Projects Edith d' Plymouth: restyling my P-15

But we like rust...keep em' coming.

 

LOL...I got no shortage of rust to photo.

Another late night sanding, etching, painting, and stripping paint, and slowly the sheetmetal is starting to gleam like a new kettle. I've gone through 6 quarts of stripper, and still have to strip half a fender, the nose, and one door, the cowl, the top, plus minor bits and corners. Only a few square feet are 100% metal finished and lacquered at this time.

My intention is to keep sanding, etching, and sealing until the whole car is 40 grit finish or better in clear lacquer. (Lots of it's already better than 320 once stripped & I had to rough it with 320 so the lacquer'd stick good.) At that point I'll know exactly what I've got to do with the body. I'll metalwork it in small sections, painting it in dark primer, until the whole car is in sealer/primer.

I don't know enough about these modern paints though.

I see people here using epoxy primers and POR-15 (a gas tank etch/sealer) and I don't know what to go for yet. This car was in old school nitrocelulose lacquer (over near-continuous bondo!) with lacquer sealer-primer or lacquer filler-primer, plus some small unidentified patches, variously across the car. The lacquer was topped with enamel clearcoat. Just what paint I'll put back on it I know not & open to all suggestions. Not regarding color, but types and brands of paint. It sounds like my old-fashioned siphon gun will get replaced by a spiffy new HVLP gun.

Tonight I'll finish scraping the hood down, and remove it. Then I can kill the last black widow in the engine compartment, and stand in there while I strip the cowl and header.

 

OK I'll let HAMB host my photos of the now nearly-rust-free metal.

 

hey it looks good! keep it up Ulu

 

I was just kidding about "rust free".

That top is as rusty as the Titanic's salt cellar.

 

OK, I'm gonna let HAMB host my attachments today.

Lots of scraping and paint stripper last night, and a round of metal finishing with the DA sander. If I can pop those couple dents in the door up with the friction disk, she's gonna look nice without bondo. (At least below the belt. )

I got the front bumper and fog lights off as well, and oiled the bazillion trim screws on the grille.

 

Where is all this "rust" you speak of? I haven't seen much rust yet. Just so you know what rust is, here is a picture of the driver side rocker on my 48 Plymouth. Gene

 

My eyesight is getting worse. I can't see your rockers at all.

Heh...I'm seriously amazed that you, not only could rebuild that, but would even want to. It seems it'd be easier to start a whole new car from scratch!


I got a lotta respect for that kinda determination.

 

It's California rust, those west coast cars rot away backwards out there, they rust from the top down and maybe a little hole in the floor pan from a leaky door seal.

 

I just swept up a considerable pile of that mythical California rust, after a day of conducting Ulu's Symphony #1 for Angle Head Grinder and D/A. I also slathered my way through another 3 quarts of stripper. I washed methylene chloride off myself a dozen times. My fingers hurt from scraping. Also I wacked myself with the D/A. Ouch!

I got the fender spears, door handles, door panels, garnish & wind wings, antenna, door spears, seat studs, hood release, and one cowl trim off today.

Almost everything below the beltline is stripped now, and 3/4 of that is sanded with the D/A. I haven't started on the nose yet & the hood isn't sanded yet. The top of the cowl needs stripping, as does the entire top. I've just barely started on the greenhouse area.

I don't have the door locks off yet. It appears I need to drill a pin & remove it with a tiny Easy-Out.

I delayed removing the hood. I was going to make a stand so I can work on it off the car, but haven't got there yet.

The last guy used several randomly located square nuts on some of the trim clips. Not convenient when you're using a hex socket to strip them.

Mixed in with the dirt in the door bottoms: several 8-32 hex nuts.

But no rust at all. 29 years ago when I bought this car I cleaned out the plugged up weep holes in the door bottoms. They're still clear, and no evidence of any puddles in the doors.

I exposed the last of the rockers and bottoms today, and I found one nasty spot on the rocker of the passenger rear QP. It looks like the rocker was smashed in a bit, by something sharp which cut the metal and wrinkled it up. It's still wrinkled up, and there's about 4 lbs lead on that spot. There was only 1/8" bondo over that, and I didn't find any other major patches of bondo or lead on the body. Many minor spots though.

Photos tomorrow.

 

OK, more photos, roughly in order.

I finally fixed up my wooden cart and got the car jacked down on it today. Now I can roll it around and get all the running gear off. I actually collapsed one of these casters moving the Scout on it, and ended up repairing all of them. The Plymouth, having the engine, trans, battery, radiator, wheels, and interior removed (don't laugh, those seats are heavy!) weighs a lot less, and moves quite easily.

