Projects 1950 Ford Business Coupe build

Thanks.

I have spent most of my career working for and around high end restoration shops (most have won Pebble Beach on multiple occasions) so my reference is askew.

I remember being at a show with a buddy and he made the comment that the car was good but you could see the pitting of the back side of the re-chromed bumper in the reflection of the paint of an otherwise near flawless restoration.
I stopped looking at others cars with that attention. Now it just needs to look cool. I'm only critical with my own work now.

 

Picking cars apart has been a thorn in my side for years. Maybe 25 years ago, I had just got my 57 Chevy on the road and had joined a car club. This old fart came along at just a Friday night gathering at the Sonic. He was picking apart every little chip that was wrong with it. Each of which I was well aware of. I was just proud of all the hard work I had done. Of course his was still in the garage and I don’t think he ever finished it. **** that ****, life’s too short. I just don’t participate with those kind of dudes anymore.

 

Man, yeah, looks really great! When my shoebox seats wear out I'll drop it off! Lol.

Keep up the good work!

 

WOW! Looks great,keep 'er going!!

 

Agreed. Once I started to just look at the big picture at shows it became a lot more enjoyable.

Thank you.

Thanks. I will. Things will slow down a bit again. I need to catch up and find some spare $ to move forward. I may get a chance to get the car to the shop and move the engine and trans back so the manifold will clear but we'll see.
Next purchase will be the headliner and rear window gasket. I need to find or make some coupe headliner bows first.

 

Progress has been on a little bit of a hold so recently I have been acquiring missing and needed parts to move forward when ready.
One of the things that I was not able to recover, and one of the next parts of the puzzle, was the headliner.
I was able to find the bows and a lost hinge. The bows were rusted so I went over them with some sand paper, ospho and brushed on some epoxy. Prior to removing the #s i made this map to keep the bows in order. Now I will label them and hopefully order the headliner soon.
I also ordered a few more parts and awaiting their arrival.

 

Another piece(s) of the puzzle showed up today.
While not generally a fan of moldings I was too lazy / ran out of time to fill the holes for the moldings.

I felt the factory moldings were too big. So I went on the search for some new stainless moldings. I finally landed on a set of moldings for a Volvo 145. They are about 1/2" wide vs my target of 3/4 vs the originals at about 1 1/8".
I will have to shorten the door moldings and I may decide to lengthen the 1/4 moldings. The plan is to eliminate the fender moldings and replace them with a crest.
In order to accomplish the switch i will need to weld the moldings.
I gave it a few minutes before leaving for the night.
First I cut a short piece for a trial.


Next is welded the 2 pieces with some .030, 308 rod at 25 amps.


This was followed by a quick file and some layout dye. To highlight the problem areas.


After a couple rounds of sanding (320, 400, 600)


Then I buffed the area with some stainless polish and 3" grinder. Then some red rouge.
I'm happy with the results.


The black mark is the joint.
Comparison of OE to new.

 

It took about 5-6 hrs but the door moldings are complete.
I will measure the 1/4s tomorrow and decide how much longer those will be.


Adding 10" to the rear moldings.


After about 10-12 hrs I have 4 pieces of side trim.

 

Pair of the last st of the body modification parts came in today.


Stripped one of the fenders before I left for the evening. Did not strip the bondo but the metal underneath it looks good.

 

Been spending a few hrs here and there on misc projects on the 50.
Stripped the fenders. Found the typical rust i have been finding under the old primer.

Against my better judgment I broke my rule on this project of not uncovering problem areas and stripped all the bondo out of the fenders.
Found a double welded lap joint under 1/4" of bondo.
I have been cutting through the outer joint and grinding off the weld. Then splitting the overlap with the air saw followed by grinding off the back weld.

Once completed i can **** weld the 2 pieces to be metal finished.
Got as far as tacking them this AM.

 

I also found some time to clean up the rings and metal finish the dents out in prep of installation.


Couple pics of the difference between tacked and douple lap weld.

 

Well, like a kid at Christmas time molding clips arrived in the mail today.
When I got home I couldn't resist mounting the door moldings.

Only way I could be more happy would be if the doors were on, had access to the 1/4s and could see the moldings in the sun.

Spent some time final welding the bottom of the right fender and a quick metal finish. It's still a bit low but less than 1/8 skim will straighten it right out.


Finished the fender over the weekend. Still going back and forth on which frenched headlight treatment I prefer.
In any event I sprayed some epoxy on the fender which is close to finished.

