Dieselhead

I'd say 5 holes or daytons would be pretty accurate for an 80's work truck. You could also do the alcoa fronts and 5 hole/dayton rears, I've seen that on some trucks too if you'd like the extra chrome up front. Looks like a great beginning regardless!

I can't give you any certainty, but just about every W900L conversion hood I've seen has been intended for either an RoG donor kit or the AMT W925.

I think we may be supplying our own decals for this one if you wish to get the Cat branding back on. Caterpillar is very quick to send out cease and desist letters and if I was a decal manufacturer, I wouldn't touch that with a 12 foot pole. Regardless, I'll have to pick this up. Looks like an interesting build, would be very fun to grime up as it should be.

What engine/transmission did you end up going with? You'll certainly need some serious power to turn those tires!

Man this is cool. I'm loving all the fabrication and problem-solving involved, this is a really unique project! I wish you luck with it.

Man that looks great. What technique do you use for your nice bends in the tubing? Mine never come out that uniform.

A 1978 truck would've been closer to the 6.2, even though the 6.2 didn't become available until 1982. That said, nothing is stopping you from saying the truck was engine swapped down the road. They're V8s so you could set the exhaust up however you want, but from factory they were a passenger side exit located behind the rear axle, as is standard on most pickups.

Looks like you've got a real monster on your hands. Do you have sources for the rest of your running/dump gear or is that all going to get scratched?

Very impressive, Sergei. That looks great.

Didn't expect to see so many builders from here on this forum. Very cool! ABQ myself.

A wee bit of a derailment, but what would make the 426 unsuitable for short round track, other than weight issues? Would the smaller track not give the engine room to really wind out, thus keeping it down in the low RPM ranges, necessitating shorter gearing?

I'm very impressed with your replication of offhighway grime. How'd you make that look so good?

Now these are projects I love! I'll certainly be following this one!

Looks like you've got your work cut out for you. Will this be a curbside to save on frustration or will we get the whole hog?

Thankfully providing one's own power doesn't seem so hard, the IH 345 looks fairly similar to a smallblock ford to me (with some cursory looks anyway) but with a different intake manifold and front dress, but they don't seem so bad to stratch.