Projects 50 Cadillac 4 Door Chop

4 or 5 years ago, I was in school... (wait, I'm still in school) I was at a different school, and this is one of the many projects I did while there. So yes, this is a bit old news, but I have been meaning to post it for some time now. Maybe a bit unsure of myself or maybe school keeps me too busy to get around to it. Only 5 more months, and I'll graduate for the last time.
So here is the Cadillac. 1950 60 Special aka Fleetwood. This one is intended for the wife if I ever get it done.



Sorry about the blurry shots here.
After reinforcing, measuring, and marking everything, I guaged what I was going to take out of the pillars with masking tape. It ended up being just shy of 4 inches. I left the rear window in tact. I cut it out later.





Here I got the roof back down in place and tacked at the a-pillars after some tweaking.



Rear window cut loose and tacked in place. Check for nice flow in the roof line.





Thats all I have time for now, I'll try to post the rest of what I have before the next 5 years pass me by.

 

Looks good thus far, let's see the rest of it.

 

Please keep posting pics. I would love to see the top back in. I have a 4 door Caddy that I have been thinking baout of it would look good chopped or not. I am very interested in seeing your progress.

 

Need more pics

 

Yes more pics please!! Somethin about a chopped 4 door!

 

I had a few more minutes this evening to throw a few more pictures on here. We'll call this part 2.

So I had the rear window frame cut out and repositioned where I wanted it and at an angle that I liked. I had it all tacked into place and started putting it back together.
Started on the inside/rear to get all the structure solid and welded the package tray back up. It took about a 2.5 inch strip across the inside there.



After all the mess of structural metal and interior stuff was done around the rear window, I moved to the outside. This also required about a 2.5 inch strip to be welded in to fill the gap. Because of the new lean on the rear window, there was penty to work with on the top it was just no longer shaped correctly. I took the slices in order to bring the center of the roof up the meet the top of the window, but the rest was still a mess. Notice the rear side window behind the C-pillar. The chop pretty much eliminates it. I'll get to that later.



Heres a shot of all that welded up with the TIG, so I could get it hammered out without to much warpage.



At this point I still wasn't sure about what I was going to do with the sections behind the C-pillars, so I moved on to something a bit easier. The B-pillars.
If you look back to the last picture in the first post, the top half of the B-pillar moved about 4 inches forward. I cut it off the roof just below the drip rail (which I wanted to keep in tact) and lined it all up. Sorry, I should have taken more pictures. I get caught up in my work sometimes and forget.
Here it is all welded back up.



From here, I moved on to the doors. Here the front door is fit back together and tacked into place. The rear is cut loose but clamped back into place (see the vise grip hanging off the door) just to get a visual for how much I took out.



I guess I'm stopping here again for now. So far so good, if I keep this up I'll have it all posted this year.

 

I'm ready to wrap this one up.

So, at this point, I was ready to tackle the rear corners. I started by cutting out a good section of the roof and drip rail in order to reshape it and bring the line of the rail back up and flow into the rear window again. I had to cut enough to work with so I could achieve a nice flowing line through the entire length of the drip rail.



I had to make multiple cuts on the bottom of the piece in the door jam area and shrink the top to get the curvature to change enough. Here it is all tacked back into place. Also at this point I began restructuring the small rear window. I didnt want it to go away.



Here I have it all welded back into place and looking pretty decent. Also finished up the area there around the little rear window.



After I got that all finished and straightened up a bit it was time to fix the roof. I did that by cutting a big hole in it, after rolling a new piece out on the wheel to go in its place.



Here it is all welded into place, you can also see I started to get the rear door fit as well. I also tipped the c-pillar a bit. Did that a few steps ago, but you can see it well now that the door is in place and matched.



And here it is, one side all but finished. I did the same stuff to the other side.



Back home and all done up, more or less. Enough for this post anyhow.



Just a view of the roof where most of the business was attended to.



Guess thats it, got it posted after all. Thanks.

 

Sweeeeet. Looks like it flows nicely. I like how you leaned the C-pillar forward , it takes the blockiness out of the area on a 4 door. Keep it up, we need more chopped Caddys here

 

you do nice work,,i almost didnt open this post because im not into 4 doors at all,,,,but im glad i checked it out,,,,,,,,,,,,

 

Nice work Jonny! Keep us posted.

 

Looks great. Glad you kept the little window. Nice work.

 

Very nice!!!

 

It is nice to see you retain the quarter windows. (I was afraid they would be deleted.) You apparently have the vision to match your skills. I think this will be a great custom. Please keep us posted.

 

Thanks for all the kind words of approval.
I hope to get back to this one come summer. I've been jonesin to work on it again. To bad I left it with my dad in Utah when I moved to Cincinnati for school.