My truck is finally back home!!!!

Well, I was finally able to get my truck today.  They were not 100% done but the last two items need to come in to finish the project and it may be a week or more before they get the light in.  

So here is the before picture of the truck.  If you look closely you will see the fender is rusted out badly and the paint doesn't match because I had the cab painted all one color two years ago to prepare for the future flatbed.  You should also notice that the front wheel well is closer to the front tire by 4 inches.  There are many other little differences that you can't see but these are some major ones.

2005 F350 Aluma Flatbed installation.  Before picture.

Here is the finished product!  We put 4500# leaf spring packs on the back, offroad FX4 springs on the front, a 2.5" leveling kit on the front, and new brakes on the front and new shocks all the way around. Gearheads coated the frame with undercoating from the cab back.  We will be doing the rest later on this summer once the weather is nice so I can get it clean and do it right.  

2005 F350 Aluma Flatbed installation.

Gearheads also took the broken racing muffler out of the exhaust and straight piped it for now.   This made it unbelievably angry sounding!!!!  I love it .... just don't want to be standing by the side of the road if I am pulling a heavy load as it sound as loud as a semi now!

2005 F350 Aluma Flatbed installation.

Gearheads had to put a lot of time and effort into getting this bed onto the truck.  First of all the B&W turnover hitch held the bed too high to properly line up with the back window or the top of the cab.  So we had to take it out and install a plate style gooseneck hitch.  The flap in the bed still hit the new ball so they had to trim some of the unneeded material of the underside of the lid so it would close properly.

Gooseneck hitch plate cover.

 While they were at it I asked them to put a new trailer plug in the hole in the bed for the trailers so I didn't have to have the cord hanging over the back end of the truck any more!   This turned out quite awesome and makes life so much easier!

Gooseneck hitch with trailer plug installed under the cover

After I saw the truck with the new bed setting on it last week I got to thinking about the fact that I no longer had mud flaps.  So I found some that matched the truck and they put them on for me.  This also took some thought and the guys came up with a genius idea.  They installed mud flap mounts for a semi truck to the frame of the truck to hold the mud flaps at the perfect height!  The only thing missing from this picture is the white LED light that gets mounted in the top center of the headache rack.  It will be wired to the cab light switch and will light up the bed at night so I can see at night when hooking and unhooking the trailers.

2005 F350 aluma flatbed installation

 All the lights on the new bed are LED so I shouldn't have to mess with them for quite a while!  Another thing that they had to do was paint the back of the cab.  Ford found out a while ago that because the bed is mounted so tight to the cab you cannot see the bottom of the back of the cab.....so they just don't paint it.  So the guys at Gearheads applied rock guard to the any area they though would need it and then perfectly matched the paint up with the rest of the cab.  No masking lines or different shades of paint....just perfect match!

2005 F350 Aluma Flatbed installation.

2005 F350 Aluma Flatbed installation.

Here is another thing the guys at Gearheads did that I don't think may people would have been able to or wanted to do.    I have seen a lot of flatbeds that when done had the fuel inlet just stuck onto the bottom of the bed.  I did not want this as my first flatbed truck had this and it was a pain in the ass to fill it up.  The inlet was too low and the fuel had to go over up and over the frame to get into the tank so it would blow out at you while trying to fill it.  

In trying to avoid this I asked the guys if they could install the fill cap into the corner of the bed.  This was not an easy task and took some skill and work but it turned out pretty sweet.  It also hides it so it is not a focal point like it would be hanging under the side of the bed!

2005 F350 Aluma Flatbed installation fuel inlet.

I put this picture in so you can see how little the bed hangs out past the sides of the cab.  I was very particular about not having a bed that stuck out past the cab as I did not like that about my old truck.

Some of the many many other items the guys had to fix were all new brakes on the front, right front hub was shot, new u-joints front to back, oil and filter change, and a bunch of other little items.  I still need to replace the back rotors, pads, calipers, and wheel seals.  When I have it back in to undercoat the front frame and the cab I am going to have them drop the carrier bearing a little to try to get rid of the rear end vibration.  

After all that I should be good for a little while!  I know I put a lot of money into this truck but when compared to the cost of a new one that is comparable to this one I have barely equaled a years worth of payments for a new truck.   The best part is that this one is just how I want it.... I just have to take care of it!

I will post some picture of it hooked to the flatbed trailer next week when I have it loaded with scrap.  It looks great.

Here is the link to the quick video of how it sounds!  Drive by with 4" straight pipe!

I want to say a huge thank you to Scott and Mike at Gearheads Garage in Louisville Ohio for their great work and for putting up with me during the process!  I look forward to working with them again in the future!

Have an awesome weekend everyone!