Technical Bondo madness

Let's see your most extraordinary bondo findings... I think the roof of my Tudor steps quite high on the ranking ladder of the most severe bondo abuse. Whoever did it must have used more time sanding than it would have taken to do properly. There was a layer from 1/4" up to 1" over the whole roof area

Furthermore the ribs look like santa claus lost skis of his sledge...

 

Holy***** that roof is a shocker!


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Thats impressive. Its harder to do things wrongly.

 

I think the same guy did my sedan...

 

Atleast it wasn't like my coupe... They gas welded and warped the top fill, bondo'd it then apparently had issues with it cracking, so they drilled 3 sets of pop rivet holes(only used one set) and pop riveted 2 sheets of galvanized with a seam down the center, then bondo'd over that too

 

Holy*****. are the ribs made of wood?,how were they attached?. Harvey

 

Wow! How do you even mix that much Bondo??!!

 

just when you thought you'd seen it all, I had to go back and look at it a couple times just to make sure of what I was seeing. crazy.............

 

No wood, heavy steel ribs

partly welded.

 

That's impressive. What's surprising to me is that it doesn't look like it was cracking much in that second picture.

 

Wow, I'm scared to ask how much bondo is in the rest of the body-such as "bad" areas like the lower 6" of the body?.....

With the price of filler, sandpaper and the guy's labor, he could have paid someone to bump out or reskin the roof.
Hell, I'd have sourced a good Sedan roof and spliced it on-while chopping the top.

You've heard the car shopping term 'bring a trailer'. 'Bring a magnet'!!!

 

I have an OT Cuda in my shop that has about 1/4 inch over the whole car. It had had a quarter panel put on, then it rusted thru. Second body guy pop riveted a home made patch OVER the rust then bondo'd over that (same on front fender). The owner had this car "rust free" car for a couple of years when the paint started bubbling. Every time I get more bondo ground off.... I find more suprises.

 

I'll bet the guys that did that fine bondo work float and tape drywall for a living.

 

With a concrete mixer?

No bondo in this pic,but this gap was filled with bondo before i stripped my 51' Ford's quarter:



There was only around ½ inch of bondo on the quarter panel,so i guess its an amateur bondo slinging when comparing the pics above.
There was "50's bondo",lead on the same quarter almost 1" thick chunk.

 

But I only put down a skim coat.......

 

I restored a really nice looking 56 Ford convert that had flat panels tacked to the wheel wells in the rear, and the body line, and quarter panel 'bulge' completely built up out of bondo.
Redid a roof on a 51 Marc that was chopped in the late 50's or early 60's. They quartered the roof...bondo at least 3 inches thick. Chiseled it out, looked like pieces of sidewalk slab. Guess no one owned a hammer!

 

I should add, i know of a 1990's, big dollar street rod from a big name builder that everyone knows of, that had peaks over the headlights, and roof scuplted in bondo, oh and a patch on the firewall out of 1/2" plywood that was also bondo'd over, A shop that i know of did a repaint on the car and found it. I wont mention names...

 

Had a 55 chevy with the tail pan made out of a nicely shaped 2x4 and some bondo, but I have never seen what you guys are posting. Awesome, but not in a good way.

 

the hood on my 51 merc was pretty bad wavy and about a half inch thick. it bothered me quite a bit cause the guy i bought it from owned a body shop and did the work.

 

I am not against mud, I think it was one of the better inventions of the mid 20th century.

That said any over 1/8 inch is abuse as far as I am concerned. I don't have any pics I am afraid but I sent a T bucket to Florida when I first joined the HAMB I sold a model T bucket to a fella in Florida that had no less than 1/2 inch anywhere on it. He knew about the bondo when I sold it to him. He peeled the entire thing and dollied out about 3 dings in the driver door area, and a wrinkle just behind the pass door. To this day I have no idea why it was covered in mud.

 

Oh how I wish I'd taken a pic of this. A fella at a car show proudly boasted of converting his '56 Chevy station wagon into a sedan delivery. How'd he'd do that? By slapping on multiple coats of thick bondo over the rear side glass. I was thankfully speechless. Kept my mouth shut rather than dissing this guy's body work.


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Over the glass...OMG...I have seen the wood, and screen filler along with reams of newspaper stuffed in quarters.
I looked at a O/T corvette custom that had inches of bondo added on modifications....posted on another thread.....

 

I worked at a body shop in high school in the early 80's. One time I leaned against the quarter of a mid 70's Buick and it sprung back. I started grinding on it and found about an inch of bondo. The shocking part was the repair under the bondo. Someone had taken and covered a 8" rust hole with chicken wire. Then spread roofing tar over that and covered it with a paper grocery sack. Then covered over the sack with the 1" of bondo. Took longer to do that than to fix it right. Wish I had a photo.

 

Used to own half a body shop with a very good friend that was an excellent body and fender man, saw some real nightmares when he was still alive, bondo over cardboard, bondo over expandofoam. But the absolute worse I have ever seen was not working there but when I was working at the KC Star ( news paper). One of the guys bought a cherry Maroon '64 327 4 speed El Camino. One quarter was built from mud and chicken wire (pretty good job really), well the guy that did it must have really liked the process, the frame was rotted out between the rear hump and the front of the rear spring hanger and he repaired that the same way. All that was holding it for about 8" was the flanges.

 

When I bought the car



With the mud ground out



A 2 1/2 lb chunk that formed the wheel opening. Impressive considering what little metal was left to make it stick to.



My homemade patch panels in process. This is for the other side, they were both about the same. There is some filler over this, body filler isn't a bad thing when used properly. It's when it's used to fill huge ditches or as a rust hole patch that the problems come in.

 

I was working on a 55 Chevy Pickup for a friend. I knew that there was Bondo in the lower section of both front fenders. I proceeded to remove Bondo with a D.A. Sander and was quite surprised to see Snuffy Smith staring back at me. The newspaper comics were just floating there encased in fiberglass resin. Got to the other fender and found Li'l Abner looking back at me. Absolutely "NO" glass mat or cloth in site. I was able to cut out the cartoon characters and give them back to my friend when the truck was finished. No telling how long those comic guys had been enjoying the free ride..........Jeff

 

Oh, the sedan delivery conversion reminded me of another one. I won't mention names, as some people idolize the guy, but I know of a chopped Merc that that had the big back window, and the guy wanted the small window in it. He laid the smaller one right over the big one, and proceeded to fill the area around it, with Gorilla Hair. Smoothed it all out, molded in. But look inside and you saw the big window still there!

 

All is NOT lost! Take a slab of that bondo. File the edges smooth, so you can't cut yourself. Now, pre-heat an oven to 500 degrees. Place bondo slab on a cookie pan and bake for 4 hours. Remove and let cool.*****! Kiln fired plates for fine dining. Enjoy!

When you're tossed lemons, make lemonade.

 

This "chunk" was once a 1/4 panel on a 30' Model A that I was painted for a friend.