67/68/69 cuda dilemma

[Garethw]

Yeah, that’s how I go about it too. Especially knowing my daughter will eventually get this car, I can’t help but do the best job I can. Whenever I get tired I quit working on it for the day so I’m not tempted to half *** anything.

 

[moparmat2000]

For those who may want to know what primer I decided to use for the duration of this project, its Kirker Enduroprime epoxy primer. Two part 1-1 mix with activator. This stuff sticks well to metal. Polyester body filler sticks to it when you scuff it up good. About $100 for a kit that makes 2 gallons of useable primer. A word of caution, use a respirator when spraying this stuff, and clean your paint gun immediately with MEK or MEK substitute when done. This stuff dries slowly, but dries like concrete. The slower epoxy dries the harder it gets.

 

[moparmat2000]

The latest on this Filet O Fish. When ricky racer cut the bottoms off of the trunk hinge supports, they were never reattached to anything. The quarters where they meet the dutchman panel as a consequence dropped down leaving a large gap at the forward corners of the trunklid where the trunklid stuck up. The trunklid screws looked like they never had been adjusted since the car was built. I figure that gap was probably not there when the car was new and only happened when the bottoms of the trunk supports were cut off

When I bought the 69 barracuda back end to strip out the metal I needed to fix this car, I made measurements from the edge of the dutchman to the trunk floor where the framerails are. The measurements on that car were 17" on the dot. Pretty accurate IMHO. Im thinking the probably went 17 inches because it was an easy number to check quickly on the assembly line with a check block or a tape measure. I checked my car and the same spots were much lower. I cut some scrap tubing and used tongue depressors to shim the tubing to act as temporary jacking supports to raise the dutchman to 17" on the dot as measured from where the framerails meet the trunk floor. The result is the trunk closes without that drop down gap.

The next step is to remove the trunklid, the torsion bars, and drill off the old cut trunk hinge supports. Then locate, and weld in the good uncut trunk hinge supports i pulled from the 69 I drilled apart that will attach back into the inner wheel houses. This will now hold the quarter skins and dutchman at the height they are supposed to be at.

NOTE: pix 5 and 6.
#5 shows the trunklid sitting higher than the quarter skin before popping and shimming.
#6 shows everything level and even once I propped up and shimmed the quarter panel and dutchman to 17"

A lot of words, but I will post up some removal and install progress pix. For now here is how I set the dutchman and quarter height where it needed to be. Last 2 pix are measurements off Cudaver I cut apart. Thank God I thought to take that measurement before I removed those supports

 

[moparmat2000]

1 hour more and I am here on this. Since I am trying to locate the hinge supports in the exact same spot, I used tracing paper, and rubbed a tracing of the edge of the old frame, and where the drill marks were on the original part. Then I transferred that to the replacement piece, and used a #40 drill to locate for cleco pins. Now the holes line up centered where the drill holes are in the body. Rechecked the dutchman height. Still at 17 inches. Not welded in yet, but this went a lot quicker than I thought. Pays to rethink a plan of action to death before acting on it lol.

 

[moparmat2000]

Gratuitous scrap pic. Anybody need the hinge pins out of these before I pitch em on the trailer? PM me.

 

[moparmat2000]

Trunk hinge supports welded in today. Removed the temp support rods, and she stayed at 17". So I removed the dutchman after making some measurements. Low and behold 48" is exact between the seams from the quarters to the dutchman. Puts 24" being dead center of the car.

It fit pretty good for an aftermarket part, but required a little bit of work to get it to fit in the rear corners. It stuck up too high even with everything clamped tight. I ended up making cuts on both sides and working the metal down so it sits level with the edge of the quarter. I will weld it up and grind it down in those spots.

I still have to remove the remnants of the C channel that attaches the dutchman to the package tray. That is rotted through in spots and will need to be replaced. The green colored one out of the parts car will need to be sandblasted and primered, along with the quarter skin tops I intend to use.

I will be repairing the corners of the rear window opening that the dutchman doesnt cover as well. I will have to drill the dutchman to temporarily pin it in place for now with cleco pins, since I also have to carefully cut and graft in the quarter panel tops shown in the previous pix.

 

[moparmat2000]

Gratuitous scrap pic

 

[moparmat2000]

A bit more progress, got the new to me rear window C channel fitted.

 

[moparmat2000]

I temp welded in some bracing by the taillight, and cut the top of the RH rear quarter off. Fitted the replacement. All this will come back apart for sandblasting, and epoxy primer. These replacement pieces are super clean with only surface rust. I will probably work on the LH side tomorrow and get it to the same point. Also it wouldent be my build thread without the gratuitous scrap metal pic at the end.

