I've been stewing on this one a while. The trunk lip, you know, the inner thing that should have been a rain gutter but GM saw fit to pack it full of rubber to make sure moisture stayed there, that thing. Well, it's in sorry shape on Tracy's car and I'm not sure how to attack it. Reproducing such a thing would be tricky for someone with mad skills. Way trickier for me. Then I thought about replacing the entire area, all the way out to the seem of the wings, with panels from a good donor. A lot of work also. So I'm not sure which way to direct energy. Thoughts?
This is the details on the same replacement on a Ford, but should be similar job....the sheetmetal won't know the brand Working on a Fairlane, pretty solid body other than a few spots. Here's the trunk opening and channel for the weatherstrip. It took a few weeks and a few phone calls, but there are still some good junkyard pieces available. We got the corner pieces out of a yard in CO. The rear channel across the trunk opening also has scattered pin holes, so I though I'd give a shot to bending some new ones. First, need a template: That looks close enough. My press brake dies are only about 18" long, so I'll need to do this in three pieces. The middle one got put in first. Be sure to check the back side for weld penetration: The replacement corner was cleaned up, the spot welds were ground off of the adjacent pieces to release the corner with no damage. Looks quite a bit better than the old one. One corner left to go, another day.......
On to the next corner. The driver's side was in sad shape: But in looking at the replacement, although in better condition, it did have issues of it's own. Time to break out the trusty Lancasters and make some replacement parts. The corner was left attached to the quarter panel section while remaking the channel in an attempt to maintain the shape. ....And a comparison of the "new" part to the old one. That should do the trick! Got the repaired piece all cleaned up, and the car prepped for it to go in. Doesn't seem like too much accomplished for a Mon nights work, but this precision grinding takes time! Welding will have to wait for later this week. Time to get this thing done. Here's the plug weld holes drilled, ready for the welder to be fired up: There we go.....that should hold paint for awhile
Great work! I agree with you about taking the time to fit everything up nice before welding. take the time now, and it'll save you time, and look better later!
I had to do that on my Dad's GTO. I cut it out of a donor car and welded it in. It took some time to fit it nice but it wasn't that difficult. I cut that section out of a '59 Belair I parted out one time, thinking it would be a hot item, ended up getting 20 bucks for it I think, disappointing. So there's gotta be quite a few good ones on donor cars out there. The tech above is impressive, but way beyond my level of patience to make all that shit. Easier I think just to take it from another car.
Hey Mac, Great job on the reconstruct of the Fairlane gasket rail! These can also be built with a heavy duty bead roller and the dies to match. The 16-18 gage required to replace most oem gasket rails would kill most of the light duty "Hong Kong-Fooie" Chi-Comm. made beading machines, however. " ..............is graffiti on the walls of history "
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