Projects 32 Ford 3 window build finish details

Can't beat working at a comfortable working height. Makes so much sense and I'm sure also helps to get a better result.

Chris

Sent from my SM-T515 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

Hi Guys (& Gals if any)
I am back on the 32. I jumped to another project for awhile putting a 5-speed in my off topic 64 GTO but now I am back on the 32.
Well there is another thread that guys were making jokes about it giving them ADD and making them dizzy because it jumped around so much. I laughed at first and then I thought ...hey....my threads do that!!! Oh well, here is my progress and yes it jumps around a bit.
My son is doing body work on the door. It has a patch panel at the bottom and since there is always a chance of a pin hole in the weld we put a layer of Tiger Hair on the seem to seal it really good so no water ever gets in from behind and causes problem later on


After sanding the Tiger Hair, Rage filler was applied


Then sanding and knocking down the high spots


More sanding and knocking down the high spots in the steel.


We have been using a Dura Block.


The door has been a struggle. So a friend recommended a hard wood block for sanding thinking the Dura Block was too flexible and causing us undo problems. So I made a hard wood flat sanding block. We'll see how that goes.


Ok I am jumping to another part of the car.
The frame is totally prepped and ready for paint. I made a wooden cart to wheel it in and out of the paint booth and around the shop.


Jumping to another subject now.... (this is number 3 if you are counting)
I also made a cart to hold the rear end for painting and to wheel around the shop. In the background is the gas tank I am applying filler to smooth out the areas you will see when the tank is mounted on the car.


I am jumping again....(number 4)
My car has a inset firewall so we plastered the welded seem with tiger hair to seal the weld just in case it has any pin holes. Most of this will be sanded off and Rage filler will be put on next. Remember car body is upside down on a cart so photo is a little disorienting.


Subject jump number 5...
The side of the cowl is turning out nice. At one point it had one of those antennas that had 2 mounting holes on the side of the cowl. Those hole have been welded up but the panel was pretty lumpy.


Wow I am really jumping around... Subject number 6
I started working on the headlights. My sandblaster has not been working very good but I found out my compressor regulator went bad, so I replaced it and now my sandblaster works great!!! I am so happy I have been sandblasting everything in sight! I have these headlights for my car, so I sandblasted them.


They are King Bee 100-101


All sandblasted


I ordered some new tags for them from a HAMB member that makes them. Really nice tags.


Well that is my progress on the 32.. I hope you guys could follow along with out getting dizzy.
Greg

 

Any work since May?

 

Jim,
Thanks for asking!
In May 2021 2 things happened. First, after being on a waiting list for a golden retriever to replace both of my shop pals ( also goldens, both died of old age) we finally got the call the breeder has a puppy for us, I got my new shop dog! Second, the company where I used to work called me and asked me to come out of retirement for a couple years. So I started full time job as Facilities Manager.
I totally underestimated the energy a new puppy takes and underestimated the time working full time at my age would take from my hot rod. So the answer is not much progress since last may.
Before they throw me off the hamb for putting my hot rod behind work and a puppy, I did get to the Pontiac Nationals in Norwalk last summer and two days of the Hot Rod Power Tour before I almost melted from the heat. I also made it to Detroit Auto Rama last week. I am planning on getting my seat upholstered this spring. My wife and I studied hot rod seats for ideas at AutoRama.
How is your 3 window coming? Any updates?
Greg

 

Greg,
Good to hear from you. I was getting worried. I will post some pics tomorrow. A lot of progress has been made on both 32s. I think you will be pleased.
Jim

 

I just found your thread, thoroughly enjoyable read, thank you for posting.

Shane

 

Thread Re-Start !!!!!
I am once again back on my 32 3 window project. I retired for the 3rd time so I now have time to get back at it!!! This is my final retirement, because the boss (my wife) has said so. After blowing all the dust off of everything, there it was just as I left it in the barn.
Since this thread has been going on an incredibly long time I think maybe a quick review is in order. (Ryan is there a prize for the slowest build thread on the HAMB?)
Here is the car when I bought it in fall 2016.