 

[kursplat]

making good progress, looks nice

 

[moparmat2000]

Thank you. I finally got a workable plan to unFuck the rest of the *** end of this thing, and now I am rippin through it. Going to trim the LH side exactly the same as the RH side. Then everything will come back apart, get stripped clean in the sand blaster, and epoxy primered.

 

[moparmat2000]

Scrap 1/2" tubing, and cheap 2" electrical conduit, and temp welded bracing to hold the dimensions square on the *** end before I cut the rest of it apart. I want to push it outside and sandblast the taillight housing structures and epoxy primer them before I put it all back together. With this all braced up, I can probably go ahead and just cut the quarter skins off.

 

[moparmat2000]

A little more. They torched out the roof supports for their tub job too. I will be putting them back in, along with heavy duty repair plates for the door jamb striker areas from dynamic renovation while its opened up. Will also be refurbishing and greasing the window regulators as well.

 

[moparmat2000]

This rain gutter has the vin. I will have to repair it and put it back on. Pic #2 shows how bad these quarter skins were. These were not fixible.

 

[moparmat2000]

A bit more on the left side. I think I am done for the weekend. Was also screwing around with my panel flanger. This thing will do nice radiuses. The flanger will flange 1" down from the quarter panel top crease and not warp the panel. Practiced on the one I cut off. I do believe these goodmark half skins are gonna go on decent and fit just fine. So much more to do up in there before I can even think about putting them on though. Now the project is gonna slow down as I repair the rusted areas, and repair the roof supports that were cut out. Plus I go to an 8 day on, 6 day off schedule at work, heading into my 8 days on shift next week. I am not going to be fooling with it much during that time.

 

[Mpacker]

So happy to see all the progress, Matt. You’re crushing it.

 

[moparmat2000]

Thanks Mike!! Now the fun begins. All the repairs, sandblasting, and priming before reassembly

 

[moparmat2000]

A bit more progress on unFucking this car. I got the C pillar structural supports fitted and clamped in place. They torched these off when they tubbed it. I spent most of the day on this. I will remove these for the last of the sandblasting and epoxy priming to take place. Wife took action shots of what it took to get in there and cut this stuff out. And finally, the gratuitous scrap pic. I swear one of these days I will stop cutting bad stuff off this thing.

 

[moparmat2000]

Final trim and quarter lips are flanged front to just before the taillight. Test fit the goodmark panel on the LH side. It's going to need a fair amount of work to fit. The rear by the light is looking like it will be the worst piece to fit. I go back on shift at work for 8 days. This will give me some time to stew on this and figure out how I will make it fit. It's not AMD quality, so I expected what I got. The RH side was socked in pretty bad and filled with bondo it would have had to come this far apart as well. Might as well do both sides exactly the same.

 

[Super-Cuda]

Great work Matt!
Love your attention to detail!

 

[4spdragtop]

This is a must read for anyone doing a 2nd gen cuda resto

 

[moparmat2000]

Thanks Steve. I plan on removing the quarter windows, regulators etc, and have a bit more sandblasting and epoxy primer to do between those areas, and the taillight structure, and everything else sheetmetal wise i will be installing. I thought I was done with the blaster on the car body. Apparently not yet

 

[moparmat2000]

I feel a little bit better about this goodmark skin after cutting the excess metal off the front, back and top. I got the front lower body line lined up, and the upper indent for the gas cap recess sits 2.5" from the top lip same as OEM dimension. This puts a hell of a gap between the wheel house lip and the fender lip. Gonna trim the fender lip edge back a little bit since its 1&1/2" in some spots. It's only supposed to be 3/4". The back lower edge I will have to work with a dent bag and a plastic mallet to get the shape better. Note the position of the vise grip clamps and tongue depressors. Theres spots on the outer wheel houses specifically for padded clamps at the assembly plant. It's to draw the wheelnopening skin in till it touches the wheel house so the 2 pieces can be spot welded. Note pic 2. Back to work tomorrow for 8 days. If I can get some of these pieces I mocked up into the sandblaster at work at lunchtime I will LoL.

 

[mopowers]

This is one job I've thankfully never had to do. It looks like a complete pain in the ***. You're doing a killer job!

 

[moparmat2000]

Oh it's a pain in the dick alright. Not too bad though. I do sheetmetal on commercial airliners for a living. So from that standpoint, this stuff isnt too terribly hard for me. I will say the Goodmark panels are pretty rough though. I double checked my measurements. Checked Hypotheneus to make sure its square. Welded another brace at the taillight buckets to keep em square, then took it all apart. Gonna be using the sand blaster at work to clean up the small parts and epoxy primer it.

Going to push the car back out for more sandblasting. Want to blast the taillight frames, the rust areas where the C channel for the rear window was, the insides of the quarters after I remove the quarter glass and regulators. Some other stuff as well. I figure that this is the best time to do any of this.