The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop inner cowl panel plaement

I have read that the inner cowl panels are difficult to fit, and so far I totally agree. I'm working on the driver's side of a 53 model 3100. I have the new rocker panel installed, plus the floor & toe board. The floor/toeboard came as 1 piece. I'm sure that I got the toeboard attached to the upper firewall correctly, as it was pretty easy to find plenty of reference points on them. When I try to position the inner cowl, I can get the front angle to match closely to the toe panel, but I have quite a bit of metal left hanging over in the door opening. If I move the cowl panel forward to minimize the extra in the door opening, the bottom curved tip of the cowl interferes with the curve at the bottom of the toeboard. I can't really see how the bottom of the cowl panel and toeboard ever mate up anyway. Does the lip at the bottom of the cowl panel go into the slot between the pillar and the rocker panel?, or does it sit up on top of the floor panel. I can't tell from the assembly manual. In the assembly manual it appears that the inner cowl front angle welds to the outside of the outer lip on the toe board. Is this correct, or does it just butt up to the toeboard? If I put the lower lip of the cowl panel into the gap with the floor flange between the pillar and rocker, and put the front cowl angle outside of the toeboard, then I end up with a large gap between the floor panel and the cowl panel at the front. I also bought replacement kick panels which have a curve and lip at the bottom, like the cowl panel, but I'm not sure where they fit. That's a lot of questions, and rambling I know. Any help with any part of it will be a big help to me. I am very familiar with the late 30's trucks, but know nothing about AD trucks, plus my cab had nothing left at the bottom foot of the cab, so I have nothing to go by.

Mike
You are going through the same cab issues that I just went through and what many others have gone through with that region of AD cab repairs. I did not document my repairs as extensively as fellow Stovebolter "czechman" Woody Vondrachek did several years ago. I am not tech savvy enough to provide you a direct link to his picture folder on the "Pbase" site. Go there and search for "czechman" then view his tree view to take you to cab restoration (202 photos with comments). Study them for enlightenment on these matters.
It helped me a lot.
Good luck!

I went back out to the shop after I posted that. I did a little cutting and grinding on the lower front tip of the inner cowl, and also trimmed down the rear of the lower lip slightly. It's pretty close to possibly fitting now. I may have to make a small patch to fill a gap at the front. The curve at the bottom of the cowl panel isn't even close to being correct, but I'll try to pull it into shape a little better prior to welding. I guess that I just need to get used to the idea that none of these panels are exact fits. I tried to buy them all from the same vendor, thinking that would help. WRONG. I am definitely going to check out Czechman's pictures. I think they will help me a lot. Apparently the kick panels that I bought are just the bottom section of the inner cowl panel. So I wont be needing them I guess. Once I'm finished, I'll likely have lots of stuff to sell.
Thanks Much

Mike

Here's a couple of photos that will help you out.
You're finding out what everyone who touches that part of the project knows - the repop parts don't ever fit correctly. The flange on the lower part of the kick panel goes between the A-pillar and the floor panel, so that the bend on the flange matches the bend on the floor panel.
I have massaged my passenger side kick panel to fit by reforming the front edge. I found that the kick panels I got from Jim Carter fit well back at the A-pillar, but the lower front didn't fit the floor panel, and the curve needed to be changed to meet the A-pillar and inner-to-outer cowl piece. I'm holding off welding in the driver's side floor panel till I get the kick panel fitted.
The first photo is the unmolested drivers side kick panel in place for fitting and the modified passenger side next to it for comparison. The last photo is the passenger side kick panel in place (not welded in yet.)
I hear you about having left-over stuff. I also bought the shorty kick panels, but they didn't fit that well at the floor either, and because I needed to go up near the top, I would have had to put a weld joint mid-way, I decided to use the taller panels. I reviewed Woody's pics and he had the same issues. Some good info there.

Good luck.

Thanks very much. Pictures help a lot. It's a bit comforting to find out that others have had the same struggles as I run in to. My cab probably should have been sent to the scrap yard, but hopefully that will make the final reward of salvaging it even better. I really appreciate the help from this group.
Mike