Paul from nzhrm was there camera on hand, so hopefully we will get some coverage in the mag. I couldn't let the opportunity for a group photo go by.
I finally got back on the job this week after a brief interlude. I started out by grabbing another load of panels out of the molasses, straighten a few then decided to make a start on the firewall repairs and mods. The firewall came with the car from an earlier donor because the delivery one has been unceremoniously removed in the past by someone. Filled a bunch of holes so I can set them where it suits me later. A trip into town for a sheet of steel. The original vertical braces were in the way on the right side, interfering with the head and have suffered from a bit of cancer at the base. So I have redesigned them and given myself more space. One side sorted to a cleco stage and happy with the form and function, this format should help with the firewall mounted booster and master, adding stiffness.
Another busy day today, dodging the rain. Working on the left side of the firewall. Where I am changing the brace on this side was going to interfere with an existing depression formed. So out with the saw and make it fit. As you can see here. I got to play with my new air saw to cut the corners. Chopped out and...... ....moved over to clear the new brace. Frankensteined to fit and clamped in with the panel clamps from timu! Lots of welding and hammering later. Then on to the foot that had some cancer issues. I made a new foot from 2.5mm with a bit of bending and a few welds. Tomorrow I will make the light gauge pieces to finish off the foot. Pretty happy with progress so far. Will look tidy and easier to paint and clean than the original braces too.
Eleven years ago. Always liked that video and this was pretty much the other end of that road. Looks like you could keep better company though! JW
No resting on a Saturday, carrying on with the braces. Replacing the gangrenous left foot took most of the day. And filling in a couple of holes to make the new braces sealed boxes. Basically ready for some weld through primer inside the new braces and blind pockets and it's off to get spot welded onto the firewall. Left side sorted. And the right. Cheers fellas, time for a brew!
A splash of weld through primer on the ares that will be covered by the braces. I also sprayed the inside of the braces before I took it all up to my friends workshop to use his spot welder to attach it all together. Today I finished up with a few bit of mig welding on the ends and where I couldn't reach with the spot welder. I have also filled the park brake holes and it is almost ready to acid wash and etch prime.
Chopping out the ugly and cleaning up panels ready for etch and epoxy today. The left side inner fender had an ugly deviation to go around the steering box, not any more! Trimmed and fitted. Welded and cleaned up. And a bunch more panels cleaned up ready to etch and epoxy. That makes nearly the entire front clip all cleaned up and in epoxy.
Etch on and epoxy coated. It's been a long week! Cleaned up. Etch on....... ....all of them.... ....epoxy grey green rolled on the lot. Now we clean up the mess!
I am completely amazed that the 72 year old panels look so great with virtually no rust anywhere so far!
We had a big day today resetting the shop so I can do a bit of maintenance and finish a couple of jobs on the coupe. To make a bit more room in the shop I decided to put the delivery chassis under the body. So I lifted it up nice and high to roll the chassis in. I only have a couple of tall stands, so I had to hoist the back up with the engine lift through the door. Then I lowered it all carefully down onto a couple of blocks on top of the chassis because there are going to be a few spots that don't fit......yet! Once down and happy I decided to make use of the space in the back to store all the panels that are painted. Playing panel Tetris in the back worked well. Both front fenders, inner fenders, both halves of the hood, firewall and plenty more all went in. Now it is all tucked in the corner with the seats and steering column in there too! I found the front valance sitting on the roof too, so it is in the molasses for bath.
The panels look great! I'm looking forward to seeing what your final colour choice will be, I don't think you've mentioned it
So, when we went away in January to the street rod national run the coupe developed a vacuum leak between the carb spacer and the manifold. This created an annoying whistle and as a result the headers were getting very hot! So much so, that the headers were glowing red down in the intersection, not helped by the fact that I had wrapped them as well. Long story short, we melted a hole in them! Another issue that I had with the exhaust was the fact that it hung below the chassis in places and was nearly always the first thing to get caught on the ground. I went to a great deal of trouble with the delivery chassis to keep it above the chassis everywhere. On the coupe, right hand side there is space to redirect the exhaust up and out of the way with a couple of bends. The driver side is a different story with the brake master cylinder under the floor, necessitating some creativity. There is a limited space that a pipe can run but not at full 2½" diameter, so..... I calculated the cross sectional area of 2½" tube and made a flat profile tube that had the same cross sectional area, and didn't hang below the bottom edge of the chassis. To make a transition piece from round to flat, I simply squashed one end of a short tube in the vise, then hammered the radius over a heavy wall tube to get the profile right. A little trimming and fettling to get the pieces to fit each other. I have ordered a couple of expansion joints to add in, so am waiting for them to arrive before I continue much on that one.....but the right side header needs some attention while we wait. The Sanderson design makes it very difficult to get access to 2 of the bolts, so I plan a redesign. Above, I clamped a spare head to the bench to keep the flange plate straight while I fabricate the new ones. .......A few moments later......
