Laying the Framework

I took the frame away to get sandblasted, revealing all of the beautiful welds that were done at the factory. Overall it came back in good shape, there are a few areas that will need to be repaired where water has collected and rusted through. I will be welding the entire seam of the 2 piece frame to add a little strength.

Here the frame is up on the jig I built to keep everything in line when I cut off the front clip. This shows the new clip already in place, we did have a small problem with it though. The body mounts did not line up with the factory locations when I refrenced the bumper mount holes. We decided to keep the overall length the same and cut off the new mounts and reweld them on.

Here you can see the new front clip and rear suspensionin place. Three was a lot of measuring and thinking to get it to this point. I am not expert at this but I tryed to consider all of the geometry of the rear end in regards to trailing arm angles and pinion rotation that will happen during suspension movement.

This is supposed to be one of the most important pieces when welding on the front clip, this is supposed to add strength to the frame where they come together. Hopefully I have retained my welding skills from shop class in high school.