Possible mistake...

[Stacked78]

I decided one night (and after a few cold drinks) that it would be a good idea and clean up the look if i welded the seams on the front of my front fenders shut and smoothed them out. Now I'm looking at pictures of other trucks and it looks like the fenders wont match up bodyline wise to that piece above the grill. Has anyone done this or seen it done? It would help if my truck wasnt completly torn apart and I might have stopped myself from ruining a good set of fenders... On a side note if its not too bad i can rework that top piece since I'm going for the completly clean look anyways.

before


after (in primer)

[jocko]

if you look closely, the seam only exists in the fenders, the line on the metal strip under the hood is solid - so if you blend the fender, you should not have ruined the matching of body lines AS LONG AS you maintain the same original peak (where the body color and white grille surround butt against each other). While I can't really make out what your smoothing looks like in your welded area, I don't think you would have ruined anything. IF the piece you were talking about (below the hood) that butts up against the fender was actually 2 pieces - then I'd say you might have screwed the pooch (or need to weld and blend the under hood piece also). But that doesn't appear to be the case. I think the piece below the hood just appears to be two pieces because of the paint color change line. But it looks like in reality that it's a single solid piece. You should be ok I think.

[TwoFiftyShifter]

Whats the deal on the New York plates?

[jocko]

Originally Posted by TwoFiftyShifter

Whats the deal on the New York plates?

AH! Good catch... Old plates. NY is where I bought the truck. (lived in MD then) - have since moved to CA. Gotta love the military!

[jocko]

a more detailed pic

[Stacked78]

thank you jocko, i somehow misplaced that underhood piece so I couldnt check it. I guess its on to the next body panel then, but this time with a little more planning.

[jocko]

you're welcome. I took a closer look at your welding and b-work - looks GREAT, and there's still a nice peak there for the body line, so it looks like it will line up well and look really good on the truck. That's cool. Are you still gonna have a white surround on the grille, even without the seam? Now THAT would be cool!! A very subtle mod that not many would catch - until they noticed it - big wow factor I'd say. But no matter how you paint it, I think it looks great. Pretty good welding after a few cold ones!

[Stacked78]

Now that you mention it, I might lay my accent color in there but it might be too much with the grill being the same color. But thats the whole look I'm going for, alot of subtle changes that most people wouldnt notice on first glance. I'm a bodyman by profession and I'm just looking to showcase some of the stuff I've learned (I rarely ever drink, and now I'm gonna stop doing that and workin on the rig)

theres a small teaser, Truck will be all satin black with the green accents and pinstriping

[jocko]

Hey, looks good Stacked! Is that green like the aircraft metal primer green? (I can't quite tell in the pic). Sounds like a cool build. My 2 cents - I think painting the grille surround to match the grille color would be great - that's the way the factory did it, so it would be another subtle trick. It would look stock but without stock colors - and with the cool bodywork to boot. Can't wait to see the pics.

[markeb01]

The seams are filled on my fenders as well. Here’s how well mine match up with the grille support. I must admit I put no effort into working the panels for better alignment. At the time I first assembled everything I was just glad to be getting it back together after being scattered all over the garage for a year. I have seen others rework the parts to provide superior alignment, but this is probably similar to the factory fit on most stockers.