1970 Swinger 340 Hemi Orange 4 speed

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Geez. That work looks like it fell out of heaven and landed on that car...
 
17 Again said:
Geez. That work looks like it fell out of heaven and landed on that car...
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Thanks!! When I first got the car I walked in front of it and said "show me" ..Nothing happened so I got to work on it, haha. I wish it was like Christine some days. It's been many hours getting it up to this point and it's starting to look like a car again.

I finished up my braces tonight and now it's all reinforced and I'll never have to worry about the torsion bar sockets flexing the crossmember and tearing out.



 
Great job as always.
I'm sure you didn't get the T bar sockets too hot when welding. I've always been told that to much heat will stretch the sockets and the bars can spin inside.
 
Yeah, dude-pretty sure your T-bar mounts aren't likely to have any problems. Ever.
 
WRB426 said:
Great job as always.
I'm sure you didn't get the T bar sockets too hot when welding. I've always been told that to much heat will stretch the sockets and the bars can spin inside.
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Thanks! I don't think I got them very hot at all, I just did about a 1" bead on either side. The torsion bars never even got hot and the rubber boots never burnt, so I think I'll be ok. They're a pretty big hex and very thick steel. I'm going to be using the stock 340 torsion bars so it won't have any extra stress from the thicker aftermarket ones either.

txstang84 said:
Yeah, dude-pretty sure your T-bar mounts aren't likely to have any problems. Ever.
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Haha that's the plan! Now I have to fix where the previous owner took a cutting torch to the crossmember for an aftermarket shifter. I will section in a piece from the parts car and then reinforce the backside for insurance.
 
Haven't been in the garage as much as I wanted to lately. It seams like all my summer weekends get plans! I did manage to repair and reinforce one side of the crossmember. Tomorrow I will do the other side.





 
gerahead said:
Nice work! your attention to detail is noteworthy! Keep it up. L8r
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Thanks!!

I got some more things done... I got the rear seat brackets welded on, made new fuel line/brake line brackets and welded them on as well. Then I epoxied the torsion bar crossmember and inner rockers. This weekend I will tackle the front frame rails and torque boxes and hopefully get them in epoxy as well.







 
76orangewagon said:
Looking good as usual, keep plugin' along.
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Thanks Ross!

My progress has yet again come to a grinding hault... I found a few surprises up inside my frame rails, so I stopped with the floorpan and am now in the process of getting an entire front clip for the car. I've gone this far without cutting corners and patching rust in the rails is not something I wanna do. so now it will be 6-8 weeks minimum before any major metal surgery starts back up. I will change out the front clip at the firewall as one piece including the torsion bar crossmember.. That's the plan anyway. Finding the rust in the rails really upset me since I had the car blasted and nothing went thru, until I started wire brushing and blasting up inside the rails and poking around with an o-ring pick.



In the meantime I might work on the roof and get it stripped and epoxied.
 
gerahead said:
Bummer, what did you find that caused this delay? Sounds like it was serious. :wack: L8r
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I poked some holes in the side with a no-ring pick after cleaning the scale off. This is up in the rail where you cannot see even with the floor out. I cut the caps off the top of the rails to replace them and clean up there. The passenger side appears to be the same, but I haven't started poking around to much... I had to walk away from it and track down another clip.

 
Hemiorangeswinger said:
Thanks Ross!

My progress has yet again come to a grinding hault... I found a few surprises up inside my frame rails, so I stopped with the floorpan and am now in the process of getting an entire front clip for the car. I've gone this far without cutting corners and patching rust in the rails is not something I wanna do. so now it will be 6-8 weeks minimum before any major metal surgery starts back up. I will change out the front clip at the firewall as one piece including the torsion bar crossmember.. That's the plan anyway. Finding the rust in the rails really upset me since I had the car blasted and nothing went thru, until I started wire brushing and blasting up inside the rails and poking around with an o-ring pick.



