69 rustbucket rebirth

vetteman_72 · Oct 30, 2018

Nice! Been following along for a while,I bet it is a great feeling and incentive to push on!

ZEN357 · Oct 30, 2018

Good Luck!!! That's a heck of a lot of rust to deal with!!!

tp_smith · Oct 30, 2018

You just turned the corner. Congratulations. I wish I could say it gets easier from now on but it does not.

I miss my jig. I could spin my car 360 degrees anytime. Now with rubber tires it just goes forward and backward. No more spinning.

How in the world did you thread the rear axle between the leaf springs? Did you have help?

350sshugger · Oct 30, 2018

allanjs said:
Nice work Matt. It's exciting to get the car back on all 4's.

vetteman_72 said:
Nice! Been following along for a while,I bet it is a great feeling and incentive to push on!

ZEN357 said:
Good Luck!!! That's a heck of a lot of rust to deal with!!!

tp_smith said:
You just turned the corner. Congratulations. I wish I could say it gets easier from now on but it does not.

I miss my jig. I could spin my car 360 degrees anytime. Now with rubber tires it just goes forward and backward. No more spinning.

How in the world did you thread the rear axle between the leaf springs? Did you have help?

Thanks guys! I've actually got more to post but ran out of time last night. Please chime in because the problems are looming......

Patrick I'm going to be reading your fender posts. The axle was a wrestling match involving a floor jack, cherry picker, and good ol bench pressing. Nothing got scratched and nothing got broken (including me) :grin2:.

350sshugger · Oct 30, 2018

Update continued.....

I ran out of time last night because Flickr wasn't playing nice. Anyway, I installed the Fenders. Here's what I've got.

The upper body lines line up but I don't like how it was achieved.

Passenger:

Driver:

This picture was taken after I racked the front end while it was bolted together until my diagonal measurements were the same. I then tightened downt the radiator support mounts. The only way I can match the door lines as shown above gives me these big gaps at the cowl. Thoughts?

travisch · Oct 30, 2018

The tops of your doors need to come in. Once this is done then the fenders will be brought in to align with the new door position and the cowl to fender gap will shrink.

350sshugger · Oct 30, 2018

Still having some trouble. Maybe it's my iPad.

I don't like the number of shims under the fenders. Same for both, and both would need enlarging the holes for the firewall bolts to be up this high.

Also causes some problems here:

Installing the hood makes the passenger side look ok. Maybe the problem is mostly the driver side, but that doesn't solve the shim stack issue.

Assembled is is great motivation though. Actually looks like a Camaro!

350sshugger · Oct 30, 2018

travisch said:
The tops of your doors need to come in. Once this is done then the fenders will be brought in to align with the new door position and the cowl to fender gap will shrink.

The doors are already aligned to the quarters and rockers. I've read multiple times to align the doors to the quarters and the fenders to the doors. I'd have to tweak the doors which I have tried to do with limited success and I find it interesting that both are exactly the same. Not disagreeing just trying to think it through. I may have to see if I can move the doors to make both panels happy the next time I work on it.

travisch · Oct 30, 2018

Aligning the doors to the rockers is correct. Humor me and try loosening the hinge bolts up on the door side top hinge - not completely loose. Leave them semi snug. Close the door and then push in on the top corner where the mirror mounts pushing it in. It doesn't take much.
I didn't worry about the shim stack size - its takes what it takes but get everything fitting good first. I bet that as you get closer to perfection the number of shim count will be reduced some.
Also remember that these cars didn't have perfect gaps when new so you may be trying to obtain the unobtainable to some degree. If you do want PERFECT gaps then you will be doing some metal work. On the plus side you are using original sheetmetal. If you were using aftermarket the fight for alignment is a much bigger fight.

tp_smith · Oct 31, 2018

Wow that is a lot of shims. But your fender looks close the first try. The extra number of shims is telling you something. What, I don't know.

Driver fender:
Notice the middle body line on the fender is higher than the door. Remove the bottom fender bolt that is next to the door. Align the upper part of the fender with the door. Tighten the upper fender bolt that is hidden by the door. Now push down on the top of the fender next to the cowl panel. When you push down the metal does not go straight down. It travels in a small arc. Hopefully the gap will close enough between the fender and cowl.

really_n0b0dy · Oct 31, 2018

I'm new to your build thread... Just amazing what you've accomplished. I'll be trying to fit my front end soon, this is motivation.

