floor pan replacement

[joeq]

Gentlemen,
Looking to finally refurbish my 83 C-30, and the floors are shot. I can find pans that go either L/H or R/H from the pedals up to the frt of the seat. Problem is mine are rusted the full length of the rocker. (Inside) Does anyone know of a supplier that manufactures a full length pan, or even the complete floor section. I've tried LMC, Rock Auto, and a 1/2 dozen others. Appreciate any responses. Thanx

[Dvldog8793]

Howdy
Been there....I found no full length pans. That was about 4 years ago. There might be something out there now. I ended up searching the junk yards for a decent floor section, cutting as much as I could and then fabricating the rest out of tin. It worked great and pretty much looks stock. The trouble is that all these trucks rust out in the same spots, so finding a good pan was a challenge.
Have fun!

[Dvldog8793]

Just checked in LMC. They offer two pieces of floor pan for the SUVs. Might work to use a partial SUV rear pan and cut it to fit. Possibly find a 4 door pickup rear pan...?

[joeq]

Thanx Mr. Devil,
I also have the LMC catalogs for the P.U.s and the blazer. The P.U. book doesn't show any rear pan, but the blazer one does. But by the picture, it doesn't look adaptable. (If the picture is accurate, or just generic). The seat area in our P.U.s are raised, relative to the foot area. It would really bite to have to fab it from scratch. Kudos to you for doing it. You would think that in this market of rusty chevy trucks, someone would capitalize on this need, and repop them. I don't get it. Thanx for your reply.

[joeq]

The saga continues. I've been fortunate enuff to find a rust free cab for $500, stripped. It's very tempting. My floors are rotted from the foot area all the way to the seat, with rot running along the the sides of the inner rockers towards the rear. Plus both rockers are gone. The cab mounts "appear" to be OK, looking from below, but once the biscuits are off, might tell a different story.
Also my windsheilds been cracked for years. It looks as if the clean cab I can "maybe " purchase,(if it's still available), has a windsheild in it.
So the dilemma is this. I have a mig welder, and can do it, altho it's not my "forte'", and will take quite a bit of metal fab, to make the missing panels that aren't available. "OR", buy the rust free cab, and go through the "hellasious" undoing of all the wiring, heater system, complete dash panel change-over, steering column, ect. My interior is crap, (as far as the dash pad, and gauge panel goes), and would give me an excuse to up-date it all. Not sure how ambitious I am to take on this undertaking, with all my other projects biting at me.
My question is this. Does anyone one know how many hours it takes to remove an old rusty cab, re-install a stripped down serviceable one, and swap the old guts, into the replacement cab, compared to purchasing replacement floor panels, rockers, and fabricating inner rockers, then cutting and welding. Not to mention, also doing a windsheild purchase and swap. It appears to me, the only way out, is to pay some-one else to do the work, which unfortunately isn't an option at my end. Any incite is appreciated.

[Dvldog8793]

IMHO----
In the long run you will be much better off with the rust free cab. Trying to battle a rusted out cab is a losing proposition. Like the song says..."Rust never sleeps" If you can get a rust free cab for 500, I think you would be money and labor ahead. Especially when you consider that you can effectively rust/sound proof the new cab very easily with it off the frame.
Hope this helps your decision!

[DmaxMaverick]

IMHO----
In the long run you will be much better off with the rust free cab. Trying to battle a rusted out cab is a losing proposition. Like the song says..."Rust never sleeps" If you can get a rust free cab for 500, I think you would be money and labor ahead. Especially when you consider that you can effectively rust/sound proof the new cab very easily with it off the frame.
Hope this helps your decision!

I agree with this. The time and labor involved with either route is impossible to estimate. One can easily be more than the other, and either way you go, you still won't know (unless you actually do both).

Also, make sure you get a detailed bill of sale with the cab, from someone with the authority to sell the cab (if possible). The VIN tags will be wrong, which must be corrected by your motor vehicle dept.

[joeq]

Good point Gregg. I'll probably go that route, like you 2 recommend. I just called, and it's still available. It's about a 2 hr drive, so I'll need to coordinate this whole deal. We'll see what happens.

