Removing my 81 cab ????

[riz]

I'm thinking of removing the cab of my 81 shorty so I can clean up the frame, I already have the box off but not sure all the things that need to be done to remove the cab. Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

RIZ

[dieseldawg142]

not much actually, if you have the front clip off already.heater hoses, wire harness, brake lines, ground straps, shifter linkage, steering column, disconnect wiper motor wires & hoses or any thing else mounted to the firewall that joins motor or inners, & body mounts. cause my crew is so heavy( me & buddies man handled it off), removed the doors & seats too. you could also do like my nephew did, left everything hooked up & just jacked cab up a couple of inches so he could hit it all with some por15

[riz]

Mine currently looks like this......... the engine was recently pulled and there's no interior to speak of.



RIZ

[dieseldawg142]

you'll have to pull your fenders, or better, the whole clip ( you will get to clean & paint area's that would never get it otherwise). your a/c lines will need attention too. any thing between the cab & the rest of the truck(cruise control, wires,etc), & you should be good to go. it's alot of work, not hard, but worth it. besides being easy to spot a leak or problem, when people look under your hood or truck, you'll know why you did it

[ole86chebby]

Originally Posted by riz

Mine currently looks like this......... the engine was recently pulled and there's no interior to speak of.



RIZ

i just did this on my 81, and put a 86 cab on it.

first off, undo your fenders and inner fender wells, and remove your hood. undo your emergency brake cable from under the truck.
as for the steering linkage and arm, near the steering box that shaft connects to the steering box with two bolts. undo those and push up on the shaft a bit pushing up towards the cab, to help get it off the steering box.
undo your brake lines from the MC, undo your firewall wiring at the connection box on the driver side on the firewall. its a small bolt and they simply pull off with little force.
take your doors off the cab. it helps alot.

if you have trouble undoing your emergency brake cable, i just undid the pedal from inside the cab and pulled the cable up through the floorboard.

undo your AC lines and ANYTHING that will inhibit you from removing the cab.

then all you should be able to do is use s 3/4 socket and breaker bar/ratchet and undo the 4 cab bolts under the truck.
it may be easier to go ahead and remove the bed as well.

i did that and slid the old cab back and dropped the new one in place.

let me know if this helps.

[84chevyguyid]

I pulled the cab off mine, it was the last thing left to pull off the frame so it was easy to remove. I felt really fortunate that all my body mount bolts came out easily, no rusted bolts. also I have a couple of loaders so the lifting part was easy too. I am doing a cummins/allison drivetrain and I am about finished with motor mounts so I am almost to the point that I can clean my frame up and paint it. Sure makes it nice to work on and clean up when its stripped down that far.

Mike

[57ToyBox]

As DieselDawg mentioned in post #2 disconnect everything off the firewall and remove front clip.
But I didn't have a kick ass loader/fork lift so I rolled my cab back onto it's back wall. Finished the underside of the floor and finished the frame then rolled it back into position

[Wrecked1982]

84chevyguyid- is that a farm tractor & boom on a semi frame?

[84chevyguyid]

Its a 1945 Diamond T 6x6 5 ton army truck, at least thats what it started out as. Its got a cab off a Massey Fergeson tractor, has a 440 dodge motor with a torqueflite behind that with the original transfer case. The Woods Du-All loader setup also fits our big John Deere tractor. My dad and I put it together 8 years ago, use it on the farm to stack hay, push snow, ect. It does everything good except turn sharp. It will go 45 mph down the road then you can shift the tcase to low for field work. We used to have our loaders on tractors but its hard on the front axle and especially front rims, they arent designed to carry that much weight but on the truck chassis they work great plus they are much faster than tractors both in the field and traveling down the road. Here is a vid of it stacking hay, the bales are 4'x4'x8' long and weigh 2000 lbs each. Redneckengineering!!
http://s73.beta.photobucket.com/user...ml?sort=3&o=32

[Wrecked1982]

nice mixed setup sorry tough didnt mean to steel the tread

[84chevyguyid]

I like 57toybox's idea of tipping the cab onto its back. Sounds like a great way to access the frame if you dont have a means to lift it off.

[riz]

I don't see any difference between taking it off completely or tilting in on it's back.

RIZ

[dieseldawg142]

took a regular cab off once by myself. used my floor jack to lift the cab hi enough to slip some 4x4's & barrels under it, then after chaining my wife's quad to her car, i was able to use the winch on it to pull out the frame in a slow, easy, controlled manner

[wraprail]

I just removed my 86 cab by myself. First i removed everything I could to make it light as possible. I used the tire rack off my car trailer (no longer needed it) cut the center cross bars out making 2 A-Frames about five feet tall.. put the frame on jack stands as high as I could, mounted the front half of aframe to the door hinge mounts. Ran a piece of 1 1/2 tubing through cab and welded to seat tracks for rear mount. Installed casters on aframe and lowered frame. Rolled cab forward and off frame. Now I can move it around till im ready to reinstall pics will follow