Dude you absolutely NEED to mold the rings in. The way you have them sitting looks great, but there CANNOT be a ring there when you paint this fucker. CANNOT!!!! I will drive all the way to Pitt, break in, and french them myself if I have to, but it needs to happen. Nothing bothers me more than when someone kicks ass with subtle kustom tricks and then forget to french the headlights, or take off an emblem, or shave the handles, etc. The thing is as smooth as butter, but leaving the rings on will take away from the rest of the car. JMO man. The radius is perfect BTW.
His car, his call. If he's gonna paint the rings, might as well french them. However, if he wants to leave them bare stainless or have them chromed, he can't do that. So long as they blend well with the fender, I think the separate rings will look good.
Wow thats all I can say, thats a lot of work and it looks awesome! Can't way to see that thing finished.
Look at it again - aren´t you forgetting that there will be no chrome on the front of the car except the bumper, grille bar and headlight rings? The grille surround will all be painted. I think Flop is dead right that there won´t be enough chrome without the rings.
Flop, This is an awesome thread to follow. ive just bought a 53 Chev Deluxe 4 door which the previous owner has started to try modifying but i have a lot of work ahead. A lot of the things you've done here i will be able to use. Basically the Chev has been started with.... 100mm Roof chop 100mm Body chop (Section the back guard 4 inch, chop the front guards up 4 inch and taper through the doors (?? Might work..) and 4 inches taken out of the firewall to drop the body) Front doors lengthened by 8 inches and rear doors fixed solid making it a 2 door, then the front doors made suicide doors. A bit of a task for my first custom.... In the state its in theres a lot of work and im stil debating if the amount of rust to be removed is small enough to make it worthwhile, but seeing the results of yours make me wanna do it anyway. There may be a few questions in the future sent yourway, thanks for the inspiration. Will be keeping an eye on your progress and starting my own thread when it all begins...
spot on JAMES D!!!!!! i love it with the rings..i really dont think it would be right without it well alot of work done today with awsome results. time to put the curve in once again i wanted the curve to look factory so i wanted it to run into the orig piece of the fender so i drill out some spot welds and did a little cutting and there ya have it new piece it ..it fit pretty well only needing a little beating to fit into place..i sprayed the rust spot and the back of the new piece with weld through primer new curve in now just gotta make the hood match it see how i made the new lip go into the fenders lip that is spot welded to the inner
Agree to disagree here James. I'm not saying it looks bad at all. In fact it looks good, I just think it would look better with the rings molded in. After all, the whole point of kustoms are a streamlined look with everything nicely rounded and smooth. I think the headlight rings take away from that. Anyway, forget the opinions, the only one that matters is Flop's! I'm sure no matter which way he goes, the car will be stunning!
gotta love 53 chevy grill shells in 49-52 gm's...here's a pic of my bros 4 door he sold...I like yours better with the hood line instead of going all the way down, he did it this way because he was selling the car and it was easier/faster this way. 53 caddy headlights on here...
yyup i agree with Billy here i think they should be frenched. Dont get me wrong i think the car is gunna look beautiful any way but it would look a tad better frenched. I think they stand out too much in stainless
Flop, I'm just catching up. How shiney is the paint going to be in the grille opening? If it's going to be full gloss you could hide the light behind the grille bar and have it reflect off the paint when turned on. Just a thought.
For some reason, I don't know why, I like them unfrenched. Wierd, really wierd. But it works? Car looks great man.
still here watching Flop. Its still amazing all the tiny details you make sure are correct! I like the headlight rings personally but who cares what I think. I'm not paying for this ride to be finished. Hell if you don't like em after you get it done, i bet you would change it anyways. Your a master of disaster Flop. (in a good way!!!)
thanks everyone. glad to see everyone fighting over the headlight rings. i think they are gonna stay unfrenched.hahaha... paint will be full gloss nexx. no work today its raining so i cant pull the other cars outside or else they will get pummeled in grinder sparks so scooter work it will be.
good day in my book so far got to drive my 47work on the poncho and have a beer ...just sumthin about driving them on holidays...seems they deserve it or something... got a sheetmetal brake the other day so no more running around to have metal broken... so i started on the other rounded corner.. this was way easier with somethin to compare to on the other side dont really have to many full frontal shots on here of the car so here ya go folks! have a good thanksgiving everyone
Great post !!! Learned so much from your pics,i dont plan on chopping any tops but can be used for fender flares ect. Thank you for posting.....................YG
I would have to agree with Bill on the headlights as well and i don't think having less chrome on the front is a problem.
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