To keep the same angle of the side glass the other option is to pie cut the pillars and lean them, Not the look I wanted. jeff
And finally time to figure out what im doing w/ the grill, or should I say lack of one. I still had a pile of stainless laying around from the stock plymouth front end, and since Im no longer stock, there no sense of saving any of it so I started slicing and dicing and came up w/ 1/2 of a grill bar So are you wondering why its setup in my lathe? well, since the two halfs are going to form a slight "V" , I needed a straight perpendicular centerline. I was struggling w/ how to do this and make it perfect so that I could repeat it for the second 1/2. whats more acurate than machine tools and lasers! I ended up mounting the grill bar in the lathe so I could rotate it and mark a straight cut line A laser level was setup and shot at the exact center of the bar, and as the chuck was rotated I was able to trace the laser line w/ a marker. Voila, perfectly perpendicular! tommorrow Ill trim the second 1/2 and weld it togther. jeff
the laser line did a great job and this thing is really shaping up, I might even go as far as saying its just like I planned ;-) jeff
Now that is cool. I been wanting to figure out something much the same for my car and I think you nailed it.. thanks.. great job
I really didnt know what I was expecting for an outcome when I started on this. I like it! The best part is the only thing I had to buy were the two dummy spotlights, and I picked them up at a swap meet for $20 for the pair. Now its time to take it all apart again and polish the shit out of it! jeff
I like the look!! Who would have thought dummy spotlights for the grill bullets!! How cool............... Keep up the nice work!!
I ended up starting a side thread for the next part of the project only because I was looking for some feedback and figured if it was in the middle of a build thread it would have gotten lost. The task this time was to make an art deco-ish center console that would cover the ugly B&M shiffter but still look like it belonged there. To save from reposting all the console build pics and shtuff, heres the thread: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=763969 Then for the lazy people, like me, heres the finished pic: jeff
So in keeping w/ the theme of being cheap, heres the next installment My original lake pipes were scuffed up and rusty and I just couldnt bring myself to pay the price for new ones. Last swap meet season I came across a set of bed rails from a pickup. So I swooped in for a closer look, 90 degree turn outs on the ends, plenty of length for lakes, the same 2" dia, and best of all...Stainless!! Maybe the best part wasnt that they were stainless, the true best part was the price,.... $20 today I started cutting them up and sanding them down... 8hrs into it and ones polished (not to mention my arms feel like they weigh 100lbs now) 120 gritt 220 320 400 600 800 1200 2400 3600 all by hand! Ill be keeping an eye out for some new end caps, but if I cant find them cheap ill just make a pair jeff
That console came out awesome, it will definitely have people scratching their heads wondering where it came from.
yeah, I know, I ve just been too busy working on it to even think about pushing it outside for a full pic. jeff
Since its been sooooo cold here the last couple weeks, I decided to find some work to do inside. ( the lake pipe polishing is still getting done during short trips to the garage before my finger tips freeze) so for the last 2 weeks ive been working in the house sewing............. Yup, I bought a $5 sewing machine and decided it was time to tackle the interior panels. so while I was busy learning this: Torque was busy trying to flatten out the ABS plastic panel board: Its time to set the Pleather free: Im pretty happy w/ my first sewing project, but you can tell by the door panel that torque did a terrible job flattening the plastic (how the hell are you supposed to get that stuff to lay flat by itself?) : And a 1/2 ass test fit (you can see the slight wrinkles in the door pleats due to the vinyl being put on while the "board" was bowed. I may end up redoing these w/ different board) : thats it for now, Jeff
Killer work, Jeff. Is that like a standard duty household sewing machine and how did it do on the upholstery materials? Hey, that heater box looks familiar!
yup, just a cheap old Singer, my guess would be mid 1960's so its pry a little tougher than todays walmart brand. It sewed suprisingly well and you could hear how hard it was for that needle to puncture the heat sealed pleats, tic tic tic tic thump, tic tic tic tic thump. HAha and thanks again for the heater setup, I was finally able to try out my powder coating setup on it. I did end up screwing up the blower motor though, after taking it apart to clean and paint, it now makes a terrible grinding noise. Oh well, ill run it till it dies then look for another jeff
What an amazing build. And inspirational. I've got a 50 sedan in the same basic shape as yours was (no inner rockers, floors made out of old furnace ducts nailed to 2x4s inside the rockers). I'm going to be "borrowing" a lot of your ideas as I go along!
i wouldnt stress on the puckered pleather on the door panel, it should shrink a little when it gets warmed up in the sun. or you can take a blow dryer to it. i think they look pretty good
Still plugging away at some interior bits. I was stumped on how to do the sunvisors since they are normally sewn thru the heavy cardboard and I knew my machine didnt have a chance. Heres what I came up w/, no sewing needed! Starting w/ this: Cut the seam and break it down, all I will need is the pivot arm and hard middle pressed board. grab some thin foam (this was left over stuff from the old door panels) and glue it to both sides of the sunvisor board. Sanding the edges will help things look nicer when done. now glue the the vinyl to the prepped sunvisor boards Last up is the $3.99 trim pc that almost makes it look like its a professional job. I was looking to use white door trim, but Im glad I decided to see what the chrome would look like. Grab a hair drier to warm it up and it will go on really nice. I still have to clean up the pivot rods but that wont take long either. Jeff
This looks great! I have the tackle some upholstery soon and am pretty stoked that you've been able to accomplish so much with a home sewing machine. Loooove the sunvisors too-great, great work.
Ive been trying to get something done so that I could do an update but I had too many things started and nothing finished,...Untill today. First off I want to throw this up here since I havnt gotten any help by just posting to the main page, so ill try this: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=780262&highlight=jcs64 Now for the update: Back tracking just a little to the sunvisors, The mounting flanges ended up being aluminum so of course I had to polish them. then the next parts that I pulled from the "to do box" where the arm rests. I decided because Im doing a white interior I didnt want to upohlster them since they would always be dirty. Heres what I came up w/ even though Im not totally sold on them yet. First step was to strip them down and spray the white. When its 20deg. in the shop your forced to find ways to cure the paint Next step, polished stainless inlay, flouresent light diffuser lense, and some aluminum wire bent up to trim the ends.. And wrap them up because theyre done. Jeff
I can also check the steering wheel of the list too. Just your typical cracks and two gouges from a suicide knob. PC-7 seemed the way to go and it came out pretty good. It dosent show in the pic, but I decided to add some pearl to help offset all the white from the dash and I do like the outcome. JEff
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