I decided to go with fiberglass fenders and running boards for my 46 Chev half ton. The rear fenders and running boards were built by a fellow in Manitoba that I found through ebay, they fit nicely. The front fenders are from Superior and they leave a lot to be desired. The issue with them is the headlight buckets don't fit the curve of the fenders, I've had to use weather stripping to fill the gaps up to 1/2 inch on the inside. I did use headlight buckets from a big bolt, but was told by one of my suppliers that the parts book says they are the same. The grill fit in these fenders is poor/fair. I have it acceptable from a distance not great. I purchased a splash pan (the piece that bolts between the front fenders and the bottom of the grill. I purchased this from Jim Carter it is the worst of the pieces, it is about an inch too short and the flanges/lip that bolts to the fenders is the wrong angle. Pulling it as tight as I dare without cracking the fiberglass leaves a 1/2 gap on each side. I tried my bumper brackets and bumper on today and the holes that the brackets go through need to be that 1/2 inch to allow the brackets to fit properly. So I will have to cut it in half bolt the ends to the fenders and then re fiberglass /body fill to make it fit. Parts that I thought would save me time have turned out to be junk and are more work than pounding on steel pieces.
thanks for sharing your experience both good and bad fitting fiberglass parts, if you could let us know or PM me the Manitoba guy for the good fitting parts i would appreciate that, my trucks are in sk so finding big parts near by is convenient.
speaking of pounding metal, i recently improved the headlight bucket on the passenger side of my GMC, it had been in an accident and fixed poorly, they hammered the metal all the way flat and left nothing of the curved ridge around the opening, after hours of massaging the metal i welded the split areas together to make it reasonable and fit a headlight rim again however i wondered about a new fender in fiberglass but am concerned when i hear stories of bad fitment. -s
I will continue looking for the information on the Manitoba fellow, he had fenders listed on ebay with a North Dakota location, I contacted him and we made a deal outside of ebay. It involved trust on my part as I prepaid for the fenders and running boards before hand. When they were done, a friend of his was doing oil field service work in Saskatchewan so he brought them along and my wife and I met him in Carlyle so no shipping. I tell my wife that she gets a lot of sight seeing traveling around to find parts etc. Scott's Super truck would like me to find him as well as he presently doesn't have a supplier. I'll keep looking.
