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720 Crewcab - 4 doors, 4x4, and a huge freaking headache


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21 hours ago, Lockleaf said:

Ordered a part to fix the welder. Installed said part and that didn't work.  Now I have to determine if my diag was wrong, or I just got a bad part off shelf and just need to do it again.  So very little has changed. 

 

I finished completely breaking down both doors

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and made some cuts to begin building the rear drivers door.

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I also burned in the bolt flanges for the hinge cover/interior panel and drilled all the holes and got that bolted in ready to build the rest of it.

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I put this one a little closer that the other side apparently, so inside the bolt point rubs on the closed hinge slightly.  I will have to adjust that fit as I finish building the panel.

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All your hard work is paying off on a heck of a project. Keep it up can’t wait to see it finished. 

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So there still has been no real progress.  I replaced the gas solenoid in my welder a second time and that seemed to fix that problem, but  now my trigger isn't causing wire to feed, so I have some wiring diagnostics to do.  Frustrating.

 

However, I have also been distracted by a pretty big house/garage project I have been spending time on.  

Edited by Lockleaf
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  • 2 months later...

I've been spending what projecting time I had for the last two months on Project Apocalypse, AKA converting my wifes 4 horse trailer to a 3 horse trailer with a tack room.  See "The Daily Routine" in non-datsun projects if you care.

 

Very little has happened on this.  But there has been some progress.  For those who don't recall, I was working on the driver side rear hinge cover panel.  I had gotten it to here.

 

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I've just about finished it up now.

 

Got the side of the panel welded to the door jamb section and to the main panel body.

 

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I also welded in a lip around the door frame, just like on the other side, so it slip fits on the door jamb sections and holds it all together. (not shown)

 

Loads of welding getting done.  Also had to add a patch to the top right corner where you can see a square section is missing.  There is an unfortunate amount of piecing together in this panel, but such it is.

 

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Welded and ground (mostly).

 

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Bottom left corner of the panel in the pic above shows a curved section missing.  This curves around a necessary seat belt bolt point in the floor pan.  The panel has to clear that so I can install the seatbelts.  I approached this differently than the other side.  This time, I cut a bowl shape out of the rounded corner of a scrap door body and used that to form this corner.  Last time I tried to hammer form the corner.

 

Installing the "bowl". You can see its orange on the back, from the "front" truck.

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And basically installed and ground back.

 

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This panel is basically finished now.  Next is to install the door hinge reinforcements behind the door frame, then I should be able to move on to the door itself.  I'm hoping I can get to the point where those are finished, then move the truck in to storage.  I have another proejct I want as a winter focus this year, one that will show progress much faster than this has because it won't be hours upon hours of invisible pain staking work to accomplish it.

 

 

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Thanks keeper.  Considering the work you do and the quality you produce, I really appreciate that.

 

I got started on the hinge reinforcements over the weekend.  I should have focused on my wife's horse trailer and getting that done.... I wanted to play with my toys instead of hers.

 

Today's episode -  "Goodness Gracious!"  

 

Matching the work I did on the other side, the first step was to install "load spreader" plates behind the truck skin.  I started with a chunk of extra door skin.  Then I bent the flanges along the edges with just a pair of pliers slowly folding everything over.  Drill some plug weld holes and ground off paint.  I use a 3/8 spot weld cutter to cut plug weld holes.  They are a bit larger than I want, but the pnuematic hole punch is too small for me to be truly confident that I've gotten a solid weld, and the spot weld cutter just cuts nice even holes, better than using a drill bit.

 

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I marked where the holes would go inside the truck body, ground those clean, and then sprayed some cleaner in there to finish prepping for this panel.  Then clamped the panel in and started filling my plugs.

 

And then

 

I lit my truck on fire.  🔥🔥🔥

 

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Down in the rocker panel inside the rear body panel.  I failed to consider that there was a large amount of built up garbage down there that absorbed the flammable cleaner I had used.  Welding sparks lit that crap right up.  Luckily I had a fire extinguisher close at hand.

 

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Ah my beloved Mtn Dew.  Not just for quenching my thirst.  It also protects my truck.

 

I showed those pics to my wife who shook her head and said "really?  you had time to stop and take pictures first?"  😄  It was just a wee fire.  And not the first one building this truck.  (sidenote, I also lit her horse trailer I am building on fire only like 2 days earlier.  That one took a real fire extinguisher to save her saddles from my stupidity.  I am taking this as a wakeup call that I am not paying enough attention to flammable things when welding, so I don't die.)

 

Anywho, after retrieving a new beverage from the fridge, I continued working.

 

Load spreader plate installed.

 

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These are the hinge reinforcement plates I cut out of unused parts of 720 doors.  The hinges bolt to these and they reinforce the whole corner for the stresses of the hinge.

