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10/10/99 We moved dad's '38 Chev coupe to Bob's barn for the winter to make room for the Camaro in the garage. Here is a great site with a beautiful '38 coupe. link We arranged the garage so that everything fit and now we are finally ready to resume working on it. I bought a Sawzall this weekend to cut out the trunk floor with. I will be working on that this week and hopefully get that done. When moving my car parts from the main hall of the barn into one of the stalls out of the way, I found that my center console had been stepped on and crushed. It might be fixable, but it looks pretty bad right now. DAMN! 10/13/99 Finally got back to business last night. I started cutting out the truck floor with my new sawzall, and quickly went through 2 blades. I only had 2, so I will pick up some more tonight and finish the job. I installed the steering column and started working on the heater control. I took it apart to clean it up and take care of the rust on the levers and repaint the black parts. Dad continued working on one of the doors and it is getting close to being ready. I will probably work on the air ducts tonight and the heate control some more. 10/14/99 Dad worked on the door and I worked on the trunk floor. I finished cutting out the old rusted out floor and did some grinding on the edges to take off the paint and rust that was left. I trimmed the new floor and we did some fitting and it is going to look great! As soon as I finish grinding off the old paint around the edges, I will use some screws to hold the floor down while we weld it in place. 10/15/99 More work on the trunk while dad continues to make the drivers door perfect. I ground the paint from where the welds will be and worked on fitting the new piece. I got a couple of screws in it to hold it down and need to add a few more around the edges. Should be able to weld it this weekend I think. 10/25/99 Basically, nothing happened with the car this weekend. We decided to get the glue to hold down the trunk floor, but the paint store was out of it until last this week. We will use it in some places and then weld around the edges in other places. I worked on the heater control some, repainting the black parts. I went to install the plastic duct for the defroster, and found out that I had to remove the heater box to get it in. Dad helped me do that and then we used the air compressor and blew off the dust from the front end and covered it with plastic. I stuck rags in the vents because when I removed the heater box, the inside was caked with dust, and it was clean when I put it together a couple months ago. 10/28/99 Finally got some more pictures developed and scanned. My console got broken while in storage. The front of the painted dash The back of the painted dash Painting the glove box door, instrument carrier and steering column What is assembled on the front end The trunk floor is cut out I have set the new trunk floor in place 11/3/99 I won bidding on Ebay for a console. The seller had a picture of it on there and it looks pretty good. Hopefully I can get that pretty soon. 11/9/99 I assembled the heater control on installed it last night. I had to unbolt the defroster duct so I could route the cables behind it and re-route the main wiring harness. I should have taken better pictures and notes on just how that harness routed. Oh well, I will eventually get it figured out. 11/15/99 I little bit of work got done this weekend. I was going to install the ignition switch and some others in the dash, but I left them at Bob's in his garage. I went and got them later, but they are still sitting in my truck. I started making a custom alternator bracket. After working on it for a while, I realized everything would fit a lot better if I had just bought a longer fan belt. DUH! I will pick one up this week and correct that. I will either go with my custom mount or buy a chrome one off the wall of the nearest parts store and use it. Dad is still checking on the glue that we will use for the trunk floor and should get that this week. He found some weld through primer for it also. I took a couple of pieces of scrap that we trimmed from the new trunk floor and I practiced my welding. I think I should do ok as long as I don't make long welds that could warp things. 11/23/99 Some good progress was made last night. I installed the new ignition switch with new bezel and bezel nut and the new key lock. I used an SOS pad to clean up the bezels for the light switch and the wiper switch. I made a tool to tighten the bezel nuts for the wiper and light switches, it worked great! I also cleaned up the center dash panel. Someone had put a hole in the upper left corner for a swtich or something, and I was wondering what I was going to do about that. Dad pulled out a bag of plugs that just pop in, and they fit perfectly! Problem solved. The plug is polished and looks just fine. I may drill a hole in the other side and put one there too so it looks even, but I will think about it for a while. I need to get a new cig lighter socket, mine is pretty rusty. I also touched up a couple of small spots on the instrument carrier where I sanded through the paint on the edges. I just used a small brush, and it will look just fine. Dad cut out another small piece for a patch in the trunk where the new floor pan does not cover. That is ready to weld in. I will probably do that tonight. I will also be priming all of the areas that the new trunk floor will be covering and then we will be ready to weld it in. 11/29/99 We welded in the replacement trunk floor this weekend. It's not pretty, but it will work. Dad caulked underneath and will pick up some seam sealer to do inside. We should be able to get it smoothed out and make it look very presentable. We also cut out a patch under the rear bumper that had been hit before. There was just too much damage and would take too much time to straighten out with a hammer, so we cut it out and will make a patch to weld into place. Dad had some cigarette lighter sockets in a box and I found one that was in better shape than the one I had. I cleaned it up and installed it in the dash. I cleaned up the ash tray bracket that bolts into the dash and threw some silver paint on it. Last week I touched up a couple of small spots on the instrument carrier and bolted in the guages. I wrapped it up and will leave it on the shelf until I am ready to install it so I don't take it in and out several times and risk scratching it. I also continued working on my lower alternator bracket. I am having trouble figuring this thing out, but I am getting closer. 12/6/99 Dad finished off the patch under the rear bumper and primed it and you cannot tell it was patched. Another great job! He also put some seam sealer on the welds on the inside of the trunk, so that should be ready to prime shortly. I will wait to paint it until after the car has been painted and sanded, that way it won't get really dirty. 