Projects 41 plymouth coupe 392 hemi build thread

Eric, you are a machine my friend. I remain amazed at the quality of your work.

 

Eric, you're doin' a lotta work and with every bit you develope new skills, not afraid of anything! i love that! now i'm sure we'll meet the next years at a carshow, BBQ or whatever in company of our two beautiful cars!

Cheers to you, my friend.

 

Thank you for the praise Allen. I'm probably going to spend most of tomorrow with a hammer and dolly on the new piece as I now have very good access.

 

Thank you Carsten! I must admit that I was a little hesitant to take the two skins apart, but it had to be done. Now I'm glad I did. This, in my opinion, is the only way to completely go through a car. Once the car is completed, I'll know a 100% sure, that everything has been done properly.

Looking forward to the next time we meet up!

 

Exactly, Eric, after going thru a car that way you know what you've built! and if you're nosy for the first ride i'm sure it feels like this:



and a little advice from me: if you're in doubt, just take an inch more....



Cheers mate!

 

Thanks for the encouraging words and pics Carsten!

 

Nice work Eric. It probably would have been faster and easier to build a small english wheel than all the work you put into that panel but really nice job of working with what you had.

 

Thank you K13! You are correct and read my mind. I figured that if I was unable to fabricate the correct curvature, I would build an English wheel. I may still build one in the future though. For the time being, it's hammer and dolly time tomorrow to get the panel smooth.

 

wow, that trunk lid was bad. good luck with the repair. your coupe is coming along fine.

 

Whoa. That is some serious work on that trunk lid. My next step on mine is to narrow the trunk lid at the bottom to make it fit better. Any ideas on how best to accomplish that? i'd say I need to narrow it about 5/16-3/8" but it has to taper from about midway to the bottom.

 

If you absolutely had to narrow it, I would pie cut the both sides as close to the edge as possible (no more than half an inch away) so that the heat would have less of a chance to warp. Take a 4 1/2 or an air grinder with a cut off blade or and start with a straight slit up only as far as you need to get it even. Start at the top making your spot welds and as you go down you can widen your gap and weld, widen gap weld, etc. This does two things, reduces the chances of warping and keeps you from cutting too big of a gap. You can hammer an dolly as you go along also to even further minimize the warpage. Good luck.

 

The compound curve for the deck lid can be done with a hammer and block of steel. Just keep tapping away.

This is basically stretching it same as an ewheel would do.

 

I've thought about your problem Rock and I think what Allen (Smokeybear) says is the best way. It more than likely does mean that you will need to separate the two lids in order to get proper access. OR, you could make some access holes in the inner lid so you can use your dolly, but this will not be ideal. Warpage will be your worst enemy, so take care not to get too much heat in the metal. I always try to use as many clamps as possible when welding, letting it cool down with the clamps in place and using my hammer to de-stress the surrounding areas. Seems to work for me.

 

That's sort of what I was thinking, too. Thinking about it and having it turn out well are two different things, however. Always good to get some second opinions. Thanks.

 

Most of the day was spent with my hammers and dollys....and the odd bit of welding. I managed to get the right hand side welded up, while combatting warpage all the time. It work out good. Also used some heat to shrink 3 of the high spots. This also worked surprisingly well. In btween hammering and welding, I use this special red paint. Once dry, I use sandpaper to find the high spots, and this indicates the areas requiring attention. I'll be continuing with the deck lid next week, as it's off to work and cruise the European skies.

 

Thank you plmczy. Slowly but surely the list of things to do is getting shorter.

 

no comment

 

more dutch hamb meet ,sorry for the spam eric
http://s1170.photobucket.com/albums/r531/DianavanNeck/?albumview=slideshow

 

Thanks for the pics Art! I love this one!

 

That deck lid is going to need some serious work, but I see you will get it done in style. What was the PO thinking when he "fixed" that? Awesome work farmer12.

 

Looks to me like it could sure use a whole new skin. Do you know anybody with an English Wheel who knows how to use it? Will be very difficult to "fix it" without a whole lot of mud involved.

Dale

 

If you've read the whole build thread, Eric will hammer away at the deck lid until it is so smooth that no bondo will be required. Getting a whole new skin would be the easy way out. Just wait til you see the end result, he has amazed me time after time. Looking good farmer12.

 

eric you can drop the lid any time and ill fix it for you, if you want we can do it together on my english wheel ,

Art

 

Eric, now that is an offer I'd take him up on . . . it really does need a new skin. Trying to Frankenstein it will actually take more time/work than making a new skin and the results probably won't compare. Even to fix what you have, you need to remove the skin - might as well just replace it.

Just my 3 cents . . .

 

Thanks for the offer Art, but with another day or two of welding and hammering, I'll have it looking as good as new. It's just another challenge.

 

now that's a nice slideshow, enjoyed very much, thanks! now i know it's easy to meet some hambers, i only have to make a roadtrip to NL when Betty is finished! looking forward to that!

and Eric, i know your trunklid will come out as smooth as a teenie's skin when you're finished!

keep on with that, see you!

Carsten

 

Eric...I love that you would rather spend weeks fixing something yourself than pay someone to do it in a day or two...I don't have your skill but every time I consider paying some on to do something on my car, I just can't bring my self to do it! I still can't believe the quality of work you turn out with a realtivly pedestrian amount of tools! Keep it up, its inspirational to the rest of us!

 

?????? How come you guys are sitting at the kids table?

 

do i hear a sponsor talking?

 

Thats the spirit Eric, you can alway go the easy way another time