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1989 BroncoII

First Bronco II Ever on the cover of Bronco Driver Magazine!!!!!

COMPLETED!!!!

298 Days

This is a Frame off Rock Crawler Body Restoration.
Basically, The Entire Exterior, Under Side, Engine Compartment, Inner Fenders Etc (Pretty much everything but the interior).

Everything will be Stripped to Bare Metal, Painted, Por15'ed and Lined.

Break in damage on the Driver door.

It also has some Collision damage to the Front end, Driver fender, and Driver Door.
An extreme amount of Oxidation (70% of the paint is Oxidized 40% to the metal)
Many small golf ball dents (Previous owner lived on golf course)
A lot of Stress damage in the Engine compartment.
And quite a few other things.

All around this was going to be a pretty big Project.

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This is how the truck arrived

Some pretty obvious things were apparent.
The Radiator support is damaged and tearing itself apart. This is evident due to several cracks can be seen throughout the support. Also it is very flimsy and can be pushed in and out with little effort. Another item is there appears to be Break in damage on the Driver door.
I do an overall check of everything before disassembly. This included instruments, radio, body, doors; pretty much anything I can try out or see. Anything found is then written down and the owner provided the list.

Then it is time to start basic pre-disassembly and inspection.

The Strip down begins.

Body Removal

You can't truly respect the height of this thing until you actually see the frame,

the engine on the frame sits just under five feet tall.

Next is frame is Frame Prepped and Stripped to bare metal.
After stripping another inspection is done. All holes are inspected, attach points, and virtually every inch is looked over.
Things to look for include cracks, rust, damage from road hazards, loose attaching hardware, and the list goes on.
Things that were found included numerous cracks at hole corners. These were created by the stressing of the frame. When a hole is placed in the frame you must ensure that there are no sharp corners. A crack can develop from that corner because stress builds up in the sharp corner and cracks result. Many were found and the cracks were routed out and smoothed radiuses were cut into the corners. Also other things you may find are not design flaws but human caused. In this case the frame was notched for header clearance with what appeared to be a plasma cutter. Very roughly cut and unclean. A future problem for the stresses this frame would see. This to was cleaned up and radiused also.

Frame is then stripped of all items, Blasted and prepped for Paint.

Four coats of Por-15 and Urethane Raptor Liner.

As well as all the remaining undercarriage parts.

Finished, and Suspension Re-installed.

On to the Body.
Body after Final Disassembly on the Compartment.
Once again a through inspection of every inch.

Items found included:
Collision damage to the front end.
Up to ½ inch of Plastic Filler were found in the drivers front fender.
A quick note here.
Plastic filler is for filling minor indentations only. If it will be more than 1/32 of an inch then it is too thick. Plastic filler will actually leech moisture into it and cause rust underneath the filler. This is why you see filler fail years after a repair.
The Radiator support has actually been slowly torn apart.
This was due to poor modification for the V-8 installation.
The structure of the support was compromised by the modifications and now has made it unusable. Cracks and tears are throughout the support. A replacement will be required.

The Mechanical paint stripping of the body begins.

Then again another inspection.
More rust is found that will need repair.
The rusted metal is removed and replaced.

Rust Repair to the Firewall and Steering wheel mount.

A hole is found in the driver floor pan. Why it was cut there is unknown. A patch will be welded in to close it off.
Repairing the hole in the Driver Floor Pan.

Break in Collision and other damage to the Doors.
It appears at some time someone tried to break in by prying on the door from the bottom. This resulted in the bottom of the drivers door being damaged as well as the rocker being damaged. Also it appears the door inner panel was cut to facilitate removal of the window regulator assembly. This was not necessary.

Collision damage to the Front Fender will be correctly re-repaired by reforming the metal and re-smoothing. The dent puller holes (created by the original repair) will be welded closed.

Radiator Support Tear down.

The Radiator support will be removed and a new one fabricated from tubing.
This will be stronger than the original and much cleaner.
Custom Tube Radiator Support Fabrication.
The radiator will also be replaced with a high efficiency aluminum radiator.

Custom Headlight Alignment Brackets Fabricated,

The vehicle had a Pillar Spot-Light that will be removed.
Pillar light Removal and Repair.

Next is Mechanically Stripping the Doors, Hood and Fenders.

More Collision Damage to Driver Door is found and will need to be repaired along with the break in damage.

Break in damage repair on Driver Door.
A piece will be fabricated to replace the damaged section. This required opening the door panel to replace.

The Rocker will need to be replaced do to excessive Collision Damage.

Panels Stripped, and minor Bodywork Completed.

Fiber Glass Chip Repair on Hatch.

Fender Flares are added to give clearance. The flares provided will be Custom fitted and reshaped to the vehicle.

Also the fenders and body will be cut back and re-welded to provide even more clearance.

Fenders Reinforced to prevent OilCanning

On to the Body.

There were many small items to do on the body. This included several golf ball divots (The previous owner lived on a golf course) 46 of them.

There were numerous other minor dings and dents to be dealt with also.

Then prime and Re-checking and correcting many times.

This is where Block Sanding shows flaws you cannot see.

Starting with Epoxy primer and finally High build Polyester primer.

Blocked out Ready for High Build

Flares Custom Molded to the Body

Underside Stripped, prepped and Por-15nd then Lined

Then to fitting the misc items.

More prime and sanding to the final Prime coat.

Next to the actual Base coating of the Jams and Engine bay.

And the Clear coat of these areas.

Then the Body stripe.

And then the Body color.

Finally the 5 Clear Coats.

Flares, Skid Plates, Tank Straps, Frame Cross members,

Mirrors, and optional Grill and Bezels, and misc bolts Por-15nd and Lined.

On to the Many small items.
The A/C core box was poorly modified for the V-8 and needed to be redone. It actually was touching the valve cover and dented it.

The headers were also hitting and melting the box.
I will redesign this modification to give more area for flow as well as more clearance.

Before and After