will continue to post when I have major changes to report.  But mostly I'm just going to get out there and drive it around every chance I get!
Feel free to ask questions or request pictures in the comments of any post and I will be happy to help.