 

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With modifications, they will now live inside the truck doing the same basic job.  This is the essentially finished top bolt point for the hinge.

 

You can see the plug weld holes where it will attach to the load spreader plate on the left, and the holes where it will attach to the door jamb on the right.  The actual bolt hole has yet to be drilled in this plate, though it is present in the door jamb.

 

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And this is the bottom one.

 

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I have not yet finished the third one,  but once built and all three are installed there will only be a bit of finish work and the cab side of the suicide door hinges will be officially finished!  Then on to the door.  But first, back to the horse trailer.

 

 

 

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Popping in to say your work is amazing. Wish I had just some of your skill, but at my age those days are gone to learn. So I’ll watch as you progress and smile as I bondo and sand lol. As my main job is fighting stage 4 cancer. Can’t wait to see the finished product!  Best wishes

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18 hours ago, the510keeper said:

Had 3 720s back in the day. My daily was a slammed pink mini 720 with blue ghost flames and snug top walk through.

LZ24 4 speed. drove the shit out of that truck.

Pics are in my photo album b4 digital 

 

Keep up the good work

 

 

Snap a couple pics of the old pics and post them up. I really want to see this truck you speak of  😄

 

33 minutes ago, Beowulf said:

Popping in to say your work is amazing. Wish I had just some of your skill, but at my age those days are gone to learn. So I’ll watch as you progress and smile as I bondo and sand lol. As my main job is fighting stage 4 cancer. Can’t wait to see the finished product!  Best wishes

 

Thanks Beowolf!  Building this thing is pushing my skills to their limits (and well beyond sometimes).  I don't think I would do suicide doors again if I were to do something like this again.  Good crud I can't believe how hard I've made this on myself 😄.  I'm sorry to hear about your health issues, so I will do my best to keep you entertained!  Thanks again for you kind words.

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Today's Episode - "Damn.  The Nuts."

 

I finished up the braces and got to welding them in to the truck body.

 

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Tops got some smoothing to help water not run in behind the brace if the door is open, just like before.

 

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Only step left is a little grinding and drilling holes in the reinforcement plates for the hinge bolts.  Since the all the real work is done, a little primer was put in place to protect everything.  I will finish the last of the priming when I drill the holes.

 

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Since the panel was done too, that also got primed.

 

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Ok, now to attempt to install the door hinge.  Wait it doesn't sit right?  WTF?  Ahhhhh......Damn.....The nuts....  On the bottom door brace, I failed to remove the old trapped nuts from the bracket.  Now they are in the way and will be a massive bitch to remove.  Idiot.  I thought I was done with the body side and was on to the door.

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  • 1 month later...

So very close to nothing has happened on this truck in months its painful.  I have been otherwise occupied, and my otherwise occupations have demotivated me.  I'm putting this away for the winter and moving on to a different winter project.  Once that is done, I will likely be back at this.  The hardest parts are all almost completely done.

 

Here is what has actually happened though.

 

I picked up a free Jeep Cherokee, 1992 flavor.  Even came with a title.

 

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Then I cut the roof out of it, hoping it would be a good fit for the quad cab.

 

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It really wasn't great.  Oh and while it looks a bit ugly, the roof is in overall decent condition.

 

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Its about 7 inches too wide (wider than expected), and way too long, which was expected.  I'm not currently sure if I'm going to narrow the roof or try a different option.

 

Then I gave the Jeep away after taking a few other random components.

 

While prepping for winter, I needed a way to put truck in a tent for storage on dirt.  So I couldn't use the 4 inch casters on my cart.  So I adapted, in the process creating possibly the greatest vehicle ever thought up (perhaps only equalled by Jeremy Clarkson's the Excellent)

 

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Boom!  Miata Cab!

 

 

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That roof looks like it could be made to fit pretty well honestly, the curve seems pretty similar at least at the front. I'd say just cut it where the old roof curves down sharply to the drip rail, but I see that the raised roof bar section could pose an issue. Could section the new roof in half and narrow it but you'd want to do it with it lying on the current roof to try to help it keep its shape.

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I want to keep the roof rack intact (its modular so easily shortened and narrowed) and the roof has reinforced sections it is mounted to that are raised ribs especially for that.  Combined with the weirdness between the front and back roof profiles, I'm leaning heavily toward cutting it in half if I keep this roof.  I would then attach the perimeter all the way around, then cut and butt the roof back together.  I made a "profile gauge" for the roof out of steel when I started this project so I could know I got the roof back in correct shape.  Using that I should be able to get the two roof pieces to work out decently.

 

The real question for me is do I want to go to that effort, or would I be happier finding a different donor.

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