As you can see a ton of work had already been done but a lot of details still needed to be done. That is why I named this thread "32 Ford 3 window build finish details". This thread is not a full build thread but a lot of details!
I bought the car from a friend who had it for about 20 years and he bought the car from a friend who also had it about 20 years. Dennis (Harmsway here on the HAMB) knows a lot of history on the car going back to the 50's. Dennis has been very helpful passing a lot of this info on to me. I have no way of proving it but I think the 3 photos below are all the same car and also might be my car. Notice in all 3 photos below the cowl is a slightly different color. The chop & louvers match and my car was owned by a guy in the Navy in California.

Again I have no way of proving it but I think this is the same car.


Again I think this is the same car and the same guy as in the photo above.


Anyways if anyone knows anything about any of these photos I would love to learn more.

My plans for the car are to build the car for me and do a traditionally inspired hot rod. The theme will be to do a hot rod as a regular guy, like the 2 guys in the photos above, would have done it in about 1960 as a garage built hot rod. I am not building it for any award competition, it won't have very much chrome just a simple fun hot rod. Very much looking like the 3 photos above. It has a 327/365 motor, 4 speed, 9 inch 3.25 rear end, drum brakes, fender-less to began with, hood top but not hood sides. The one unique feature this car has is Fenton exhaust manifolds so if I put hood sides on, no one can see them. I plan to do the mechanical work, electrical work, body work & paint. Glass & upholstery will be farmed out.

Now back to progress on my car. I worked with a local glass & automotive interior shop to get a green tint windshield installed. We chose the glass that he was confident would be available when I need the side & back window glass installed so the tint would match.

I purchased a pair of chopped windshield arms from Walden Speed. Man those boys know how to polish stainless steel!


The final step in the windshield project was to turn the old one into wall art.


Next was to finish the headlights. There was only some very small dents that I was able to fix without body filler. There was a little rust pitting I needed to skim with body filler.


I had to slightly widen the slot to get a good fit up with the mounting bolts square shank.


Then I shortened the mounting bolt and milled a flat on it so I can tighten the mounting nut tight without worrying about the headlight being deformed by the square shank on the bolt. I have a feeling these headlights need to be tighten fairly tight.


That should work. I can put one wrench on the mounting bolt and another on the nut.

Then a quick trip through the paint booth.


And because I stink at painting and have to much orange peel, I had to wet sand and buff. In the end they turned out great. Later I will install the King Bee nametag and call it done.


I hope to keep posting every week or so for awhile.
Greg

 

I like the "hand mill"! Like your theme, too.

 

Hi Guys,
I finally finished the steering wheel & steering column. The steering wheel is a 1958 Chevy steering wheel that came with the car. It started out maroon & cream.


Under the maroon & cream it was orange & silver.


It had some cracks in the plastic so I bought one of these kits to repair it myself.


I think it went well, just like filler on a body part. I "vee'd" open the cracks and forced the epoxy into the crack.

When it dries I started with a file and then sand paper to blend into surrounding surface.


The light grey is where the crack is repaired with the epoxy. There were several cracks that needed epoxy.


Next I painted it with auto body 2k epoxy primer.


Then masked it and painted the top & bottom white.


The masked the top & bottom and painted the middle blue to match the body color.


I also painted the steering column blue.


I was tickled pink with the out come.


It looked great with new chrome separators where the color changes.


It fit nicely on the column until I realized I needed to drill an extra hole in the steering wheel for the IDIDIT steering column cancel cam to function.
So I had to drill a hole in the steering wheel on a finished painted wheel. I carefully marked the hole and had my wife hold the steering wheel with towels while I drilled it. I sharpened the drill by hand the best I know how so it would cut like butter. We did it!!, We drilled the hole without scratching the steering wheel. The turn signal cancel function works perfect now. ( the new hole is the one at the 10:30 location)


I have read both good & bad about the epoxy PC-7 and both good & bad about using regular auto body paint for steering wheels. Long term I will see how it holds up but doing it myself is keeping with my theme of a garage built Hot Rod.
Thanks for following along!
Greg

 

Happy to see you back on your 3W project and don’t fret about your project timeline. I’ve seen a roadster project on here that’s been stalled (apparently) for ten years. Keep up the great work and I’m routin’ for ya.
Those slide arms look pretty nice. I had a bunch of shorter slide arms cut from stainless steel (304 if I remember correctly) a few years back as I could never find a set when I needed them. Now that I see what folks are selling them for, I better find my stash and polish out a few more sets.

