SUPER CREW!!!

[Mark Nixon]

Mark, on the frame, i thought that ford had a full square box frame, and thats why most people like the ford frame better. do they have reliefs cut in them for flex ?

i'm just wondering and trying to learn something here.

Dar,
While I can't speak for the latest and greatest Ford and Dodge frames, the '94 through 2007 Dodge frames and the similar era of Fords are not "full" box in the sense we are seeing here, in fact they are similar to a 2nd gen, full boxed near the transmission, to just around the front cab mounts.
Even so, the Dodges and Fords both tend to rust out at the points near where the trans crossmembers are, because neither have drainage and collect debris.

Worse, having been under both Dodges and Fords in the junkyards, both have a propensity of cracking the frames BEHIND the boxed section.

Mark.

[m880cummins]

Well as far as everything you have said, it doesn't really affect me at all. Frankley, the welds have the highest penetration possible without heat marking and to each man his own frame. I've been welding for 7 years now and leaving this summer for mechanical engineering at a merchant marine college. As far as welding certification, I'll have that under my belt in the next 4 years with the program I'm doing. If you need to find another loop hole for me Mark, I don't plan on ever selling this truck EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Its a pickup truck built in 1985. Its not a 30000lb tri axle dump truck and yes, it is heavy and can destroy the sh*** out of a car but look at any truck made by dodge between 1972-1993 and watch it hit a toyota corolla. My dad totaled a toyota corolla with his and he only had a bent fender and bumper. That car was slanted over, rear axle hanging out a foot and broken in half and the lady's glasses in a ditch 50ft away. Yes, insurance will try to find where they can make you liable and not have to pay but what I'm doing is fairly minor compared to the massivly growing network of diesel conversions, lifting trucks, running non factory tires and wheels etc. My title says gas truck, dana 70 rear. Now its diesel with a D80. How about the ones running rockwells on the street or running 10" of lift!! So yeah, Mark, I know the risks. If you have further comments to my work post them in the lounge where I don't care.

Thanks to everyone else for the nice comments. Thanks to Jungle for his shackles, a fellow member on the Cummins forum for the truck, the parts store for brake parts and everything else I could possibly need.

Charlie

[Mark Nixon]

Copping and attitude now, are you?
That can only mean you've done some checking and found out that I'm right and now you're pissed.

Mark.

[cmann250]

The kid's getting snippy In my shade tree mo-kanic opinion, box the whole damned thing. Make it solid as a rock then drill and tap a hole for a Schrader valve in each rail and fill it with nitrogen. No oxygen, no rust (For those that don't know me, that's 100 % sarcasm.)

Anyways, get some paint on that thing Charlie! We want to see the finished product.

[m880cummins]

And, tell me how you went about putting a cummins in a ram charger? Not only did you swap frames but regarding the addition of WEIGHT, how did you resolve this? Surely a ramcharger frame is not rated for that weight.

Attitude comes from the way you present yourself here on the forum (which neither of us can change). I'm not copping, I'm fully aware of my modifications jepordizing the outcome of a typical fender bender in a court of law etc. and have known this growing up around my family and friends who modify and customize vehicles all the time.

Wonder why you aren't showing up on FABO anymore?

Charlie

[Mark Nixon]

And, tell me how you went about putting a cummins in a ram charger? Not only did you swap frames but regarding the addition of WEIGHT, how did you resolve this? Surely a ramcharger frame is not rated for that weight.

Okay, time for schooling.
The RamCharger's front frame section is IDENTICAL in crossectional thickness and depth as the front of a 3/4 ton Dodge with a Cummins. the front spring hangars, rear spring hangars, crossmember, even the engine support is the same thickness, depth and height.
I had measured and re-measured all dimensions and parts involved for thickness and the only thing different was the spring rate on the front axle and the front and rear eye bolt diameter, which was increased.

