Bandit Customs
Member
- Joined
- June 16, 2013
- Messages
- 21
- Reaction score
- 3
- City, State
- Austin, TX
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 1992 Explorer
We here at Bandit Customs pride ourselves on our out of the box thinking and problem solving skills....and by that I mean we fly by our pants and make stuff up as we go. So when Randall approached us about repairing his 91, we couldn't just leave well enough alone. Here's how it started:
After a minor collsion with a ditch, the 91 was in major need of some work. After further investigating, we found the firewall had actually crumpled like a 'V', forcing itself down into the frame. So more was needed than just a new front clip...
As you can see in the images below, not only was the front clip destroyed, but the roof had buckled, doors became misaligned, and before the sliders were level with the body..not quite so anymore
So unfortuantly, there really was no way to save the body as it had just taken too much abuse over the years. So after kris and I had talked, we came up with this as our idea:
This was a 93 Limited I had purchased myself a while back for the sole purpose of having a dedicated off road truck...well, in a sense that happened, but more on that later. Kris and I basically planned on taking the 93 Limited's body off it's frame and just swapping everything over...wiring, front clip, interior...everything. So a lot of planning was involved in getting the two vehicles prepped for the body swap (or frame swap...whichever works best). First thing first - gut the vehicles:
Both vehicles had glass removed, carpet, ect to access body mount bolts and to make the swap a bit smoother. At this point, the plan was to raise the white body off it's frame, roll the stock frame out, cut the black body up on the lifted frame, then roll lifted frame under white body and reattach. So the interior was left mainly in place in the white body, while the black body was almost completely gutted.
here the running boards and rear slach sheilds have been removed and excess metal cut off the body.
Which finally brings us to this past weekend of full prep work and the actual swap to begin:
So with a bit of help from Randall, Parker, and our welder Clay, Kris and I began everything about 9:00 am.
And then work began on cutting the black body apart:
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you do a complete body swap in under 10 hours time in your driveway. And this won't be the last body swap at Bandit Customs. We see at least one more in our future. So comment below what you think!
After a minor collsion with a ditch, the 91 was in major need of some work. After further investigating, we found the firewall had actually crumpled like a 'V', forcing itself down into the frame. So more was needed than just a new front clip...
As you can see in the images below, not only was the front clip destroyed, but the roof had buckled, doors became misaligned, and before the sliders were level with the body..not quite so anymore
So unfortuantly, there really was no way to save the body as it had just taken too much abuse over the years. So after kris and I had talked, we came up with this as our idea:
This was a 93 Limited I had purchased myself a while back for the sole purpose of having a dedicated off road truck...well, in a sense that happened, but more on that later. Kris and I basically planned on taking the 93 Limited's body off it's frame and just swapping everything over...wiring, front clip, interior...everything. So a lot of planning was involved in getting the two vehicles prepped for the body swap (or frame swap...whichever works best). First thing first - gut the vehicles:
Both vehicles had glass removed, carpet, ect to access body mount bolts and to make the swap a bit smoother. At this point, the plan was to raise the white body off it's frame, roll the stock frame out, cut the black body up on the lifted frame, then roll lifted frame under white body and reattach. So the interior was left mainly in place in the white body, while the black body was almost completely gutted.
here the running boards and rear slach sheilds have been removed and excess metal cut off the body.
Which finally brings us to this past weekend of full prep work and the actual swap to begin:
So with a bit of help from Randall, Parker, and our welder Clay, Kris and I began everything about 9:00 am.
And then work began on cutting the black body apart:
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you do a complete body swap in under 10 hours time in your driveway. And this won't be the last body swap at Bandit Customs. We see at least one more in our future. So comment below what you think!