 

Hi Guys,
Algoma - Thanks for the kind words!
Rocky - your slide arms look nice! start polishing them and offer for sale!

I spent the day seam sealing the doors & trunk lid. I used the 3M 08367. That is nice sealer, spreads nice, comes out of tube easy and cleans up nice.


I taped off where I needed sealing.


Spread the sealer on, then dipped my finger in lacquer thinner and spread it out.


Then peeled the tape off.


I think I am ready to paint the doors & trunk lid now. Except I keep doing the "one last check" before paint....and then I see something, some little pin hole or a hair in the primer ( I have a barn cat to keep mice population down and a golden retriever so I have hair everywhere in my barn.) Then I try to fix it by sanding and/or sanding and re-priming a small area. This process is driving me crazy. I think it is time to paint!!
Take Care
Greg

 

Hi Guys,
I started to get the grille shell ready for painting. I decided to see if the grille fit nicely into the grille shell prior to painting since the paint will only make the grille fit tighter in the grille shell. Well, it was a very tight fit and it was difficult to get them apart. The grille is too tall at the area shown circled. The grille shell dips down in that area. So I decided to modify the grill shell.


First I marked a cut line after I sanded off the paint.


Then I cut it with a .023 wide saw blade and carefully folded it back to make room for the grille insert. (only one side done shown here)


Then I tack welded it to hold it in place.


Next I tried it for fit. Much better!


Then I finished the butt weld.


Then grinding the weld flush with the edge of a cut off wheel.


Then a little sanding & filing, another test fit up which looked good and now it is ready for filler & paint prep.


In other news, I painted most of my suspension parts. I chose to go with cast iron gray. I am used to chassis black from doing GM muscle cars and I wanted something a little different that would be a contrast with the very dark blue that I am painting the frame & body.
All the parts were first coated in 2K Epoxy primer.


Then the Cast Iron Gray.


Some finished pictures.


The rear end all ready to go.


Next up is painting blue on several parts.
Thanks for following along!
Greg

 

PERF!

 

Looks great. That headlight bolt trick is a clever one! Might have to file that one for later use.

 

Thanks patsurf & Tim.
Hi Guys,
I made a little progress on my 32 project. A friend came over and we sprayed 1/2 gallon of paint. Some parts for the first time and some re-do parts for past painting issues.


The big parts were the doors & trunk lid.

We painted the bottoms of the hood. We wanted a little practice painting the louvers before we paint the top side.


A few of the parts had a small crater in the paint. A perfectly round dimple like a BB had fallen on it when the paint was still soft. Its the dark circle below the tape. Ignore that squiggly piece of lint.

So I bought a box of pipettes ( I call them eye droppers). I put 4 drops of paint, 1 drop of hardener and 2 drops of reducer in a small glass bowl and mixed it up.


I took a fine paint brush and put a little into the crater.

This paint takes two days to cure for sanding. I carefully sanded the dot of paint after two days. I have no idea if this will work long term, but after sanding you could not find the dot or crater.


After wet sanding it was time for buffing I laid out my arsenal of buffing supplies and my new Harbor Freight buffer. My old faithful Milwaukee buffer is getting to heavy for this...actually its always been that heavy, I am just getting weak


The trunk lid was ready for buffing. The doors will be ready for buffing in the coming week, I am still wet sanding the doors.
Here is the finished trunk lid.


Another shot


I am really happy with the results. I will be able to pick up speed on the next one which will be one of the doors.


Thanks for following along!!
Greg

 

Slick!

 

Awesome job!!!!

 

Thanks for posting the details - in detail. I appreciate it.
Marcus...

