Bronco Forum - Full Size Ford Bronco Forum banner

JonnyBronco's Resto-Modification

15K views 75 replies 24 participants last post by  jonnybronco 
#1 ·
I have been on this site for about 5 years now and think it is time to start my build thread.

First, a little bit about me. I know, nobody wants to hear about me, but I think it is important for you to understand the way my build is going.

I have a BS in Agricultural Engineering and a minor in Mechanical Engineering. I grew up on a farm and learned "Farm Engineering" at a young age. I have been working on trucks since I was 14.

I am married and have 5 kids. I also like to volunteer with Boy Scouts and go camping and shooting.

Now for the truck.

It is a 1979 Bronco with a 400 and NP203.

I bought the truck 5 years ago in Southern California in barely running condition for $500. (it ran well enough to drive onto the trailer) The body had no rust (except for the bottom of the tailgate) and no obvious body damage.

When I got the truck home I checked the compression to find out it had 3 bad cylinders. But that was fine because I planned on swapping in a 429 I had sitting around.

I don't have any good pictures of it when I bought it, but don't worry, I will have more pictures in upcomin posts.
 
See less See more
#2 ·
The first thing I did was remove the body from the chassis and started removing the drivetrain.

I had the frame sandblasted at a local shop then primed and paited it gloss black.







The paint was sprayed without reducer, that is why it has the texture to it. The guy I bought the paint from told me this would make it tougher. He didn't tell me it would have the rough texture, but it may have just been becaue of the spray gun I was using. I kind of like the texture.

The next thing I did was stripped everything off the body and had the inside of the truck, doors and taligate Line-Xd grey and the undercoating done in black.

Before:







After:





 
#5 ·
So far I am flashing back to late 2005, it will take me a while to get caught up to where it is at today. But there is still a lot to do.
 
#4 ·
I sold the dana 44 front and 9" rear for $300 dollars and found a pair of Dana 60 axles and an NP205 to rebuild.

I had both axles rebuilt by Western Differential in Tucson. I chose 4.56 gears because I knew I was going to have a doubler and I decided to have the C6 regeared with the E4OD 1st and 2nd gears for a wider ratio.

I had ARB lockers installed front and rear and disk brakes installed on the rear axle. I also had the rear spindles bored and 35 spline shafts installed.

I also had them weld radius arm wedges on the front axle.







The rear axle uses Eldorado calipers for the disk brakes.

As I mentioned above I had the C6 rebuilt with the E4OD 1st and 2nd gears. This changes the first and second gear ratios from 2.46 and 1.46 to 2.71 and 1.54 respectively. I figured this would keep my in town driving liveable and my highway driving in a good range as well.
 
#6 ·
The hit and run

So at this point I had the body back on the frame and was waiting to save up the money for my suspension when this happened.









To make a long story short, some teenagers were trying to turn around in the street and backed into the bronco.:banghead

It was pushed 15 feet into my front patio.:shocked I think they must have hit the gas instead of the brake.

They were gone before anybody could ID them (and there was a whole group of teenagers watching, this is why it is a much longer story).

Tailgate and passenger side fender were the worst. Also cracked the fiberglass lid.

 
#7 ·
Next thing to go on was the suspension.

I bought Cage arms, 6" Deaver Superflex coils and Deaver 10 leaf 6" leaves in the back.

You can see a little bit form this picture that the coils bow out a little bit. This is because the coil doesn't seat all the way in the lower coil mount.



You can see in this picture how the coil doesn't end in the lowest part of the mount.



I redrilled the lower coil mount to rotate it so the coil would seat completely in the mount.





This fixed the bowing issue.

I later decided to move the coil buckets forward so the front coil bucket mounting holes lined up with the front shock mount frame holes. I had to drill two new holes in the mount to line up with the original frame coil mount holes.

 
#8 ·
Steering

I decided to go with Northwest Fab highsteer arms. These things are beefy.









I also bought a 1.5" .375 wall tapped DOM tubing and Chevy TREs for the tie rod from NWF.

A few months later I bough my drag link with Chevy TREs and the panhard bar with 3/4 X 7/8 heims with the same 1.5" .375 wal DOM from WFO concepts.

I bought a double shear panhard bar mount from Roughstuff, and decided to add a little extra strength to it. I had a friend who is a professional welder weld it to the axle for me.

As you can see from the pictures, the mount was offset to the rear of the axle to line up with what use to be the rear upper coil mount holes on the frame.








The upper track bar mount was made from 2" .250 wall tube, which also doubles as an air bump mount. I also added a cross member to strengthen the upper mount and tie it to the other side of frame and the other air bump mount.









It was not easy getting it all to fit under the oil pan. As you can see from this picture, I still need to move the axle forward about .25" to make sure the lower panhard mount doesn't hit my pass side air bump/crossmember mount.



