Awhile back I opted to sell my 51 Merc to pick up a ride that belonged to my Pop back when I was a kid. The gentleman (Rich) who made it possible for me to get my wish, also got his, which was owning a Merc. After some chit chattin for a few months, he asked if I would be interested to come over to OZ and do a chop on the Merc..In my head I yelled HELL YA, but then thought, uhhh I'll need to run it by the wife and get her input... After tossing it out to the wifey, and her telling me that would be fine if I went...... BUT!! if I went without her and our little boy, she would divorce me, since Australia was a place that she had always dreamed of visiting. Well fast forward about a year and we were off to the beautiful LAX to take the very long and cramped plane ride to the land of the Roo!! First couple of pics are from a couple of years ago I think, of me dropping the Merc off at the exporters down in Long Beach. I gave the ol Merc a pat on the fender and thought I would never see it again. It was a little bitter sweet. It arrived safe and sound in Melbourne with only minor injuries from the idiots on the boat I guess, but Rich was happy to finally have it after waiting for what seemed like an eternity to arrive. Here's a pic of him at his first show that he took it to, which I heard he got a trophy for the Merc...Best paint I reckon... And then the time came.....THE POINT OF NO RETURN!!!
I was lucky enough to have Rich working with me the entire week to get as much done as we could in the time frame. Thank God he knew how to use a grinder and a welder also! After a couple of days it started to look like a Merc again which made Rich pretty happy.
Cam Arkell (Cams Metal and Speed) down in Geelong was a great host to let Rich work on the Merc with some damn Yankee from the states. We drove past the Geelong Ford plant every morning, so eventually I had to jump out and get a pic of me looking like an idiot..I heard the whole place is coming down in the next few years..Its pretty sad, It has been around since the teens I believe..I was figuring it would be perfect for an Ozzy based Townsends shop....It might be a little tight on space though.. Got to love Cam's shop sign on the back wall!
The goal was to have the Merc shaped by the Friday night. Rich had put a BBQ together to have a few guys over to BS and check out the hair cut on the Merc. I don't think either of us got any pics of the BBQ unfortunately.. The outcome on the Merc was great and Rich was happy as can be that he owned a chopped Merc now..I kept on thinking I would walk out in the garage and catch him sitting on his block of styrofoam in the merc pretending...
After a lot of long days that week we were through for now. I had a weekend of resting and then some more fun come Monday morning and the new patient...I'm tired now and the screen is getting blurry, so I'll pick this back up tomorrow!
love this Adventure Matt! What a great compliment go your skills to have someone from another country prospect you to come do their chops!! Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
I like the way you made the 51 window flow, not a easy task, most don't look appealing. Nice job on the chop! Brent
Cams Metal & Speed in Geelong is my local bodyman ,,he did a great job on my Morris Minor a few years back ,,,always a friendly shop visit ,,, and you did a beautifull job on the Merc,,
waiting patiently.... btw is the rear screen in the Merc stock or modified? It looks a tad smaller in the end result..
Ok OK I'll do some more typing.... My next leg of the adventure was to cut Rich's pal Paul's 41 Zephyr....Rich had asked me if I could do it, I said sure it's just metal! That still didn't give Paul a lot of comfort in the thought of his baby being cut up by somebody he never had met before!! Rich let me borrow his car for the next two weeks, to do the 20 minute trip to Steve Costas body and paint shop down in Bacchus Marsh..I thought...This should be fun... Driving in Australia with all your guy's round abouts keeps you on your toes...Not to mention trying to abide the (slow) speed limits and stayin on the left side of the road!! I stared at the car for roughly half the day studying the lines and the "what if's". Then once I finally figured out what I wanted to do I dived right in... One of the guys (Bayden) at the shop was nice enough to send Paul a heart attack pic of the car, with it's roof on the floor and a caption saying...That guy just grabbed his stuff and bailed out of here real quick!! Gotta love friends...
I started by taking 4.5"....no wait..114.3mm out of front...Damn metric tape measures.... and then slicing the roof above the gutters down to windshield to let the roof come down some. Then I did the verticle relief cut to let the top flatten out to get it to flow a bit more..Those Zephyrs have a lot of metal back there....My dream is to have a 38-9 and I'm glad I like the stock height on those!! After some well thought out cuts and a lot of standing back and staring, I had the profile that I was happy with and so was Paul. Now the fun part..Fitting all the pieces and welding it all back up!
One morning I spotted this little Roadster out off in the pasture. Not sure what it was but I thought it had potential to become something! After the first week that Saturday Steve hosted a BBQ for me and a bunch of guys showed up with their cars to BS and eat some food!
Both chops look spot on. The Zephyr chop is perfection, it just flows, awesome work!! Too often when a Zephyr is chopped the b-pillar has an awkward angle and doesn't flow.
Steve's little 34 3 window was quite the ride being powered by that BB Chevy on those little ass wire wheels!! Here is a link of Steve taking me for a spin.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrkJLn7lkfg
Which probably seemed like years to th guys at the shop of me bumping metal the car was pretty much completed. It still had some finnesing to do here and there but Paul was very pleased on how the Zephyr turned out..It takes a lot of faith to let someone you don't know take your pride and joy and cut it up...I know I couldn't do it!!! While we were out and about in Melbourne, the first day cruising around I made Rich catch up to a motorcycle that was ahead of us. I recognized the paint scheme, a 1937 Ariel Red Hunter! A bike that I admire, since the reason this whole trip came to be after selling my 51 was to buy my pops 39 Ariel Square Four that I stumbled upon. Passed this cool old building, it looked to be an old Chevy dealership, it would make an awesome shop for someone..
Thats pretty much about it...The family and I got to go bum around Cairns for a week and then check out Sydney for a few days so that was pretty cool also. The wife really like Cairns we saw some pretty big Crocodiles and checked out the rain forest. It was definitely a great adventure.. The guys over there that I met were great and love the hobby. I take for granite a lot of the stuff we have here. The crap they got to go through to get a car and then everthing else....Man that is passion!! Well thats my trip, thanks for looking!!
You forgot to mention that the Zephyr was stock height,so you had to do all your work off a box/milk crate! You are definately a master!!! Question...That last shot with it lowered...did you guys lower it before you left? Or,is that photoshopped?
One of the guys on my FB page did a photo shop and sent it to me.. That's true about the milk crate Bob, these cars are TALL in their stock form. Luckily I only had one milk crate blow out!!
Cool Story Matt, Drewfus has told me you were coming out this way to chop the merc. Rich has built some nice cars over the years and I'm sure the merc will be just the same. He had it at the picnic ( John's Rod and Custom Picnic - on this weekend) last year and was telling me about it and the plan to chop it. Glad to see it all worked out. Great job.
The Jalopy Journal
