Some positives with the cab corner and news on the engine!

 I was messing around again with the front cab corner trying to get the panel to sit flush. I must confess, I have not actually stood there and spent lots of time figuring it out. Until the other day, when I stood there and considered why the panel was not lining up flush with the rest of the body, and I came to the conclusion that the aftermarket piece needs to be bent more inwards. I proved this with a screwdriver and managed to get the panel quite nicely in line. And, so, no real development, but I was pleased to note it can be made to fit, and on another happy note, lines up quite nicely with the door with a good even gap.

This mightn't sound like much to you, but it is a HUGE relief to me. It means I can probably move forward and work towards welding it permanently into place. The other side sits a little better and is not a great problem. What IS a problem with the other side is the door. 

And that is another story.

The other issue is this uneven gap between both panels. A bit of filler could fix that, but I would rather remove the panel and get it as straight as I can. The less filler the better.

There is a bit of work needed on the opposite side of the panel. Too much of a gap and the panel needs to squeeze in under the panel on the right for a neat fit.

Gives you some idea of the unevenness of the panels. The lower piece is fine, but we gave the top panel a hard time when removing the spot welds. 

The panel sits flush on the right. That is, the two pieces sit nice without any raised section. As you can see, I still have a lot of cosmetic work to complete to get this panel looking halfway decent.

A couple of other things I have been doing...

Changed the springs on the old Dodge seat. Changed the wire as well. Was a cheap fix and easy to do. I bought a set of springs from Bunnings and some heavier wire. I drilled a hole in a bolt on each end and fed the wire through the hole then tightened it up. Works well.

Another thing I am doing is fitting the headlight buckets to the new lights. Discovered I was missing the ring that locks the headlight into place. Apparently fairly common to a lot of Fords and Falcons, but nobody is willing to part for them cheaply, so I opted to buy a new set for not much more.

Here are the headlights just for reference. Hella brand and very good.

Received an invoice from Peter Niven (Illawarra Auto Specialists) and the bill is quite reasonable. 

A little higher than first quoted, and haven't received quote for alloy heads and roller rockers nor the 408 stroker kit, but I think I will stay with the mild build and keep the old closed chamber cast iron heads, unless the price is not too high.