Left for dead: 72 2wd blazer build

[1956cameo]

Critter, Jtrux, Thanks for the info guys. I think removing the dash will be the best route to go to properly fix the rust behind the dash. I did remove the dash to my parts suburban and I think it had about 35 spot welds. That really isn't too bad seeing that the two panels I am taking off of the parts suburban to put onto the blazer had between 40 to 50 spot welds per panel. Thanks again for the replys, hoping to show more progress on Wednesday evening!

[FRENCHBLUE72]

Nice score count me in on the watchin part..

[1956cameo]

Got a little work done on the blazer today. The first thing I did was finish removing the patch panel that I am going to use from the donor truck. It took a little more work than I thought it would. I found that the top part was three plates of metal deep, so I had to re drill the spot welds from the donor panels side. I also had trouble finding a few "Hidden" spot welds.




Here is the comparison of the old panel versus the one that I am going to use off of the donor truck. Things will be much better off once the switch is made.




Well the only spot weld remover bit that I had broke today. The guide wore out and fell off. So while my dad (Muleman100) went to the store for me to get another bit, I started working on taking the windshield out. It was a little bit of a pain to take the windshield chrome off without further damaging it, but other than that this was a quick task.

[1956cameo]

To no suprise I found some rust hiding beneath the windshield weatherstripping. A little more rust than I was hoping to find (which was no rust) but no so much that I get it patched in a couple of hours. This is the drivers side upper corner.




Here is the damage on the passenger side. It is a little more eaten away that the drivers side. I thought that was a little ironic since the kick panel rust is far worse on the drivers side.




It was starting to get a little late in the day and I didn't want to start removing the dash since I didn't have time to complete the job today so I removed parts instead. I removed the A/C system from under the dash, and also removed all of the wiring that was under the dash as well. Since it looks like this project is going to have to sit out in the weather for a while before a slot in the shop opens up I also removed the glovebox door so the SPID didn't get damaged.




My dad has a teenager (Ben) who helps out in the shop in the afternoons once school lets out. Today my dad said that he didn't have much for Ben to do so he let me have him work on my blazer. I gave him an option on a few tasks he could do. He opted to get a wire brush and clean out the pitted up bed. So far a few pinholes have popped up. Not sure if I need to replace the whole bedfloor yet or just do patches. I will have a better idea of what route I need to go when he finishes that task.






That is as far as I was able to get today. Next time I go out I am going to try and take the dash out, put the donor panel in, and start opening up the passenger side kick panel.

[Jtrux]

Looks good, i'm curious to see how the windshield frame turns out.

[Thealien]

Subscribed for an interesting project!

[Critter]

Send Ben my way! Looking good so far.

[jaros44sr]

Originally Posted by Thealien

Subscribed for an interesting project!

Gotta agree! I guess we will find out how one of these things went together at the factory

I think Ben would be a very busy guy, if we could all hire him for a day

[1956cameo]

Critter and jaros44sr, Yeah, I hope he sticks around for a while. It is nice to have someone that can do the time consuming odd jobs while you focus on the more in depth parts of the project.

[BurnoutNova]

I think this will be an awesome build. I really like when a car or truck looks like it could be factory, and gets people who think they know everything about everything. I'll be watching for sure.

[1956cameo]

Well I had this week off of work so I was able to make some progress. Last Friday I was planning on working on the blazer but since it was brutally cold and very windy I decided to go pick up some parts needed for this project. My dad and I headed out to the Dallas area that morning and got to board member ShanesChevys at about lunch time. We chatted for a little while and checked out all of his rides and then loaded up my much needed parts and hit the road.

I picked this very nice radiator core support from Shane.





I was also able to get a solid passenger side fender from him. The drivers side fender was a fender my dad picked up at one of the local swap meets.





After leaving Shanes house in Ft. Worth we headed down to Midlothian, to board members 14u2nv's house. Here I was able to get a rear seat for my blazer.





He was generous enough to give me a jack hold down set up for my blazer.

