How now brown cowl?

[Sharkdance]

The vented space on the outside of the cab between the windshield and the back of the hood: The cowl?
How the heck can you get into there?
Im trying to clean and prep for paint as much of my doner cab as I can before the actual swap and that includes trying to prevent future rust as well. But I cant figure out how to get into that extierior space of the cab that I call the cowl.
Its not real bad under there, but I thought I could clean it out and coat it with something like Por15.
Anyone done this yet?
Should I even bother?

[460 crew]

Pour some in there and tip the truck side to side

[fordman]

the cowl vents into the vents on the kick panel. other than that i don't think you can get into it without removeing the cowl from the truck. which means breaking the body seams where it's attached.

[FORDification]

I asked this exact same question here a couple months ago, and wasn't able to get any ideas. I asked on a couple other boards online and again nothing. Since I'm going to be painting my cab pretty soon too, I'm still running this over in my mind.

My guess is that the oval-shaped plug in the top center area of the cowl is the access hole for a flexible paint gun extension. I also spent some time surfing online and even sent out a few e-mails to paint gun manufacturers looking for such an extension, but all replies back said they didn't know of such a thing. I've toyed around with the idea of cutting a full-width hole across the front and then covering it with a larger patch panel from a donor truck, but I decided I really didn't want to cut up that area, or put that much extra work into it.

Since my truck is probably going to be painted black, I might be a little better off than someone who wants this area painted a different color. I was thinking about soaking a rag in POR-15 and then smearing it around in there through the access hole using a stiff wire, and then using a rattlecan to topcoat as far as the stream would reach. It won't be perfect, but since it'll be black anyway, it should only be obvious if you specifically looked down into the vent area.

[4x4_Welder]

I'm having to deal with a similar situation on my 69, except it's rusted through and my feet get wet (Clean the leaves out of the cowl!). I am going to cut a large oval hole in the underhood area at the front of the cowl, weld in the patch panels, weld the hole back up, and spray about a whole can of brite-zinc through the louvers. Then, I will probably take the most elegant option, and pretty much dump a can of POR-15 through there, before blasting the cab. It will be nasty, and not very pretty, but who looks in the cowl anyways?

[tcb1969]

Ford did the same design on the early (64-66) mustangs. The only way to really get access is remove the spot welds all the way around the cowel - do the repairs, etc and then re-weld the spots that you drilled out. It takes about 2-3 days for an experienced mustang restorer to do this though - so figure alot of time for an amateur!

I had another idea though - anyone is welcome to steal it though!
Remove the entire cowel vent/grille area - do the repairs and then weld in new sheetmetal with an old ford cowel vent - say from a '48 ford. Then you can close it when you don't need the airflow and open it when you do!



John

[flyboy2610]

The side panels for the cowl area are available as aftermarket parts, so it would be posible to remove those to get to the inner area of the cowl, then put in the new panels.

[Stroked]

Hmm....I've never really thought about this. I have to say that was not one of Ford's brighter ideas. The cowl unbolts on my Chevy. I'm gonna get flamed now.

[flyboy2610]

Nah.
Frankly, Ford did a lot of bonehead things on their vehicles.

[fordman]

i dont own a flame thrower.