66 dart convertible

[66Dvert]

thanks Pettybludart looks like you got a little work going on yourself. I can only hope mine comes out as nice as yours and others that I've seen on here, tommorow I'm finishing up the a-pillars and adding in the metal so I can test fit the top cowl. again I have to patch the cowl, when I bought the car it looked fair, might have had some mud in the lower quarters(expected that) and normal trunk am floor rustout, didn't expect to have the major portion of the cowl and windshield pillars to be bondo. it was hidden by the ss covers and they were really nice. soooo one thing led to another and it's been torn apart,
this car will be my daily driver,
I have another 66 dart (V8) that need slightly less work that I'm going to do back to original (mostly) other than brakes and ignition upgrade
black body white top pearl white interior

 

[66Dvert]

I made a little progress todat I did get the a-pillar on the drivers side on and tacked in, but I had to do some major surgery on the cowl to fix the sides so I did get to the other a-pillar,
oh yeah I'm playing now with some tail lightsturn signal and backuplights , I'll see how they work out, I want both trunk and quarter to be active.. it just drives me crazy that one stays bright and the outer works as turn and brake, we'll see how these work out, they are 4 chip superflux 80ma

 

[66Dvert]

welp I did manage to get a little more done on the dart. I finished up the apillars except for the final lower corners (since it ain't going to come apart again in pieces) I dicided to just cut our the lower corners after it was all tacked in and put in the lower windshield edge got the firewall preped and sealed. I was trying to get it all sealed but time/money just ain't there yet.

I just got word today that my daughter just had a bad siezure :sad7:and fractured her back, looks like I'm going to be going to michigan(brrrrrr cold) to watch the kids for her until she get straightened out on her meds and healed up. so work and workin on the car just will have to wait,

 

[66Dvert]

Well I got a little more done since I did'nt have to go to michigan, (kid's said that they can handle things for each other until the daughter got home from the hospital) any way I finished up tacking on the cowl and apillars and started on the front floor pans, I might just learn how to plug weld by the time I'm done, I did use a 73 dart 4 door rear floorpan and other than the seat bolt holes not lining up it fit pretty good. heck I even matched most of the spotwelds back up to plug weld. did a little on the front drivers side jam , had a pinhole but I was worried that there might be more in the jam, I was wrong but now I know it's solid inside there, also a little metal on the back side of the driver side jam was crunchy, cut that out and am working on the fix there, I did have to slice sime of the rear pan out because the shape just wasn't right for the 66 year dart bucket seat mounting locations, I'll have to fab up some patches for that area on both sides. It's actually starting to look .... well closer to a shell is all I can say right now. giong down to ocala monday and check out the cost of the nisssan ivory pearl paint that I want to put on this one. plus get some hi build and guide coat so that I'll have it when I actually can use it

 

[pettybludart]

WoW!I have to say your doing a standup job here.The primer sure helps seeing how faar you,ve come.Keep up the great work.

P.S I just recieved some new 66 Dart taillight gaskets from Detroit Muscle,just thought I,d let you know there available.Got mine off of E-bag.8)

 

[66Dvert]

yep just saw them in you post and went and ordered me a set of painters gasket set and tail light , A buddy's supposed to be dropping off some more nason epoxy sealer so I can at least get it out of bare metal in most places. now all I gotta do is get it ready for the gaskets, I'm patchig in the seat location pieces this weekend (hopefully) and will be adding in the old reinforcement metal for the seats that way I can test out the carpet and see if it'll work without to much modification since I'm using the 73 rear floor pan, I measured the thing and it looks like it's only off about 1 inch further back in the footwell area, I'm hopeing that the carpet will lay down that extra inch if not I'll use the valiant rear seat and fudge it up under the seat

do you have your quarter on yet? I was lookin at yous and thought ohh don't wanna go there and then realised i already did,, spot weld suck big time don't they.. looks like great progress on your car.

 

[66Dvert]

AGHHHH couldn't wait, I just had to test fit the carpet on the floorpan, seeing as how the back half is a 73 unit patched in, and before you ask no I didn't put in the seat locator patches yet for the front buckets or the 3rd bracket for the console, I'll do those next after I drool over the carpet fittingfor a while, It looks like I have 1 inch extra on the rear footwell floor pan I'll have to do some heatlamp work with that area the verts side panels fit nice on both sides and I'll be putting back the brackets to locate the bottom of the convertible top cylinders. it looks a lot better than I thought it would and fits really good

 

[pj_elia]

Looking good. Do you plan on seam sealing the floor pan?