[1956cameo]

As much as I didn't want to take the dash out I knew it needed to be done if I was going to properly replace the drivers side inner cowl panel. Here is a shot of the dash after it was removed.





A shot of the bare dash area.





With the dash now out of the way I was able to completely remove the inner cowl panel.





An inside shot of the removed inner cowl panel.





All of the areas that will be sealed back up were cleaned, prepped and primered. I used weldable primer so it wouldn't just burn off whenever we welded the panels back together.

[1956cameo]

The donor inner cowl panel was also prepped and primered in weldable primer.





It didn't take much manipulating to get the donor cowl to line up into place. We placed a couple of clamps on it and started welding the panel in.





Everything fit like the original panel did by the time we got done welding it in. After everything cooled off I went ahead and put seam sealer over all of the seams. Some of it burned when putting the outer cowl panel on, but all of the hard to reach parts are seam sealed.





It took alot of lining up, clamping down, unclamping, trimming, re-lining up, re-clamping, etc... to get the outer cowl panel lined up to make sure the fender and cowl panel would all line up and bolt on properly. This is a shot of the outer cowl in the fitting stage.





I do all of the cutting, measuring, and panel placement, and my dad welds. This seems to be a good system that we have for now, but I know that I really need to learn how to weld for myself.

[1956cameo]

It took a little longer than I was anticipating, and I have ALOT of grinding to do but the outer cowl is back on. So now the drivers side cowl area is back to bieng solid, rust free, and waterproof.





We used a drivers side fender and a cowl to make sure everything was going back together in a way that didn't need a whole lot of shimming to get good gaps between panels. Everything seems to be lining up beautifully; as if nothing was ever replaced.





Thats as far as we were able to get this week. I am hoping to get one or two days worth of work done next week. Hopefully I will get the passenger side cowl finished off by then. Fortunately the passengers side cowl panels don't need nearly as much work.

[lks dcvn]

There is no way I would have tried that - but you made it look easy.

What we don't get to see is the pictures of the repeated removal of the part/trimming/cursing and doing the same thing over and over until it looks spot on -

I think it looks great - NICE JOB!

I wish I lived close to you so you could assist me with my Blazer body work...

I took a small break from my project until the weekend - it is warming up here - 40's this coming week - that is sad when I think that is 'warm'.

[1956cameo]

Thanks for the compliment lks dcvn! The inner panel went on almost too easily, yet the outer panel wanted to settle in high and a little forward. What we ended up doing was tach welding the top in and then using a rubber hammer and a body hammer to massage the panel into the right position. The only part that didn't go in exactly like it came out was the very bottom rear corner, it ended up bieng about 3/8 of an inch high and about the same forward.

I wish I lived closer to other blazer addicts as well! I would definately help you with your project if I did. Hopefully the weather will cooperate for you so you can make some more progress.

[1956cameo]

Well, I got some more work done to the blazer last week and this week. Since I got the drivers side cowls solid I figured the next logical step would be to get the passenger side solid again.


Unlike the drivers side the passenger side cowl was actually in very good shape. The only issue I could see was down where the fresh air vent was there was a rusty area. This is what the cowl looked like before work started.




Of course there was the typical layer of leaves inside once it was opened up.



This was the problem area. The metal around the fresh air vent flap was heavily rusted on the top and the bottom on the piece on the front. Besides that and part of the inner cowl to outer cowl support panel everything was solid beneath the outer cowl panel.



Here is what the area looked like after all of the rotten metal was taken out. Alot less metal missing here than there was at this point on the drivers side.



A comparison of the rotten panel bieng replaced to that of the donor panel that was pulled off of my 72 parts suburban body.

[1956cameo]

It didn't take very long to put all of the clean metal back in.



After the fresh metal was put back in the area was primed and painted flat black. Not sure how well the paint will hold up over time, but I figured it would ad a little extra rust protection.



Before I was able to put the outer cowl panel back on I needed to do a little repairing. The first thing that needed repairing was welding up the flap that someone had made so they could do metal repair by covering up rust with fiberglass.



