Friday, June 17, 2005 - Well, I had a good birthday today...I got to spend the whole day in various area junkyards, scouting how parts trucks and parts in general. The pictures posted here are from a half-dozen yards in several different towns. I'll be headed back tomorrow with the tools to go ahead and salvage as much as I can. Most of these places have very reasonable prices, and while I don't really need much for my project now, the pieces I get will be sold off to help finance the project.

The depressing thing was the complete lack of rust-free sheetmetal. I could find NO doors, fenders, inner fenderwells or tailgates that weren't rusted through. I did find one R/S inner fenderwell that only had a small amount of corrosion immediately under the battery box, so I might grab that, depending on how much time I have.

Yard 1 - Truck #1: 1969 F100 - There really wasn't much left of this truck worth salvaging. I'll be grabbing the steel instrument panel and windshield washer jug, (and a few small odds and ends). These jugs aren't being reproduced by anyone and are getting hard to find in good shape. This one is perfect.

Yard 1 - Truck #2: 1971 or 1972 F250 - The FE in this Camper Special has been replaced at some point with a 302. About the only things I can see worth salvaging are the radiator shroud and dash trim. It's got the passenger-side toolbox, but it's locked and there are no keys, so I'm not going to mess with it.

Yard 1 - Truck #3: 1969 F250 motorhome - This was the surprise find of the day! This truck was a conversion and had seen better days. However, the black dashpad is perfect. I thought it was interesting how the VIN tag was mounted on the front of the cowl panel...necessary because there was no driver's door. This would have been ordered as a cab-and chassis and delivered to a third party who added the motorhome components. Notice the different antenna mount and the raised platform that the bucket seats are mounted to. I'm also planning on getting the underdash A/C setup.

Yard 2 - Truck #1: 1972 F250 - This truck is beat to heck and all panels are rusted out anyway. However, it's got a few pieces of good trim on it, including the perfect rear tailgate panel. This truck also has dual fuel tanks under the bed, but are (I believe) owner-installed. I've never seen a setup like this. Unfortunately the tanks were crushed by a junkyard forklift. The rear window is a piece of plexiglass held on with sheetmetal screws.

Yard 3 - Truck #2: 1968 F250 - This Ranger Camper Special is the best truck I ran across today, but unfortunately it might not be one to be parted out. It was off in a section of the yard for possible keepers...and in fact I got chewed out for being back there. (Whoops!) The yard attendant I talked to said it belonged to the owner of the yard, and he wasn't sure what his plans for it were, but I'm to call back next week and talk with the owner about it. This truck has good trim, C/S script and 390 emblems, an add-on cruise control setup, dual tanks and an almost perfect grille. I don't think I'll be able to get my hands on this truck or any of the parts, but I'm definitely going to call back when the owner returns and find out what the story is on this one.

I've got more pics that I'll add within the next day or two, some from other yards. Here are some of the items I've marked for retrieval tomorrow when I return:

'73-'79 truck items:

• Bronco rear chrome sport bumper brackets - I've heard they'll work on our trucks, so I'm gonna grab a set to find out for sure.

• F350 front swaybar setup - all hardware is here, so it's gonna get removed.

• another front swaybar, but the type that extends between the radius arms. Great for a restoration or someone who isn't planning on adding headers.

As mentioned above, I'm headed out tomorrow and will probably get more pics. I'll get those posted within the next few days as well, as I can find the time.

Saturday, June 18, 2005  -  OK, I'm back. It was a long day...but I wasn't able to get half of what I wanted, due to time constraints. It's very time-consuming removing parts, especially when you leave half your important tools at home and you have to improvise.

We actually ended up getting a late start, didn't make it back to the junkyards until about 1PM.

At the first yard, I'd spotted an absolutely PERFECT tailgate panel yesterday, but it was riveted on and I don't have a cordless drill. I talked to the yard man about it and he told me it was mine for $10. When I told him I needed to drill out the rivets, he said he wouldn't do that, because this was a self-serve yard...but then told me he sell me the whole tailgate (rusted out) for $20. I went back to remove the tailgate, but decided I didn't want to carry the heavy thing, so I used a small punch and was able to carefully pop the heads off the rivets and got the panel. I then went around the truck and removed all the aluminum trim, even the bent pieces. I hauled it all up to the office but made sure all the bent pieces were on top....for the visual. He saw the pile of 'bent' aluminum and only charged me $25 for the whole pile. It was actually a pretty good deal.

