Go Strapless
34 CUSTOM RIGS Winter 2009 O ne modification growing in popularity among today's custom rigs is strapless air tanks on trucks where the exposed tanks are mounted just under the cab's doors. Petes, KWs and other conventionals are often built with the air tanks attached to mounting brackets, which, in turn, are bolted to adapters located on the truck's frame rails. The ensuing rings or straps, with their 1 / 4 -in. or 5 / 16 -in. metal dowels, are unsightly to those who are going after the clean, slick look. The solution: Go strapless. Jeff Davidson, president of John's Truck Repair north of San Francisco in Cotati, says while his company's main-stay is big-rig collision repair, about 30 percent of our shop's work is customizing, spanning everything from simple chrome front bumper upgrades to quarter-mil-lion-dollar tractors customized from the tires up. JTR's Rick Porter, their lead fabricator, showed the strapless tank process as he customized a `95 Extend-ed-Hood Peterbilt 379 owned by Nick Barbieri Trucking of Santa Rosa, California. The approach to making air tanks strapless is similar for both steel and aluminum tanks. In short, the stock retaining straps are scrapped, new brackets are fab-ricated and welded to the backside of the tank, and those brackets bolted to the existing adapters on the frame rails. Aluminum or steel, the custom conversion is an easy DIY project as long as you have the requisite welding skills and equipment to fabricate the brackets. If you want strapless tanks on your conventional and you're not a DIY fabricator and welder, experienced rig customizing shops, like John's Truck Repair, can convert your air tanks to strapless mounting in about a day. If your custom rig has ugly air tanks ... story and photos b y HIB HALVERSON STRAPLESS AIR TANKS How-to How-to