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Finally, my posts are caught up with my videos!
So, for a little change of pace, I decided to take a break from getting the underneath ready for paint. I visited a local auto body place on Friday afternoon, during their business hours (according to Google) and the door was locked with a sign on it saying that it would no longer be open to the public as of May 1st. Well, that was a bummer.
Today, though, I went to another place and two older gentlemen were behind the counter and were very helpful. By the end of my visit, we were showing pictures of our project cars like others do of their kids. Though I didn't purchase anything, I'll be going back there later this week or early next to lay down some cash.
But, as for my garage visit, my initial intent was to get the strengthener brackets that go under the front of the floor pan between it and the ends of the outriggers welded in. These attach to the floor pan. To do this properly, however, I wanted to get the body on there to make sure I wasn't going to weld them in and not have them align.
Getting the body on and off is a rather involved event and it takes me a few hours on either side so I knew that I wouldn't make much progress, but it needed to be done. While I was at it, I also wanted to fix the broken bolt in the passenger's side front outrigger, and that's what I started with.
First, I needed cut out the area of the bolt and fish it out.
Hole cut, magnet stick at the ready.
I fished the bolt out of there . The bolt is " collared" and the smaller diameter of the collar fits in the hole. Unfortunately, there was no evidence of it ever being welded, so I took care of that.
The top view, showing the collared portion of the bolt sticking through the hole
The underside of the. Yeah, I don't see any weld metal, either.
There is now! She's not coming off of there. Just hope the other outrigger was done properly.
With the bolt now securely fastened to the metal, I tacked it back into the outrigger at the corners. I wanted to get the body landed, since I was going to do it anyway, before I welded it in fully just in case I needed to tweak its placement a bit (I did).
Another part that I was working on was the driver's side front body mounting bracket. I did a horrible job welding it in the first time around (as I mentioned in my last post) and decided to take the one from the black car since it was unmolested (I reamed out the hole to enable me to mount the body).
Getting it cleaned up.
Another angle.
With that bracket prepped, I landed the body back on the car and get several bolts (in the back and to the middle outriggers) aligned.
Home again, home again, jiggidy-jig.
I got the new bracket as aligned as I could (I think the outrigger ended up being welded in just a bit off) and verified that the other side bolt repair also came into alignment.
Looks good to me!
I also get the strengthener pieces in there and these ended up being essentially a non-event, as they fit in a channel and extend all the way out to the edge of the A post (I'll show this better when I actually get them welded in). Well, I didn't need to land the body to tell me that, but at least now I know and am confident the other repairs will align as well.
So, with that, off came the body and I welded in the outrigger bolt and repainted the area in POR-15.
Welded in.
And POR-15'd. I'll scuff this up and hit it with red eventually.
And that was about it. All told, I spent about 7 hours over there during this visit and I would say a solid 4 of it was dedicated to getting the body on and off. So, lots of work for little progress but, like I said, better safe than sorry and better to avoid creating new problems that I may only find much later down the process - like after paint! Cheers!
Sounds like a horror movie title or something, doesn't it? Well, it was pretty dirty under there, but it's getting much better. Lot's of messy, time consuming work, but it's coming along. If you haven't (or don't) kept up with my YouTube channel, there are a few videos to update you all on. Keep in mind that they aren't incredibly exciting, but that's how this stuff is. I'll provide the video then do a quick discussion for each, so here you go:
As I mentioned in my last post, using various cleaning methods including paint stripper disks, wire brushes and wheels and 2" roloc abrasive disks, I was able to take this:
Before.
...eventually to this:
After...well, the "top" half anyway.
The next visit was more of the same, again using the same general cleaning methods. I also used a heat gun and a coarse wire brush to melt/scrap away the hard-to-get seam sealer. This method worked pretty well, actually.
In addition to cleaning, I did get some repair work done and loose ends tied up. Namely, the front sill cap for that passenger's side, the rear seam of the passenger's side outer sill and the cut in the floor that I intentionally put in to help it fit better.
Front sill cap.
Floor cut welded up.
Rear seam. Not real crazy about how this came out.
All of that and, of course, more cleaning:
Floor work.
Rear area.
The next visit involved, you guess it, more cleaning but also some assessment of the front lower valance. Surprisingly, the one from the black car, while not as dented up, had quite a bit more cancer, so I'm sticking with Dorothy's.
Bumper still attached. Not the straightest of pieces!
Inner strengthener was made of Swiss cheese, I guess!
Outside shot of the hole where a strengthener piece resides on the inside.
Outside of the cancer, however, which isn't really all that bad, it just needs some straightening and it should be good as new.