 

Hi Guys,
Tim & Tim - Thanks!!!
nrgwizard - Glad you like the details, I have learned immeasurable information about Hot Rods from guys posting on the H.A.M.B. So I try to put a little detail in my thread so maybe I can help someone else.

I spent the day with my gritty littles buddies Mr. 1200, Mr. 1500, Mr. 2000 and Mr. 3000. I wet sanded my passenger door and used 3 times as much water and I didn't push as hard wet sanding as I did with the trunk lid that I did a few days ago. And when I got all done buffing, I can still see tiny micro scratches in my paint. It probably doesn't help I am standing right under florescent lights but still, my goal is to not see any wet sanding scratches.


The Data Sheet from the paint says to start with 1200 grit. Because I had a few sags & runs in the paint I sanded those areas in 800 and then 1000, then onto 1200. Otherwise, if I start with 1200 I will still be sanding the sags & runs next summer. The paint is PPG Concept single stage paint. At 3 feet away it looks fine. I am open to suggestions to eliminate sanding marks.


I also wet sanded and buffed the under side of the gas tank. (the top side hasn't been painted yet.) Here I was not going for a deep luster, I just wanted to sand out some dirt knibs.


The window area on the door of a chopped coupe can be a challenge to buff so I bought a set of 3" buffing pads to help out. These little buffing pads sure look small on a standard size buffer.


They do help you stay out of trouble on a chopped window opening. You can get into trouble easy with a 9 inch buffing wheel when you are looking at where you are buffing and the other side of the buffing wheel catches on something.


Thanks for following along!
Greg

 

I’m by no means an expert- I’ve only cut and buffed a couple things in my day. But are you sanding incrementally perpendicular to your previous grit? For example, at 800 you sand vertical, at 1000 you sand horizontal. It’s easy to see at that point when you’ve removed all the previous grit scratches. For my eyes and experience, beyond about 1200 I had no idea if i had sanded an area or not unless I kept track that way lolol. Also, at the end I seemed to have to hand rub to get a scratch free surface. I also used a different buffing pad for each compound- you’re probably doing all of the above- just thinking out loud.

From the phone screen it looks like you’re doing fantastic! Keep it up!

 

Hi Guys,
Tim with a T - Thanks for the wet sanding suggestion, I will try that.
I have some progress on my 32 to show. Just painting, nothing to exciting. Actually kinda boring.
I finished painting, sanding & buffing several large parts. The wife said I could store them in the house so they are up in the loft.


With all the big parts safely in the loft I cleaned the paint booth and got ready for more painting, but first I played catch with my dog Summer in the empty bay. I am up to 1 hour with her in the barn before she stands at the door & barks to go in the house. I am hoping to get her to be like my other shop dogs where they would stay in the barn with me all day but she is sort of a house dog.


I dug out the frame and rolled it into the paint booth and washed 3 years of dirt, grim & shop dust off of it.


My friend who helps me paint suggested because of all the nooks & crannies on the frame that we really need a rotisserie. So I welded up a budget rotisserie using the spreader bar mounting holes, jack stands and my wooden stands.



I designed it by eyeball for the center of gravity. I almost nailed it but if you leave it alone, it slowly rotates to being upside down. So I just prop a stick under it.


A garbage bag over the jack stands and its ready for painting. The body work was done 3 years ago so I just had to scuff the whole frame and clean it again to get it ready for painting. First a coat of epoxy primer


Then the top coats of blue.


After several rotations it was all blue again.


Several other parts were painted also, the top side of the gas tank. (The bottom was done a few weeks ago.)


The dashboard.


The glove box door.


Several other small parts were also painted but we had to pull the hood out of the line up.
For some reason as soon as we started to paint, it spotted up. We decided to skip it until we figure out what happened. Any ideas guys? It had the same epoxy primer, same high build primer, same cleaning, but it didn't like what we were doing.


It feels so good the have the frame painted again.. It was painted a long time ago by my friend who I bought the car from but I welded on body mounting nuts, revised the crossmember so I could use a Hurst shifter, welded on brackets for the steering linkage, brackets for the e-brake and mega fuse. By the time I got done doing all this welding I decided to re paint the whole frame.
Next step is wet sanding and buffing the frame and all these parts.
Thanks for following alone!
Greg

 

Could it have been contaminated by a product with silicone during storage?