This is the one bad body mount. It's the 3rd from the firewall, under the front passenger seat. Evidently it was pushed up from below and is nearly touching steel-to-steel. I stuffed that hunk of inner tube between the metal in 1985 and it's still there.

The left fender has a few dents, but very minor. The right is even nicer.

This was just after the last round of paint stripping. Now that I can move the car sideways, I'll have lots more room to work on it. There was just barely enough to slap some stripper on and scrape it off.

I really want to see this baby bare, but there's more sanding to do yet.

The last two are the bad spot on the right rear rocker. There's a blob of lead over it, but it's not too thick. Right above that hole is a horizontal wrinkle. I'm thinking this "repair" has something to do with the "door" cut into the top of the right rocker.

 

More random photos of interest to rust assassins like me.

 

Well several hours of sanding later and about half the rust on the roof is gone. It was bad. The worst rust on the entire car except the floorboards.

The other half of the roof looks even worse. Like the backside of the moon. It'll have to wait. It's taking longer than it should because my compressor can't keep up with a D/A sander for very long. I'm using the electric 1/3 sheet sander for some stuff, but nothing beats the D/A IMHO.

I had to stop & replace the cord on my new 1/3 sheet Craftsman sander. They put a dang 16 Ga cord on a sander fer cryin out loud. The copper had parted ways. I replaced it with a 14 Ga cord from an old power strip.

 

The passenger door is stripped and sanded and is looking quite primo.

I also spent a lot of time on the header and roof. I'm still half-convinced I'm gonna cut the roof off, I just don't know if I'm gonna weld it back on or not. Anyhow, I'm stripping and de-rusting the roof now.

The "golden" front fender had started to rust in the few minutes between acid washing and the lacquer. I didn't get the acid all off fast enough or something. Scotchbrite & more lacquer will solve this.

I'm not really trying to 100% metal finish the body at this point. I'm just trying to remove the major rust and strip everything down to identify the spots that need real attention.

 

It's a bit random and disorganized of me to strip this much of the car without finishing the dis-assembly. When I look at my own photos it looks like I don't know what I'm doing.

The truth is that I had to see what was under the paint ASAP. The compulsion to sand was overwhelming. I was in panic mode, thinking I had major rot and I was just gonna end up with a total rustbucket.

Now that I've stripped almost all of it, and the hidden damage is all quite manageable, I'm going to force myself back into a more systematic attitude.

Anyhow, the roof is sooo rusty I'm kicking myself for sanding it at all. I thought I was just gonna cut it off anyhow???

The truth is that my plans for this car are evolving. I haven't come to grips with what I really want to drive versus what I want it to look like.

Fortunately I've got lots of floorpan and frame de-rusting hours ahead of me to decide in.

 

I took pity on my neighbors and left the grinder and sander alone last night. I concentrated on paint stripping and detailed metal finishing around the windows.

I got the quarter glass out easily, as the rubber mounting tape had expired some years ago. The regulator mechanisms are still in place, working, and adjusted (and they might remain so.) I got the driver's side glass out as well. It's a lam-glass "reproduction", it's cracked & will get replaced. The quarters were original tempered glass and still OK. One has some light scratches, which a Mooneyes sticker will cover conveniently.

Both windshields are cracked & I'll take them out as soon as I'm ready to cut the main wire trunk and remove the dash.

I had to remove the driver's glass run channel, and It appears to be a generic aftermarket item. It was not clipped into place per the manual instructions, but screwed to the door with 6 short flathead #6 wood screws. Of course one was a phillips, which screwed me up for a bit until I realized that. It probably should have been expected considering what I found on this car so far.

Need new bourdon-tube temp gauge, but will it work with a modern engine? The other original gauges all worked OK.

I'm wondering if I can find tempered glass for the front side windows and vents. Mine's all lam-glass except the quarters and rear window.

 

Get yourself a paint and rust stripping wheel for dealing with that little bit of surface rust you have on the roof, sanding it is a waste of time and doesn't work.

View attachment 2180918

I don't know if you have an angle grinder (works best, faster) but you can those wheels with an arbor for mounting into a drill, they are great for stripping paint and digging out pitted rusty metal.

Home Depot or lowes should have those wheels on the shelf.

 

Daliant, I get an "INVALID ATTACHMENT" error when I click your link.

Are you talking about the flapper type wheels with ceramic grit? I saw some & I didn't think they looked very durable for the price.

I have an angle head grinder, a D/A sander, and three assorted jitterbug sanders. I don't have a long pneumatic body file though. 1/3 sheet sander is the longest.

