63 chevy progress...laying rocker

One at a time! Got all the floor in, all the braces welded in. Most of the hundreds of plugs are ground. Still a lot of weld dressing to go, and a few details.
For the new guys, and the old ones with memories like mine, this is what I started with a few months back, and where it's at today.

 

wow man lookin good

 

Today I made a little piece to brace the new body mount. I couldn't buy this piece, and there wasn't enough of the old part to copy, so I made up my own design.
I rolled the S curve in the piece with this old roller. The edges of the hole for the fule filler are rolled over by hand, a little past 90 degrees. The X's are markes for punching 5/16" holes for the plug welds. This is as far as I got today

 

I am always impressed with your work Tinbender. Thanks for sharing
Shiva69

 

I am doing similar work on my 64 olds. Any tips for replacing floorpans? I have never done somthing like this before and the only instructions i could find were from article in magazine and it was pretty vague.

 

Nice. That looks like a job and a half! You doing this car for yourself?

 

Yeah Hudson, it's one of the biggest I've tackled. It belongs to a very good friend. It was his first car, otherwise I don't think we would have saved it. I wouldn't put myself thru this for just anybody I don't know if the cars find me, or I find the cars, but it seems I end up restoring the ones no one else will touch. It was the same way when I worked in collision. I'd always end up with the rolled over, bent around a tree, torn in half jobs! I loved it!

VonMoldy, do you have any good pictures of your floor and rockers? Can you get floor pans? The saveing factor on this car was that the outter rockers were still good. That(and some cross braceing) helped to hold the door openings and the roof in postition. That is critical. You can buy most everything for the chevy.The floor pans fit very well along with the reinforcements. The replacement wheel houses were way off, and took some major reworking. The quarters were fair, at least I could get full quarters, Most of the partial quarters SUCK!!!!. The first ones I got for this car looked like they were made with a rock and a stick.
If you can get parts, it makes it much easier. I remember you posted about not being able to get any quarter patches at all. And if memory serves you got some interesting advice I gotta wonder if the floors might be real close to the chevy. Does you car share the same frame as a chevy? If it does, there's a good chance some if not all the floor will interchange.

This kind of work is definatly not for the inexperianced, but it's not rocket science either. Most important thing is to fit everything first, then cross brace really well. I never lost the door fit thru this entire job, even loading on and off the rotissery. If you let it get out of shape it can turn into a can of worms fast!
Post some good pictures of you car if you can, and I'd be happy to offer up any help I can. I have tons of pictures of this car, but I've been hesitant to post too much as it's a little new and off topic. Let me know if you have any specific areas or processes you want to see.

 

Here's a link to floor installation in a 57 Ford:

http://www.wurthitdesigns.com/57Fordfloors.htm

 

DAMN nice work!!!!!!!!

I love 63 impala's, and have one myself..
I'm all for saving cars when you can..but man that one had to be something special to someone for that amount of work to be done to it.
Is there a story behind it, or is it just a car that someone just had the desire to bring back to life?
OR, is it yours?
Very cool no matter what.

My hat's off to you for some very impressive workmanship.
I wish i could see it in person.

Tony

 

I was wondering if this was the same car I remember from the first post. That is some damn impressive work Tinbender, most guys would have passed on that for a parts car. I can't wait to see the finished product.

Bill

 

Excellent workmanship..........

 

Very impressive. I would love to come over and meet you someday. The work you do is beautiful.

 

Thanks guys. For some crazy reason I still love this work. It's nice to show it to people who understand both the work, and why we do what we do.
My shop is always open to hambers. I have summer "off" so I'm always around. We have a very good swap meet here in july, and a nice but smaller one just over the border.I think it's comming up soon. Come on by.

 

Tinbender you have a PM.
Shiva69/Garth

 

Man, that is incredible. Very nice.

How many hours do you have in it? Or maybe how much does that kind of job run? I ask because my '64 imp ragtop is a bucket of rust, and needs to be done in that same manner.