Sorry about the quality of that last picture.

The Dakota floor pan was used intact. The rear cab mounts are supported by a formed box that runs side to side. It is tied to the pan, the inner rockers, and the rear of the cab panel. Brackets were moved on the frame to make use of this floor reinforcing. As the body sat on the Dakota floor pan, the coupe's rear door posts were trimmed so the post sat just inside the floor pan box. Hindsight tells me I should have trimmed another 1/2" off the box. I welded the door post to the cab mount box.

This is the point where I wave the red flags. I made a mistake at this point that wouldn't show up until a year later. You need to understand, this coupe body was in such bad shape, many measurements were simple best guesses. My doors were hinged, but there were no latches, the doors were wired shut. Since the floor pan was gone (the previous pictures were taken before I did anything with the car other then clean up the loose stuff.) I have no reference to the proper location of the rear door post, it was just hanging in the breeze. When the bracing was welded in, before the body was removed from the frame, the swinging doors were all I had to guess the location of the door posts. While it was tacked to the new floor, the doors were test closed. The door gap was real close and the body to door was a good fit, the doors swung free and came in line when held closed, it was determined to be correct. What I failed to notice was that the tops of the doors were out about 3/8". Its easy to see now that the car is nearing finishing. I will have to cut the top of the door frame and tilt the top of the post in and reweld it. I am not going to cut the car apart to fix this mistake. Remember where the car came from, and what it is going to be, a street version of a dirt track race car. Perfection is not my highest priority.

I add a new vertical panel as an inner rocker, welded it to the floor pan and extend it from the firewall to the rear cab mount box and another vertical panel from the rear of the cab mount box to the rear wheel well. Once the inner rockers were in place, I would extend the front and rear door posts and attach them to outside of the inner rocker. The front cab mounts were located about mid way between the original coupe front 2 firewall body mounts. The mounts were modified to tie into the bottom of the firewall. At a later date, the front coupe firewall mount would be added to the frame.

Instead of attempting to have the bottom of the body kick outward as the 46-48 Plymouth's did, it would be much more simple to take them straight down and under the body like the 41 & 42 body's were.

The Dakota had a 8' box. That box had a topper on it all its life so the box floor was in great shape. Measurements revealed if I cut the sides off the box, its floor could be shortened and it would fit in the coupe as a rear floor. If i trimmed the front, I could still mount the box floor on the Dakota frame using the center 2 mounting points on each side. The box floor on a Dakota is about 6" higher on the frame then the cab floor is. The coupe is a business coupe, there was not ever a back seat, and I didn't plan on having one now. The rise in the box floor would sit behind the cab floor pan, which would be behind the seat. I would have to cut the box floor in 1/2 (front to back) to get it in the car. With the front 1/2 of the box floor bolted to the frame, the step up between the front floor pan and the rear floor pan was made and reinforced. At this point, I was still planning on installing a roll cage, so provisions were made at the step up so the main hoop could be welded to a well structured floor. Floor extensions were made to attach the wheel wells and rear body to the box floor.

The coupe trunk floor was removed before I got the car. Someone also cut the bottom 6" off the trunk lid and had it screwed to a piece of wood that was screwed to both rear quarters. A rear cross member and body reinforcing plates were built to attach to the quarters to each other and provided a pair of rear body mount locations.

Through the process the body was channeled on the frame about 3" at the front and about 2" at the rear.

Pictures: In this one, you can see the "new" inner rocker and where the rear door post is welded to it. I believe this may have been before the door post extensions were made on this side. The raised part of the floor pan is the body mount box. You see the little kick up in the inner rocker just in front of the door post is where the rear edge od the Dakota door originally was. At the right edge of the picture you can see the step up to the rear floor.