 

Possibly? I didn’t have any issues when I painted the underside of the hood a few weeks ago. I normally keep anything silicone away from my shop. I keep the rags separate that I use for cleaning for painting, wet sanding etc. When my wife washes the rags she uses no fabric softeners or soap with any additives like perfume. I scuffed the hood with a brand new scotch brite pad the day before painting, then rinsed with warm water.

 

I've had problems with wiping a panel down and applying paint too soon.
If you used a degreaser or some other product just prior to shooting, the product might not be fully dry even if it looks dry. Still might be gassing off.

 

Hi Guys,
Dubonet Garage - I see you are in France. Many years ago, I used to travel to Sainte Suzanne for business. Beautiful country and people!
1946caddy - good advise, see update below.

Well, as my painting went on the results did not improve and possibly it was getting worse. I kept finding little things to try to fix it but no luck. So, I talked to the guy at the local paint store. I was lucky and for once the store was not busy. He offered a few suggestions. First, even though my paint spec sheet says 65 F minimum he said in January in Michigan you have to bump that up to 70F or higher. I have an infrared temp gun and always check my parts but I see his point. I had been painting if it was above 65F surface temperature. But, if someone walks in the shop door when it is 15F outside the shop cools in a hurry. The second thing he said was try a different wax & grease cleaner. He said he has something that also has an anti -static feature. Oddly, it was not on the shelf in his store, he had to go back in the warehouse to get it. He said all the pros use it. This is the stuff. It was over $40 /gallon. You must shake it first and spray it on with a sprayer. At this point I’ll try anything. And as 1956 caddy suggested I clean parts 1 hour before I spray them.
The other change I made was a friend of a friend that uses PPG single stage paint said to wait 1-2 hours between coats, not 10-15 minutes like it says on the spec sheet. So I did this and cleaned the gun in between coats.


The last change I made was to try a new gun....and yes that makes me feel like a real loser.... You know you are a loser when you blame the paint job on the gun..
Since I had a bunch of small parts to paint I bought a $29 Harbor freight touch up gun to do the small parts. Seriously, that gun is AMAZING!!! I was planning on painting my grille after the small parts with my DeVilbiss FLG3 but I just keep painting with the Harbor Freight gun. The grill is by far the best part I have painted. Here is the gun I bought. I plan to order a rebuild kit for the DeVilbiss soon.


Here is the grill in primer.


and painted ready to cut & buff.


It seems that the chrome 7" headlight rings are no longer available so I dug out my old pair and decided to rework them and paint them until new ones are available. First I ground off the pits & rust.


I was concerned that some of the left over chrome would cause the paint to not stick so I hit with some adhesion promoter.


Then a little high build primer and wet sanding.


Then some more primer & paint with my new harbor freight gun. I think they will work for fine awhile until I can get some chrome ones.


In other, news I started to assemble chassis. I installed the rear end and began do a preliminary alignment/square up job.


I installed all the rod ends on the rod links in the middle of the threads on each end. I am not sure if this is the best but it seemed like a good plan.


I put a little white dot on the L.H. threaded end of the link and put all the L.H. thread towards the back of the car. That way I always know which way to tighten/loosen the lock nut.


After I put the 4 links on I did some preliminary adjustments.


Does anyone know of a good book, YouTube video or H.A.M.B. build thread that gives a good way to set the rear end/wheelbase side to side etc.??? if so, please pass it on, I would be very happy to read it.
Thanks for following along,
Greg

 

Thank you for your kind words.
I have been to Michigan 3 times to lake houses near Saugatuck or New Heaven for vacation or for a friend's wedding. It was so great! It seems so long ago now...

I'm currently struggling with painting too. I hate that. What a waste of time!
I hope your painting problems are resolved soon. It seems to be. Good luck!

 

Hi Guys,
Dubonet Garage - I live 20 minutes north of Saugatuck. Let me know if you ever come back to Michigan.

