I've finally decided to bite the bullet and dig into doing something about the rusted floor pans on my '70 Hilux. Both the driver and passenger sides are pretty shot in the front outside corners where the cab mounts are.

I've read through all the threads I could find on this and I know there's no after market panels and something solid from a donor isn't easy to come by, so I realize I'll have to fabricate something myself.

I'm pretty new to welding/bodywork, so I'm not quite sure how to come at this, especially addressing the cab mounts. I don't need to perfectly reproduce what I will cut out - just need to make everything solid again. Not looking to do a body drop or anything aggressive. Once the steel is solid again I plan to prep/Por-15 the whole floor.

My initial Qs:
- Are strengthening ribs absolutely necessary (I would have to figure out how to do that), or would flat 20 gauge sheet metal be ok?
- Any ideas on what to do for cab mounts? These are so gone that I don't even know what they're supposed to look like. Did they have a rubber bushing and/or multiple layers of metal?
- Anything structural I need to pay extra close attention to (besides that obvious unattached front driver-side support for the bench seat )?

Any advice/tips/anecdotes/warnings are appreciated! I'd love it if anyone could post some pics of what the cab mount area is supposed to look like.

 

Rolling beads in the metal will add rigidity.

Not sure about how to add the cupped portion for the actual mount, ive been wondering how to do it also(without expensive tools shop have) since my passenger side mount is rotting through a bit

 

Try an 89-94 standard cab floor pan. Haven't done it myself, but another Toyota forum I belong to had a member said it was very close and would fit the 1978 truck with minor trimming.
Not sure if it will work with a 1970. You may have to buy a couple of different pans to find a perfect match. Maybe 1979-83?. You can always return what doesn't work. Might be easier than trying to fabricate your own.

 

First & foremost, cut all of the damaged metal away, than use angle grinder with a sanding disk & clean all the edges where you will be welding. Use cardboard to make patterns & cut form plate stock, I'd use thicker than 20 ga. Than weld in place, stitch weld ,than fully weld in,using a mig with gas.
The body mounts you can make from 1'' flat bar forming a u, than plate top & bottom,find some bushing on line & some pipe the same ID as the bushings OD, drill a hole & fit a length of pipe in weld in place & add the bushing ,bolt to the body ( will have to cut the u to fit from the frame to the body mount hole first).
Lots of work ,but will be better than was new!

 

Thanks for the good info! I will begin cutting away the bad metal today and see where I'm at from there.

@jetas - I found this on Youtube where the guy welded in some cupped-shape parts he had lying around - I may walk the aisles of Home Depot to see if I can't find something similar.

@fred heath - I searched pretty good for something aftermarket for a later truck that might work but I may be too much of a newbie to this work to recognize something that would work with creative fitting. I think I'll take the small-patch-at-a-time approach.

@TRUCK ACTION - Good info! I think I will go with 18 ga then. As for the body mounts I'm not quite following the solution you described, but I'll read through again once I've dug in and understand the mounting area a bit better.

 

Personally I think I’d try to use a preformed floor pan off something else so I could have ridges in it for structural rigidity, otherwise it will likely flex a lot and make popping sounds under feet is my guess.

I remember seeing fairly universal patch panels in catalogs like JCWhitney, so I’d likely start with one of those and trim it closer to fitting using cardboard mock-up.

For the body mount, I’ve also seen rust repair patches for them too. Might not be the right shape though. I suppose you could also do dimple die with some sheet added to DIY the cup then reinforce on the bottom side.

 

Ok after a couple days of cutting and exploring I think I know what the game plan is.

The good news is I think I won't have to replace much sheet metal in the floors - and the areas I will replace will have a curve so I don't think I'll need to add any beads.



The body support brackets are pretty pitted, but seem solid enough, so I'm gonna re-use them (@TRUCK ACTION thanks for the drawing - makes sense. I would have gone that way if these brackets were too far gone). The real issue is the steel on the cab wall they were attached to. I'm going to weld in new panels that cover the inside of the rockers, then re-attach the brackets to that. I was surprised to find they were just spot welded in.



Where I'm stuck is replacing the bushings. They seem pretty simple: an upper and a lower, about 1" thick and 3" wide. Unfortunately the vehicle lookup on most sites don't go back this far. I called Prothane and the guy wouldn't/couldn't lookup by dimensions and was no help. I looked into FJ40s but they have square bushings.


(Red lines denote where the support brackets go. There's a rubber collar that sits inside the hole in the frame bracket and that the lower bushing fits over.)

Anyone know what fits our early model Hiluxes? I'm sure someone has figured this out during a cab swap or something.

 

Lookin good so far!
hockey pucks are 1" thick and very close to 3" in diameter, they can usually be found for a dollar a piece.
Keep up the good work.

 

Haha the hocky puck idea is pretty good! I looked into it and they are actually pretty hard (a 90A on the rubber hardness scale), whereas original rubber body mounts were about a 50A.

I just ordered this universal body mount bushing set from Energy Suspension (Part Number 9.4102). The originals on the 1970 Hilux look about the same, so I'm hoping I can make these work. We'll see in a few days.

 

Ok its been a couple weeks but I think I'm out of the woods on this, so thought I'd share an update.

The universal bushings from Energy Suspension seem like they'll work just fine. The larger upper portion has a 1.25" collar that sits down in the hole in the cup of the frame support. That hole is I think 1" and so it had to be drilled out (using a step drill bit) to 1.25". Once that was done, I just stacked all the parts together and bolted them up (now using 1/2" bolts), and then welded the cab support arm to the new metal on the cab.




The welding job aint the best but it should hold. Now its just a matter of patching in the remaining floor areas. Looking forward to wrapping this up so I can get some carpet in there and then lower it!

 

May you should add a side gusset too the flate plate , looks like that is what the stock support had?


Just my 2 cents

 

Good call - I definitely kept the gussets and added extra welds.

Everything is pretty dang solid now and has a couple coats of POR-15. Really happy with how it turned out. I added new door seals and repaired the bench seat too. A little carpet and something to cover the cracked dash and I'll be rollin' like its 1970 again.

 

Looks great .
Before the carpet goes in use a sound deadener, I used Fat Mat, a lot less than the most conmanly used item.
I used on all inside surfaces including the roof . Makes a big difference!!

 

Well Done!

 

Looks good - x2 on sound deadener. My truck has 1 layer and I've been wanting to rip out the carpet and do at least 1 more layer on the floor and the back of the cab

 

Good job man. I've got one truck with no floor (like literally no floor in front of the brace the seat bolts down to), and another that has floors, but some bozo welded a flat plate on top of the existing rusty floor and it looks like ass. Not sure which cab is going in my build, that will be the last step whenever I get there.

For anyone reading this down the road, your local "Maker Space" will likely have all the sheet metal tools you need to make full-blown custom floor plans. You'd want a shear, brake (bender), and bead-roller. Mine's $50/mo, so if you can get a lot done in a month, it's very worthwhile. There for sure has to be at least a half-dozen of these places in Portland.

 

Man that's a great idea! If I was gonna replace more of the floor, this would have been a great way to go.