Moving right along....started getting the front clip lined up. Nothing major, just documenting as I go...
I'm going to cut the cowl off of the one I bought last weekend, and then transplant the roof and everything from the windshield back onto this car. The cowl on that car is shot.I am going to also put the longer doors from the 2 door donor car on it. I am going to use the floorboards from this car. They are mostly in great shape. The front floors in the Sedan Delivery I bought last weekend are non-existent. The rear floor and braces that are unique to the Sedan Delivery models are in decent shape. With pieces of both cars rear floors I can make nice solid floors. Think Franken-Delivery. I need to get some good pictures to post but it's dark and cold out there right now.
Moved more cars around today and got busy cleaning out the car. Made room in the shop to get the new Delivery in to start prepping it for the transplant. Cut the passenger door off as it was barely hanging on.
I went ahead and pulled the drivers door off and the rear door. So at this point there are no doors on the car. The rear door is going to need a bit of sheet metal work on the very bottom of the door, and one of the hinges on the rear door was missing the pin. I'll use one of the hinges from the chopped SD I guess. Pulled the stainless beltline molding off on the passenger side. It was kinked when I got the car and I don't remember what shape the one on the chopped Sedan Delivery is in, but I think one of them can be saved. Started cutting the floors out while leaving the vertical Sedan Delivery floor bracing in place for now. It will have to be moved when it's time for the long doors to go on. Good progress today! If I can keep this momentum up, I should be ready to move the body onto the 4 door cowl/floorpan in a couple of weeks. I have the 2 days after Christmas off from work so that may be a great time to get it done.
Oh shit! Go get mom, he's got the sawzall out! You're kicking ass Monty! Thanks for making me feel so worthless lmao!
Sunday night antenna TV Grit channel Big Bad Clint: For a few dollars more[emoji41][emoji106] Surfing [emoji475]♀️ the H.A.M.B. at commercials [emoji12] Nice project [emoji471] Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I'll spare the details cuz it wasnt fun, but I just spent the last 2 1/2 hours melting some kind of tar sealant shit out of the beltline in the inside at the rear of the car to get three 7/16" nuts off the retainer clips that hold the stainless trim off, 1/8 of a turn at a time. The only trim left on the car at this point is the thin stainless that goes along the top of the rear fenders. That comes off tomorrow night. The trim had some sort of a long thin metal band type retainer that was screwed in the beltline, and the stainless clipped over the band, except for the three previously mentioned 7/16" bastards at the rear on each side. The metal band/retainer is all rusted out, you can see where the screws pulled through the band that is on the inside of the trim, and it left heavy pitting and a couple of rust holes under the stainless. All in all it wont be too tough to fix. Going to grind out all the screws and remove the rust scale from the band/retainer and weld the holes up and try to locate some new clips when the time comes. I ordered a leading kit so I may try to smooth the beltline with some of that just to make a smoother surface for paint to adhere to.
Yeah it wasnt so bad after I got it done but while I was doing it I was thinking "this sucks, but it wont beat me! I'm the one with opposable thumbs here!"
Started working on the spare tire well a little this morning. It is in really good shape. It has a bit of a cave-in on one side but I can get that out pretty easily. The car was undercoated, mostly with red Georgia clay, as the car lived the majority of it's life there I believe. As I mentioned earlier, there are remnants of signage on it that say "Tom's Toasted Peanuts". They were based out of Columbus GA, and the paperwork I got with the car shows it last registered in GA in 2016. I am using a cheap HF needle scaler I have had for several years and the undercoating is basically peeling off. There is some rust on the piece but all in all it is very solid. I have never shot any epoxy primer/sealer, so I was thinking this might be a good piece to start on. I'm going to try to get the whole car sealed with it some point.
Saw this one in South Carolina FB market place for 600, about same shape as your second parts delivery. Saw it and had to share.
Wonder what the story on the signage on the car is. I would be willing to bet it isnt "official", but you never know. Had it been black with orange, I might think differently. It looks like another car sitting behind it on the right side of the picture, but cant really tell. Cool picture though, and added it to my collection. Thanks low!
I thought the same thing when I saw it. Also thought if it was a H.D. dealer vehicle it would have had the Co. name and address along with the Bar and Shield. That would make it an advertisement and a Tax wright off.
I have been soaking the body mounting bolts in the rearward portion of the car, and the rear bumper mounting bolts with Kroil for over a week now. I managed to get the bolts for the bumper out with the rattle gun. Even using the impact, I had to loosen, tighten, spray, loosen, tighten, spray, rinse and repeat at least a dozen times each on all 4 bumper bolts. The body mounting bolts are a different story.They are vertical with only a few inches of open space to get a wrench in there. I haven't tried getting a 1/2" drive socket in there yet. I think I am going to break out the torch and give them a few heat cycles before trying to break them loose. Then try to break them loose with a long breakover bar and do the same "loosen, tighten, loosen, spray, tighten, rinse and repeat method". I have a feeling I am going to end up replacing the captive nut or whatever the bolt scews into, but we will see once I get the body off the frame. I have noticed that all the bolts I have removed as far as what holds the body on have been deteriorated badly. I sort of expect this is going to be the case on most of them. Hopefully there wont be too many captive nut type fasteners along the way.....
So there were no "captive nuts" on the rearward most mounting bolts. These plates were slipped inside the frame channel. The one on the passenger side came out relatively easy, but the drivers side fought me the whole way. The bolt head was rusted so bad I couldn't get a wrench or socket on it. I attempted to grind the bolt down to good meteal and weld a nut on top of the bolt, but the area is really confined. I opted to weld a big booger on top of the bolt and use vice grips to turn it out, 1/8 of a turn at a time. Im going to call the car the 1/8 Turn at a Time Wonder I think...
It rained here all day with some thunderstorms rolling through so it was a good shop day. It was an all day project but I think I got all of the rusted fasteners out that hold the body to the frame. Tomorrow I think I will weld some temporary bracing in between the B posts and the cowl/firewall and start working on getting the body off the frame. The inner and outer rockers on both sides are toast so I will weld in some 2" square tubing just to support the entire structure. I want to be able to put the body on a rotisserie and roll it over to get all the old undercoating off, cut the floor pans that aren't needed out, and prepare the body to transplant onto the 4 door floor pan. I came up with some big cable reels that I am going to make a rotisserie from. Check out this video from @casper50 . I am going to borrow his ideas on the rotisserie he made for his 1955 Pontiac Station Wagon. Great build that guy is doing! https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=13&v=UGZTwq2WUe0&feature=emb_title
Got some shitty news today. My next door neighbor that has been helping me some with my project died of a heart attack yesterday. I hadn't known him long and didn't know much about him but he had been battling renal failure for a long time. He was the one that found the Sedan Delivery I bought a few weeks ago. 44 years old. RIP Paul.
That truly sucks brother. 44 years old. Said it before, I'm gonna say it again. Each day is a gift. Don't waste it.
Sad news, way too young. Good of you to let him be a part of something and be normal. Around here, feeling normal is quite a positive thing.
Sorry for your loss man, This stuff just becomes stuff when something like this happens as passionate as we may be about it, however we have to keep on truckin and enjoy it while we can
The Jalopy Journal
