I agree that $500 doesn't buy you much, but in terms of steel, you can buy a lot of steel for that amount if it's standard sized mild steel & you buy it by the length. If you want to check out some rough numbers for cost, you could do so on line - there are lots of steel retailers with good web sites that will give you the standard sizes for angle, channel, tube (square, round, rectangular) along with the associated specs & "by-the-foot" prices. If you decide to buy steel, don't go to any of the "convenience" steel marts that soak you an arm & a leg just for a couple of feet of something simple, go to the online yellow pages for your area and find the steel suppliers that tend to sell to the public but also sell to shops - cash & carry will always give you the best deals & it's the cheapest if they don't need to cut.

The labor for this job is not going to be light, so you should be prepared for several thousand dollars in any quote - the material price will easily be eclipsed by labor, if not lost in the noise. There's a lot of work to fabricating all new pieces for the back half of the frame and then moving all the suspension mounts and re-attaching them to the front. This cost element was why I originally suggested getting a good frame from a salvage yard (your cheapest, but will require a lot of your own labor, which I assume is free) or using angle iron on the top & bottom of each side from the cab to the tail - here, there's no alignment issue, no mount transfers, no re-assembly. The truck stands in place with the bed off while the welder cuts, bends, and welds the pieces of angle to go over top of the existing frame. There's still a bunch of labor with this approach, but it's a lot less than fabricating a whole frame section.

 

Here are a some pictures from a jeep project for myself - I rebuilt the entire back of the frame in this case.

 

I think you should seriously think about finding a good frame somewhere and swapping it over. The work to do that isn't really that bad, just time consuming.

As was said the material to do the repair is cheap, it is the labour that will kill you. I would assume any good shop that you would want to do this work would have a shop rate of at least $100 an hour, so $500, subtracting material and taxes, and shop supplies, will probably buy you a 3 hours of work. After three hours of work they would probably have the frame in, inspected, and a game plan together for how they will go about it.

Just buy a frame, clean it up and transfer your otherwise good truck over. Good luck!

 

Yeah, I'm the guy that suggested that you look out of state for a suitable replacement truck. Not really as outlandish as it sounds. I know that Tucson is too much of a hike for you--even for a fly, buy, and drive deal. But if someone asked, I'd probably be willing to go look at something local, so that it wouldn't be exactly like buying sight unseen. And I have a fairly comfortable sleep sofa.

I suspect there are others on this forum who might do the same.

 

Nice work. I could do that, takes a oxyacetylene torch and a mig welder, right? Tho I wonder if the welds with my Handler would be deep enough. Grinding grooves in the frame and angle grinding the edges of the reinforcing pieces would help, I suppose. I'd almost rather use a high power stick welder for this, tho.

The OP might be able to do some of the prep work. Grinding and cleanup is fairly time consuming--and grinders & disks are so cheap (Harbor Freight.) And he could probably do the finish/cleanup work, too. Then POR 15, some black Rustoleum, and put it all back together.

I don't think I'd want to try grafting a rear half of a frame on tho. Way too ambitious (and fear inducing) for me.

 

I used both an oxyacetylene torch & a 220 V Lincoln MIG for this project. The penetration isn't that hard to achieve since it's all 1/8" steel and then I added a second layer over the back hump as you can see, to reinforce the splices with an overall 1/8" box. That frame is for a YJ and around here it's very difficult to get an old wrangler frame in good shape. I used 2 frames (each frame had 1 side that I used about 2/3 of) plus some custom fab to make this and initially assembled it on a jig I made in my garage. It's not difficult work but takes a lot of time to do, especially if you're trying to make a living at something else as well.

The black that you see on the frame is POR15 - 2 coats, and I used grey POR on the inside. I sealed up all the holes except 1 and then poured a half quart into each main frame member, sloshed it back and forth, then unplugged the holes and let it dry. I used grey so that I could shine a light into each main member through the various holes in the frame to see the coverage - black would have been impossible to see on the inside. If you plan to use POR, make sure that ALL the welding is done - POR burns and produces clouds of noxious fumes. It's not hard to put out, but it's not good for the lungs.

 

Alright guys, you're all great and I thank you very much for all the help. I definitely underestimated the cost for the plan that I had. I guess I'm going to look harder for a good frame, and if I can't find one, then I may be looking for a truck is Tuscon or elsewhere.

I had my friend look at it yesterday. He told me to clean it up as best as possible to see what I was working with (which I was going to do anyways).

 

Great plans, let us know how you finally decide to go.

 

A minor update: Basically, I have decided beyond reasonable doubt that this frame is dead. I took the gas tank out and the rest of the crossmembers, and the rot is just terrible. It is the worst behind the front leaf spring mounts. I am pretty sure the riveted front leaf spring mounts are holding the frame together and without them the frame would have already broke in two.

So, the search is on in full force for a frame. If anyone has any leads on a frame for a '93 4WD Extra cab, please let me know! Thank you.

 

Where are you located?