Technical Help with radiusing Willys rear fenders?

hi after reviewing your post and after reading others 31 vickey hit the nail on the head. my brother and i have been willys for a very long time and had many. race cars street rods the list goes on. and when willys were made from the factory just like the fords etc. they had one person assembling the left side and one person assembling the right. each side would never be exact to the other. even if you swapped parts from one car to another a lot of times the piece would not line up correctly.i know this for a fact I've experienced this many times. as a matter of fact I'm having that problem with my new build 39 willys pu. you need to message each side or item separately. so measurements made on one side may not be exactly the same for the other.they will only get you in the ballpark. good luck. ps the fellow that wrote in saying his dad has a set of finished fenders may have the same problem on your car because the bodies were built by many different workers.

 

Hey Speedbump, I totally see that now so I guess we can call ourselves Willy's Engineers since we have to make stuff fit to what we want it to be, back then they must not have took the time to make both sides of the car match where we are a lot more picky about how we want the car to look when we get done with it. Well in my book that's why we do the challenge of the build we want things to match and fit. I have had friends say why are you being so picky you can only look at one side of the car at a time, but they just don't get it in are minds, we know and want stuff to look right when it is a finished build.

 

Bump this up, maybe there might be some new comments about this thread.

 

heres how I do it, get some moroso 3/8 aluminum gas line.( bends like butter) bend it around your rear slick to get a perfect radius. after you get the rear end in square, with the fenders off, put your slicks on the car,(make sure you have your desired ride height in the rear) now mock up the fender in bolt on position, it will have to be balanced up on milk crates and some wood. the fender will be out from the body, stand back and line up the fender top where it bolts to the body and stand back from the car and line that up with the body so it looks like its bolted perfect to the fender well when looking at it from the side.(you have to stand back a bit) now take your gas line radius and hold it up to the fender and line it up till you get your desired radius tire clearance.( I usually measure mine all the around the radius to make it perfectly even) tape it in place so you can mark it with a marker on the bottom side of the tubing. cut the radius on your fender, you can use 3/8 inch brake line and weld that from behind to the edge for a perfect rolled edge. I garantee you will get both sides symmetrical and it will turn out perfect, heres some pictures.

 

When I did my 55 Chevy, I bent up a piece of 3/8 flat bar stock, and bent it at 90 degrees on both ends, and ground the ends down to sharp points. I bent one end was long enough to sit in the center of the axle ( the stock indentation in the center) and the other end so that I could use it as a scribe to keep the opening concentric with the rear tires. Once I had my mark, I cut it 1/2" inside the line to leave enough metal to bend the metal to give me a 1/2" lip when finished. Once you have your rear fenders both marked out, than you can do it the Larry did the Mystery Willys.
Here is his thread picking it up where he is radiusing the rear fenders on his coupe.
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/beside-the-barn-willys-find.480358/page-17
My 55 Chevy rear quarter