I am back working on the 32!! I took a few weeks off and went to Florida with the wife, cat & dog. I was able to to go to one cruise night at a place called Quaker Steak & Lube in St Petersburg. There were a lot of cars and a few H.A.M.B. friendly cars too.

I started assembling the front suspension. I cleaned, polished, buffed & waxed each part as I go and work hard not to scratch the new paint but man is that tough with old fingers.


I have the style of king pin that does not have a head on it so I needed a cap to cover the top of the kingpin and keep dirt out and grease in. It seems all kingpins now have the head on the top of them. I went looking for a cap and only found one aluminum cap. I decided to make my own cap from some brass bar stock. So a little time on the lathe.

and little time on the mill to make some wrench flats.


Now I have some kingpin caps. They will get some silicon to hold them in place. The flats are so I can twist them off with a wrench and break the silicon. (There wasn't enough bore length in the spindle to rely on a press fit.)
I can't wait to be out with the car when some thinks I have a brass kingpin and tells me I can't use brass for a kingpin. I will tell him I used to use wood but it keep failing


Assembling the RH kingpin & spindle was a breeze. The LH was not.
The back story is that when I bought the car it came with a cast SuperBell axle. In general I prefer forgings over a casting especially in a critical component. So I bought a forged Roadsters Supply axle. They warned me about the slightly wider track dimension. I like the forged aspect of the Roadster Supply (actually I think SoCal)axle but I didn't like the extra weight or the extra track width. I liked the sleeker, slimmer look & lower weight of the SuperBell axle. I was having a hard time deciding so I sent a PM to Krylon32. Gary sent a nice reply and said he has used 100's of the SuperBell axles but also 100's of Roadster supply forged axles. I even did an old blacksmith trick to check my Superbell axle. I hung it from a wire and taped it with a brass hammer. It rings a nice tone as beautiful as a 400 year old German Church bell. If it "rings" it means no cracks. If it goes "thud" when you hit it, it means that casting has a defect (crack ) in it. At this point I was still sitting on the fence until one day I hit a MICHIGAN pot hole in my truck that I didn't even see and it rattled my brain!!! I thought to myself if I was in my 32 I would rather hit that with the heavier forged axle so I decided to use the Forged one. I'll keep the SuperBell for now.
Back to where I was, the LH kingpin would not go into my new forged axle.


The kingpin is .808in and the axle bore was .8065in. I didn't exactly have a .808 reamer on hand so I made a poor mans reamer out of a piece of aluminum and emery paper.


Then using my drill I did the best imitation I could of an old Sunnen honing machine. I ran the drill at full speed and went up & down in the bore and rotated it in a circular motion all at the same time. I stopped often to check my progress. After a awhile the kingpin could be taped in with a rubber mallet.


Time for assembly. I am taking so long with this project that the grease had turned into soap so I had to clean and re-packed the kingpin bearings. The bearings are new...well they were back in 2002 otherwise I would have bought new ones.


Not to mention I ran out of shims and had to order some more, but after this I was ready to complete the RH kingpin with new grease, new shims, honed (sanded) axle bore. My excitement ended quickly when after I had is all assembled, I realized the spindle would not rotate forward. I had interference with my new forged axle.

So off it came and I had to grind some off the spindle casting. There is that word casting again. Maybe I should see if a forging is available.


The front suspension is finally together to the point I can take new measurements for a longer tie rod and drag link tube to compensate for the wider axle.


I will do a little rough alignment next and then comes the front brakes, bearings, drums & wheels.


Thanks for following along,
Greg

 

I still fail to see the point of using 4-bar batwings on hairpin front ends. Why would anyone want a bushing (pivot point) when using hairpin/radius rods?
Reason I always ask this when I see it is I have a buddy up here that did it and when he was punishing his brakes with a healthy double pump hard stop he bent both hairpins. Each hairpin had the top bow up and the bottom bow down. They looked like chicken wishbones. Maybe using those adjustable spring perches he used assisted in the failure, as the front axle just rolled back, but…
Funny as hell to us…not so much for him.
….

 

Your original Ford spindles are forged, not cast.