With the current setup I have about 5 inches of uptravel before my tie rod hits my pitman arm.





Drag link angle at ride height:



Panhard angle at ride height:

 
#13 ·
Nice truck...can't wait to see what it looks like finished.
I probably have at least another year to go before I finish.

This is what I still need:

- Brakes (f350 upgrade)
- Electrical (I think I am going with Ron Francis wiring)
- Fuel tank(s) (want to fit dual Manchester under body tanks)
- Roll cage (I am also going to install a third row bench to fit the whole family or a few boy scouts)
- Custom dash with full range of gauges and switches
- Tires and wheels (I am still considering what tires and wheels I want, but I am leaning toward Pitbull Rockers and Stazworks wheels)
- New Paint (I am considering doing the bottom half in Line-X)

Also as a side note, the reason this is taking so long is because I am not willing to put it on a credit card. The work is being done as I have time and money available. I am also not willing to make short cuts just to get it done earlier.
 
#10 ·
The Engine

The engine is a 1969 429. I had rebuilt it in 1995 for another truck and I only ran it for about a year before I tore it out and stored it.

I ported the exhaust ports to let it breath a little better. I also had hardned valve seats installed.

Before porting:





After porting:






I decided to go with L&L fender exit headers to avoid headaches with routing exhaust and hopefully move heat out of the engine bay.



Here's a shot next to my old headman inside the frame headers.



I decided to go with Kieth Black Hypereutectic pistons to bump the static compression up to 11.2:1.



I had head volume measured to do the compression ratio calculations and they were 73 cc.

I bought a custom propane cam from Colt Cams. I will have to dig up the specs for the cam, but it has a slower closing rate on the valves to compensate for the lack of lubrication for running propane vs. gasoline.

As you can tell by now, I decided to run dedicated propane for my bronco. There are several reasons I chose to run propane.

- Cheaper fuel (still about $2-$2.15 vs $2.70)
- Cleaner engine
- No stalling at steep angles
- I got most of the hardware cheap

A shop in the town I grew up in did a lot of propane instalations back in 2000 or so when Arizona had their propane tax refund. After that program failed he was left with a lot of propane kits that he couldn't sell. so I got an OHG 450 mixer, X-1 regulator and a bunch of miscelaneous parts and hoses for $100.



Here it is going in:

I didn't realize how far off center the tranny hump was until I looked at from this view.








 
#12 ·
The Doubler

I decided to go with the Northwest Fab doubler adapter.

I already had the stock NP203 from the Bronco and the NP205 that came from the 79 F250.

I rebuilt both cases with new bearings and seals from JBG.

I will let the pictures do the talking.









I have to go back and look at my notes, but I think it is clocked up 3 inches from stock.













Because of the clocking the whole thing had to sit at a little bit of an angle because the NP205 would hit the body.

I need to upload pictures of my crossmembers for the transfercase.

This is pretty much how it sits today.




Here is a link to my supermotors account for anyone who wants to look at more pictures.

http://www.supermotors.net/registry/10957
 
#18 ·
Well, it has been about a year and half since I posted any progress here. Unfortunately there hasn't been as much progress as I would have liked, but sometimes life throws you a curveball and you have to just go with it.

Since my last update I have put in the roll cage, and finished my brakes.

More to follow.

Mods, if you want to move this to the "Builds" thread that would be great.
 
#19 · (Edited)
Roll Cage

This is the basic rollcage before painting. I had a friend do most of the work for me.



We used tube couplers from Ruffstuff Specialties for all the front pillars to make the cage removeable for painting.

http://www.ruffstuffspecialties.com...=ruffstuff&Product_Code=TC-DUB&Category_Code=

All the main hoops are 1.75" .120" wall tube. The dash, center console and some of other interior tubes are .095 wall.

I wanted to keep path to the rear benches open from the front doors, so we built the front passenger harness bars off the center pillars.

I would like to have had more triangulation, but I didn't want any bars behind passenger's heads.


I removed the factory dash and will be putting in a custom dash. I will be mounting the dash using trick tabs.

I will be mounting my B&M Transmission shifter and NWF cable operated triple stick transfer case shifter to the center console.

I got a rear bench out of another bronco and it fits nicely in behind the factory bench. The leg room is pretty limited, but for kids it is perfect.

Here are some more pictures.



























More Pictures added 28 Oct.













Jonny
 
#22 ·
Brakes

I started with the standard F-350 upgrade booster and master cylinder.

I bought all new hydraulic tubing from Inline Tube

http://inlinetube.com/

This is what I bought from Inline Tube:

- SLS-01 Stainless Steel tube kit,
- 2 each, 34" Stainless Braided lines with 3/8-24, 35 degree Banjo bolt fittings for the front
- 1 each, 34" Stainless Braided lines with TS-01 fitting (has the hole to be mounted to the axle tube with the axle breather)

I used a Rigid brand 3/16" tube bender model 403.

http://www.ridgid.com/Tools/400-Series-Lever-Benders/EN/index.htm

This is a high quality bender, much better than the cheap multi size benders you get from autozone.