Sosh67 · Nov 2, 2018

350sshugger said:
travisch said:

The tops of your doors need to come in. Once this is done then the fenders will be brought in to align with the new door position and the cowl to fender gap will shrink.

Click to expand...

The doors are already aligned to the quarters and rockers. I've read multiple times to align the doors to the quarters and the fenders to the doors. I'd have to tweak the doors which I have tried to do with limited success and I find it interesting that both are exactly the same. Not disagreeing just trying to think it through. I may have to see if I can move the doors to make both panels happy the next time I work on it.

I followed the same process as you. Align the doors to the quarter, the bottom of the door to the rocker and then the fenders to the doors.

I have 4 shims on each side of the top fender mount. All the metal is original. I can't recall the shim thickness I used. But, I kept all my shims grouped as they were removed. I did add 1 shim to each side to improve the door to fender alignment.

I had to add shims just below the pillar post to push the fender out from the body to ensure the top of the door would not rub the fender.

Tweaking both enabled me to align the fenders to the door.

You have so much more new metal and fabrication to your vehicle that it might be something else.

You might have to adjust that top hinge and see if you room to push the top front of the door in a bit. That would allow you to possibly pull your fenders closer to the cowl panel.

Sosh67 · Nov 2, 2018

P.S. I really want to see your car on the road!

tp_smith · Nov 2, 2018

Is it cold up there in the great white north? :smile2: It is miserably cold here (47 degree F) this morning. We are all dressed up in our eskimo outfits of hoods and gloves. I bought a new truck with an engine block heater. Does that gadget heat the oil or the water in the engine?

Matt,
Temporarily install the stainless molding that goes around the windshield. The bottom corner of the molding touches the top of the fender. Mr. Tim from Manorville, NY suggested this tip to me. You cannot move the glass up if the fender happens to be too high.

Sosh67 · Nov 2, 2018

tp_smith said:
Is it cold up there in the great white north? /forums/images/Camaros_net_2016/smilies/tango_face_smile.png It is miserably cold here (47 degree F) this morning. We are all dressed up in our eskimo outfits of hoods and gloves. I bought a new truck with an engine block heater. Does that gadget heat the oil or the water in the engine?

Matt,
Temporarily install the stainless molding that goes around the windshield. The bottom corner of the molding touches the top of the fender. Mr. Tim from Manorville, NY suggested this tip to me. You cannot move the glass up if the fender happens to be too high.

The cowl panel should provide a good reference point for fender height as well. But I like the use of the lower window trim as well.

350sshugger · Nov 3, 2018

travisch said:
Aligning the doors to the rockers is correct. Humor me and try loosening the hinge bolts up on the door side top hinge - not completely loose. Leave them semi snug. Close the door and then push in on the top corner where the mirror mounts pushing it in. It doesn't take much.
I didn't worry about the shim stack size - its takes what it takes but get everything fitting good first. I bet that as you get closer to perfection the number of shim count will be reduced some.
Also remember that these cars didn't have perfect gaps when new so you may be trying to obtain the unobtainable to some degree. If you do want PERFECT gaps then you will be doing some metal work. On the plus side you are using original sheetmetal. If you were using aftermarket the fight for alignment is a much bigger fight.

I pretty much did exactly this and it worked brilliantly!

tp_smith said:
Wow that is a lot of shims. But your fender looks close the first try. The extra number of shims is telling you something. What, I don't know.

Driver fender:
Notice the middle body line on the fender is higher than the door. Remove the bottom fender bolt that is next to the door. Align the upper part of the fender with the door. Tighten the upper fender bolt that is hidden by the door. Now push down on the top of the fender next to the cowl panel. When you push down the metal does not go straight down. It travels in a small arc. Hopefully the gap will close enough between the fender and cowl.

I had sat on it and nothing happened. It was hard tight.

really_n0b0dy said:
I'm new to your build thread... Just amazing what you've accomplished. I'll be trying to fit my front end soon, this is motivation.

Thanks!

Sosh67 said:
I followed the same process as you. Align the doors to the quarter, the bottom of the door to the rocker and then the fenders to the doors.

I have 4 shims on each side of the top fender mount. All the metal is original. I can't recall the shim thickness I used. But, I kept all my shims grouped as they were removed. I did add 1 shim to each side to improve the door to fender alignment.

I had to add shims just below the pillar post to push the fender out from the body to ensure the top of the door would not rub the fender.

Tweaking both enabled me to align the fenders to the door.

You have so much more new metal and fabrication to your vehicle that it might be something else.

