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Projects Not Your Average Coupe Build: 37’ Chevy Unearthed

Discussion in 'Traditional Customs' started by oneratfink57, Jan 31, 2017.

  1. Leakie
    Joined: Nov 10, 2010
    Posts: 270

    Leakie
    Member

    FYI sedan doors are different then coupe doors.



     
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  2. 1blown57
    Joined: Oct 19, 2006
    Posts: 832

    1blown57
    Member
    from Florida

    Found some pics When first dragged home! IMG_8961.JPG IMG_8964.JPG IMG_8963.JPG
     
  3. chevy54man
    Joined: Feb 7, 2013
    Posts: 1,683

    chevy54man
    Member
    from NC

    Incredible job you're doing, best to you man~!
     
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  4. ...what happened to this project?
     
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  5. 1blown57
    Joined: Oct 19, 2006
    Posts: 832

    1blown57
    Member
    from Florida

    Summer time!!!


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  6. yeah, I know the feeling, I don't get nuthin done on projects in the summer....
     
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  7. jp52
    Joined: Apr 17, 2011
    Posts: 120

    jp52
    Member

    Those floors look great! 16 or 18 gauge?


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  8. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Hey guys I'm still here! Summertime family fun has consumed me for the past 6 weeks. However I've got the week of the 4th off so I'll be hammering some work out on the 37. But I'm going to be buttoning up some stuff on my 57 too! Just got my 57 titled and registered. I might cheat a little and post some 57 progress on here too!

    Glad to know you guys are still into it!

    jp52 i used 20 gauge for the floor pans. With the spacing I've got on the floor structure and the beads, the 20 gauge holds up just fine


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  9. nice to see you're back, and I wouldn't mind seein the 57 stuff also.
     
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  10. sololobo
    Joined: Aug 23, 2006
    Posts: 8,378

    sololobo
    Member

    Rspect for your skills, this is looking great. I love these coupes and the awesome stling, yours will be an instant icon. Best wishes on the project.
     
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  11. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Had a few hours until our family excursion to the local drive in movie theatre so wanted to get back in the swing of things with the 37.

    I wasn't much for documenting today, but I needed a transition panel between the rear floor pans and the drive shaft tunnel. I actually made two. The first panel I made would of had to be butt welded and could of turned into a nightmare with distortion of the rear panel.

    So I scrapped that idea

    [​IMG]

    Instead I went for a design that had a flange in it so I could plug weld which would match the rest of the floors design. Unfortunately the panel wouldn't fit back in my bead roller to roll a bead on the tunnel side, but it'll remain rigid nonetheless. This was a little more time consuming but I used a flange stretcher on the vertical portion of the flange, which would help form the radius of the part.

    I used the planishing hammer to smooth the marks left by the stretcher and dialed in the overall shape with the panel beater bag and tapered mallet

    [​IMG]


    Since I've gotten as far as cleco pinning all the components in place, I'll sneak in the garage tomorrow to plug weld them all up

    [​IMG]

    Can't promise much more progress this week on the 37 despite having the week off. I'm planning on splitting some time with my 57 to get some more bodywork done and install my new factory gas tank setup.

    And of course there's the Iola swap meet on Friday!


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  12. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    As promised, Rear floor pans and passenger front floor pan welded in today

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]


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  13. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Started brainstorming some rear body mounts. Sketched a few concepts but this is what I came up with. I'll weld it up and weld it to the floor structure and use the factory rubber insulation pads between the mount and the frame. When I make the trunk tail pan, I'll likely just make small access panels to get to the bolts

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]


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  14. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    I hope everyone had a great 4th of July!

    Today I got some serious garage time which was nice for a change. Threw back a couple PBR's, threw on some rockabilly, and threw on my weld helmet. As usual, progress below

    Welded rear mounts

    [​IMG]

    Ground them smooth for reasons unknown to science, since they'll never be seen

    [​IMG]

    Welded the mounts to the trunk tube structure. Don't mind the file marks on the frame

    [​IMG]

    Made the passenger front floor transition for the firewall. Need to do some more rust repair before I weld it in though, on both sides.