 

[66Dvert]

Looking good. Do you plan on seam sealing the floor pan?

yep sure do inside and out using brushed on seam sealer if I can find it after I finish welding up the floorpan completely on the bottom side and then add sound deadener for quieter bottom . I still have to add pieces in the front seat areas to conform to the bucket seats that I'll be putting in there, I have the original seats for the dart but those will go into the other 66dart ragtop ,I've already got the interior skins for that one (v8 supposed to be a black body and pearl white interior , white top) soooo I got some 65 or so cuda seats and have valiant/dart low back? covers that were given to me with the car and a black top. I like the nissan qx1 color and it's work ok,
Im also going to find out exactly how hard it is to graft in a 73 a/c firewall section and a 73 ac heater box, using the stock a/c controls for the 66

 

[66Dvert]

whoooeeee! got the floor pan in ant tacked up pretty solid and it sure is mice to see it looking like a car (almost anyway) I couldn't believe how man plug welds just to get the pan stabilized then tacked in solid. but it sure looks good being in there after the car's been on the car dolly for tooo! long.. I'm makin forward progress

 

[66Dvert]

Just got home from Taylor Michigan after working on my house (hoping to sell it one of these day's) and did a little work on the dart.
After working on the house and tearing up my knee so bad I couldn't even walk on it , I decided to do some easy work on the dart and finished up the trunk pan and welded most of it back in. Well that went well (NOT).


I had the car on the rotisserie and climbed in to plug weld in a couple of places figuring that my weight would hold the pan in position. that worked !

But as soon as I shifted position I grabbed the trunk lid tension bars and pulled myself around the Damn Trunk came down and jammed shut (yeah I had put the lock latch on to test fit) scared the crap out of me I had the mig in there and it was wedging the trunk against the trunk rail and wouldn't let the latch release. I had to call (had cell phone in pocket)the Wife. After she quit laughing at me she opened the trunk and let me out. The pan is NOT completely welded in as of yet and WON'T be until I take the darn trunk lid off. that dumb mistake cost me 40 bucks or more because I now have to take her out to dinner (red lobster bribery ) or pictures will be posted all over facebook


anyway I decided to do a little more work in non confined spaces and welded the patches in the trunk extensions and test fit one side of the lower patch panel View attachment DSCF2455.JPG
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now all I have to do is figure out the best place to cut the lower patch panel to weld in (above body line in curved profile or below on the flat part
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[65dartcharger]

MAn you're doing a great job on your car. I searched tonight but I can't find the mouldings for you. I will keep an eye open for you if I found them again. Good luck with your car. Gonna turn out nice.

 

[66Dvert]

MAn you're doing a great job on your car. I searched tonight but I can't find the mouldings for you. I will keep an eye open for you if I found them again. Good luck with your car. Gonna turn out nice.

thanks for looking for those parts. I hope you can find them.
I hate to fabricate those parts, but I will if I have to. they want stupid money and I'd have to send them a good set to reproduce them at the one place I called (convertible parts place ). You'd think I'd get a break on the price if I had a good set to send them but they wanted almost double what a 67 dart tack strip cost to prototype them.if I had a good set why would I want to buy them? that's not happenin'


Truthfully if I had realized how bad this car was and the wife hadn't said it was the ugliest car she's ever seen I'd have scrapped it for parts once I started taking it apart, now I'm sort of glad I didn't give up on it. but it's taken time to replace all the bad metal and get it straight and square again. I've got both lower patch panels to do and some door jam issues to take care of along with making sure it'll not rust again. This ones going to be my daily driver.
I'm in the process of paying off the blue one (in the parts wanted section) picture. so I might be able to get the samples off of that one.(but I still don't want to have to fabricate them if I don't have to)
It's supposed to be a V/8 power top and black body white interior and the wife say's that it's starting to grow on her. (if I paint it brilliant blue with the pearl white top and interior add a/c and let her drive it) that helps me get more done on mine so that one looks like it's blue with a pearl white top and interior.

 

[PapstXX]

MAn you're doing a great job on your car.

x2

 

[66Dvert]

Got A little work done today (just taking a break right now to clean and fuel me up.)
I just got the lower patch panel almost done in metal prep
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now for some fitting
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yup it'll fit , measure measure, hmm gotta cut more metal off
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ahh all better now to test fit it
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ok scribe the back and make the cut (fingers crossed I can measure correctly
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whoooooEEEEE! now to tack it into place

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I have a little bow in the body line (at magicmarker lines and waves in the welded area (I have to remember tack skip 4 inches tack again:violent1 that I want to straighten out before I get too crazy on the grind and weld process but it looks pretty good (nice penetration on the welds and nothing a little hammer and dolly work won't fix. )

 

[66Dvert]

got busy today and started working on the rear quarters on the dart
trimmed up the metal to fit good
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added the backstrip to weld to
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fitted and tacked the lower patch (passenger side)
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fixed a couple of spots on the wheel well and drilled out places to spot in the wheel well attachment points
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now for the dogleg side I used some of the good metal I cut off of the driverside rear to swap to the front so I can get a good curvature and the correct shape without beatin the heck out of some flat stock
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hmm came out better than I expected. I just have to skin coat it with filler. It came out flush with a couple of pit's in the tacking, almost perfect curvature (whacked it with a hammer a little harder that it needed. but I'll pull it out with the stud gun)
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next was 2 weird holes in the middle of nowhere, I looked at them and they were pinholes , but by the time I got to good metal they were at least a inch square. one is done already and here's the second one
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that bare strip on the quarter panel is a crease (got em on BOTH sides. some one couldn't drive evidently) I'll pull them out hopefully with the stud gun. but not today.

all done for today.
IT's BEER:30 time!

