I bought my 39 Chevy a couple of years ago at a swap meet. The guy that built it had passed and apparently it sat quite a while. His wife sold it to a car guy friend and I bought it from him. It needed to be brought back out and driven. He did a pretty good job on the build with a 79 Camero front clip and the usual SBC V8. I've really enjoyed driving it, nearly daily, my family and grand kids love it and I enjoy do the typical mechanic work, manifold oil leak, breaks, master cylinder, starter and the like. Took it to a few car shows and it looks good and compares well with similar cars, but its not really a custom or a hot rod. Someone call it a Resto Mod. I think that sounds like something a doctor would do to your colon. I kissed the fender back in the spring and started to repair it. My grand daughter informed me that her elementary school was having a car show & carnival fund raiser and she told her 1st grade teacher her "Papa" had a great old car and I would be there! SO, I was there. That's when I decided that the car needed more than just a fender repair. It was time to take it back down to the metal and do at least a little custom work to improve and personalize the car and take it up to the next level. I've never done this type of body work, but after reading custom build threads for a couple of years I decided no guts no glory and I got out the big sander! I found a ton of body filler all over the car. The previous body guy had the car real smooth but it looked kind of thick or plastic. I also started uncovering some rust and metal issues here and there. Over the 4th of July weekend I rolled it out in the yard and got out the paint stripper. I'll stop the post here and continue later.
Looks good so far. How about a nice set of Halibrands or straight spoke polished Americans and some nice shiny black paint? Also, what kind of front end do you have under it? -Abone.
better to be called a Hot Rod, rather than a RestoMod or Street Rod. nice ride, good to do as much as you can. always surprises under older paint. so, are the Grand Kids going to pick the color?
Thanks for the comments. Yes, it has a 79 Camero front clip. I put some shorter coil springs on the front and made some lowering blocks for the rear. When I purchased it there were different size tires front and back. they needed replacing. After a lot of consideration I put modern radials all the same size. I drive it nearly daily on Dallas / Fort Worth freeways in traffic and highway speeds and wanted the best performance for that type of driving. This gave me a lower back end and the leaf spring shackles were hitting the frame so I corrected the height and fixed the shackle by making 1 1/2" longer shackle arms and 1" lowering blocks. This is a much better look, and improved ride and allows me to put adult friends in the back seat and go out. My only clearance issue is the Camero front end is too wide. so the front tires kiss the fenders on a dip. I'm considering new tubular control arms that are a inch narrower. Fatman Fabrication in Charlotte NC has a set with all new ball joints bushings for ~$1,000. that's a lot of cash but would give me the right width without too much work. Back to Color, there are a lot of opinions but I'm 90% sure I'm going with a rich dark blue. I have a ton of photos of 39 customs and except for a couple of outrageous orange or lime green ones I like a keep coming back to a cool dark blue. Still lots of choices in the exact blue. Dark color means my body work needs to be real good and straight. I'm still considering how much custom work to do. I'm definitely changing the bumpers. Cutting the front one into two pieces and pulling them back closer to the body. I want the grill and boat prowl piece under the grill to show and be more prominent. I'll pull the back bumper closer in and adjust the shape closer to the body shape. May also make it two shorter pieces. The rear pan under the trunk was in pretty bad shape so I cut it out and bought a new replacement. I fitted it in and I'm reshaping the fenders to have a nice smooth curve like the new back pan. They were both pretty flat backed. Biggest challenge so far is welding the sheet metal. The new replacement piece welds fine but a lot of the original metal tends to burn through. I'm using a copper shoe and find that if I clamp it in place it pull out more heat and frees up my other hand to improve my gun control. My Northern Tool 135 welder just won't do the thin metal so I borrowed my son's Hobart Handler 125 and it does a pretty decent job. Yes, I know, I ought to get off my wallet and get a TIG. Well gotta go. I'm surly open to suggestions from this community. That's mainly why I started this post.
The Jalopy Journal
