The Ram that should have Dodged - a rebuild thread

As some of you may have read, the 1998 Ram I brought up from Florida was a victim of teenage driving and looks a bit different now. 

Before:

and now it looks like it was punched in the nose by the hulk :

This thread will be the rebuilding of it by my son (with some guidance) so he can get back on the road. His driving will be extremely limited until he makes the repairs and he needs to pay for the parts. Hopefully this should be a learning experience for him. 

Next step is for him to find fenders and a hood. The auto body shop at his school will paint the parts if he gets them, so he needs to get moving if he wants to have them painted before putting it back together. 

Ugh, sorry to hear about the accident. Fortunately, it looks relatively minor. Good luck to your son with the rebuild. 

What did he Ram into? Was he unable to Dodge it? 

I resurrected my old Mustang from a similar hit a few years back.  Had to bend the radiator support back into shape (took measurements from my Dad's Mustang), and then replaced a fender and a hood.  I had it for another 3-4 years after the accident, passed 300K (it was at 294k when it was in the accident), and sold it back to the original owner's son-in-law.  It wasn't as nice as before the crash, but it cleaned up nice and I got a few more years of enjoyment out of it.  Hoping you can do the same.

The biggest challenge is finding rust free, or relatively rust free parts. I'd consider aftermarket, but many places are back ordered so that limits options. 

Have you looked at Copart or similar salvage auctions.  I'm amazed by some of the vehicles they get, newer and older.  Dodge ran that body for several years (as I'm sure you know).

5 or 6 years ago I bought that same generation Ram from Copart that was a previous state highway truck, bright orange and all.  It was a V6 automatic 4x2 standard cab.  I paid $800 for it and it still ran and drove.  Body looked good with little rust.  You could do a deal like that, steal all the parts you want, and sell it on for scrap which is through the moon due to the value of steel and those damned catalytic converters.

Also, I just took a look and Amazon looks to have fenders in stock for that vintage of Ram.  They aren't as cheap as usual, though.

In reply to Loweguy5 :

Thank for the tip on Copart, I'll have to check that out. I had been looking at Car-part.com, but not finding anything decent. 

I may go with one of these options:

No title but complete

or

Southern sheet metal

The financial side of my brain says the complete truck is the way to go, but my practical side says it might be worth letting my some spend a bit more on parts already removed to get my son to finish the repairs sooner.

Buying just the parts has no recoup, but I also wouldn't have 3 inoperable vehicles in the yard (the white Ram, the SX4 with bad bearings, and a parts truck).

One more suggestion.  Have you looked at Craiglist under auto parts?  On there I have found several guys who are privately parting Rams.  I have a 3rd generation 2500 but I found a couple of guys local to me who buy wrecked earlier trucks, strip them and send the hulks to the crusher.  Similarly, take a look at FB marketplace.

We ended up buying a parts truck, 2001 Ram 1500 4wd with 5.9, 46RE, and it's an off-road edition. 

While the off-road edition doesn't add anything really needed for the rebuild, it included a Dana 44 front axle and Chrysler 9.25 rear with 4:10 gears and limited slip in the rear. It also came with a set of 17" factory wheels, and a hitch that looks like it was never used. The parts I don't need are rusty, but that is a minor detail. 

Hopefully the leftover parts will be good form recoup to get back some of what was down on the truck and the tow.

The AAA driver refuse do do the move as a AAA call because the plates didn't match the vin on the truck. The first thing he did was call in the plate and then check the vin (first time I've seen that happen).  At that point it didn't make sense to drive home without it and make another trip to get it. I bit the bullet and paid $320 for a berkeleying 60 mile tow, but am not happy about it. 
 

Wow on the vin match by AAA!  That could set back my standard operating procedure.

In reply to John Welsh :

It may just be that towing company, or that it was going from RI to MA and crossing state lines that led to the increased scrutiny. 

AAA checking vins is a scary thought to me. 

I wonder if the AAA driver was an "owner" and not just a driver/employee getting paid by the hour?  As an owner, he would understand how much money was being left on the table.  I'm also not calling your guy directly underhanded but it is also known that some tow companies use AAA as lead generation.  That is, they get called out and then they do what they can strong arm the customer into some high rates.  

If just an employee, I find a nice tip that cover at least lunch for the day goes a long way!  

Mr. NoTime,  if you have time, you might want to call AAA.  See what the notes were recorded for your AAA call.  I wonder if maybe the tow company still stuck AAA for some pay like said they performed a jump start for you and then got you to private pay for towing...double dip!  

Double dip for him but sucked up one of your allowed services for you...maybe.  

Karma is an interesting concept. All I will say is that it appears that debit and credit buttons on the CC machine must be close together. 

The driver might have had a hunch that it was a long-term inop rather than a breakdown and cross-checked the VIN so he had a chance to not take the AAA rate.

GCrites80s said:

The driver might have had a hunch that it was a long-term inop rather than a breakdown and cross-checked the VIN so he had a chance to not take the AAA rate.

I forgot the RI inspection sticker, so that was on me.  

Technically i could have signed my registration and driven it home legally if transferring plates,  so it's not like it couldn't legally be driven home, even if the registration wasn't transferred yet. 

But what's done is done, and it looks like it might have worked out ok anyway. 

Some progress made removing some of the parts that my son is going to try to have painted at school:

I didn't realize you're just up the road from me (I'm in CT).  Congratulations on the great score!  Parts truck FTW.