Projects My Apache...

Very nice notch on the rear, I just finished the same set up on my 59. What are you going to do on the front?

 

Yes....cut those old receivers out of the doors and use them

 

dig the truck miss my 58 every day could not hall 3 kids and the misses in my old Jessibelle

 

Thanks Bluedevil, truck came with an 81 camaro clip up front. Im converting to manual steering as well. Chuck, idk what im gonna do with these doors man. If i do decide to keep em ill use the old receivers

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Thanks pandora..

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Hell that truck is in excellent shape!! You wanna see beat go take a look at my uncles 50 gmc!!

 

Man I've given up, the perfect door died in the 60s I imagine. I figure by the time I patch/repair mine or have someone do it. New door is the way to go. And I'm sure there's people who would kill to have some that are as bad as mine just say'in, my .02


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My passenger side door has aluminum flashing wood screwed in and sheeted in bondo, i shit you not. And im having issues with the "good" condition drivers door. Idk man, im so tempted to just grab new doors. Itll eliminate hours of work. I can probably tear the engine down and re assemble with the new parts and re build the front clip in the same amount of hours one door will require. Its insane

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I have never worked with the doors made for these trucks but in my experience all A/M body parts still need extensive work to look and fit exactly like they should. Just keep that in mind before you order new doors.

 

I second that. The floor and firewall I bought were bad ass, but every patch panel had to be cut and reworked. Pain in the ass for sure...

 

I heard some stamps on the original dies (good mark?) I haven't talked to anyone who has actually used a repop door.... I have heard from a lot of people with bad doors.


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Yeah ive never talked to anyone who has used repops either. Maybe ill throw a post out for opinions. also, i just ordered a stainless bolt set from a local vendor i talked to at carlisle truck week. Im just gonna mock the rest of the truck up and worry about doors later. Should have the entire bed on and have the front end on shortly after. Should be nice to see an entire truck again, then its tear down for paint

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I have a repop drivers

 

I have a repop drivers door too.

 

(Repop doors) what brand? How do they fit? Likes/dislikes
Thanks for your input
[Sorry just saw the other post with this question.]


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I'm curious about repop doors also.... Who all makes them, and who's doors are the best.

 

Fill us in fellas !! What brand, fitment, quality, overall worth the price ?

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I bought mine from a fellow on CL and I don't remember the manufacturer but it might have been Goodmark. I remember on the box it said it was licensed GM part. Overall the fitment was good. It seems like it might be a little lighter duty than the original door but that could be my imagination.

Keep in mind that even when these trucks were built that the fit was not great and from what I hear each door had to be fit to the hole. After doing a little bending with a 2x4 on the upper part, it fit pretty good and I'm pretty happy with it. The only complaint I have is that the gap between the inner and outer shell (where the window goes) is a little wider than on my original door. Once the felt channels are installed, the window fits okay in the upper channel but the gap is still too wide at the bottom and the cat's whiskers barely touch the window. Everything else is good though. It's actually better than I thought it would be.

My original door was a lost cause so I cut pieces out of the inner panel to fix the speaker holes on the passenger side that always seem to be present in these doors.

One other thing...in the repop door there are no drain holes in the bottom like the original so this is something I need to address also.

I'm looking forward to hearing what 1959Apache has to say about his repop door.

 

That's good info. I do think Goodmark is the one with GM authorization, and I don't think LMC sells the Goodmark parts...I'm pretty sure theirs are Chinese, Korean or Taiwan made.

 

Lol. I got my '59 from my dad when I was 15. The first thing I did was to remove the AM radio, & add a Pioneer Super Tuner stereo tape deck & cut a 6x9" hole in each door. When I told the sales chick at Pacific Stereo what I was doing, she replied "...your putting JBL 6x9 bi-amp speakers in the doors?????" I said yeah.
BTW, it was probably one of the best sounding car stereos I've ever had. The big empty doors really add some bass punch.
The window regulator is a hell of a lot easier to access too.

Here's an old pic me & my sister. I was 17, 1982...
Check out my primer graphics & Jackman wheels. I also had my NHRA sticker in the windshield corner...Ooooooo

 

Everything is really looking nice man. Really nice work.

 

Bam, you have any pointers for the lower door patches ? Im catchin hell man, probly gonna grab different doors

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I used some on a 55 and they worked well. Fit was good but they were physically lighter. I don't know who made them (Ebay) dealer. Definitely off-shore. I wasn't disappointed at all since original ones are drying up out here...

 

Well this is how I did mine. I picked a place of reference in two spots and measured to the bottom of the door. Then I wrote that measurement down on the door. The I laid the patch over the the door like to have the hinge hold match up and made a temporary cut line. Like so

Then I cut the measurements of the cut line on the old door to the measures of the patch and held my breathe and make the cut and tack the patch in place then measure from the reference point I spoke of earlier and all looked good.

I installed the outter skin and took it to the truck to check things out.

All looked good at this point but wait a min no fenders.lol

I had a gap when I installed the front clip on. So I shimmed everything the best I could and fit the doors the best I could and added metal to make everything fit nice.




