Restoration under way

[pinellas50]

I got the truck back from the paint shop today. That only took about 6 months.

Before:

After:

I kept the roof rack for originality sake

Now I just have to put it all back together and then take it back to the shop for wet sanding and buffing.

I'll move onto the interior once my bank account stops having a heart attack.

 

[ShuggsRR]

Re: Restoration under way

Nice! Looking good!

 

[MRKING]

Re: Restoration under way

Your garage is way to clean . Your supposed to have syty parts all over the place like everyone else .

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

Your garage is way to clean . Your supposed to have syty parts all over the place like everyone else .

Haaa. Well, the pic of the rear of the truck is a little too dark. If you look close enough, you will see the old doors to the left of the truck. What you can't see is all the everything else piled up just behind the doors closer to the camera. And all of the cladding and grill is in the back of the truck.

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

Just found the first annoying thing. They dropped the antenna down inside the fender. I spent about an hour with magnetic things and such trying to get it up and out the small holes in the inner fender. I'm going to have to pull that pass side fender off!l

I'm going to have to pull the hood off to do that, right? Something tells me this is going to take much longer to put back together than it was to take apart.

 

[Sy#2373]

Re: Restoration under way

Looks good, who did the work?
Take it back to the body shop and let them deal with antenna. They should have never let it fall down there.

 

[MikeRenz]

Re: Restoration under way

if you just removed the coolant overflow tank, you should be able to get to the antenna from inside the engine bay w/ no prob.

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

if you just removed the coolant overflow tank, you should be able to get to the antenna from inside the engine bay w/ no prob.

The over flow is out right now. I can't get my hand down in there from the top. The holes down at the bottom are mostly covered by the body shell so I can't get in there that way either.

Or should I just keep trying? I was pretty tired and frustrated when I was messing with it last night.

2373...Klaus Auto Body did the work. I'll take it back to them after messing with it a little more I guess.

 

[ShuggsRR]

Re: Restoration under way

Something tells me this is going to take much longer to put back together than it was to take apart.

I dont think anything is as time consuming as drilling out the rivets!

 

[SEL777]

Re: Restoration under way

Looks nice. Be sure to post more once it is assembled.

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

I dont think anything is as time consuming as drilling out the rivets!

I got pretty good at that. I just used a small drill bit to drill out the center some and then a center punch to drive the pin out.

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

I pulled the cladding out of the truck today. I found all of the mounting tabs on the front driver's fender piece folded over, one broken off. Both mounting tabs on the pass side rear corner broken..........at least they taped those to the piece for me.

Is reattching these tabs going to be easy enough? I bought some 3M Automix Plastic Repair stuff that I was going to use to try and reinforce some of the flimsy tabs I knew of. Will this stuff stick them back on?

And I had thought about gluing in some type of metal reinforcements to help the tabs. Good idea?

 

[SYO237]

Re: Restoration under way

Be sure to sand the area up really good before using the plastic repair (but you knew that already). Ive used polyurethane and epoxy resin in the past with good results.

Best be would be to fabricate some gussets for the tabs, IMHO. Some good rigid plastic might do the trick, this way you could rough it up with the sand paper as well when using the plastic repair.

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

Some type of hard plastic used as reinforcement? I was thinking of emmersing some type of 90 degree metal object in the plastic repair goo while it is drying. I'm not sure what kind of plastic I could find that would be in the right shape.

Any ideas?

 

[SYO237]

Re: Restoration under way

Problem with metal I see is that nothing is going to stick to it long term, unless you seriously put some deep grooves or notches in it to grab and hold the plastic epoxy (or glue, or whatever it is).

I was thinking on the lines of plexiglass to use for gussets. Easy to cut and work with...

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

Sounds like a better idea. I'll try that. Thanks.

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

I was thinking on the lines of plexiglass to use for gussets. Easy to cut and work with...

I've been using your plexiglass idea. So far it has been working great! I fixed the completely broken tabs on the pass side rear corner and reinforced the top rail that hangs on the round discs. I have to rivet on the metal hangar back near the bumper and then it will be ready to go on.

It's the driver's front fender cladding piece that I am not looking forward to.

Anyway, your plexiglass idea works well. In case you hadn't tried it yourself.

 

[SYO237]

Re: Restoration under way

schweet. havent done it myself, but working alot with fiberglass over the span of 14 years helps :tup:

glad it worked out. now you gotta bring that thing out for the next big meet!

 

[pinellas50]

Re: Restoration under way

Assembly is complete:

Now I need to take it back for high speed buffing, some light wet sanding, and for them to fix a spot on the hood that cracked. I'll put the decals on it when I get it back from that. And then I'll spend many days cleaning up the interior.

I am also going to try and adjust the rear bumper. It is kind of sitting goofy.

 

[SYO237]

Re: Restoration under way

that thing looks really good now