Dakota's build thread

Soo ever since I hit that curb back in September my bed has been bent towards the cab at the top. I got under it and couldn't see where the frame looked bent or anything out of the ordinary but over the last week it's been getting a lot worse. So yesterday me and my dad got it up on jackstands to get a good look at everything. And this is what we found...
Drivers side


Passenger side


Notch was cracked all the way through on both sides. And the frame also had a small hairline crack on each side.

We welded up all of the cracks and welded up the sides of each notch. When I was jacking it up to get it off the jackstands it broke again and worse this time.



I didn't see that the crack went all the way to be back side initially so we didn't weld that. Causing it all to break when I jacked it up.

We took the bed off and welded everything all the way around and it's been good so far. Haven't put the bed back on yet as I'm gonna take it to a muffler shop or welding shop and get them to lay a bead across the top of the notch since our little Lincoln won't get hot enough to lay a decent bead.

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Lmao. Do want full backhalf. But I'll have to have funds for 4 link and coilovers aswell haha.

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Bag with a back half is the only solution at this point :D


Lololol. You got $15k laying around you wanna slide my way? If I ever bagged it I would go all out and I can't afford that. Plus I'd have to find out how to set the front suspension up so that I could keep all of the 4wd intact. And I'd need billets, there's another $3500 for used wheels. Lol sooo make that $20k. Haha.


At this point my dream parts list is as follows...
-coilovers for all 4 corners
-backhalf shortened to fit 5.5" bed and 4 link out back
-raised bed floor
-built awd transfer case, tranny, rear
-370 or 408 with boost
-rcv axles
-set ride height to 5/8
-bodywork and paint on whole truck including shaved/relocated gas door, shaved stake pockets, shaved 3rd brake light
-some 22s or 24s.
-whatever else I can think of that I can't afford along with the rest of this shit :rofl:

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Mcgaughys bolt in. Not to take anything away from them. I've been rolling them for like 3 years and for 2.5 of the 3 it's been 9.5" drop out back. It sits in the notch without air in the helpers so once I hit that curb and cracked them, the truck sitting in them probably did more damage to them.

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Is the exact spot I'd expect to see a crack propagate from. I would have ground the crack out to fresh base metal and rewelded from there for a more robust repair. Hopefully she holds up this time though.
 
We ground it down to bare metal at every cracking point. I just painted everything black when we got done since the bed is gonna be off a few days.

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I've been driving it "not so easy" all day and haven't had a problem yet. I'm gonna pull the blocks when I put the bed back on so it won't bottom out in the notch anymore. So I'll be somewhere around 5.5/8-8.5 or so.

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