Did you know they use the EXACT same rinky dink front spring mount bracket on a 4X4 Ramcharger as they do on a 4x4 1 ton dually? Probably not, but I did, because I RESEARCHED IT, instead of breaking out the tools and hacking away.
Same goes for the front crossmember support and all other collision-sensitive parts, I researched it all, even down to part numbers, just to be 100% satisfied.

I didn't just break out a welder and a grinder, I took the time to know what I was accomplishing.

Attitude comes from the way you present yourself here on the forum (which neither of us can change). I'm not copping, I'm fully aware of my modifications jepordizing the outcome of a typical fender bender in a court of law etc. and have known this growing up around my family and friends who modify and customize vehicles all the time.

Your attitude comes off as being a gung-ho kid with inexperience, which if you don't stop and take a reasoned look at what you're trying to do here, will bite you in the ass later.
Put your emotions aside and look at it from the standpoint of how much unnecessary work you are doing.

Wonder why you aren't showing up on FABO anymore?

Charlie

I go there sometimes, wonderful site, don't log in much, since I no longer have Mopars to ask questions about.
Sure miss my old 69 340 4 speed Swinger.

Mark.

[BC847]

I'd appreciate it if everybody would just step away from the screen and go piss, wash your hands, and get a sammich.

Everyone will stop the personal insults, etc or get a vacation.

[m880cummins]

So in school today, I started fiddling around on CAD. Learned how to use lofting so I can make different profiles on the part. Printed out some factory drawings of the rails, made it up in the computer to scale with proper dimensions. After it is done, I will run a stress test in the computer going on every thing from load placement to steel quality. Then I will add in all reference points wheel centers, spring center holes and print out a large blue print of a rail. Then I will modify the existing factory style in the computer and add in my boxing with welding beads, run another stress test, find the likely fracture spots and then design a piece to install that will distribute load lengthwise along the rails. My engineering teacher gave me some good ideas so we will test them out. Then we can apply vertical loads and rotational loads (twisting on terrain) and find a way to allow the frame to flex but spread the stress areas out so it isn't focused in one area. This may be virtual, but I can add many factors in to get it pretty close to real world scenario! Luckily, the frame wasn't pitted or damaged before I started on it so I don't have to include the rusty/dented factor (if one even exists!) I'll be working on the frame tonight and hopefully this coming week, I can finish the model, run the tests (posting a video for others to see) and then design parts, install, run another test and once satisfactory results are achieved, I can make a blueprint of the part, print it out, get a piece of steel, mark it, cut it, and weld it on! I DO NOT WANT TO BOX THE ENTIRE FRAME!!!! The nice part about the curved area is if water somehow got inside (flood water, off road or tires spinning in reverse, it would drain out the open end. This isn't easy to manage on a flat area like under the cab as debris will find its way in there and stay. Hopefully, once all is done, truck guys with similar goals of modifying their frame for use with crossover steering plates, making their own motor mounts etc won't need reference from another frame or have to test fit and guess where they need to beef up the existing structure.



The beginnings of the rail. I still need to finish the lofting/profile in the front and narrow some to widths such as the engine area and a small area in the rear which narrows a little.





Charlie

[Mark Nixon]

Now THAT'S the REAL way you figure out how your modifications affect what you're modifying!
I'd almost KILL to get to work with programs like that!

Mark.

[bmoeller]

Hell, with a program like that, you could make templates pretty easy for marking bolt holes on a crew cab frame to put a Cummins in and 4wd like I'm doing!

[sxd217]