We then headed over to the second yard, where the '69 motorhome was. (I thought it was a '68 yesterday.) I took those pics of the motorhome early afternoon yesterday, but 24 hours later when I returned, the steering column was missing out of it. No big deal, since it was a manual steering column anyway with a cracked wheel. Fortunately they didn't take anything else, or mess up the dashpad when removing the column. I went to work removing the dash pad and underdash A/C, plus all the A/C hardware, including the hoses, condenser, in-line dryer and the top plate of the York compressor, since it's got the special barbed fittings for the hoses instead of the hoses with fittings.

I got three of these, but the fourth was damaged. I saw another good one yesterday in another yard but wasn't able to get it today. I also got an assortment of 15" chrome wheel trim rings to use in conjunction with the dog-dish hubcaps

Here's a shot of the recessed cup holder from a conversion van and the combo windshield washer tank & radiator overflow tank. I saw one of these combo tanks in a truck and was trying to decide whether it would be worth the trouble to remove, when I happened upon another truck with it already removed and just sitting there, so I grabbed it.

The coolest thing I found, believe it or not, which probably would be trivial to some of you, was the original radio speaker under that dashpad that was 100% intact....the cardboard cone was in perfect condition. It looked like a brand new speaker, so I grabbed that. The glovebox insert was also in almost perfect condition, so it got salvaged too, along with the metal instrument panel and one of the 2-post Jr. West Coast mirrors...but an older version than what we're used to seeing on these trucks.

I wasn't feeling up to getting the inner fenderwell off that at the time, especially since my wheelbarrow was already getting full of parts, so I told myself I'd come back to get it, after grabbing a few smaller items off a few other trucks. I went down to the end of that row and spent an hour grabbing dash trim, the radiator shroud and the chrome windshield trim, then went back up the next row over and grabbed a '68 windshield washer tank & pump, and then out to the truck to empty out the wheelbarrow. When I returned to get started on the inner fenderwell, I got a shock. It was already gone! In the hour or so I was gone, whoever had removed the L/S inner fenderwell and returned and removed the R/S fender and fenderwell, but left the fender. I grabbed the chrome wheelwell trim off it. And here's the kicker....when they removed the fenderwell, they brought back the grille! It was sitting on the ground in front of the truck along with several grilles from other vehicles. Evidentially they'd gone around grabbing good grilles but decided against taking them, and dumped them all right there. It's a decent '69 grille, it's got some minor bends in it, nothing major....but it was NOT there earlier! Hmmm....OK, no problem. I grabbed it too, and was pleased to find a small transmission cooler was clamped to the backside support.

In one thread at the FORDification.com forums, we were discussing possible ways to incorporate a cupholder. I've been keeping my eyes open for something to use, and ran across several full-size conversion vans, one of which had a cool plastic woodgrained cupholder/ashtray combo. I decided to grab it and see if this might be a viable option. (Picture posted at right.)

Unfortunately, I ran out of time...we had to get Mary back to be on call at the hospital, so I was only able to hit 2 of the 3 yards I wanted to.

Here's a list of other items I got, in addition to those mentioned above:

• '69 aluminum headlight door (perfect)

• full set of wheelwell trim (minor corrosion on inner lips, not obvious when installed)

• '72 longbed beltline trim (almost complete, some with minor dings) and lower ribbed trim (almost a complete set)

• '72 tailgate panel (perfect)

• '72 hood lip chrome endpiece (perfect)

• several e-brake warning light lenses

• combination windshield washer tank & radiator overflow tank, from a '90s Ford pickup (thought I'd see if I could make it work...it looks cool!)

• two pairs of '67-'69 front turn signal lenses (good condition)

• five chrome trim rings (two pairs and a single, for the factory mags) and three 5-spoke sport hubcaps (the 4th hubcap was there but damaged)

• one set of perfect windshield chrome (this truck also had driprail chrome, but I forgot to bring my removal tool)

• two radio antennas in great shape

• one defroster vent hose in perfect condition...it looks brand new
   

I showed up today with $300 in my pocket to spend, but all together, I ran up a bill of only $122! Of course, if I'd have had time to hit the other yards for the swaybar setups, bumper brackets, etc. that I'd hoped to get, the tab would have been a bit higher. I'm hoping to go to the shop for an hour or so tomorrow to get some individual pictures of the day's haul, and if I do I'll get some more pics posted.

Stay tuned!