The plan is to change to a factory Corvette style tube header. Using a couple of donuts and some 180 deg bends.
Yesterday I got the main primary tubes cut, tacked, welded and assembled from the flange plate to the collector. Sanderson on the top, my new one in the middle and a stock TPI Vette style factory one on the bottom. Today I marked out, cut, formed, fitted and welded the 4 in to 1 collector piece. Sanderson on top, factory Vette in the middle and mine on the bottom. I have added the 2½" tube extension to get the lower join down where it is easy to reach, not like the original Sanderson set up with a 3 bolt flange up above the chassis where it was nearly impossible to reach! I am sick of spending hours trying to dislocate a shoulder to reach the fasteners! I am waiting now for the expansion joints to arrive......time for a clean up.
So, the expansion joints eventually arrived. No excuses left, it was time to get back to work. I have just come in for a break after stitching everything back together. Pretty happy with the results, but I haven't run the engine yet......so it could all get ripped out and beaten with a hammer to clear interference! A quick shot of high temp paint to keep it looking sharp. That might help it last a little longer. The expansion joints landed right under the starter and oil filter so I added a couple of heat shields. I also added a shield for the e-brake cable and cover. I added a couple of extra rubber isolation mounts to unload the flexible joints and support the rear half of the exhaust. There was the need for one slip joint (not my favorite) on the right side. I have not replaced the fiberglass thermal wrap on the headers, so added some thermal sleeves to the sparkplug boots. The e-brake needed a little assist to keep it away from the redirected exhaust. So that's it for now. Test drive and a few more jobs then back to the delivery.
There is just enough room to drop it down, but it only takes one fastener to drop the exhaust out of the way.
I started the car yesterday and it was making a horrible mechanical banging sound, like a hammer somewhere under the car! It didn't make sense to me so I grabbed the laser temp probe and shot all the exhaust ports, wouldn't you know it 5 and 7 were cold......duhh! Swapped the leads over and the banging stopped! Firing a plug with the exhaust valve open already makes a big bang! Ha ha! After that I took it into town to make sure everything else was good and to burn off all the assembly moly and cook the paint awhile. Happy with the results it was back home and into the shed with the back of the car facing the door so I can see for the next job. Next job being the fuel tank issues. The OEM sender and after market gauge have had a "lost in translation" situation, reading a max of ¼ full when the tank was full. I found the appropriate sender hiding in a box on the shelf and had to remove the tank from the car to access. Fitting the sender was fairly straightforward, with a little tuning of the resistor to achieve the full/empty cycle required to read correctly on the gauge. Another job I wanted to do while the tank is out of the car is to move the vent away from the filler neck. The way I set it up originally made it almost impossible to fill at the gas station without the handpiece cutting off constantly, which has been a big ole pain in the butt!
New vent braised on with the assistance of some argon purge to prevent launching anything into suboptimal orbit. And the appropriate sender to interpret signals into 1s and 0s for the human interface!
Finally got back to work on the delivery today, after a break to service others in the fleet. I decided to attack the front door to straighten the dents and sort out any rust issues. Step one was to remove it from the car. Organized a bin and ziplock bags to label and keep my OCD in check. Apparently in days gone by, when you broke a side glass, all you need to do is fit a new one and not bother about the old broken glass, just leave it rattling around in the bottom of the door! A couple of reference shots for later. Tomorrow I will slice open part of the inside skin to give a bit better access to push out the big dent, and be able to clean up inside the door before we coat it appropriately.
Today's mission was relatively successful. I finished removing the last few pieces from the door, bagged and tagged them for future assembly. The bigliest job was to remove the 3" deep dent in the skin. First up I cut out a piece of the inner skin to give better access to remove the dents, dolly etc and clean up and coat the inside of the door. Then I flipped the door over and marked a grid in chalk to make the shape a bit more camera friendly. From the front...... ....top....... .... bottom... ....and rear. Then it was time to apply the #12 gauge dent removal equipment to reverse the previous inversion. Along with a few gentle taps here and there to get to this stage. Rear..... ....front.... ....top.... ...and bottom. I threw the door on the ute and took it up to a friends shop to do a bit more tappity tap tapping and while I was there a mate turned up in his Dodge roadster. Pretty cool old beater he takes everywhere. The interior is leather from another old lounge suite I had a while back.
The Jalopy Journal