Hello Charlie, thanks for posting the progress of your project, I have enjoyed watching your progress and I realize how much time it takes to take all those pictures post them and then add the text. In addition you open your project up all kinds of criticism
I have had my truck for 10 year and have merely done what it takes to keep it going and I am impressed with the amount of effort you are putting in this project.
Is your objective to merely post what you are doing or are you looking for feedback?
I am very curious to see what results you obtain from your virtual analysis. This is such a great opportunity for someone your age to be able to apply these concepts. You say you intend to be an engineer? What do you want to do in particular?
My older brother and I work as engineers at a large agricultural/construction manufacturer near you.
My brother does virtual load modeling (finite element analysis) on structural components. I design, build, and run tests in a lab to verify the virtual results, verify the life of structural components, and failure modes.
Depending on how powerful the software is that you are using at school, it should show you that you will have significant stress riser at the transitions between the boxed section and the open channel at the front of your frame and also in the rear at the spring hanger.
Twisting the frame like driving over a large mound with one tire will be the load that will create the most high stress areas.
The thing that the software will not tell you is the stress riser that you have induced in your frame by where you have located some of your welds. When dodge developed this frame, as did other truck frame manufactures at the time, they went to great lengths to eliminate/minimize the amounts of welds on the frame rails.
Even the powerful software we use at work struggles to estimate the effects of how welds weaken the metal surrounding the weld. (That is right, even a really good weld, by the mere act of welding, has weakened the metal surrounding the weld)
As improvements have occurred in virtual modeling, manufacturing welding (welding machines have improved, there have been improvements in wire materials), and testing of frames. You do see welding on frames on trucks now. Generally there is a lot of work into designing those frame weld joints and they are only designed to last a finite amount of time.
I have worked on quite a few frames (channels, rectangular tubes, castings, and combinations), 85% of the failures occur at welds.
Where you have welded across the top and bottom of the frame rail you have drastically reduced the life of your frame in those locations. Whether those areas will crack before other areas or whether it will last as long as you want who knows? You may just have to re-weld a spot or two every so many years. But Dodge knew how long there frame would last (under certain conditions) because they tested it.
If you are interested we often have high school kids come and tour the facility. It could be just you or maybe your engineering class depending on the number. My brother and I would be more than happy to show you some frame related projects and could make some suggestion on how to make those transitional pieces and how to weld them in.
This is not theory, these are facts, I have piles of broken parts that prove these very things.

[m880cummins]

Here's what I got done Friday/Saturday.

Started construction of a paint booth:







Wall looks ghetto. Thanks to my friends.





Still need to paint the walls, paint the floor and make a front entrance door along with a fume evacuation system.

Nick got his 1930 Model A front suspension kit. Assembled it for the start of making brackets and mounts:



Mocked up truck again after adding a passenger side bed mount. Complete with a milk crate to sit on and all! Really upset, I found pictures online of people who modified the front fenders and I liked it. I decided to try it and once standing back, I HATED IT!!! Wish I had a spare fender to do this with....I guess I'll be robbing the front heel off a fender at the junkyard.









See the mod in this picture? Ugh, I hate it!





Underside looking very clean, Just need to replace the rusty crummy rubber cab mounts.













Also dug into the P7100 to repair the cracked governor housing from junkyard handling. I had to have a GIRL help me out hahahahaha. She's a good with mechanical things though. Need to pull governor flyweight assembly off and repair the housings and add 4k springs and reassemble it. Rack moved nicely and everything else checks out nicely.





Paint will be sprayed on the cab and doors this coming weekend. Need to finish the booth, finish roof repair, weld up the seams in the rockers, ruff the entire cab up with 220grit and then finish the drivers door.

Charlie

[m880cummins]

Is your objective to merely post what you are doing or are you looking for feedback?
I am very curious to see what results you obtain from your virtual analysis. This is such a great opportunity for someone your age to be able to apply these concepts. You say you intend to be an engineer? What do you want to do in particular?

I'm posting to share my experience in building a first gen crew cab. With the web, anybody who has interests in building a vehicle can search and find builds like this to be inspired. What made me want to build a crew cab was seeing CE4Tex's (sp?) '85 crew cab on DTR.

I'm going to school for mechanical engineering in the fall.

[m880cummins]

Came across a Cab/Chassis dana 80 in a dodge 3500 at the junkyard today. Its only a 1/2" wider WMS-WMS than a 1st gen SRW and I can bolt it right in and use a steel bushing for the spring centering bolts to get it to the right mount pilot hole size. I hope its a 3.54 geared axle. It has disc brakes too!

Charlie

[bmoeller]

Pretty good chance the D80 off of a C&C will most likely be a 4.10 geared axle.