I've had the idea for a long time that I wanted to stretch an old pickup in the doors. Now I have a bunch of 35 and 36 Ford pickup stuff and I'm thinking about tackling it. 3-2 chop and 4 inch stretch. Here are the photo shopped pictures of what I want to achieve. I do have some assistance from an old timer restoration guy. Is this doable on a sane level? How do I deal with the narrowing cab? It looks like there will be about a whole inch difference in width. Do I pie cut on the crown above the door, all the way along to add/subtract metal? I would use 2 doors to make one so there would only be one seam. Where would be the best place to cut? Or should I just add it to the end of the door? It looks like closer to the back would be less taper on the bottom to deal with. first picture is stock and the second picture is what I'm going for.
I would stretch those doors as far back as i could, so the cut goes straight down right about the tip of the door handle.... of course I don't see what the inside structure looks like so that could change. the only old Ford truck I ever drove was a 1940, so I would like to see a couple inches of stretch in the cab behind the doors too. those cabs are way too small inside. I'm not seeing where you would need to narrow the cab. if anything you will need to widen it on top.
Maybe "narrowing" wasn't the right choice of words but if you cut the cab across and moved it apart 4 inches, you now have an inch to make up side to side due to the front to rear taper of the roof or there will be a dogleg on top of the door openings instead of a basically straight line as viewed down from the top. To bring that back right, it looks like you would have to pull the front section ahead of the cut out a little, and bring the rear section behind the cut in a little.. I've seen plenty of old pickups stretched behind the doors and most of them end up looking like 10 pounds of crap in a 5 pound bag to me. I want the stretch to be subtle.
Also, can the stretch on the doors be done without removing the skin, or would it be better to build the skin separate?
A friend of mine has a 1936 truck that is chopped 2 inches and stretched to make a club cab. It looks somewhat like your second photo but with quarter windows. I know he shorten the front of the bed and used two tops to do it.
I think I would also shorten the bed but I don't want the stretched cab, quarter window look. I want a look that most people wouldn't even notice as modified.
This 36 has had the doors widened 6 1/2", and the top chopped 2 1/4". He had to widen the top about an 1" infront, and about 2 1/4" at the back ofthe cab. Rich
when you cut it it will get wider and longer so you will have to add metal or slant the windshield. take a 12"straight edge and place it over the rain gutter then you can see where the least amount of bow is. that is where i would cut it i did this one 2" in the doors 12" behind the doors 4" chop
I stretched my International in the cowl 4", the doors 4" and behind the doors 16". The object was to keep away from the obvious stretch that many pickup end up with. The width of the cab increased by 5" since I kept the original taper in the panels. I used another cab for the pieces so the formed sections matched perfectly.
He kept the same slant on the windshield posts, he lengthened the top more than the doors. The split down the middle of the top was to make up for the taper of the body. He also modified the cowl to fit a 37 pass front end. Rich
I didn't mean the slant of the posts. If the front was an inch wider he either had to widen the cowl too or tip the pillars out, right?
The split down the center of the top was more like 1/8" front, and 2 1/2" at the back. He kept the shape of the windshield original except for the chop, but layed it back a few degree's to help the post line up. Hope this is helps, I'm just relaying info. Rich
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