June 22, 2009 - I started taking the front apart.

Here we go with taking the front end apart. All in all it went fairly smoothly.

A shot of the glove box.  They were cardboard and the mice LOVE them.  There is not really enough here to make a pattern from.  Don't let it get you down.

I bought a engine puller (always wanted one) and yanked the 289.  It runs, so if you know anyone looking, send me an email.

Pulled the steering wheel and started removing parts so I could remove the cab.

Goodbye front windows.

And finally the cab was removed using the engine puller.  Quite a handy tool - this is easily a 3 person job otherwise.  I did it myself.

The Dodge Dakota in the background is the doner vehicle.  I need it for wiring, engine and transmission, front steering and rear axle.  It cost $400 and looking back, maybe I should have looked a bit harder.  It was really rusty - the frame was rotted through in a bunch of places and many of the bolts would not come out at all.  Everyone I talked to thinks it came from Ontario - salty roads wreck cars.  We are spoiled here in Alberta.

There are many places one can go to research a project - and research should be done before you even buy a vehicle.  Once you decide on a path - Restore, Rod, etc, changing your direction is really hard.  I decided to street rod it - update the engine and steering and chassis and brakes.

The simplest way to fix the front end was to use a clip (the steering, engine mounts, brakes and suspension) from a newer car or truck.  This gives you a solid unit to use.

Once I had decided to use a front clip  I looked for donor vehicles.  Volare cars seemed to be popular, and some people were using minivans.  I wanted to keep the Dodge all Mopar, so when I found people using the Dakota chassis that is the route I went. The track width is only out by 1/2 inch, so it fits really well.  And if you find a 1989-1991 the wheel lugs are 4.5 X 5 so you can use your original rims.

http://www430.pair.com/p15d24/mopar_forum/index.php  is a forum for the Dodge Pilot House trucks (1948-1953).  This information is invaluable.  I can't thank the people on it enough for answering questions and helping with different ideas.