'32 Ford Quarter Panels for $25 DOLLARS EACH

Let's start Tech week with some home brew, down to earth metal HOW TO........
We all know- all it takes is money to buy Early Ford sheet metal when yours is crap or just plain missing!. well that may just be the problem,we all aint gots all the money we need -now do we?
Herein, I am gonna help out the poor hotrodder who wants what he cannot afford to buy.

I did these for a job I was doing a while back and think you may enjoy seeing my solution to a common problem....
[BTW] this will also apply to many other similar style and year cars like Model A's and early odd brand cars...

1- First I did make a posterboard pattern off a nice Original 32 Quarter panel of the "flattest" area of the Ford part.
2-
Then I placed the pattern on som 18 Ga -cold roll sheet and cut it out.
3-
Next I had the body lined up appropriately to maintain the shape of the rear body with the quarters both missing and all.
4-now we will sorta step by step walk ya thru the rest of the making of quarter panels for little cash!

 

Now we set the gap at the door line between the sheet stock part of this panel and the door and the little area of the old quarter attaching peices[above and behind door]........
BTW there was no wheeling or shaping done on this flat section -it is just installed as cut and is later twisted to match the roll in of the beads at rear......

 

Note that the "reveal" at the lower front of new part is seperate.
I hammer formed it over a peice of appropriate size pipe and then "hammerd in" the "corner form" to where it engages the new wheel opening beads....
all these shaped portions are then going to be welded to the flat sections.

 

The bead around the wheel openings are now formed.
I did this by using 1" Galvanized electric conduit,
It was shaped by placing it around a tire on a parked car and pulling it up and around that tire for a roll shaping buck!!
after initially bending it to a "round" shape I then adjusted it to shape by bending it back some, by hand till it fit the wheel opening shape of the flat sections....
THEN=comes the super secret part of this tech....
to duplicate this reveal stamping we simply use a cut off tool with a .40thousandths wheel and slice it directly in half-which in turn yeilds you a matched pair of deuce reveal stampings.....
same thing on those upper quarter reveals too......
REMEMBER-
ALL THE GALV needs to be ground off of these if using this material instead of mild steel,before ya weld on it....

 

Great fix. This is the kind of stuff we read the HAMB for! Now, will you be diluting Bondo and spraying it on to finish and Rust-O-Leum or tractor enamel to paint it?

Brian

 

Next we are gonna form the upper /top peices we are missing on the quarters....
I also had actual size patterns from a good part on these...You will see that on a 32 and other cars there is also a stamped reveal next to trunk opening I made as the others that were formed....

I did not have my E wheel at the time I did these so I just pounded the parts out as I could and adjusted by relief cuts as needed,If you got a wheel you can easily duplicate these parts.
I had to also make a flat part that wil later end up being the side of trunk opening and used it as a shape form for these upper peices....
things are not shapin up and are temporarily tack welded together at this time....

 

DISCLAIMER=
Now is probably a good time to quell the squeals by the all metal crowd on whether there is gonna be any plastic on these parts or not.
Yes it will require a small skim and blocking .
Lets put it this way- I would not be afraid to simply eat that much body filler,and have over the years by the way- so If you cannot deal with it on that level I suggest you simply whip out that CreditCard and purchase a set of new quarters at about 2 grand and enjoy em!
ON with the tech....
Now I am sure this is the part of these quarters you thought you cannot duplicte realistically....
By that I mean the lower rear peice that is a double dip of Ford artwork in the original 32 Quarters......
I did it this way...
first I traced the patter onto a peice of flat stock and then I cut it out with a 1/4" of spare metal all around the perimeter for safety in case I was off....
I then hand hammered the edges of this peice on top[END] of a peice of round bar stock I have that was about 2" in diameter.....
Here is a pic or two=

 

Now...
Welding this all together.
I personally do not use a tig and envy you if ya have one. So I mig weld all my work, this is an aquired skill and afted 37 years at this I am getting better.
I usually use a higher setting than a lot of guys do and merely do hot spot welds evenly spaced and jump around in an effort to keep the heat evenly dispersed...

By hi settings I mean I do not use a 110 mig welder on my sheet metal I am usinhg a 220 Volt Hobart 210 Amp welder set on #3 setting and #3 wire speed. this imparts a hot spot weld that penetrates thru placing a spot weld that is evenly centered-[same amount of bead inside as outside]....
This allows you the feedom to then grind the part flush and not leave a crack prone repair....
another tip on heat input is this-
we are not building a bridge here =its sheet stock- move around a lot- place quick 1 second timed spots.-NO BEADS-
by keeping your unused hand on the work area is a good indicator of too much heat input into the work peice... just remember if you cannot lay that hand on the part you have too much heat in that area.....

 

Good start for Tech Week!

 

Here are some more pics of the nearly finished parts.

I hope I have adequately explained the process and I think a lot of you guys can benefit from this ,as these are an expensive repro and hard to get original part.....

As you see I used some small "braces" inside to align and hold the part in shape while welding- these could be left i place or removed -your choice-

Now remember you can also warp your parts badly with that grinding as well as welding...use an 1/8" thick wheel on the air grinder or even a stack of 3-4 cut off wheels left over of a small diameter....

I use the EDGE of wheel on these beads[I know instant death] and that way you are not ever heating the flatwork around these welds -just removing the beads..JUST NEVER RUN SANDER FULL TILT=.then I use a 24 grit sanding disc to finish em down for the bodywork stage....
You will notice I show these in metal so you can see that it can be done -I am sure there are better metal guys than me so quality level will vary, try this your self and see what you can do with them....

 

Welllllll, There ya have it =the answer to your dilemma.
I used about a 4X8 sheet of 18 ga Cold roll=37 dolla's
and a stick or three of Conduit=3 dollars each...
Anyway ,hope I passed the audition.....
Thanks ///-ENJOY//// and I hope this helps someone out
/Kenny

 

Hey Choprods! Good to see ya.
I have had good luck doing the welding on the *inside* of the car where you join the split conduit to the big panel in this picture

 

Looks great so far!!

 

I would also suggest this when MIG welding sheetmetal. Less grinding, and a stronger weld left at full depth.

 

Awesome tech.

Thanks for posting and including the details about the spot weld technique.

 

Great tech,
very informative. You could use muratic acid to remove the galvanizing off the conduit.



Ago

 

Great tech and it's nice to see you hanging out... Haven't seen you much lately.

-Abone.

 

Kenny is back posting!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Fantastic! This will come in very handy.

 

Nice tech!! Great for those of us with more time than money or for cars that repops are not available.

I'd be curious to know how many labor hours you have in one side (layout through welds being ground)?

 

wow imagine that, making stuff with rocks sticks and fire, no magic, no spendy tools, and no bullshit. Great job,, my kinda tech!

 

Great tech! Not to be picky but is there a photo of how much original was there before you tacked the new sheet to the car? I am imagining just air, but then it would be much harder to get the body curves into the new sheet. I can't imagine your sheet is just sitting on top of the old rusty quarter. Thanks.

 

nice work!

 

Kennys specialty 1 sows ear= 2 kid gloves, Nice bud. Cal

 

Kenny/choprods skills are good enough that it would only take a little more effort and no bondo would be needed

 

Nice!

 

Sure is nice to see one of the more talented guys on this board back posting. I'm guessing we might see more if there was more appreciation and less bull shit about this stuff. Good to have you share some wisdom Kenny.

Frank

 

I love these lo-buck metalwork tech threads, nice work !

 

Hell yeah, great tech, thanks for posting..

 

Love this! Even if you're building something else, the ideas can be used elsewhere.