 

[66Dvert]

I got a little more done on the dart today.
man I LOVE that stud gun, I used it on all the creases and dents.
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and even got a skim coat of mud on part of the finished passenger lower welded panel
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then jumped back to the driver side. UGH... more work rocker panel got pulled out almost there with that one . lower quarter patch pulled into shape and straightened. did I say that I love the stud gun, man that makes dents an EASY fix.
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theni started on the drivers dog leg patch, I have to do a couple of patched due to more rust in the wheel well. I patched the wheel well housing in a small spot too to make sure I don't rust again.
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I just have it tacked in right now and haven't fully welded it in. I also have ot do some more in the bumper cutout areas on the lowers on both sides to get a full weld in that area,
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but it's starting to look like a complete uni-body again instead of pieces of metal stuck in between rust and thin air.
whew! done for the day!

 

[66Dvert]

Well, I was able to do a little more work today. I finished tack welding in the wheel well arch piece and put on the first fill coat. I'm not going to have to use much filler at all which makes me feel good.
I will not have much left after sanding that coat down (got a few high spots to knock down ) and probably won't have to do anything but a glaze coat to finish for prime and blocking.
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[SSVDP]

Fantastic stuff!
It looks great!

 

[66Dvert]

Fantastic stuff!
It looks great!

thanks, I just glad that I'm putting things ON :thumleft: instead of cutting things OFF. been a looooong haul to get where I'm at now

 

[66Dvert]

Got a little more done today
I was dreading doing the part by the convertible top hinge (it has 2 backing pieces that rusted out also and was worried that I couldn't get them duplicated) but it ended up being easy to duplicate. Whew load off of my mind.
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and the top corner of the duchman panel and quarter panel
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here's the hard piece done
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I sure am glad that most of the metal work on this part is done, now to mud work and primer!
yeehah!!!

 

[66Dvert]

I had a little more time tonight (wife forgot to lay out the honey-do list)
so I did a some more welding and muddin, I did the first coat of duraglass on the windshield pillars of the uni-body and most of the rest of the body has a foundation coat done, it came out really close to true form and I won't have to use much more to finish, But it's starting to look good!
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and the dutch-mans panel actually has the close to the correct height to match the trunk lid but it took a lot or work to get it there. I did have to heat/grind out the lead that was in the dutch-man panel (lot's of lead in there more that a1/4 inch layer.) now I won't have any more than a 1/8th inch inthe deepest area.
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now I flipped it to the side so I can finish the alignment and add filler where I need it to Gap the trunk lid correctly
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I'll be flipping it over to the other side to make sure it's clean and clear on the alignment and a smooth radius to match the trunk
All done for the Day

 

[66Dvert]

I got tired of the mudding dust all over the place so
I went and made paint chips fly all over. hey different dust. I forgot how long it takes to strip a fender of about 6 coats of paint.. whew got it don mostly.
I have only a couple of bad spots on the passenger fender here's the start of the stripping
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and the first bad spot
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the worst bad spot
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fully stripped
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first bad spot stripped hmm not as bad as I thought it would be
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worst bad spot stripped as bad as I thought
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ahhh well more welding on this end

 

[66Dvert]

I did a little work today on the drivers side fender and discovered it's a LOT worse than the passengers side, SOOOOoooo that's the side I'll do first. I think every corner and side needs rusty metal cut out and good put in. since I've got a LOT more time than money I'll have to fix it. here's the pic's of before.
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and after stripping.
YUP lot's of work on that fender, hopefully I can save it with metal from other pieces of parts that were damaged beyond my ability to repair.
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time to cool down a little and then I'll check out how bad it is going to be,

 

[66Dvert]

I just finished opening up the driver side fender and have a great big can of worms in my lap. I'm going to have to fix the support structure for the fender and then add the surface metal
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it's ugly but I can use some of the sedan bracing to replace the bad metal. It won't be perfect but it will work. here is what I'm using.
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and here's the cutout parts that I have to fix
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not really as bad as it looks but I have to make sure I don't screw up the curvature on the lower part of the fender.
Well done for the day more work later