Well it’s back together. My bright idea of hiring a mechanic/welder failed. He never showed up and didn’t answer when I called. So most of the house went out to breakfast and then I got Anthony to give me a ride to Lowes to pick up a welder. Expensive, but nice to have of course. David cut off the mount and we used some heat and a sledge to pound the frame back into shape mostly, then welded some stock to straighten out the mounts home. It wasn’t perfect in the end, but it didn’t matter and the radiator support was happy to be a little off because the mount bolts weren’t fitted, so to speak. The fender bolted back on without much hassle, much less than getting the new bumper on. I got black as it was much cheaper than chrome, Maybe I should have spray painted the grille black. Anthony helped for a bit and Wendell came over for a few hours, it was great having them all helping.

Definitely need a kit of clips for the radiator as support a lot of them didn’t come off the old one in  one piece. Super glad I picked up the bumper parts and just bolted them on rather than trying to straighten the old ones. I did save the hood and that’s about it. It’s awesome having a function hood again, now if only I can still drive the thing…

It looks like the tarp failed and some point and the engine filled with water. Great. I changed the oil and I’m charging the battery overnight and hopefully tomorrow the truck will start up fine tomorrow. In retrospect, it was all a pain in the ass. Not having a vehicle sucks and I’m going to go on some kind of murderous spree if there’s engine problems from all of this.