Thank God this truck only has four cab corners, because I have had to replace them all!

 With some trepidation due to the fact that I really don't know what I am doing, I manned up and attacked the fourth (and thankfully final) cab corner. Now, the front cab corners are still only tack welded. That is because I want to get all the panels fitting together harmoniously before I (or someone expert) welds them in for good. But the back ones are a different story as once they are on, they're on forever. 

The final corner was the very awkward to get at rhs corner. The truck is in our two car garage, and in those days (back in the 90's) cars were probably quite a bit smaller, and when they designed these garages, they weren't factoring in F100 trucks into the equation. So, it just fits in there, backed up tub end first into our two-car garage. 

Quite understandable! 

Anyways, long story short is, I have about 60 cm of space to crawl around in to reach the cab corner. But I managed to do it with my back against the rear wheel and my feet forward underneath the cab. In that position, I was able to access pretty much the entire back section of the panel. All I can say is, I am glad nobody was around with a camera catching footage of me trying to extract myself from that small space. 

I now have a deep affection for sardines and submariners and people who crawl into small spaces.

Now, if you promise not to laugh, I will show you my handiwork so far. I had been welding some slightly different grade steel the previous week and forgot to reset it to suit the very thin metal on the cab, and I was too lazy to change it...why? Read the fourth stanza again! So, it is what it is, and of course I have yet to grind it off and patch up any holes etc, but the good news is, it all more or less fits.

I had to grind some of the welds off to adjust the gap between the replacement piece and the original, but that is just par for the course. I could have just left it and slapped some bog over the whole deal, and at most it would have been less than 2 mm of bog, but it didn't take much more effort to get it flush. 

Now, these aftermarket cab corners are notoriously bad fitters. There are scores of horror stories with guys trying to fit them evenly. It does appear to be an impossibility. The cab corners I received were both out buy a good half an inch and maybe more on either side. The first rear cab corner I fitted, I kinda made a bit of a meal over as I flush fitted the rear panels very well, but when it came to aligning the tricky folds of the inner door pillar, I was in a bit of a situation. I managed to just cut and weld one piece of plate at a time following the contours of the inner pillar, but the final results (which I haven't finished yet) are not excellent. 

For the other side cab corner, I simply left that tricky curved original piece where it was as it was not rusted and cut the rust out a smidge back from the pillar. You can see it in this photo. This way, I had a nice flush fit with only the back to worry about.

The back was a nightmare. I couldn't believe I had to chop that much metal out just to get the back to align with the inner cab corner panel. I got there in the end and it looks okay, but I wasn't sweating over the end result as much as you are not going to be able to see this part of the cab corner once the tub is back on. Still, I wanted to get it nice, and once I grind it off and clean it up, that should be the case. 

You can't really tell how cramped I am here, but see that brick to the right of my foot? That is where the wall starts. I am actually sitting on the rear tyre looking down. Yes, I am STILL wearing white shoes, but not the same pair. I go through about four pair a year. Just sayin'. 

Check out all the tools etc I brought with me; hammer, Dremel, G clamps, welding gun, wood, drill, texta markers and so on.  Notice the split piece just below the inspection hole. That was how much I had to cut out to align the cab corner to the inner panel. A good inch easy.