Technical how did you first major body work go

Right now I'm in the process of converting a sedan to a coupe in my 47 Ford project. Did all the measurements cut all the same lines. My cuts didn't come out perfect but I think I got everything pretty close. I was wondering, from seasoned vets on the HAMB, how did your first project like this go? Did everything fall into place, or is there going to be a fair amount of SWAGing it no matter how careful you are?

 

Not sure that I am a seasoned vet, but there is lots of just making stuff work out since even the factory had major variances in fit. What we all consider as good gaps, etc. is typically way beyond what the factory produced.

 

Started doin body work in high school. Looked at magazines and read the label on a can of bondo.
Turned out great.
Looked just like a 15 year olds body work should.
I have learned a lot of patience since then.
Measure, plan, make patterns, check patterns, follow patterns.
You still make adjustments.
How you handle the adjustments is where the experience pays off.
That’s the biggest difference from a 15 year old me and me now.

 

Converting a sedan to a coupe is a ambitious project if this is your first attempt, I have learned if you measure a lot before you cut things generally work out for the best, you are a braver man than I Gunga Din. HRP

 

My experience is about the same. Had old timer's showing me to stuff rust holes with Chore Girl scrubbers so the bondo had something to grab on to. I was pretty proud of the results and like you said it looked like a 15 year old did it.

 

Fortunately I found myself working with some talented old guys a few years later.
Learned how to skip most of the bondo part.

 

Have a look at my build thread in my signature. I'm more of a grinder than a welder, but I'm a better welder and all around fabricator than I was. The more you do the less mystifying it gets and after awhile you're not intimidated to cut, weld, fabricate... anything.

 

I chopped a deuce 5 window way back and didn't have a clue. Could probably fix that now but where did it go?

 

at 16 I cut the back of an International pickup cab off and grafted it onto a '56 New Yorker to make a Chryslermino,
long way from being done but pieces were fitting pretty good.
'went to Alaska for three months and neighborhood kids trashed it..
sold it to the scrapper for $25.00

next major "custom" job was at 20 or so, a '36 Plymouth coupe, chopped, channeled, sectioned, wheel wells raised and '35 Dodge cowl and windshield section grafted on.
it was rough but close enough for the girls I went with.
got it on the road for a few years but sold it before it was finished

 

My first was an OT El Camino that had the factory rust holes from a vinyl top right above the windshield . Pan to fire lol but it held up and I eventually sold it to my boss . I didn’t get fired and he filled the back up with beer cans , so I don’t think he cared as long as cans had a place to go .

 

I too have learned to slow down, measure several times, make lots of patterns. We all learn as we go just some learn more than others.

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Ive been cutting up 4 different old Chevys to make 1. Been working on it for 4+ years now. Getting closer every day (that I work on it). I was afraid to cut the first one up but now I like the sawzall!!

 

Did not go well. I bought a 63 Olds starfire with a baseball-size dent on the left rear 1/4 panel. One of my fellow club members said "bring it by the shop....we'll fix it." So, I did and we started out knocking the dent out from behind...in the trunk. WE found the metal was stretched so he says...."I'll get the torch"
We heated and cooled with a wet rag...many times. Pretty soon it began to oil can. We heated and cooled until the metal finally cracked! And the damaged area went from a baseball size to a basketball size! I told him thanks but I think we're done here.
I ended up selling the Olds to get something with no hard dents.

 

I'm great at cutting cars up. Putting back together? Not so much.

 

the first major project went pretty well, but I did learn a lot, and it wasn't perfect. Good luck! you won't succeed if you never try.

 

What is considered major? Replaced the nonexistent rockers on a 52 Plymouth and still had doors that opened... patched up so much floor in my Falcons that I could have done it twice each... first car that I actually took hammer and dolly to was my first 63 Galaxie. It had a dent in the roof where another car had been set on it. Managed to pound it out enough to make me happy.

 

Not as extensive as OP project but. . .
This was rotted up to the door handles. Quarters, inner and outer rockers, floor braces, floors, wheelhouses, half the trunk, lower fender patches, inner fender pieces, etc . It was a mess for my first real build. It was. . . And is a great experience

 

First rust repair was peel and stick aluminum patches from Walmart.

