Project '64 Cheapskate

[Corts60]

Originally Posted by chevyrestoguy

especially if the scavengers tried to gut the interior armed with only a cresent wrench and a claw hammer, which is very common out here.

Seriously. And now that saws-all's are easier and cheaper to get, it is even more dangerous out there.

[chevyrestoguy]

This truck lived a hard life, and had a cabover camper for a good part of it's life that caused a lot of issues. The rear cab mounts are broken, and there are areas all over the truck where the metal is torn because of the forward camper support struts and the spare tire that was mounted in front of the grille. I grabbed the driver's side cowl extension to show you some of the damage:


The metal is torn badly, and the previous owner drilled numerous holes. The paint on the truck is original, and I want to save what's there because I like the patina. This repair is going to be tricky because I have to hammer and dolly the metal back into place, shrink the stretched areas, make a few patches, and at the same time save as much of the original paint as I can. I saw a link on this site about a guy in Texas who used CLR and a Scotchbrite on his '59 ElCamino with AMAZING results, so I just had to try it for myself:


CLR is amazing! I used very little with some hot water and just light hand pressure on the Scotchbrite.


As soon as it warms up I'm doing the entire truck!!! I'm still working on the repair of the cowl extension, and I'll post more pics soon.

[chevyrestoguy]

Here is the panel after I did a bunch of hammer and dolly work and slowly stitched the torn areas back together. I drilled about 15 .098 holes to stop-drill all of the cracks. The cracks had spread everywhere. Getting it all dollied and stitched back together helped get the outer shape back to where it needed to be. I'm still deciding on whether to make the patch panels the circular shape or just cut a large square panel that fixes them in one shot. The skin was also torn around the edge of the entire area where it meets the cowl, an area about 10" total. I still have to fill the 1/2" hole in the front corner, but that'll be a snap.

[Fat Mike]

Originally Posted by chevyrestoguy

Here is the panel after I did a bunch of hammer and dolly work and slowly stitched the torn areas back together. I drilled about 15 .098 holes to stop-drill all of the cracks. The cracks had spread everywhere. Getting it all dollied and stitched back together helped get the outer shape back to where it needed to be. I'm still deciding on whether to make the patch panels the circular shape or just cut a large square panel that fixes them in one shot. The skin was also torn around the edge of the entire area where it meets the cowl, an area about 10" total. I still have to fill the 1/2" hole in the front corner, but that'll be a snap.

Question for you? In the picture above when you grinded the welded surface down why is there a black lowered edge around the weld zone? Can you prevent this? When I am welding sometimes I have these lowered darkened areas and would like to learn how to prevent it? I am asking you because you seem to have a craftsmanship way above and beyond.