Where to check frame for rot on 98 2500

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It's a long story, but I purchased an unfinished 98 1500 ext cab LS swap project. I was only interested in the drivetrain and I'm going to swap all of the drive train over to a 97 two door Tahoe that I have.

My plan was to put the rest of the truck up for sale. The issue I'm having is the truck is rust free and don't really want to just scrap it. I am in Minnesota Andrew Street trucks are in both impossible to come by. I found a '98 2500 (7.4) that has a rebuilt transmission and a new crate motor installed 3k miles ago, but is rusty. I want a truck that I can tow with when necessary. This price on this truck is about half of what the crate motor costs. I was thinking about just swapping the rust free body under the 2500 frame.

Anyway, to get to the main question. I know to check the frame where it curves under the front cab of the truck. Are there any other areas that I should check out? I just want to make sure that the frame is good before I purchase.

Thanks!
 

454cid

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Anyway, to get to the main question. I know to check the frame where it curves under the front cab of the truck. Are there any other areas that I should check out? I just want to make sure that the frame is good before I purchase.

Yes, check the frame by the steering box.... basically both the frame rails forward and into the suspension. I've seen multiple trucks get so rusty the front cross member doesn't have much to hang on to. There was one up for auction a few weeks ago locally, super low miles, body OK for an old MI truck, but the front of the frame was crumbling.

You might want to look at cross members under the box, but that would be much easier to fix than the front.

Really you're going to want to look at the whole frame, but the areas up front would be "fast walk away" worthy to me..... unless I was after powertrain parts.
 
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Thanks for the info. I am just looking for a tow rig and figured since i have the rust free body I don't know what to do with, I could end up with something decent with a little sweat equity. The asking price is half what the crate engine cost, and that only has 2500 miles on it. He is done with it as he put all new everything for the brakes and it turned out be the ABS module, so he's done with it......but the rust free truck is complete and has the ABS module
 
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