I bought a KD tools 45 degree double flaring tool

http://www.tooldesk.com/automotive/...60-SAE-45-Degree-Double-Flaring-Tool-Set.aspx

I tried making a few test flares to make sure it was going to work and discovered that the tool was defective. The holes in the holding bar were not perfectly perpendicular to the bar, so the flares would always turn out oblong.

They warrantied the tool and I got a new holding bar about a week later, but I didn't want to waste my day off not finishing what I started so I went to Autozone and bought one of thier cheap flaring tools. It worked fine, even with the stailess, but it wouldn't have done many more flares. The tip of the cone shaped tool that presses the final double flare was getting worn out from all the flares I did with this one job.







I put one 360 degree loop in each line for flex between the body and frame.



The front line goes down to a T with a line to the driver's and passenger's side.



This is the driver's side coming down from the T.



This is the passenger's side coming down from the T looping around the front cross member.



The other end of the passenger's side.



Passenger's side flex line.



Driver's side flex line.



Rear line coming down from Master cylinder.



Willwood Proportioning Valve.





Rear line from Proportioning valve to flex line.



Rear flex line to TS-01 fitting.





A few pictures of the rear axle.
 
#23 · (Edited)
Parking Brakes

I upgraded the rear axle with disk brakes with Cadilac El Dorado calipers with cable actuated parking brakes. But the factory cables weren't going to be long enough.

Another critical aspect of making parking brake cables is making sure the difference between the length of the cable and the length of the housing is correct.

I got my cables from Inline tube.

The front cable was a factory replacement for a 1979 Bronco.

The rear cables were custom made to my specification.

These are the measurements I gave them and they came in just like I ordered.

Driver's side: Housing 53", Cable 67" Spring finger both ends.

Passenger's side: Hosing 66", Cable 80" Spring finger both ends.

Notice that the difference betwee the housing and cable was exactly 14 inches for both cables. This is critical, since they both are pulled from the same front cable and have identical attaching points on the calipers.

Pictures:



New vs. Old



Cleaned and painted the pedal assembly.



I had to grid down the sides of the cable end ball to get it to fit into the pedal assembly. Notice the small flat spot on the side of the ball. A couple mintues with a file took care of that.








The hole in the floor the cable goes down through.



Where the cable comes out.



This was actually a little tricky, I had to push it through from this hole in the body mount back toward the back of the Bronco.











Front cable body mount.



The back side with the adjuster screw.



Passenger's side



Driver's side



Cables going up to the rear body mount.



Where the cables come together.

Pictures added 28 Oct:









 
#25 ·
Here are some pictures of the NP205 mounts I made. The passenger side isn't perfect, I should have mounted the bushing horizontal. I may redo it when I make my transmission mount and skidplate.

I still need to make a transmission mount and skidplate. I am waiting until I get my driveshafts to make sure the clearance is right for the Trans mount.









 
#31 ·
Bumpers

Ok, so it has been a couple years since I have had any real progress on the Bronco.

Here's my latest progress.

Front Bumper







Getting ready to start on the rear bumper





The pieces for the rear bumper



All welded up and mocked up in place





I decided to cut the rear quarters so I can tuck the rear bumper





This is what I cut out on both sides. It was a lot more work than I was anticipating. If I had known there are three layers there, I may not have broken so many sawsall blades.



After the cut with bumper tucked.









I still need to make the rear mounting bracket and paint it.

The front and rear bumpers are pretty much identical with the exception of the mounting. the rear frame rails are about 3 inches wider than the front.

Eventually I will make a spare tire carrier, winch mount and tow receiver that will mount in the receivers on the bumper, front or rear.

Lower tubes on the bumpers are 2" X 2" X 14" wall and the upper tube is 2" X 2" X 3/16 wall.
 
#34 ·
Third Row Bench modificaton

The third row bench back sits too high because it is attached to the roll cage. Moving it up also gives more leg room, but of course sacrificing head room.

I will only have little ones in the back bench, so I don't need the tall back or head room anyway.

This is what it looked like with the factory bench back.



The seat back frame. I forgot to take a picture before cutting.



The sides of the frame actually have a double walled tube. It stops just short of the bend on the top.



I cut the outer sleeve shorter by about an inch so it would insert into the upper half before welding. In all I took out 4 inches of length.



Here's the frame for reference prior to welding.





Back cushion and cover front.



Back cushion and cover back.



Cut frame with back cushion.



Back cushion cut.



With the frame.



Seat back installed



With my 4 year old sitting in the seat.



 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top