In the meantime I might work on the roof and get it stripped and epoxied.
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Replacing and entire clip is a heck of a lot of work and chances of finding one without a rusted left side frame rail will be pretty slim. It's a common problem on the left side where the battery often leaked juice or water accumulated. Just buy the special frame rail reinforcing recapping sections and weld them on. I have done six Darts and used the frame rail capping on four and they work great and are inexpensive. The "U" shaped caps just slip over the factory frame rail.
 
Swinger340Canuc said:
That's a shame Randy, but I think your decision is the right one. Danny
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Yeah it was disappointing finding it, but it's better catching it now then when the car is finished and gets a surprise bubble a few months down the road.

Hartman-52 said:
Replacing and entire clip is a heck of a lot of work and chances of finding one without a rusted left side frame rail will be pretty slim. It's a common problem on the left side where the battery often leaked juice or water accumulated. Just buy the special frame rail reinforcing recapping sections and weld them on. I have done six Darts and used the frame rail capping on four and they work great and are inexpensive. The "U" shaped caps just slip over the factory frame rail.
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Thanks for the suggestion! I already worked out the details on getting the front half of a car from Cali, and i should have it in about two months. Shipping is a little pricey but I can offset that cost by selling all my front AMD parts. (Inner fenders, firewall to inner fender braces and lower rad support) since the doner clip is perfect with no rust at all. My drivers front frame rails have a bit of damage around the bumper mounts so that's another good reason for the swap.
 
WOW!!! I just read every page. Awesome work. I love to see restoration work done correctly. So much good to say from workmanship, welds, material and your detail in this post.
Keep up the great work.
 
65dartcharger said:
Great job so far! It will be a blast when it's ready! Subscribed!
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Thanks! I can't wait to be done with all this metalwork so I can get it up on a rotisserie and start on the bodywork.


davescuda said:
WOW!!! I just read every page. Awesome work. I love to see restoration work done correctly. So much good to say from workmanship, welds, material and your detail in this post.
Keep up the great work.
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Thanks for the kind words! I bet it took a few hours to go thru all the pages. I'm building this car to keep, so I'm doing everything I can to prevent rust and making sure there is no existing rust in it.
 
ef8340 said:
bummer to hear about the front end by the time your done with it it will be more solid than mine
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Yeah it definitely put a hold on the car. Haha by the time I'm done with it I will have every panel replaced!

I made a little slideshow of the progress so far.

[ame="http://youtu.be/xiCKsUjOIWU"]http://youtu.be/xiCKsUjOIWU[/ame]
 
That sucks!!!!! I have some supper nice frame rails I wasn't going to sell them but this car needs so pm and we will get together on the price or we can trade something. your car is going to be so nice when done!!you should move to N,C we would covered up with car down here. It was 70 in Dec. here last year just saying.
 
Tbone416 said:
That sucks!!!!! I have some supper nice frame rails I wasn't going to sell them but this car needs so pm and we will get together on the price or we can trade something. your car is going to be so nice when done!!you should move to N,C we would covered up with car down here. It was 70 in Dec. here last year just saying.
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Thanks for the offer! I actually have an entire front clip coming from Ca. I would love to move somewhere without a winter!
I am currently waiting on the clip which is why I haven't been on here posting updates. I have not lost any interest in it at all. I just can't do much until i get the clip. I have been picking away at the roof.. Cleaning the gutters and I found more rust, so I need to do some repairs in the gutter, which will be tricky but I have a plan I action! September and October I'll go full tilt again and wrap up all the metal repairs hopefully by January. I actually prefer working on it during the cold season because I can adjust the temp in the garage to my comfort! It's been pretty hot here this summer and the garage was like an oven.

gerahead said:
nice little resto review. Love the thread. L8r
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Thanks!
 
I just came across your build. You are doing some of the best work
I have seen. I will be watching as you progress with the front clip.
Great documentation and inspiration for us trying to learn and apply
to our own projects.
You will be driving one of the best when done. Congrats.
 
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