    [​IMG]

    There should be some stuff there

    [​IMG]

    Something like this with less holes in it! But that repair is for another day

    [​IMG]

    Last step of the day was welding all the floor pans I could (like I've been rambling about for several postings.)

    [​IMG]


    Before I weld the trunk pans I need to finish the rear shock cross member as me and rusty1 were discussing



    Before I weld the drivers front floor pan in, I'd like to mount my underfloor brake pedal and master, as well as mount my Lokar shifter

    Which reminds me, I'm not sure if I ever posted a picture of it. The knob was 1 of 80 or so cast by a fellow hamber about 10 years ago. I'm sure some purists won't like the knob, so before anyone gets excited, the great thing about shift knobs is you can change them. :)



    [​IMG]



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    Last edited: Jul 6, 2017
  15. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    You may have noticed the two discolored spots on the passenger floor, I got a little planishing hammer happy on that one. It's easy to hide mistakes behind the internet, but I'd like to highlight one of my many mistakes during this build.

    So what happened is I got oil canning in two spots from over stretching the material with the planishing hammer, so I tried my hand at shrinking them with the torch.

    For those who are experts or have better documentation, feel free to share some thread shortcuts or insight!

    For those of you who haven't done it, you take a torch and heat up the high spot in the panel, until there's a portion that is red hot. Quickly take a hammer and dolly and hammer around the hot spot

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    What's happening is by heating the panel to red hot, you're allowing the panel to be more maleable again, just like when material is hot rolled , by hammering the hot spot, you're trying to counter intuitively trying to stretch the red hot material, but the cold material around it is stronger, forcing the isolated hot spot to shrink.

    Repeat until panel is relatively flat, then you can hammer and dolly out imperfections without heat, but use caution not to stretch the panel again.

    Again for those of you who would try this for the first time, you're eyes aren't deceiving you, when you heat the panel the high spot grows because the heat is temporarily stretching the material even further, technically making the problem worse lol.

    This is my second time doing this torch shrink method and it took me about 5 minutes per spot to eliminate the oil canning. I know that there are WAY MORE well documented and more detailed descriptions on how this is done. But the more this kind of thing is talked about, hopefully the more interest in the craft will be generated





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    Last edited: Jul 6, 2017
  16. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Today I was determined to actually finish the passenger compartment floors.

    As I stated in my last post, I had some rust repair to do before I welded the front floor pans in.

    So o started with the driver side since it had more of the old pieces that I could try to mimic.

    [​IMG]

    In order to access the area, I had to cut the outer portion of the cowl. Since this area is hidden by the fender, I didn't take as much care as maybe I should of when cutting apart

    [​IMG]

    Cut the lower portion of the cowl that I'll be replacing

    [​IMG]

    Made and test fit cardboard template, followed by transferring it to 16 gauge steel.

    This portion of the cowl is structural and holds the front body mounts in location which is why I used 16 gauge

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    Bend the new patch to it would fit flush against the front floor structure I made

    [​IMG]

    Welded it solid then repeated on the passenger side

    [​IMG]

    Once all this was done, I was able to weld my front floor transitions and the drivers side front floor pan. So now all that is left is the trans tunnel!

    [​IMG]



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  17. hacknwhack
    Joined: Jan 25, 2006
    Posts: 481

    hacknwhack
    Member
    from mass

  18. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    That car is the sole reason I committed to save this coupe. Love it!


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  19. hacknwhack
    Joined: Jan 25, 2006
    Posts: 481

    hacknwhack
    Member
    from mass

    Yes its stunning.
    You will get there.
    Just takes time.
    I spent 10 years on my last one...
    Hope it goes quicker for you.

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  20. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Trunk floor is in!


