After Shots-prt2

Here are a few after shots after I blasted the cancer areas. Still not spot less, but it is a little better than it was. This will be a fun job!! Or will it?

HOLY RUST!!

Window day- the day of all days that isn't the most exciting work there is to do, but one of the most important things especially on this design of a car. Research shows that if a Charger is found years later it will almost definitely have rust on the back frame of the rear window. Mine is no exception. Any ordinary fellow would have called the time of death on this car years ago just from this back window. I on the other hand look at it as another chance to cruise to proove all of those nay-sayers. I stripped the weatherstripping off, blasted the outer frame, and sprayed the cancer areas with Rust-Mort. These areas will definitely be cut out and made fresh again. It will take time and patience, but what else do I have with this car?

I CAN Get Dirty

Yes I grew up and continue to be the clean one in the family. I didn't like to get my hands messy or come in smelling like a car. I was and still could be called a prep for that reason. My motivation in this project is to show everyone who has doubted me that I can work hard and get my hands dirty. Now I will wash them extremely well afterwards (my wife likes my clean hands). I mean look at those dirt stains on my pants. Okay I did buy them that way, but you can't go wrong with a little dust on the carhartt jacket. All in all I'm getting a little make-over too on the perception that I've created growing up.

Is This Going to Break?

Here is one of the parts of this restoration that we were nervous about; the back window. After purchasing the panels they sat for almost a month. We had some family issues that has kept up from working steadily on Rusty so nothing had gotten done this month. But here we were ready to get that back window out. We were almost positive that it would break on us for some reason. After an hour of pushing, digging, and heating the glue around the window she broke free of the car and did so without a crack. The window revealed that the mouldings around the window will need to be cleaned (sandblasted) before we put the panels on there.

RIP

The cancer in these panels was too much to cut out, so we cut it off. They will rest here in the leaves for now until they will be scraped at the scrap yard where I won't have to look at them anymore. They have done their job for 38 years, and now it is time bid them farewell.

Driver's side panel replacement

Rusty made it out of surgery once again on th driver's side. As you can see a surgery scar is still noticeable. we can't do anything with that until the spring when body filler will be applied in warmer conditions. We also manufactured our own trunk extensions for this side as they are $90.00 a piece and we had stronger sheet metal for it anyway. There was some rust in the area and we stripped it down and cut it out so rusty will no have to worry about that cancer for a long time. She is sturdy and it is a solid piece that noone will ever see once complete.

Collateral Damage…

Two other things that burned me this weekend aside from that bad patch piece was the fact that I destroyed my pullover jacket. You see I got in the welding mode and didn’t care to put on the protective jacket my dad has and that I wore many times while welding just feet away. I was welding in the vinyl top holes on the sail panel leaning on the car when I experienced a nasty burning smell. I stopped and looked around on the floor, then to my dad, and finally down my chest to see a decent flame climbing towards my face. I quickly snuffed it out but not before my jacket paid the price for my stupidity. Later as I was finishing the weld on the trunk lid my dad wanted to take the lid off so I could sandblast it. Well he started to loosen the bolts and I didn’t want the lid to simply slide down and cause a problem so I placed my hand on the corner, which is where I just finished welding. Needless to say I branded myself. After this experience I can’t see how people choose to brand things into their body. I now have a small line to remind me of the day I wasn’t thinking, TWICE!!!!!!!

Out of Major Surgery…

This weekend was a nice boost to this long process of bringing a muscle car back from the dead. The passenger side fender was welded on and straightened to match the body lines. It wasn’t as difficult as I once thought it would be. I’m sure glad I wanted to learn to weld or this would probably not have been done so quickly with calendar conflicts. We had to also make a couple small metal patches to go under the wheelhouse to have some metal to weld it to. Then we hand sanded the replacement piece so we could primer it gray so in the end the paint wouldn’t appear darker with the black. I'm glad to have this piece on there finally. We would have actually had the other side done too but I had to send the patch pieces back to Sherman Parts because they bent the piece wrong and the body line was off by a full two inches. This is the second piece I got from there that was bent wrong. Anyway I experienced the frustration of having a nice day and the time to complete the ¼ panel with the wrong piece to put on the car. Just something I’ll have to wait for again.

ROAD TRIP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! For the engine.

My addiction to the Internet has resulted in another unexpected purchase for Rusty. Something I wasn’t really looking for but for some reason kept typing it in Craigslist ( online classifieds). I would type in the numbers 383 big block MOPAR. After probably two months of just monitor shopping these engines going for a couple thousand dollars I came upon this listing that was intriguing - 1968 Dodge 383 engine with 727 tourque flight tranny $350 - At first I thought it was just the block itself, but I emailed the guy who said it was a running engine but blew oil and has been sitting for 6 years. Also the tranny would need a rebuild. I was excited about the opportunity and called my dad to see if this is something we could do. He shot the idea down at first and I emailed the guy back and told him to forget it. An hour later my dad called back and said to offer him $300. Therefore I had to email the guy back and try and make a deal. He accepted the offer and two days later we were off to Constantine to pick up Rusty’s future engine. I’m always one for road trips, so I was very excited. It took us about an hour and a half to get there. We had no problems getting it or bringing it back. The 383 is now resting in my garage as we will slowly begin that part of the restoration later. I know in the end I will have to put some money in this engine, but I chose this route instead of buying a read-to-drop-in-engine for the simple fact that I wouldn’t learn anything about engines if I did that. Plus I think I will appreciate it more when I can say that I helped re-build the engine. Onward!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Learning to Weld

Mostly the last weekend was devoted to learning how to weld and getting it right before I applied my skills to the car. It took us many hours to complete the bottom patch to this door. It was a long process, but in the end replacing and applying new sheet metal will go much further. All the rust and rotted holes were cut off the bottom of the door. While the door was off we were able to clean and undercoat the front fender. I have to say that I did a pretty good job on the welding on this door. Another small objective achieved in this process. I am learning and having fun seeing the car getting new clothes.

Front Valance

After banging out some small dents in the front valance, blasting off the surface rust and getting some clean primer on there, I put it back on the front so it wasn’t just sitting around. The garage only has so much space. It’s a small victory, but it’s nice to have moments in this process where something is done being cleaned. I gave the frame a blasting and the surrounding areas before the valance was put on. Those areas were pretty clean, just 38 years of surface rust. It could have been much worse.