Fig. 2 - About 5 hours later, the majority of the firewall has been cleaned up with a wire wheel, now it's time to start sanding the nooks and crannies with sandpaper.

July 29, 2005 - I decided to take the afternoon off work, and spent the day in the shop working on the truck for the first time in about a month. Even though my last update said I was going to start on the interior floorpans next, I changed my mind and decided to go with the firewall first. Today's agenda consisted solely of getting the firewall stripped and ready to coat with POR-15. I spent about 5 hours with the angle grinder with a wire-wheel attachment stripping paint down to bare metal, and then another couple hours touching it up with 60-grit sandpaper. There were a lot of areas inaccessible with the wire wheel, so these areas had to be done by hand. If I'd been painting the firewall instead of using POR-15, I wouldn't have taken it down to bare metal, but since POR-15 can't protect metal it's not touching, it had to be completely clean. I thought it came out looking pretty darned good....and I'm really looking forward to see this get painted tomorrow!

July 30, 2005 - I got a late start today, not making it to the shop till about 11AM. But once I got there I got right to work. I started off by rolling the truck out into the driveway and blowing off yesterday's sanding dust with compressed air. I then wiped the firewall down one final time before hitting it with the MetalReady (Fig. 4). I kept making the rounds with the spray bottle, making sure it was kept completely wet for at least 15 minutes per instructions...which kept me busy, considering it was 85 degrees outside with a mild breeze. The firewall then got rinsed off with a high-pressure nozzle and blown dry with compressed air, making absolutely certain to hit every nook and cranny where moisture might be hiding. I then let the truck set for about an hour while tending to other chores in the shop, just to make sure, but I did go ahead and use the air nozzle again, just to eliminate the possibility of moisture lurking anywhere. And then it was time for the actual POR-15 application.

Because it was breezy outside, I really wanted to do the painting inside the shop to slow down the drying process, but there were just too many flies inside...and I didn't want the little buggers landing on the tacky POR-15, so I went ahead and did the application outside. It did dry a bit faster, but there were far fewer bug tracks this time around. The application time was about an hour, and by the time I finished up, the other side was almost dry, but still a bit tacky....which is the perfect time for applying the color coat, in this case Krylon Semi-Flat black. I started on the left side, applying the Krylon over the top of the POR-15, and by the time I'd made it to the right side, the left side was ready for another coat. All together I applied about 4 coats of Krylon, about 2 cans worth.

I still had a little bit of POR-15 left in the Tupperware dish I was using, so instead of wasting it, I went ahead and did a quick cleanup of the inside of each door pillar, and then using a sponge I reached inside and blotted POR-15 everywhere I could reach, and after letting those areas set up a bit I used up another can of Krylon in there. The coating inside the pillars didn't turn out as smooth as the firewall, but once the doors are mounted you'd have to specifically look inside them to see it anyway....so I'm happy.

Well, now what? I mean, getting the firewall painted was really the only thing on today's agenda, but I didn't have to be home for several more hours to take over watching the boys while my wife starts the graveyard shift at work, so I decided to take advantage of the opportunity. The next step would be mounting the radiator support, inner fenderwells and fenders. The fenders will need some work prior to final attachment, but by mocking everything up now, I could go ahead and get everything else tightened down for the last time, including the cab. The inner fenderwell brackets were already sandblasted and painted, but I didn't have any bolts, so I spent the next hour or so cleaning nuts and bolts with the wire wheel on the bench grinder, then spraying them with a light coat of primer and then a couple thin coats of Krylon. While they were drying I went ahead and dug out the powdercoated radiator support and new bushings from LMC and got the support loosely mounted. By this time the bolts were dry enough to use, so I got the brackets mounted and then set the inner fenderwells down in place and started a couple bolts, just to hold them in place.

Fig. 4 - After I used compressed air to clear any debris, the firewall got coated with MetalReady.

Fig. 5 - TA-DA!! Damn that looks good! I was really impressed with how the POR-15 laid down flat when applying it with a foam brush.

Fig. 6 - Next on the agenda was the mockup of the radiator support and inner fenderwells. Here's the '79 F150 support loosely mounted.

Fig. 6 - This shot (and Fig. 7 below) show the inner fenderwells setting in place. They're not bolted in yet, since I ran out of time this evening before I could use the freshly-painted bolts and nuts.

Fig. 7 - It's finally starting to actually look a truck again, isn't it? Next on the agenda is to spend several hours cleaning and painting bolts, nuts and washers to get everything bolted together for the last time.

When I was prepping the '79 radiator support for powdercoating, I wanted to have all mounting holes for the '67 grille drilled beforehand. However when setting the inner fenderwells in place this evening I noticed that there was a hole on each side I'd neglected to drill out. However, the support already has a dimple where it needs to go, so it's a no-brainer. Also, before mounting the support this evening, I was debating whether to use this '79 support or the '67 support I have which is in excellent shape. I finally decided to go with the '79 support since it's already set up for use with an A/C condenser, which I'm gonna need on this project. Otherwise I'd have had to go with an add-on style condenser, but I think I prefer the look of a factory piece.

Well, this is where things stand as of now. The next time I'm in the shop I'll be spending a lot of time getting attaching hardware cleaned up and painted. This will include all the hardware for the inner fenderwells and fenders, hood hinges and grille area. I've decided to go ahead and get a lot of the exterior items done before getting started on the interior of the cab, since right now (for personal reasons) I just want to be able to SEE some progress on this thing. Being able to get the external pieces mounted will satisfy that need...so stay tuned!