I also noticed it had a few pinholes poking out behind where the A/C box normally resides. When I looked at the underside of the cowl I noticed that those pinholes were just the tip of the rusty iceburg. There was a whole area that was very pitted and weak.So I marked the area out and cut it out with the plasma cutter.



I used the cut out piece as a template and made a new piece out of flat steel. After a few welds the outer cowl was ready to be put back on.

[Critter]

Good progress!

[1956cameo]

Shot of the repaired original outer cowl welded back onto the blazer.



After finishing the outer cowl I did notice some thin metal on the inner cowl right where the weatherstripping goes.



The rust didn't seem anywhere near severe enough the require tearing out the whole panel, so I simply cut out the section that was rusty.



Replaced the rusty metal with a small patch from what else but the trusty old parts suburban.

[1956cameo]

Got home from working on the blazer that day and my wife told me that there was a big box on the front porch!



Loaded inside was my order of reproduction patch panels. Outer floor sections, rocker panels, bed patches, lower cowl patches, and door pillar patches. I still have to get the rocker box for the drivers side, but I think everything else I will need I will be able to pull of of parts vehicles.



Then what would you know, the next day I come home from working on the blazer and I have two large boxes sitting up against the garage door.




Inside of them was my well worn and mismatched; but affordable and complete set of factory 69-72 blazer bucket seats with all brackets and hardware that I got from fellow board member Toomuchstuff. Even though the one has non factory upholstery, both seats have decent repairable factory foams.



When I went back out to my dad's this today I took the seats and mocked them up in the blazer. I can't wait to see them when they are back in with new upholstery.

[1956cameo]

After playing around with the seats I got started on doing some actual work. Since all of the cowl patching was done it was time to put the dash back in. I put my guide pins (drill bits) into place, and the side bolts to get it lined back into place. All of the bolt holes and drilled out spot welds fit back up beautifully. Here is a shot of it clamped down ready to be welded in.




About an hour later everything was back into place exactly as it had been before.



Another shot of the welded in dash.



After wrapping up on the firewall area I debated whether or not the next area I needed to work on; the upper windshield area or the floor. Since I didn't want to take the top off I decide to start working on the floor section. The majority of the floor is riddled with small rust spots or gouges and dents. I am not sure what someone did to beat the floor up so bad but it is rough. I don't know if I should repair the floor as a whole unit or in sections since the middle section is still in good shape.




The rust issues facing the passenger side rocker panel area.




Just like the cowl panels, the rocker area on the drivers side is in much worse shape than the passenger side.

[1956cameo]

Fortunately my dad is going to let me use a junk cab he had laying around. The cab is very rust free, unfortunately someone cut up and beat up the interior of the cab beyond repair. However the floor and roof are both in still good shape for patches.




Whoever owned this cab before my dad must have been related to the guy that used to own my blazer. The outer edges of the floor and the rocker panels were covered in a layer of fiberglass in an attempt to do rust repair.




A view of the underside of the donor cab. My plan is to take the entire floor panel out of the donor cab as one piece. From there I will determine whether or not I wan't to insert it into the blazer as one piece, or just use it in the areas that are rusty or damaged.




I worked on getting the donor floor out for about an hour before I had to leave today. In that amount of time I was able to remove the drivers side firewall and floor braces. I already know this is going to be a slow process to get this floor out as one piece but it sure is alot cheaper than buying a complete repro floor panel.

[1956cameo]

Critter, Thanks! I wanted to let you know that the parts cab most likely has solid inner cowls so when I get done cutting it up I will get with you on what you need.




Alright I have a question for all of the blazer experts out there. For some reason I always thought that the lower chrome on the blazers were with the black inserts only, and not the woodgrain. Then when I got this blazer it had the woodgrain inserts on the lower chrome. I didn't think much of it and assumed that someone added it. Then I have seen some suppossedly "unrestored original" blazers on the internet with the woodgrain inserts as well. So my question is did the blazers come with black inserts only, or black and woodgrain inserts from the factory? Below is a picture of some of my blazers chrome.

[Jtrux]

Really nice work.