I have a pair of 56 caddy front fenders I want to graft part of onto the front of my 51 chevy 2dr HT. I just want the headlight area and the bodyline that runs down the side from the headlight. I'm thinking I can just cut the bottom half of the chevy fenders off and weld them onto the top half of the caddy fenders. The caddy fenders are a few inches longer so I'm going to extend the caddy bodyline into the door of the chevy a little bit and just cut the extra length off of the rest of the fender. What's the best way to take measurements for something like this?
heres a little idea of 53 caddy lights on my pontiac.but i ended up cutting them out haha. more or less the way i work is cut the caddy fender apart get it laying on top and start cutting. i really dont measure to much on these old cars i get it so it appelas to my eye because ive had cases where the measurements were off but it looked good and vise versa.
what flop said. Grafting is more of an art than a science. Cut off what you want and lay it on top of your existing fenders till you get the look you want. Just remember, it's not wood, you can always add more metal if you cut to much!! haha
I figured it would be one of these things I would have to eyeball but figured it would be worth the time to ask if it got me some fancy trick of the trade sorta thing. Ha! Thanks for the input guys, I'll post pics of the process soon.
I started cutting up the caddy fender yesterday, here's a couple pics of what I started with and the mock up of the driver side fender and bumper and grille from a 55 GMC truck. I might go with the factory 51 chev bumper and a 51-53 buick grille, not sure yet. Chev fender before... Caddy fender before.... Fender and bumper/grille mock-up. I'll post more pics once I get the first fender done.
OH YEA that looks much better.A lot of work but well worth it when finished.You could continue the side body line the length of the fender with steel rod and have it fade away before it gets to the door.Front bumper needs to be just a little shorter on the ends so not to stick out so much. Man I like it so far.Keep posting .Now this stuff is what I call fun.
looks goood lottle work though!!!....if you dont use that body line i will gladly buy one off of ya or both for that matter
I'd cut that caddy fender at the side seam, easier to hide the weld line, and shorten it there also. Leave your original fender, where it meets the hood on it and then blend the caddy fender to that. Under the headlight looks pretty close also. Makes me want to build another custom......
I got the driver side about half way done today. It's all tacked in place, just have to blend it to the chev fender, weld it in and cut away the rest of the chev fender underneath. The fun part will be getting the other side to match. Then I'll start on the tail lights. It's always dark by the time I'm finished so I'll get some better pics in the daylight before I get started.
looks cool, I kind of like the gmc bumper/grille... what about some caddy dagmars instead of the gmc ones?
Here's a better pic from the side, getting ready to put the end of the body line into the door. I thought about the caddy dagmars but I think they would be a bit more difficult to blend into the front end unless I used the caddy bumper too. I think I will stick with the GMC grille, more unique, and use 53 chevy front parking lights to finish out the "bullets" on the bumper, that will also give me front turn signals.
What are you going to do with the pieces cut out of the Chevy fenders? It's different, it worked better than I thought reading the thread - the Caddy fenders being kind of flat on top I would expect to be hard to blend into the rounder Chev fenders.
Like the fender treatment, but that truck grille is killing it for me. Caddy parts would look a lot more classy.
The blending on top is going slow, it's proving to be a bit tricky but I think it's gonna turn out pretty nice. I also got the rest of the body line set into the door today. As for the pieces of the chev fenders, there are lots of them, due to the fact that I'm doing all my cutting with 4" cutoff wheels. Sorry you don't like the truck grille James, it's just a mock-up. Maybe you'll have a change of heart when the bumper is narrowed, parking lights are in and the center opening gets some nice big shiny chrome bullets, maybe not.
Nice love the look. The only thing I would have done different is grind the paint off the working area before tacking.
Thanks surgeon. I usually do take the paint off before welding, I just let the excitement get the best of me. Rest assured I will get the paint off before I finish welding. I haven't been doing much since it's been pretty cold here lately, not to mention holiday preparation. I'll be getting back to work on it soon and post more pics.
that is going to work. you are doing good.keep it comming. this is whats its all about. custom built one off stuff rocks. I always wanted to go to the bone yard and just cut shit up and make it all my own and build a car that no one has yet. May be i still have time.
You should, I bought a set of 58 lincoln fenders and headlight trim for my 51 Merc. I have always loved canted headlights on the Mercs. Done lots of welding but this will be a new skill for me, and I am old!
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