[Yukon6.2]

Change the Cab.
The last cab swap i did was on a Toyota,the donor cab was from a diesel,so that meant changing everything.The steering column and heater were even different.
I completely striped the new cab so there was nothing left other than tin and the windows.Then i removed the wrecked cab and placed them sisde be side.After striping the new cab i had a good idea on how to remove the layers.Then i installed it into the new one.I had to swap the complete wiring harness.
Swapping a GM cab will be a cake walk compared to the Toyota.If you like the options the new cab comes with,and if the wiring is unmolested you can convert the wiring instead of swapping it.Then you could get the new cab ready for the truck,and probaly have the truck back on the road in a weekend.
Good Luck
Thomas

[joeq]

Thanx Tom,
One cab I saw was totally gutted, but had a windshield. Since then, a buddy of mine found me a couple more possibilities, closer than the 1st. However the one 2 hrs away looked mint. (As far as rust goes.)
You did good, if you did a Toy, by yourself, in a weekend. I'm not sure I'm as ambitious as I was 20 yrs ago. I would work till midnite in those days. Now I shut down at prime time.:rolleyes:

[joeq]

Here's an up-date to my rusty floor pan. As much as I would love to change my entire cab, in my home garage, it's just not feasible. altho I have a lift, my ceiling is still only 8" up. There's no way I can get my cab up high enuff to clear the motor, and push out the chassis. I haven't any farm equipment or forklifts, so I came across another option. Some-one is parting out a truck cab with a floorpan that's "almost" perfect. And the extra is it comes with a windshield, that will replace my cracked one. So for a hundred dollar bill, I'll be purchasing the entire cab, and cutting out the good floor section, and removing the windshield. The rest of the cab will be cut up for scrap, which won't have much of anything left of it.
Replacing my entire cab with another unit, as appealing as the rust free option was, would've turned into a huge set-back, time wise for me. Dash wiring, heating system, ect. ect. But the thing that really turned me against it, was the actual removal and installation. If my ceiling height was 12', I might be thinking differently. When I start the pan replacement, I'll snap some pix, just to show the improvements. Don't know how soon I'll be able to accomplish this, with the holiday season around the corner.

[joeq]

So here is my new acquisition. It doesn't look like much, but will fill the void for what I need. When I get it cleaned up, I'll get some better pix, and maybe some of you bodymen type, can offer a little experienced advice.
http://i1206.photobucket.com/albums/bb453/tajoe/83%20duelly/coalcab003_zps5da61c2c.jpg (http://s1206.photobucket.com/user/tajoe/media/83%20duelly/coalcab003_zps5da61c2c.jpg.html)
At least it fit on my tow dolly. Should be relatively easy to jack up with 4x4s, and a couple farm jacks, and somehow get it lowered onto the ground. Anyone need a back window?

[Yukon6.2]

Good luck with your project.

Personally i would still try to find a way to change the cab,if you have rust in your old one you have rust in places that will show up after you do all the work to change the floor pan.

My sig truck has hidden rust that will show up at some time,i found large sections of deep surface rust that would come of in large chunks.These were up the back pillars of the cab towards the rear window.My floor pan is rust free,but my rockers arn't.Even though they look fine from the outside they are rusting from the inside.

With the tree in your yard you could make a support to lift cabs,or hire a contractor with a loader or tow truck with an extendable boom.With everything disconnected it wouldn't take long to do the actuall switch on the frame.I know it would be less time than cutting and welding floor pans.
Unless you are just going to bodge in the replacement floor.By this i mean cut it out of the good cab and place it over your old sectuion and weld were you can and call it good.If you plan on doing a replacement like you see them do on TV you will be in for a big job,and really should have the cab off to get at all the sections that will have to be welded.Then you also should treat all the areas you work on to keep the rust away for a while.
Rust is like Cancer it takes a real effort to rid a vehicle of it.I'd hate to see you go through a bunch of work and have your rockers rust out next year
Thomas

[joeq]

Thanx for the advice Tom, and the hidden rust is definitely a concern. My rockers are also shot, but the replacements are cheap, and I'll be welding those on too. (I've had the RHS one for almost 20 yrs. Never put it on) The cab corners I did replace a few yrs back. I didn't pay a lot for this cab, and am hoping the pieces I can salvage from it will get me a few more years out of my existing cab. Changing the entire cab, for me, in my shop atmosphere, would really put my truck out of commission for longer than I wish, because once it would be off, it would turn into a full blown frame restoration, which means I would never finish it. Really, my life now-a-days is basically "hack and stab". With everything. Not just my truck.