The next two visits were more of the same; yup, cleaning. Sorry, but this stuff isn't very exciting and is also quite time consuming. So much so that I didn't even take any pictures for my Part 3.
,
I took a few for part 4, though, because I did some more welding, finishing up the driver's side floor weld (from the bottom) and also the driver's side sill cap.
Weld bead, ground down.
The picture below doesn't really do it justice (you can see it in the video here) but I got a small cancer hole drilled out and repaired in the rear deck pan behind the seats.
Hole repaired.
Front sill cap done.
And that was about it. So, I apologize for the long time span between updates and then slamming you with a bunch of videos. Like I said, they aren't all that exciting but you can see the methods that I used to clean stuff up. I've got one more video in the hopper so I'll try to get that up soon as it's a bit more exciting. Cheers!
For the longest time I had visions of making myself a rotisserie to more easily get to those pesky spots on the car. Instead, using an idea I found from ChefTush on YouTube, I decided to make wooden bucks (which I'm calling wings) instead. While not as slick as a rotisserie, the wings allow me to roll the car on either side to get at the underneaths. Works pretty good, I'd say, and much cheaper and less complicated for sure!
First off, here's a list of the materials that I used. You may find other things that work just as good, or better.
(2) 2' x 4' by 3/4" sheets of plywood
(6) bolts to go into B post (I didn't use original screws)
(8) bolts to go into A post (I did use original door bolts)
(16) 2 1/2" bolts (for attaching the wings to the tubing)
(16) Lock washers for above bolts
(32) Flat washers for above bolts
(~8ft) 1" Square tubing
(~2ft) 2" Angle iron for door hinges at A post
(~12ft) Angle iron or flat iron for stability "struts" For my angle iron I was able to use an old bed frame, which worked out really well. I think the angle iron you would purchase may be a bit thick, but you could make it work.
As I had mentioned in my last post, I had made paper templates that roughly traced out the body at the A and B posts.
Rear template that will attach to B post.
First up was to rip the plywood in half, giving me two equal pieces of 1'x4'. My cuts weren't perfect, but they were good enough. I marked the center of the board and then put the template on there, also marking it's center and aligned them both to each other. I traced the template to copy the contour of the body.
With that done I started on the angled part that the body will "roll" onto. I didn't have any measurements for this, but knew that I wanted a relatively shallow angle for the resting position. Armed with that minimal knowledge, I forged ahead.
On the "outside" long side of the board (which will rest on the floor when the body is rotated), I marked off an inch on either side of center.
"Flat" spot I created between the shallow angles.
Then, I marked lines at 1 1/2" and 3" from the end.
Side marks. I'll discuss the rest of the pencil lines in a bit.
I then marked three spots on the "outside" short side (which will rest on floor when the body is flat) at 5", 7" and 8.5" from the top. Again, these were arbitrary numbers, but they looked good to me. This would give me a 3.5" base of wood that the car would rest on when not rotated.
Marks are as referenced from the top, long side of the board.
Then, to get my angles, I connected the dots, so to speak.
Everything above and to the right of the lines is cut away.
This may be a bit confusing, but after copying what I did on the other side and cutting everything out, I ended up with what looked like this:
The body is still on stands here, not on the wing.
Once I got the B post wing done, I traced it for the outside portion of the A post wing, trying to match them up, and used the A post template for the inner, body side of the wing and got it cut out as well.
With the general shapes done, it was time to figure out attachment points. I used my original door supports that I made forever ago as donor parts. Specifically, I had the 16-gauge sheet metal plate that I used for the B post attachment, screwing it in to where the door burst plate attaches. I then used the 1" square tubing and made two extensions, diagonal to each other, to run out to the wood. I got the fit up all set, welded the tubing to the sheet metal and marked and drilled holes for attaching the tubing to the wood.
The B post attachment arrangement.
Moving to the A post, I was originally going to use a set of old hinges that I had from the black car, but located some angle iron from an old bed frame that I used instead and was happier for it. I cut the angle iron to mimic the hinge and used a step drill bit for the holes for a two-point attachment to the top and bottom hinge mounts.
Angle iron with bolt-hole cutouts. I used the old hinges as a template for the holes.
Final dry fit.
I came straight out with more square tubing, welding it directly to the angle iron. Much like the B post, there were several dry fits until I got it the way I wanted it with no wood-to-body interference.
Close-up of the attachment. The pencil line is not being used for anything here.
All bolted up. Need to cut the tubing down.
There were several dry fits for making sure everything fit as good as possible. I had to cut away some wood several times to prevent direct contact between the wood and the body so that I wouldn't bend anything. I also had to use some thick washers as shims in various places as I wanted the wings to be as level as possible.
Once I completed the driver's side, I essentially copied it for the passenger's side but I did several more dry fits just to make sure I didn't have any major differences between the two sides.
