A little light entertainment: 1939 Ford 1 ton Utility restoration

[jack neville]

I don't have any clues as to what the floorboards are held down with but as the body is held down with large wide head bolts I decided to use these elevator bolts I found on the internet and imported from the States.

[jack neville]

The boards are varnished and I sprayed the underside with body deadener.
It is ready to refit permanently.

[Danny Devers]

Looks Good

[jack neville]

Body is back on and outer guards have been fitted but still require a lot of work to straighten them as they have had a hard life. Now all the guards are in situ I can reassess the running boards. Back in Post #70 I had a go at straightening them. I was hopeful they could be salvaged but once sandblasted too much material will disappear and I am not satisfied they can be straightened enough to look presentable.

[jack neville]

Fortunately the inner section of the running boards is solid and straight so I decided to have a go at replacing the flatter section with the raised ribs and join the two.

I bought an old bead roller which luckily had the correct profile wheel.

The last time I used one of these was about 20 years ago when I built a replica Kubelwagen body and I used an identical machine to put the ribs in the side panels.


A test piece shows promise so we'll see how it goes.

[Bob Carriere]

Hi Jack

How thick was the steel you used....?

Nice work....

Bob C

[jack neville]

1.2mm cold rolled panel steel.
I made up some simple tooling to press the ends of the rib which flattens out the pull in the sheet metal at the end of the rib. Trial Looks ok.