You might have to adjust that top hinge and see if you room to push the top front of the door in a bit. That would allow you to possibly pull your fenders closer to the cowl panel.

I did this and it worked great!

Sosh67 said:
P.S. I really want to see your car on the road!

Me toooooooo! :grin2:

tp_smith said:
Is it cold up there in the great white north? :smile2: It is miserably cold here (47 degree F) this morning. We are all dressed up in our eskimo outfits of hoods and gloves. I bought a new truck with an engine block heater. Does that gadget heat the oil or the water in the engine?

Matt,
Temporarily install the stainless molding that goes around the windshield. The bottom corner of the molding touches the top of the fender. Mr. Tim from Manorville, NY suggested this tip to me. You cannot move the glass up if the fender happens to be too high.

Great tip on the trim. It helped me locate everything the same for both sides. I was impressed how much help just having the trim on was. It is cold, been in the high to mid 30's with rain the past few weeks. 47F would get me to put on a hooded sweatshirt :grin2:. Today is sunny and 51 so I had on a flannel shirt while in the garage. When I go to Florida to visit family I melt outside. My blood is too thick for that sweltering hot stuff you southern boys have. The block heaters heat the water to keep them toasty. I've never needed one for a gas engine. I think my duramax has one.

Sosh67 said:
The cowl panel should provide a good reference point for fender height as well. But I like the use of the lower window trim as well.

Yes, the cowl and the trim together worked fantastic!

350sshugger · Nov 4, 2018

Here we go. Round 2. :boxing:

Travis was on the money. I took off the fenders. I loosened the top hinge and pushed the doors in then tightened the hinge back down. I took some steel tubing and stuffed it in the back of the door and gave a yank in a twist motion to line them back up to the quarters. Here's the results.

You will notice the trim doesn't sit perfect on the fenders. The repro trim clips for the edge are not bent correctly and are holding the ends up in the air. Pushing down on the trim (bending the clips) makes everything line up perfectly. Yet another part to modify.

I am really happy with these gaps!

Small tweaks will have these looking very good. In the front, I've got some interference between the valence, the fender extensions, and the forward portion of the inner fenders. I'm not sure what it is yet but seems to be coming mostly from the drivers side. It could be the drivers front damage pushing in toward the center of the car.

Sosh67 · Nov 4, 2018

350sshugger said:
Here we go. Round 2. <img src="http://www.camaros.net/forums/images/smilies/boxing.gif" border="0" alt="" title="Boxing" class="inlineimg" />

Travis was on the money. I took off the fenders. I loosened the top hinge and pushed the doors in then tightened the hinge back down. I took some steel tubing and stuffed it in the back of the door and gave a yank in a twist motion to line them back up to the quarters. Here's the results.

You will notice the trim doesn't sit perfect on the fenders. The repro trim clips for the edge are not bent correctly and are holding the ends up in the air. Pushing down on the trim (bending the clips) makes everything line up perfectly. Yet another part to modify.

I am really happy with these gaps!

Small tweaks will have these looking very good. In the front, I've got some interference between the valence, the fender extensions, and the forward portion of the inner fenders. I'm not sure what it is yet but seems to be coming mostly from the drivers side. It could be the drivers front damage pushing in toward the center of the car.

I am so happy you were able to get the gaps square. The cowl alignment looks great! As does the alignment to the doors. I think you are on the right track. Great job!

350sshugger · Nov 11, 2018

Welp....:sad:

Never ends. So, I tried fitting the front metal again and something was pushing the lower valence way out of whack. I pretty much nailed it down to the damage on the left fender. Comparing the contour between the fenders with my contour gauge shows the drivers front is way off. I knew it was off but it is like 1/4" off. This brings the fender extension flange in toward the center of the car too far and makes it near impossible to install the valence.

I cleaned off the inside of the fender and had a bodyman I know look at it. He says the metal is stretched and no matter what we do it won't be right and will take a bunch of filler.

You can see the crease from the original damage.

So I pulled out my original junk fender and this area is in decent shape. I am contemplating grafting this section from my junk fender onto the good fender. Am I crazy for considering this?

dhutton · Nov 11, 2018

Should be doable. Measure carefully and planish your welds.

Don

69 rustbucket rebirth

vetteman_72

ZEN357

tp_smith

350sshugger

350sshugger

travisch

350sshugger

350sshugger

travisch

tp_smith

really_n0b0dy

Sosh67

Sosh67

tp_smith

Sosh67

350sshugger

350sshugger

Sosh67

350sshugger

dhutton

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