Nice job on the stainless. One of those things that takes time especially with thin sections that are easy to overheat and warp.
Nice tips on straightening stainless trim. I do it much the same way, and find it very relaxing. Last trim I straightened was on a buddy's 55 Ford rear window.Looked like someone beat on it with a ball peen hammer to install. Spent a few relaxing hours and better than new.
Thanks for the comments everyone.. Sorry for the hiatus, the day job had me travelling, two weeks in UK and two weeks in HI. Got back this past Sunday. Tuesday afternoon we loaded up the wagon and dropped it off for media blasting.. should pick it up this weekend. Tonight I worked on getting the Go Kart Slick hub fabricated for the wheeling machine.. I had stopped at a local machine shop and picked up a 3-1/2" diameter slug left over from their water jet. After some cleanup work on the South Bend, and a clearance hole for the 35mm upper shaft on the wheeling machine... I had found this roller bearing (35mm ID) on ebay, as well as this thrust bearing... Getting close... Bearing installed.... With slick held in place, the alignment looks pretty good... Motion picture version.... Still need to drill and tap the three lug holes and install the outer thrust bearing.. and then we can get working on the re-skinning of the glove box door..
Thanks Henry, good to hear from you! Well today was our Saturday so we put the newly installed GoKart slick to use on the cast wheeling machine, along with the 4" diameter lower anvil. Started with slight pressure and gradually increased. Tire was about 1/2 deflated. The sides (as shown) had been left a bit long to keep from flattening out fingertips, so now we trimmed one side and marked for the bends. The tipping wheel in the bead roller was used to thin the bend area for a bit of friendly persuasion.. These were fun. About 3/16" from bend to bend....or less. Had to use all the tricks, hem is still loose, we'll epoxy all the pieces apart and then assemble, making all the folds tight. Still have the lock hole to go as well, we are going to leave this one smooth as opposed to the factory's vertical bead to simulate the gap at the ashtray..
Well with a nice radius on the face of the glove box door skin, we now need a flat area for the lock cylinder. Since I had a piece of Polyurethane here from the care package Rich B had sent me, it seemed the right tool for the job. The lock cylinder hole was added using a step drill for the hole and a die grinder for the notch. A punch is used to add the needed stretch to provide the flat area.. Starting to take shape.. Some fine tuning of the detail... The bottom flange was measured, trimmed, and folded in the Diacro press brake The side flanges were tipped slightly in the Bead Roller.. This also gives us a nice mark to show the fold line.. Touched up with the DA With the three flanges folded to a 90, now we'll media blast and epoxy before assembling the two halves. This shows the tipping tool used on the side flanges. With lock cylinder. Looks almost factory...
Thanks so much for letting me look over your shoulder,I learn a lot ,retain very little but still am so impressed with your work.Thanks again.
Well last night's efforts saw us media blasting, hanging the next batch of small parts for epoxy primer, and general cleanup.......which has been sorely needed. So we don't have much of interest to show, so let's turn it over to Dana (the owner) who got these parts powder coated yesterday for us...
Well the two weeks plus of non stop rain has finally subsided where the media blasting could commence. Got a phone call today that the car was ready to pick up.. Here it is before we loaded it up.. This is the part where you wish you had a tilt bed trailer so any media residue would be persuaded on out on the return trip home... But alas, we found a combination of using the air hose and a shop vac best to evacuate most of the media. That and about 50 or so revolutions on the rotisserie..... Real pleased with how well it turned out... here moved into the booth and the dehumidifier energized. We do have some pin holes that are more apparent now, so we'll get those fixed Saturday morning and see how the weather looks for priming in the afternoon..
Your phrase about the glove box door being "almost factory" makes me think that should be the name for this entire build. Keep us updated.
I like that! Well, no primer just yet, while Kyle was taking care of some pin holes that became more obvious after media blasting... I ran across this... With so much widespread "issues", let's see if we can come close to duplicating this.. Taking a paper pattern.. Here laid out on some 19 gauge AKDQ... Trimming... But I always prefer a test sample first... this done on the tipping wheel Step dies on the Lennox add the final detail... Need to fine tune the dimensions, but this looks close. I think I'll make up some dies for the Lennox for better consistency on the good piece.. Should be priming soon... once the dominos stop falling.
Time to make some dies for the Lennox, here fine tuning the fit.. The outside corners will get some steel added for a sharper detail in the bends.. The 19 ga steel is a good snug fit for the band saw cuts... The front edge of the panel will be tipped prior to running it through the Lennox, the tipped flange will act as a guide in the slot in the lower die.. Another test run using a straight piece of scrap Dimensions looking much better. Enough practice, starting to tip the flange on the good piece.. The tipping wheel on the bead roller bends about 30 degrees and the remaining is done manually with the hand tipping tool.. Flange tipped, some kick shrinking to get the right contour, and we're about ready for the Lennox.. As Kyle was off tonight we'll wait until he returns so we can have two people feeding this long piece through the machine..
Your explanations always make it seem so simple after you break it down step by step. Thanks for that!
Thanks guys, wait until you see all the scraps left over. As we found with some of the practice pieces, when you try to shove metal too much into a hole it tends to pull in from the edges. So to fix that we'll make up a new bottom die to form the ramp fold fully, then change back to the above die to form the step.. The down side to using phenolic is that it gives a bit where it doesn't make sharp creases well or short reverse folds either. The initial practice pieces wouldn't fold the step down flat, so a wrap of steel was added to the top die to better persuade the step flat... The upper die holder helps keep the wrapped steel in place. That did the trick, step is laying down nice and flat.. The front flange hangs over just a bit too much, some hammer action will bring it back in place. Real pleased with how well this turned out.. Some of the practice scraps..
Next task on the list is to add the semi-circular relief areas into the new cowl repair panel.. A suitable piece of Phenolic is cut out, notched at the bottom for "vise support", and used a roloc sander and drum sander to add the relief area in the "hammer form". Here's the Vise support shown in action... should remain nice and stable through all the hammer action.. Centerline of the hammerform marked, as well as on the vise, to better align our new cowl.. Door skin hammer will be used here to provide the radius, this one was touched up as the factory radius was a bit too large. Tried it on one of our scrap pieces first.. Back side.. Front side and comparison to the factory version Action video showing the process:
Thanks for the step by step process on this piece. It really does look like the factory piece, well done!
Best thread on the HAMB right now, the thought process and execution of the task at hand are amazing. Craftsmanship at its best.
Thanks for the comments guys.. A bit further along on the cowl repair.. Repair patch trimmed to size... ....and then scribed to the cowl area, which gets rough cut using the 4-1/2" cut off wheel. About 1/4" excess is left for final trimming using the snips.. That should flow some air... Tacked in place..
The Jalopy Journal