 

The beginning of something cool or abject failure.

 

Judging by your success thus far, I doubt failure is in the cards....

 

Thanks, guess we'll see. I'm often unsure of the outcome either in execution or if I will like the outcome.

Spent a little time on the mill this AM.

 

Little more progress.
Awaiting some more material so I can finish up.

A little sneak preview: with setback. Bottom of my hinge is flat. Factory is angled. I will have to make some wedges in order for these to work or I may choose to make another set. These might be shorter than I preferred, so, I'm guessing these will be remade correctly.

 

Couple little parts done.
I still plan on making hinges but need to make another set. I'll use the originals painted as a place holder.
Also I cut and welded the bottom of the left fender primed it while I decide how to finish the headlights and fit them.
Hopefully I'll roll it out of the garage tomorrow and hang the doors and any other panels and parts I can fit. Clean up and grab anything that I can work on over the winter.

 

Well progress has come to a hault since X-mas. My pup tore her ACC and I have been dealing with that financial burden.


Good news is she is now on the mend and the bill almost paid. About the only things I have accomplished are getting some dark blue carpet samples (plan for a white carpet is not working out.
The only other thing I managed to accomplish is finding this:


I'm going to leave it a bit under wraps for now but if someone guesses I'll let the cat out of the bag. I have not seen it done in a custom and it will work or be yet another epic failure. I'm hoping for work and see no reason it won't.

 

Glad that your fur baby is healing. Thank you for getting her taken care of.

 

Took a few min today... we'll an hour and a half, to work on the rear bumper.
It was in rough condition. Previously I had shaved the mounting bolt holes welding in 1/2" bolts.
Yesterday I ground the face a bit and treated the rust with ospho and put a couple coats of epoxy on it. The bumpers will eventually get painted either mat silver or the blue body color.
I had a leftover piece of the trim I am using on the doors and 1/4s. I thought it would be a nice touch to use it to accent the raised portion of the bumper stamping. I cut it to length, tapered the ends and welded it up. I then gave it a quick polish with 80, 180, 320, 800.
Now I'm leaning towards the blue bumper maybe with a pinstripe.

 

Started from the beginning
Great thread
Thank you
Dan

 

great read, really liking where this project is going

 

Sorry there hasn't been more posts. I have a lot going on and little time. I am going to start picking away at things once I get caught up a little. Hopefully by the end of the month. I have made some progress but nothing note worthy.

 

Great work and a cool car. Thanks for taking the time to post. Reminds me of the good ol’ days of the HAMB.

 

Your project is fantastic and thanks for do***enting it for us to see. You have so far downplayed your mastery of spray painting, especially in a small garage and temporary tent! I’m looking forward to the finished product.

 

I had one back in the day. Sectioned it 4 inches and gave the car a whole different look.

 

Thanks. I was wondering if it was worth keeping up. Hopefully i will be able to make more progress soon. I have been doing this long enough to produce good results with less effort than someone new to this. I have seen some amazing Freshman efforts by others. Mostly boils down to effort.

This isn't necessarily my dream car so, as my buddy says I don't want to make a "carrer move" out of this. I deliberately did not dig into the filler on the doors and 1/4s knowing that if I had I would have sectioned the car. I think these cars are absolutely great sectioned. I love the look of the one that Valley Customs did.


I'm off the original program (quick at home build) at this point. I am also finding that much of the work that was done is done incorrectly. Now I'm going to have to go back and rework those issues (set back engine etc) and I will have to correct some of the corners I cut trying to hold to unessary self imposed time constraints.

 

Ok. I'm far to excited about this. Especially when I think about the work that will be involved.
I hatched this plan over the winter but figured it would not materialize due to my cheap nature and not wanting to spend big $ on this build. Then I was browsing e-bay and this came up locally. I made a best offer and with a little haggling acquired what I believe to be one of the neatist touches (as well as one of the most expensive).
The new steering column:


While not seeming very interesting it does have the following unique feature...


LEFT turn Clyde!


Right turn!
The horn ring does double duty as a turn signal. Throwback to my early days working my first job.

Sooooo Cool! (If I do say so myself)

 

never saw one!--very cool

 

Well, as this project continues to spiral out of control I decided to play with a little AI. This took about 15 min and is closing in on what I'm hoping/going for.
I like the painted bumper and 49 grill on the second 2 pics.