TrackpackRT
Junior Member
- Joined
- Jan 4, 2026
- Posts
- 1
- Reaction score
- 14
- Location
- Edmonton, AB Canada
- Ram Year
- 2010
- Engine
- 5.7 Hemi
Last year I was checking auction sites for a cheap Ram to do truck stuff I needed around the house. After looking at some hail damaged trucks, I found what I was looking for and I ended up winning my Ram 1500 for $4900 in a city 3 hours south of me. It had some rust problems I could see in the pictures on the site, but to be honest the pics weren't the best so getting an accurate idea of how bad it was proved difficult. At least it had videos of it running with the hood up and I could also check the maintenance history of it, so I knew at least mechanically it seemed alright and taken care of.
Fast forward to me getting the truck transported to my city and to my surprise the truck is actually a super nice Ram Sport, with every option available (heated/cooled leather seats, heated steering wheel, sunroof, remote start ect) just with some minor hail damage and some bad rust problems on a lot of the panels. After driving it home, I was really impressed to find it was in perfect running condition as well. It was clear mechanically the truck had been well taken care of. That's when I realized, body aside, this was a pretty nice truck and it had potential to be alot more than just a beater work horse. With some work it could be a really nice Ram that drove like a new truck. First major problem to tackle however was rust at the windshield and roof area that I discovered after my drive home, investigating where the whistling sound was coming from on the highway. Because I'm not a body man, but have a father in law that owns a body shop and a brother in law that spent his entire life in the trade as well, I had lots of advice and lots of help tackling such a massive repair myself. That borrowed confidence convinced me to try and fix this first major hurdle myself.
I'll basically summarize the process here but I will leave a link to the video of the entire repair for anyone interested more detail of what went into it.
After realizing the rust was both on the top of the roof and in the windshield channel I realized a simple patch repair would be impossible. I'd need to cut out chunks of this roof and use a donor roof to do this properly. I ended up finding a wrecked 2017 Ram at a parts yard and got them to cut the front 13" out of it for me which only cost me $450. After getting a glass company to remove the windshield in my mom's garage where I was doing the work (my truck was actually too long to fit in my own garage unfortunately) I was ready to get to work.
From there I seperated the donor roof skin from the structural support steel underneath it. Then I started grinding every single rust spot into oblivion on my trucks battered roof. In spots where the rust was right through or too much I simply cut those chunks of the roof right out, leaving little 4"x3" holes along the windshield line. After consulting my FIL about the best way to approach fastening the roof skin he strongly recommended a special autobody grade glue instead of welding to avoid catching the headliner on fire and risking burning the truck down. He said he was always a weld guy but once he started using this glue it made him a believer. That's all I needed to hear. So the process became using the glue for the flat section of the upper roof and then welding all of the spotwelds I had to drill out in the windshield channel where I could put fire blanket behind it and use that to shield the interior from sparks and ****.
Turns out my FIL was right and the glue worked amazingly. The fit of the new roof skin was perfect and made it relatively easy to get the body filler to give me a seamless transition between old roof and new roof. After grinding my welds down smooth and also using filler in the windshield channel to give it a totally flat surface for the windshield, I called the glass guys back to throw a windshield back in so I could drive the truck to my FIL's shop for primer and final paint.
I've got to say although it was a pretty serious repair for someone with my experience level I couldn't be more happy with how it turned out. Sometimes it's worth it to dive in and give things a shot that are out of our comfort zone. To add an even sweeter bonus, my FIL refused to let me pay for the paint job he did for me. While that amazingly nice of him, I didn't want it to seem in any way like I was taking advantage of his shop and talent. I guess I'll just chalk that up to the "I really owe you one" list and try to repay his kindness where I can. All in all, it's pretty amazing that this repair only cost me $450 for the roof, around $100 for supplies and around $230 for the new windshield.
For anyone looking for much more detail here is the video of me tackling the repair in fine detail. There's 4 parts to it as there is a lot covered in the series but here's the first installment for anyone interested. Ram Roof Fix Part 1
Fast forward to me getting the truck transported to my city and to my surprise the truck is actually a super nice Ram Sport, with every option available (heated/cooled leather seats, heated steering wheel, sunroof, remote start ect) just with some minor hail damage and some bad rust problems on a lot of the panels. After driving it home, I was really impressed to find it was in perfect running condition as well. It was clear mechanically the truck had been well taken care of. That's when I realized, body aside, this was a pretty nice truck and it had potential to be alot more than just a beater work horse. With some work it could be a really nice Ram that drove like a new truck. First major problem to tackle however was rust at the windshield and roof area that I discovered after my drive home, investigating where the whistling sound was coming from on the highway. Because I'm not a body man, but have a father in law that owns a body shop and a brother in law that spent his entire life in the trade as well, I had lots of advice and lots of help tackling such a massive repair myself. That borrowed confidence convinced me to try and fix this first major hurdle myself.
I'll basically summarize the process here but I will leave a link to the video of the entire repair for anyone interested more detail of what went into it.
After realizing the rust was both on the top of the roof and in the windshield channel I realized a simple patch repair would be impossible. I'd need to cut out chunks of this roof and use a donor roof to do this properly. I ended up finding a wrecked 2017 Ram at a parts yard and got them to cut the front 13" out of it for me which only cost me $450. After getting a glass company to remove the windshield in my mom's garage where I was doing the work (my truck was actually too long to fit in my own garage unfortunately) I was ready to get to work.
From there I seperated the donor roof skin from the structural support steel underneath it. Then I started grinding every single rust spot into oblivion on my trucks battered roof. In spots where the rust was right through or too much I simply cut those chunks of the roof right out, leaving little 4"x3" holes along the windshield line. After consulting my FIL about the best way to approach fastening the roof skin he strongly recommended a special autobody grade glue instead of welding to avoid catching the headliner on fire and risking burning the truck down. He said he was always a weld guy but once he started using this glue it made him a believer. That's all I needed to hear. So the process became using the glue for the flat section of the upper roof and then welding all of the spotwelds I had to drill out in the windshield channel where I could put fire blanket behind it and use that to shield the interior from sparks and ****.
Turns out my FIL was right and the glue worked amazingly. The fit of the new roof skin was perfect and made it relatively easy to get the body filler to give me a seamless transition between old roof and new roof. After grinding my welds down smooth and also using filler in the windshield channel to give it a totally flat surface for the windshield, I called the glass guys back to throw a windshield back in so I could drive the truck to my FIL's shop for primer and final paint.
I've got to say although it was a pretty serious repair for someone with my experience level I couldn't be more happy with how it turned out. Sometimes it's worth it to dive in and give things a shot that are out of our comfort zone. To add an even sweeter bonus, my FIL refused to let me pay for the paint job he did for me. While that amazingly nice of him, I didn't want it to seem in any way like I was taking advantage of his shop and talent. I guess I'll just chalk that up to the "I really owe you one" list and try to repay his kindness where I can. All in all, it's pretty amazing that this repair only cost me $450 for the roof, around $100 for supplies and around $230 for the new windshield.
For anyone looking for much more detail here is the video of me tackling the repair in fine detail. There's 4 parts to it as there is a lot covered in the series but here's the first installment for anyone interested. Ram Roof Fix Part 1