But the D/A sander on zip mode with 40 grit Gator, or the grinder with a coarse wheel cuts that stuff right to bare steel. I hit it all first with the angle head and a carbon knot wire cup, to strip paint & Bondo, then sand off the remaining rust with the D/A or grinder for the worst stuff.

My only problem is that I fear I'll sand the metal too thin in spots. Oh well, that's what lead is for... LOL

I got the rest of the door glass, window fuzz, and glass run channel out tonight & started removing the steering wheel to get at the dash next. Those #6 wood screws on the window fuzz were rusty and did not come out without a fight. The glass run looks like universal aftermarket stuff, but hard to tell, as I don't know what the originals looked like.

 

Just to give you folks some more perspective (those who have so kindly volunteered their information and opinions) I'm just a hobbyist, but I've been working on cars since the mid 1960's. It runs in the family, and the things from my past that mean the most to me are the cars and tools I've inherited, fixed, built, and otherwise made my own through labor and love.

But I'm not a restorer, and what I do to this car will be not be endorsed by the AACA. It's going to be what makes sense for my purposes. What anyone else does is their business.

Also I've been out of the old car game for a couple decades, and things have changed a lot. Lots of stuff is available now that was unheard of until the CNC era.

Some folks look at this business as preserving a heritage. Preservation is not my main goal. I'll do my best, but what I build is going to be what I can manage without ruining the fun of the building process, and without driving me broke.

Anyhow, I have all the wood screws out of the sheetmetal (I hope!) and the steering wheel came off without a struggle. (The anti-seize I put on the splines in 1986 was definitely worth doing.) The headliner is coming out in one piece and will make a usable pattern.

Now I can finish detailing around the side windows before going on to the windshield.

The inside of the door bottoms & rockers look unbelievably good. I am so glad I had the foresight to clean out the weep holes back when I bought the car. This is something I always do when I buy a used car: clean out all the weep holes I can find.

Nothing reduces a car or building to ruin worse than plugging up the drains. You've all seen the ruins of the Packard complex. Crumbling to dust because the drains were plugged up for decades and pooling water and snow corroded rebar until the concrete just spalled off and the floors collapsed.

Archaeologists say that the giant ziggurats of ancient Sumeria were reduced to mounds of mud because of inadequate drainage.

<---makes note to check the rain gutters on house this week.

 

One of these

 

Always loved the P15s. I've owned two over the years, (49 (1st series) Deluxe coup) and just sold last year my 48 2 door sedan. Miss em. Your making me want em back.

 

Oh, the "Scotchbrite-on-steroids" wheel!

Yeah I have one for the drill, but I don't have one for the angle head grinder. Good call there.

 

A shot of the window fuzz, with #6 flathead wood screw

Not the method I would have used.

 

I found out last night that while my car is a late '47 build from the LA assembly plant, the passenger door is from an earlier P-15 with the early wire window regulator clips. It was also originally maroon, while my car was originally dark green.

Thankfully, the doors are both in great shape, needing only new starwheels and window fuzz.

The late (top) and early (bottom) design regulator retainer clips.

 

The one that goes in a drill kinda gets the job done eventually but the ones that go on an angle grinder just plain kick ass.

 

I'm stopping at Lowes on the way home!

 

GO< GO< GO, love following this.

 

GOOD for you man !! You and the car look GOOD !!! Chris

 

Thank you guys. It's hard, but I know it's all worth it in the end.

I had to repair some OT things so I got out too late to sand anything last night. I spent the time stripping off small stuff like sunvisors and lights, and going around the greenhouse area with more stripper and a little scraper I made to clean out the creases. I stripped the remaining paint from the roof so now there's just a smattering of primer and plenty of rust.

I spent some time looking at the patch job on the right QP rocker area, and I think it'll be getting pulled and dollied and re-surfaced, but the metal itself is undamaged except for being wrinkled and buried in lead.

ALSO: I found a tiny bit of maroon paint in the right rear window detail creases. Evidently this car was green then maroon, then green again. There is no maroon paint inside anywhere. I may be totally wrong about the right door being from another car.

 

I finally got the hood off last night. The release cable had rusted through & snapped , so I had to crawl up inside the engine compartment with the spiders & trip the release with a screwdriver.

I bought some iron casters & built this little cart out of some scraps, so I could work on the hood off the car. Much easier than leaning over those huge fenders to sand the hood.

What a mess, and covered in dozens of years of dirt.

Lots of late-nite oil burning continues, as I continue to clean up the roof and greenhouse.