Psaboic

Hi Folks,

New to the forum, but in no way new to cars and trucks, been wrenching on them for almost 40 years. Anyway, I want to pick folks brains about a restoration project I have been given.

The vehicle is a 1992 F150 Custom Supercab 2WD with a 302 and a 5 speed that belonged to my late Father-in law. Before I go into too much detail, the family wants to restore the vehicle come hell or high water for sentimental reasons.

That said, the vehicle is completely stock and pretty much what you would expect from a daily driver work truck with just shy of 300K on it. She’s tired, but aside from the bed, tailgate, and windshield, it is in amazingly good shape. The rig runs great, shifts just fine, doesn’t burn oil, etc, and overall is a good running truck.

Now for what the family wants me to do. They want the bed and tailgate replaced with a unit that hasn’t been beat to hell, body and paint work, the entire interior re-done, with new headliner, swap the vinyl bench seats for cloth captains chairs, put a bench seat in the back (it never had one from what I have been told) and possibly put carpet on the floor as it has the vinyl/rubber type floor. They would also like me to possibly remove the crank windows and put in power ones.

On the outside, they want the brakes, tranny, clutch, bearings, and motor gone through, and swap out the black grille and painted bumpers for chrome ones. Basically make it an XLT model instead of a custom.

I told them if I did the work, I would take the bed and cab off so I could pretty much do a frame off resto and replace everything I saw that needed it. I would love to do a diesel conversion and swap out the 302 for a nice Cummins 4BT unit, but that is down the road for sure.

Ok, so if you are still with me, I know what you are thinking…..the same thing I told the family. It would be easier and cheaper to just buy an older XLT if they want all that stuff, and even if I did do all that they wanted, it would probably cost close to $10,000, and it would not be the same truck when it was finished. Of course, that fell on deaf ears. They are adamant they want that truck fixed up for sentimental reasons among other things.

So, in a nut shell, I can do it for them, but I do have a couple questions before I start. Taking the bed and cab off will be fairly straightforward, but as far as the cab goes, will I be able to put in a bench seat in the rear if it did not have one in the first place? Will I need to drill the holes and fabricate brackets or should it pretty much go right in? Also, how hard will it be to swap out the front bench seat for cloth Captains chairs? Again should it bolt up, or am I looking at a mess with brackets and mounts. Lastly, aside from new door panels with switches and wiring, and the motors and different linkages, is there anything stopping me from putting in power windows.

Thanks for any help, tips and/or suggestions, it is greatly appreciated.



Glenn

raski

My advice, doing all that to a 92 with 300k miles on it is foolish. I would leave it alone and enjoy it as is. The most I would do is deal with the bed and tailgate if they are all beat up. After the cosmetics, you still have a worn out engine and a $3000-4000 truck at best. This has all the ingredients to a money pit. If they insist, let them fund the project and you do the work.

Flareside1992

Depends. Cars in general are horrible investments financially, and this being a run of the mill f150, not a lightning or anything, its even more so. But you said it in the first paragraph, sentimental value. Yea, it might be the story of your grandfathers ax, head replaced twice and the handle 3 times, but sentimental value makes us do funny things. If its worth it to the family, and its something that will stick around, then yes its worth it even if the vin tag is the only thing left original. An XLT, no matter how perfect, will never be your father in laws truck. If your looking to make money on the thing, then of course its not worth it.

David Young

Sounds like they are using your skills, to me. Sentimental reasons doesn't mean changing everything on the truck, making it look completely different. In my opinion

BLDTruth

I have spent just shy of 10k over the last 3 years restoring my truck. I don't regret a single penny I spent on it. Some people will have spent 1-3 times that amount just in new truck payments alone.

92 was the first year of the aeronose body style of truck, and it was also the worst. If you are truly committed, consider upgrading everything to 94-95 wiring. This will allow you to have factory keyless entry, anti-theft, power mirrors, and all of the luxury amenities that didn't really show up in these trucks until 94.

Your best bet to save the most money and still keep it as stock as possible - find a nice parts truck donor that has everything you want. Ideally, a 94-95 Supercab XLT with power bucket seats, power locks, mirrors, windows, keyless, anti-theft, etc.... and same bed/drivetrain configuration. With your budget, it doesn't even need to be a parts truck, it can just be a solid running truck. 5k will get you a lot of really nice older F150's in my neck of the woods. This gives you everything you need to swap over. If you plan on painting it, then you can just swap over the doors and not deal with any of the internals. And when you are done you will have an entire second truck to put together, part out, tinker on, etc.

While you are waiting on finding the right truck to show up, you can start stripping down the old one and figure out what needs to be done frame/body wise.

Welcome to the forum! Let's see some pics!

djfllmn

iTrader: (1)

one hiccup you might have is finding a decent bed for your truck. Either they are rotted away to nothing or they are pristine and therefore $$$$

how beat up is the one you have now?

Psaboic

How beat up is the bed, well, lets just say the last 4 years my father in law drove it, he used it to get firewood, gravel, and large landscaping rocks........if you need more details, the bed rails are pretty dented, the wheel well tubs are really banged up, and the bed floor is warped and dented.........long story short, the bed is pretty hammered.

Psaboic

Nope, they don't want to make money on it, they want it fixed up and drive it forever.....

Chris_1

iTrader: (1)

Buy a southern box and tailgate.
Find a donor truck you can pull power doors and harness from.
You're going to have to pull the dash to get the door harness out of the donor truck but you can probably sneak it into your truck without doing that; it's a one piece harness all the way from the driver's door lock all the way to the passenger kick panel and it's attached right below the windshield so you can't remove it without taking out the dash.
If the cab and front clip are clean you're ready for paint.
I would suggest starting with that much; that's a lot but it's manageable.
You can do more later but if you tackle too much all at once you may end up with a lot of pieces of truck all over your shop or yard and if you get tired of it or sick, or you want to move (whatever) because of the sentimental value you can't get rid of it, you can't sell it, you have to keep it. That could be a problem, unless you're sure you can tear it all down and put it back together in a month or two for sure. Going to take up a lot of your time.
Seats will fit, but you will be messing around with holes and such.