12/7/99 Mounted the switch for the convertible top last night. Also painted the inside of the ash tray, and I will paint the front later this week. Installed the mounting braket for the ash tray also. Dad did some more cleaning in the trunk and will spray it with DP-90 primer. 12/7/99 Here is a pic of the car on the trailer when we moved it to Dad's house on 9/28/99. car on the trailer 12/14/99 Dad patched another small hole he found in the trunk while cleaning it to paint. He then sprayed it with DP-40 primer, which is green. I was expecting him to use the black primer, because then all I would have to do is put on the truck bed liner stuff on the bottom and the trunk would be done. He will spray it with the black later this week. I finished painting the ash tray and installed it. We also cleaned up the corner weights and dad will prime those with the black when he does the trunk. I will leave them black primer and then I can install the trunk weights. Right now the car is in the garage nose first so we can work on the back, byt we are pretty much done with the back and will turn the car around this weekend. We just need to spend another night or two to finish both doors and then we can start on the front fenders. I also have a LOT of works still to do in the engine compartment. I need to re-connect the brakes and grease all of the new ball joints and tie rods. I am still working on the alternator bracket and need to clean the carb and a bunch of other little details up front. 12/19/99 Dad sprayed the trunk with the black primer and it looks exactly like I had imagined that I wanted it. He covered absolutely everything in there, so there is no sign of the red or splatter paint. He also painted the weights and installed the ones in the trunk. We pulled the car out of the garage and turned it around on Saturday also. Now we can easily access the front and work on it. 12/21/99 I installed the new front brake lines last night. I had to replace them because when I added the power brake booster, the stock lines were just a little bit too short. Dad worked on the trunk lid, taking out some of the little dents that look like they were from slamming it closed with too much stuff in the trunk. The car did not come stock with a spoiler, but one was in it when I bought it. I will keep it, so we made the mounting holes that were hacked in the trunk better looking with a hole saw on the inside. 12/28/99 Messed around with it tonight a little. Dad worked on the rear spoiler and I tinkered with stuff under the dash. Didn't accomplish anything though. I found that the steering box seal is leaking, so I will have to pull that at some point and put a new seal in it. 1/4/2000 I have been out to work on the car the past 2 nights. Dad is working on the trunk lid. It was/is real wavy and he has been working hard on it. Last night I mentioned that he should not put too much work into it because a replacement repro lid is only $114. He was not aware of that and would not have put any work into it had he known that. Oh well. He is going to skim it with bondo and see if he can straighten it out that way quickly. It not, I will order a replacement. I have been working on some of the smaller parts. I cleaned up a couple of the smaller secondary wiring harnesses that go under the dash for the courtesy lights and things and installed them. I had to solder one of the light sockets back on, but that was not a problem. I cleaned and painted the horn relay and voltage regulator and they are ready to install. I checked out my new engine harnesses to make sure they are correct, and they do look good. I will be concentrating on getting the engine in running condition for the next couple of weeks while the fenders are off. I still need to replace the seal on the power steering pump. 1/5/2000 Dad worked on the trunk lid and the driver door last night. Both are coming along fine. Another skim coat of bondo for the trunk lid and more sanding and it's gonna turn out fine. There will be bondo, but it's thin so I don't mind. I installed the headlight wiring harness and the voltage regulator and horn relay. The new harness looks good. I also painted the washer bottle bracket and dad found that he had a washer bottle that fits it, so he cleaned that up for me last night. I also installed new spark plugs in the engine. I will work on putting oil in it and greasing the suspension bushings soon too. I was thinking about the new subframe bushings that I installed 6 months ago. I learned somewhere that the bolts should be torqued to 100 ft/lbs. Mine will not tighten up, it just squishes the bushings. There are supposed to be steel collars in them, and I think I did not get those with this set. I will check that out for sure tonight and will have to order a new set that is correct. Good thing to discover this now, because the frame alignment would probably change once I started driving it. 1/6/2000 Installed the washer bottle bracket and washer bottle last night. Dad continued on the trunk lid and door. I also worked on cleaning up the radiator so that I can paint it and install it. I checked the subframe bushings and they do have a collar that runs through them, it's molded in. I tightened them down a bunch more than I had them and they should be fine. I used about 70 ft/lbs. 1/10/2000 The driver door, trunk lid, and rear spoiler are complete. Dad primed them and we set them out of the way to work on other things. He is working on the passenger door now. The right side of the radiator on top was dented up some, so we used some All Metal, it's a bondo like stuff, to smooth it so it will look good when we paint it. I don't know how well it will hold up, we will see after I start driving the car. The radiator shroud is broken completely on the right side about halfway down the side. A new one runs about $50. For now, I used a couple of small black zip ties to hold it together. I want to put a new one on, but this is really something that I can live with for now and it I don't like it later, I can buy a new one. I also sanded the fan blade and we will prime the radiator and fan blade Monday night. More pictures finally. I didn't have a good one of the completely done trunk floor after it was painted, but these should give you an idea of how it looks. The new trunk floor is welded in. We have gone around the weld and sealed it. We replaced this patch where it had been hit. The driver door is done and in blue primer. 1/12/2000 Nothing really new. Dad continues on the passenger door. I cleaned up the horns for painting. The fan blade and radiator are ready for priming and painting also. 1/18/2000 The radiator, fan, and horns were primed by dad. I painted the horns and fan gloss black and left the radiator flat black. I will spray the fan shroud with the flat black too because it looks pretty used. I installed the radiator, shroud, fan and horns on the car to get them out of the way. |
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