Digging through all the shoddy repair work on this car is like an archeology dig. I don't know what the POs were thinking. Check out the door "upholstery." That's a sheet of steel covered with puke yellow bedliner. Another custom touch by the PO. New rockers were riveted over the old, rusty originals. No effort was made to clean up or stabilize the original sheet metal. The "new" rocker after I drilled out the rivets. What lurked beneath. An example of the "body work" previously done to the car. That's a chuck of bondo I'm holding. Quality sheetmetal replacement. That was the bad news. There is some good news, however. The floor braces somehow survived in relatively good shape. And the rear floors are very solid and will need only minor patching The passenger door bottom is rust free. So, things could be worse.
"remount the body to the frame, with new rubber/urethane body mounts, and bolts" I'm no expert, but I thought covertible bodies had to be mounted solidly, not with rubber or urathane, or the body would flex too much. Both my car and my parts car had no rubber mounts for the body. They were hard bolted to the frame with washers as shims. "What horror stories have you heard?" Nothing bad about the motor itself, just that, as you said, the cost of a rebuild was very high.
When you get to the point to replace the rubber on the car, Steele is the best choice, good quality and correct fit, like the Hemi, the rubber is not cheap. http://www.steelerubber.com/
Nice car man but they can sure hide allot of crap huh? I`m rebuilding a 52 coupe and pretty much replaceing the whole bottom of the car with coustom chassis, so I feel your pain. lol I braced and lightened the body as much as possible, but mine was gutted from the getgo. You may not have this luxury but I`ve been lifting my body on and off with a homemade gantry hoist, I`ll post some pics if you want?
Like previously posted being a convertable, you would need x bracing, My rockers were thought ok untill I removed undercoating etc. So I fabbed new. difficult, but they came out decent. I utilized door hinge holes and striker holes to save on bodywork. I`m no pro, this is my first major project, so I do my research and go for it. I came off the hood hinge holes and welded in a crossmember in trunk, install uprights and tied with a piece of 2x3 tube and made an adjustable center slide with lockbolt. had body on and off dozens of times, works good. The long piece of 2x3 you see across the door is used to support body on pipe stands and allow enough room to roll chassis out then supported by 4 pipe stands. All the crap your looking at on yours I`ve allready replaced. If I can be of assistance I`ll try and help. Good luck if you persue the restoration. Most people would`nt touch the car I got, but I`m aglutton for punishment/Mopar nut, going 440 in mine
Well, life just threw me a curve. This last weekend I actually located the first car I ever owned - a 1932 Dodge. This is the actual car I owned, not one like it. The guy I sold it to 45 years ago still had it and I just bought it back. Now I need workshop space and the convert has to go. It's listed in the For Sale section. I have enough parts with it to almost build a second convertible. Sorry to see it go, but I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get my old dodge back.
The day I bought it in 1965. Here it is coming off the transport truck. I know, I know, it's a sedan, but damn, it was my first car. Lots of work ahead.
The Jalopy Journal