I say to fit the doors the best you can and deal with the aftermath the best you can. You can not expect a perfect fit on trucks that were seen as farm and work trucks when Chevy built them. GM had no ideal we would still want these old truck today. They had no idea how cool they are.lol

 

Thats pretty much how i did mine. Everything fits great but the patch just kicks out towards the front of the door. You can see it in the stamping. Inside of the door fits great. Just the frontside profile is way off. I may try to make multiple cuts and bring the profile back in to line. Idk how well thatll work tho. Btw bam those door gaps look incredibly good

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You need to be carefull with these foreign doors because they are sometimes way off. The door I got was made in the Phillipines, shot in black epoxy, needs a little attention. Most of the reproduction parts are made there that are shot in black epoxy (i.e. the cheaper cab corner patches that you used on your truck green and most of the chromed crap). Their quality has been getting better over the years, but still is lacking in some areas. As it was stated before trucks were considered work vehicles so door gaps and stuff of that nature was not as important as other things and they didn't have the quality standards that we have now, so each door had to be fitted to the hole.

Getting back to the door I bought... I will have to do what others have said regarding taking a 2X4 and probably heating the door posts up with a torch to get it to bend to the correct flatness. Overall mine is pretty good, but I will for sure have to work on the door gap for this thing on both sides (passenger side is original and in good shape). I told the guy that I was buying the door from that I will not accept lousy doors, so he got a couple in that were way off and told me that and ordered a couple more until I got one that was good or way better than the rest.

If you can go with a Goodmark or at least Counterpart, but you are paying premium for those doors and they aren't necessarily perfect by any means. For you guys in Northern California there is a really killer junk yard in Truckee that is run by hippy biker type guys... The junk yard starts of with 20's cars and builds its way out in rings 30's, 40's, 50's, etc. I know those guys have some late 50's pickups, but I haven't been in years. Also in Mound House, NV (yes where all the prostitutes are) a couple miles south of Carson City there are a couple really neat junk yards there too, but some have been sold off to scrap yards (some really cool cars too!). Check them out if you can!

You can set your current door flat on the ground and get some measurements and record them from like the edge to the ground and do the same with the replacement doors to find out what you are getting yourself into. That is what I did. My repop drivers door is like 1/4 to 1/2 an inch off on the window frame and a little off with the door gap on the latch side, so I will have to shave some stuff

 

Just had to jump in on thread, you guys are really doing some nice work.

I’m with you about door fit, I got some better used doors for my ‘57 GMC and did a trial fit before removing and repairing bottoms and putting on a preservation coat of paint. While I had them off, I noticed a split on the door window frame just above the bottom sill. I matched up and welded the crack shut. When I put the door back on the upper frame stuck out about a ½ inch with the rest of the door reasonably aligned. Guess I will cut it open, align and weld on the truck. Also the area of the cowl where the door aligns had a 1/8 to 3/16 of body filler to match up with the door profile. Fender alignment is another issue, I decided that I go for as good alignment as factory, which is not all that good. My truck appears to have had a hard life, my cab too had a split at the door frame hinge mount as I saw on Green’s cab photo. I thought mine was caused by collision damage, fender shows signs of bowing and had ample amounts of body filler from previous owners repair. The alignment of the cab opening itself is another variable even with a good door.

Nice to know I am not alone in my frustrations.

 

Its looking like finding a good set of stock doors will be cheaper and may fit a little better. It sucks because the door im working on now fit great before hand, just the bottom was rusting through. Now since the patch the front side is screwed. Idk we will see. And 59, i agree with what youre saying in the patch panels, some are great and fit pretty much seamlessly. Others leave a lot to be desired in quality. I have a stainless bolt kit on its way in the mail, so im gonna bolt the bed together and get the front rad support mocked in. Then get the front clip bolted up and knock out my front bumper mounts and front fender patches

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Actually I’m in the same situation and am looking for good used doors. The “better” doors I got needed a lot of work but it seemed at that time a better alternative than aftermarket doors for the reasons of quality, fit and cost. As the surgery began I found one had been double rusted and patched. Had little success finding used doors that didn’t need work so I plated and blended in with the old repairs which was not my first choice. I body filled and preservation painted and put them on the truck, I have other work to do to get it roadworthy while I look for doors, best I could find has to be good enough for now.

 

As a result of this thread I decided to pull my passenger door today and weld up the speaker hole with the patch I cut from the junk drivers side door. My passenger door looked straight as an arrow and almost rust free. Once I got the door off I decided to have a look inside and noticed a couple of dozen holes with boogers of bondo visible of the inside. Uh oh! I decided to strip the paint on the outside and see what I really had. The door had been hit pretty hard at some point and the whole lower section of the door had about 3/8" of bondo. Shit! I started calculating the time I would need to fix this right and I decided to see what a new door would cost. Brother's has them on sale right now for $479 and they claim that these doors are the best on the market, well made and superior fit. I decided to spring for one so I'll let you know when I get it. I'm going to pick it up next weekend to save the $150 shipping.