Week 3

Another week and guess what, more rust removal.  Having tackled the cowls last week, I returned my attention to the back half.  As I am still new at this blogging thing, I dove into the work and forgot to take pictures throughout the process.  I will try to do better as I move forward.  At the rate I'm going, there might only be a couple more weeks of rust removal before I can move to mechanical work.  The rust removal has gone much quicker than I anticipated.  Of course I've not tried painting and sanding so I may still end up with a lot more work to clean everything up.  So far though, almost all that I have done is either underneath or hidden.  It doesn't have to be pristine.  Soon I will have to work on fenders.  I will be taking my time then to ensure they are perfect.  I will not glob on body filler, even if I have to weld and grind for days.

Door shut area outside view with the door shut already removed

Door shut area inside view

The bottom of the door shut area is the bottom of the inner wheel well so needs to have a radius flange.  How do you make a radius flange if you don't have a bead roller?  Well, I cut slices in the flange.

The slices allow the metal to be shaped to match the contour.

After the metal has been shaped properly, I weld in the gaps between the slices and then grind back down to appear as a single piece of metal again.  Time consuming vs. the proper equipment but I don't do enough of this to justify buying EVERY tool (just most of them).

The frame rails did finally arrive and fit pretty well.  Its also nice that the previous owner took measurements for spacing, height of spacers and location of cowl.

After leveling the frame, mounting the rails on the obligatory spacers, rails are level too.

With the rails mounted, I can move the cowl back onto the frame to see just how it fits.

Like a glove.  Well like a glove after several hours of tweaks and adjustments.  Next week, hinges and doors installed.  By then, I will hopefully have enough of the rust removed from the rear to ensure gaps are correct front and back.