The "wings" supporting the weight of the body.
Once everything was bolted up, I wasn't too happy with how wobbly everything was. So, I cut a few more long pieces of bed frame and bolted it to the back of each board to provide some vertical stability. This made a huge difference in stability.
Supports. Should have centered them on the wood, but they were effective.
With that done, all that was left was to roll the car and see how it felt. One thing that I wasn't prepared for was the added weight in the back caused by the boot. Without the "front" of the car, the wings aren't at the center of gravity, so the car wants to fall on it's rear a bit when you lift it. Applying proper counter torque, I was able to easily lift the and get it on it's side.
It really doesn't weight much at all.
Because my cuts weren't perfect between the two driver's side pieces, I had to put a ~1/4" shim of wood under the A post board to prevent some rocking. Once I did this, it was pretty solid. Some additional cutting of wood was required down by the rear wing, but otherwise, the body and wood did not come into contact.
All in all, this took me two visits and about 8 hours of work. Like I said in my video, I had no plan other than a general idea and was winging (ha! get it?) it the whole time. I'm happy to say I like the way it turned out.
I spent my most recent visit working on cleaning up the "underneath" and the wings held up nicely. I wasn't gentle using the grinder and stuff, so I was happy with the access and the stability.
Before.
Some of the gunk gone.
Some more corrosion to fix under the boot floor.
After...well, the "top" half anyway.
The pile of debris from 3 hours of work. It's about 3-4" high at its peak.
Next visit will be more of the same. I looked like I crawled through a coal mine when I was done so I invested in Tyvek suits and a 3M respirator to keep me a bit cleaner, and probably healthier, too! Cheers!
Two videos, but the first one, frankly, isn't all that much...
Like I said, in the first video, there isn't a whole lot of new material as compared to my post on the driver's side installation. The main reason was that it was essentially redundant and I didn't run into any real issues that I didn't have to come through on the other side as well.
A few things were different, that I point out in the video, mainly of my own doing. First, I had welded the seam at the A post area of the sill.
The seam in question, prior to welding it up a while ago.
Unfortunately, in doing so, I prevented the required flex in this area that was required to get the proper bonnet-to-sill gap. Fortunately, I didn't go crazy on the welding and was able to cut it apart with a quick swipe of a cutting disk.
Another problem, though one which it doesn't appear that I could have avoided, was that I had cut away about 1/4" of the back of the sill where it meets the rear wing. This removed the nice rolled edge in this area that helps to keep the seam between the two at the same height relative to each other. I didn't notice this until I had done a significant amount of welding putting the sill in, so I'll have to figure that out eventually. A piece of metal in between to provide a spacer is an option, but that's just another place for water to collect, so I don't know yet. Future me.
The seam in question. Looks good from about 5 feet!
Otherwise, like I said, it went in smoothly and much quicker, as you would expect with the added experience and some pre-fitting that I did the first time around.
With that done, and in keeping with my grand plan (which doesn't exist, but it sounds good!), I needed to pull the tub back off the chassis to get the underside cleaned up, pin-holes filled, and everything seam sealed and painted. I haven't fully decided on what I'm going to use underneath, but I've been very happy with the POR-15 stuff, so either that, or their bed-liner product. Jury is still out.
Being an old pro at it, I snatched the tub off, got the chassis to the back of the garage, and brought the body back up for work.
Still makes me nervous to see this!
Front strap.
Rear straps at seat belt hold down points.
With the body off, I moved on to making templates for wooden "bucks". This may not be the most appropriate use of this term, but I consider it a "poor man's rotisserie" solution. I have the materials that I need (at least I hope so) and that will be the focus on my next visit, so more to follow. If you want to see what I'm talking about, ChefTush has his in action on a lot of his recent videos. Here's a good example (and the rest of his videos are great, too)!
Rear template that will attach to B post.
Front template looking forward.
After that, I moved on to putting in the A-post to sill transitions. This wasn't that difficult, but it did require some metal persuasion, as you would expect. Again, nothing too bad and I didn't need to make any real modifications. The transition for the driver's side that I pulled off the black car fit much better than Dorothy's original (I had to repair both the A post and transition piece), so I went with that one (and it was in better shape), but I used Dorothy's on the passenger's side.
Driver's side transition (black car's original).
Passenger's side transition.
Essentially that was about it for the day. I apologize if my write-ups seem to be getting away from the instructional side a bit. However, I've gotten better at the videos (I like to think so, anyway) and those are really better than my write-ups for more of the instructional side of things. I do intend to provide a more detailed write up of the wooden buck fabrication however, assuming it actually works, so stay tuned for that soon!