    [​IMG]

    There's only a couple transition pieces left and the trans tunnel. So I roughed the two inner wheel well panels in with a stump and shaping mallet. Just need to planish and trim

    Before

    [​IMG]

    During

    [​IMG]

    After

    [​IMG]


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    Last edited: Jul 25, 2017
  21. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Smoothed out the transition panels I made last week with the planishing hammer


    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    And welded them in

    [​IMG]


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  22. jp52
    Joined: Apr 17, 2011
    Posts: 120

    jp52
    Member

    I like your wooden form. I see a husky which I assume was used to make it?


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  23. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin


    If I was smart I would of used the chainsaw lol but I took a 6-1/2 circular saw and buried the blade into the stump, rotating it about 5 degrees every time, creating an asterisk shape * .Then used a wood chisel to carve out all the sections into a bowl shape and cleaned up with a grinder. I haven't spent the time to make it perfectly smooth, but it's also not a hardwood stump so I didn't want to spend the time.

    If you look up metal shrinking stump online there's some videos on how to make them and use them. Then the hammer I got from Joe Mielke at Snap-fab.com

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    Last edited: Aug 2, 2017
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  24. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Today was the day to finish the passenger compartment floors!! (Almost)

    The Trans tunnel was the mighty adversary that I've been brainstorming for several weeks on how I wanted to do it. Keep it removable like the factory? Or weld it solid. Turns out I'm indecisive so I did a little bit of both


    Trans tunnel opening

    [​IMG]

    Used paper template to get approximate shape

    [​IMG]

    Roughed in shape over my knee. In upcoming pictures you will see I beadrolled the rear edge so it would fit with the beaded offset I put in the tapering portion of the tunnel

    [​IMG]

    This is where it could of gotten a little tricky, but given the amount of space I had between the motor and trans, I found a flat panel was provide enough clearance. Cut down a cardboard template

    [​IMG]

    Now I didn't do a good job taking progress pictures from here on out. But I bead rolled a recess and welded weld nuts to the back side of the floor panel. This would allow me to cut an opening and make a panel later on that would fit snugly inside the recessed area

    You can also see the transition panel I made. I took a 2" strip of 20 gauge, formed it to a 90, then used my Eastwood shrinker/ stretcher to form the compound curve. Not only do the ends taper down, but they also angle forward as well towards the rear of the car

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    Sort of finished product. I ran out of time, so I wasn't able to weld it, but I'll probably sneak in the garage tomorrow to button it up

    [​IMG]

    Zoomed out

    [​IMG]


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  25. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Not a lot of excitement today, just welding. Welded the tunnel and a couple of areas throughout

    [​IMG]


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  26. 39 Aaron NZ
    Joined: Jan 2, 2017
    Posts: 85

    39 Aaron NZ
    Member

    Your "Not a lot of excitement today" was still more than my car for this weekend!
    Your floor is looking awesome, really liking all that beed roller work! Keep the updates comming.
    Cheers Aaron.

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  27. Pete
    Joined: Mar 8, 2001
    Posts: 4,745

    Pete
    Member

    Much respect, I know from experience the work involved with resurrecting a forgotten soul.

    Looks killer, can't wait to see it with the nose on.
     
  28. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Thanks gents!

    Getting all the panels mocked up isn't far off on the to do list. I've been thinking of doing it soon, so maybe I'll realize Im actually working on a car and not just a floor lol


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  29. metalman
    Joined: Dec 30, 2006
    Posts: 3,297

    metalman
    Member

    After looking thru your thread here all I can say I really glad I live in the rust free desert. As crusty as that car looks I'm amazed you can get enough solid metal to weld to. I don't see where you're grinding or sandblasting the parent metal down to clean anywhere, how are you welding that?
     
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  30. oneratfink57
    Joined: Feb 12, 2006
    Posts: 737

    oneratfink57
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    I'm using some abrasive sponge pads on my grinder to clean up the weld zone prior to weld, the fluxcore soot hides the ground down areas in the pictures so you can't see it very well. Fluxcore scavenges most of the impurities from the weld puddle so theoretically it welds a little better than solidwire on a a less than ideal surface


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