Does anyone know of an easy way to get the doors of a roadster to line up properly. I have the p***anger side working well, a little tight, but lined up. the drivers door is now about 1 inch low. I am also thinking that the wood that goes between the frame and the body is wrong. dont know it that is part of the problem. history. a friend of mine bought the car a few weeks ago at a show/swap meet. the seller had taken the car apart, priced every peice and begun to bring it to his booth. my budy noticed the car, offered to buy it and now has a car in pieces. NOW.... he wants to sell the car at the stafford swap meet in stafford ct. on sunday. wants the car together and running if possible. Started on monday with roler, mounted body, front fenders, skirts, trans, and a few other things. now the doors and i am stuck. any help would be great. it is a 29 roadster , 6 wheel, in very nice shape. ch***is is perfect/restored. including a rebuild on engine and trans. body needs some work. I would leave it alone but its not mine. guy wants $11500 together. this is the only picture i took so far, and i took it because its a cool pic. no other reason. if you are interested i will put up a proper post for the car.
Like eaglebeak said, you will probably have to put shims on top of the wood blocks. They seel rubber shims at most any Model A parts house that you tack on top of the wood block to adjust things like that. Have fun!
Shim your body first. Model A's tend to squat in the back, sine the body hangs past the frame. Ive had to tweak the hinges to for good door alignment.
I just finished going through this process with my '30 coupe. I know yours is a roadster but it's the same process. The first thing I would reccommend is getting a model a frame that you know is perfectly square with all the correct body mounts. Next, get the body mount wood blocks and rubber shims from Brattons or Snyders or whoever. Once you start bolting the body down using the blocks and stock mounting locations, you will see very quickly where things need to be shimmed, pulled, pinched whatever. It's a pain in the **** especially if your subrails are tweaked but if you are patient you'll get it.
Patience! Is this a painted car already? It looks like a brown but I can't really tell. If not here is a starting point. Put a paint stick between both door jambs and pony clamp from the rear quarter to the front cheek panels both sides to where you want the body. If you can get four pony clamps two per side even better. Set the Body on the frame and measure for shims or put the wood blocks in there and slide thin rubber or b***/balsa wood on top of the blocks until it's solid and you can take the pony clamps out without it moving too much. The reason I use Balsa wood is because it's readily available in thin consistent strips. But it isn't strong or dense enough for the long run. This is where you need to duplicate the thickness in oak or maple. You can glue thin pieces of oak to the original blocks and get back to the thickness. But balsa is cheap and easy to work with. Oak is alot longer of a process. If you are bad with wood go to a good cabinet shop and have them cut you some quarter sawn oak into thin pieces. This takes alot of paitence sometimes but it's worth it in the long run. Good luck, Tim Oh yeah it also helps if the car is on level ground and the frame is level and not preloaded anywhere.
I know it's been said allready but door shiming is what you have to do. I've got a 29 roadster and my doors shut like a VW thanks to my friend Bob Mayes and some wood.
I had a feeling that the answer was going to be "Patients boy, Patients". just hoping i was wrong. thanks guys. It is brown but its not that nice a paint, done a very long time ago and is chipping off in places. The goal with this is to get it to the swap meet. the car is going to need to be taken back apart for paint anyways. no matter what i say guy wants a complete car at the meet. his money
Try this site: http://www.abarnyard.com/workshop/door-2.htm The diagrams help you see what to do to get it right.
He is asking $11,500.00 for the car, and now it is supposed to rain on sunday so he may not bring it to the swap meet. i worked for another 5 hours on the doors yesterday. hard to do without a little help. got the p***anger door perfect and started to get the drivers door fixed and totally fubard the p*** door. then got the drivers good and the p***anger was close. its like a game.ugh.
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