 

Slowing down and being patient it's usually the hardest for me. That's why I'm gonna step back and really rack my brains about what I need to do and then take my time doing it

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I have started taking lots of pictures. I sit and look at them at night instead of watching tv. It helps develop a plan

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Wonderful stuff to get a beater passed inspection.

 

Sad part is Bama doesn’t do that.
But I learned how to weld not long after that.

The funny part is the red glazing putty it can with.
Great stuff.

 

There is a great thread here where thunderbirdesq cut a sedan and made a beautiful coupe. Should review it for ideas on how do it right

https://r.tapatalk.com/shareLink/to...&share_fid=11843&share_type=t&link_source=app
All of the pics are gone. This is his current thread.
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I remember the red glazing putty in a tube. lol. I watched an older gentleman who would shoot a lacquer job with two inches of ashes on his cigarette, no mask or anything. Those ashes never fell off his cigarette. LOL.
I shot my first car, it was a 55 chevy hardtop. He came and looked at it and said, hell, yesterday you couldn't even spell bodyman and today you is one!

 

Funny we were just out looking at my 1956 Fury which is on it's second body off since I've had it....still making some things (welds) better. My first body off was a convertible Chevy. I'm still a long way from that High School Power Mech class where we carried in that Crosley Station Wagon body off project for our shop teacher...still learning and watching....

 

My 1st adventure in body work was part of a class in our high school's power mechanics class. A buddy had an uncle that wanted the doors fixed on a 66 Bronco (this would have been 72 or 73). That "10 hour quick" job took the two of us most of the school year. We ended up brazing (the only option available to us at the time) floors, rockers, and door posts (all parts we hand made from flat steel in shop class) onto that Bronco. We were fortunate enough to have a shop teacher that knew how to do body work. When we got done, the doors actually opened and closed better then they did when the truck was new, according to my buddy's uncle. The 2nd project I learned how to gas weld with steel filler rod.

One thing about doing body work is if you actually learn something every time you do it, as you do more projects, you get much better. Gene

 

First what I guess you would call major body work was fashioning a T bucket style body using a Model A cowl I picked up at a swap meet for about ten bucks and the back panel off a mid 20's Dodge touring with sheet metal that I had bought in 4x8 sheets at Central Salvage in Waco. Cut, fit and tack together with my little Monkey wards stick welder and then take to work and use the torch to weld it. I sold it before I got too far with it and about two years later when I was hunting a T bucket body I drove 40 miles to look at a T bucket body a guy had listed in the little nickle and there the damned thing was. Guy about flipped when I told him that I had put it together and what the parts were. No idea of what ever happened to it.
The first chop on my truck probably rates as a three guy fiasco. We chopped it in my buddy's driveway and non of us knew that we needed to brace the cab or set the door gaps before we braced it. That may go down as one of my greater disasters.

 

My first what I thought to be major body work at the time, I was 17, was some quarter panel work on a 63 Chevy ll Nova of mine.
Looked pretty good untill a guy backed into me in a parking lot and all my body work fell out on the ground.
The guy looked at it and freaked out when he saw the whole quarter panel caved in and split open.
He said crap ...I barely touched you, and I was not even moving, how did it do all that. I just told him that it was probably because his car was alot bigger...
Then he says well I can give you some money but I can't do it through insurance then people started to gather and he pulled me off to the side and says will this help you get it fixed and not mention anything...I looked down and he shoved $200 bucks into my hand , I said ya I can do that , I only give $150 for the car , and he was out of there.
I bought another gallon of bondo and filled it all in again.

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I had a '67 Impala I converted to an SS, I had bought a parts car, should have just used the parts car and scrapped the Impala/ The rear 1/4 panels had the usual north-east rust out. Luckily only the outers. Tin snips, some chimney flashing, self tapping screws and bondo, I was good to go. Primed and touched up with Duplicolor, it looked okay until a few months later when the screws started popping through the bondo.

 

I have been making patch panels since the brass and over lapping days. My first major job to replace the roof (cutting at the posts) on a o/t pick up after my failed attempt to fill a hole from a sun roof. My next MAJOR job was when my daughters o/t car got t boned. I cut it in half (long ways) and welded 2 cars together.