65 Corvair Convertible Restoration

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This spring (January) I undertook the body restoration of a 1965 Monza Convertible. The car looked pretty good a the beginning of the job. There were some obvious and known rust issues in the rear of the front fenders hinge pillars and left rocker panel. I will share photos and limited commentary as the job progresses to provide yet again insight into the trials and tribulations of restoring old Vairs.

Before pics

Disassembly:

Added braces to the door opening to maintain square for the rocker replacement prior to a trip to the media blaster:

Next step is off to the media blaster.

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A couple weeks past from the photos in the last post and the car is back from the blaster with many surprises...and not good surprises either:

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Continuing on...good thing I had a buddy that had some NOS door skins and three 1/4 panels (too bad he did not have a L rear 1/4 which I needed the worst) so I bought them. I found a NOS L rear 1/4 from Corvair Ranch in PA...(a late rear 1/4 panel will ship by UPS oversize) :)

Next I etch and epoxy primed all the steel I would not be cutting off and replacing (not a lot of the exterior in this case).

[rv6aaviator]

Looks like your well on your way. Keep it going. Like the pictures of all the bagged parts.....I do the same thing. Makes it easier for reassembly. Kids couldn't believe Dad used all the sandwich bags for their lunches......

[mart]

swap ya

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swap ya

No thanks Mart. I think the one you have was worse.

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Have some time today so I will add a few more posts of progress.

The first area I repaired was the badly rusted Left rocker panel. I start by removing the badly rusty lower 1/4's and rocker outer and inner pieces.

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Finding the inner rocker support section badly rusted along the bottom and at the rear I proceed to mark, cut away and fabricate a replacement section from some 1/8" 3x5 square steel tubing. I cut a piece form the tubing and bent the short side to the proper angle to hit the bottom of the new outer rocker and welded my patch in place.

Finding my self lacking a really good reference to be sure the new outer rocker will gap properly to the bottom of the door, I cut up the cars old very rusty door so I could tack weld the outer skin in the door opening.

I liberally coat all rusty and surface rusty areas with POR15 before welding things closed.

Next step was drilling and installing the Clark's repro rocker sections. These parts are usable but not perfect. They stick out a little too far below the door and are certainly much rounder along this edge than the stock contour. I fixed this by installing them as supplied and then cutting them lengthwise at the round upper edge, pushing the face in and re-welding forming a nice square edge. I also as you can see in the photos chose not to use the entire part supplied by Clark's, as using the top all the way onto the top of the rocker step area would involve attacking parts of the car that are in good shaped. Regardless of where you stop you will have an end to end butt seam anyway so I chose to cut part of the replacement sections away and install as the pics show.

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The next order of business was repair of the rusty L lower door hinge pocket area. I started with re-making the missing rear fender support and then cutting away the rusty pocket repairing holes behind it and eventually fabricating the new outer pocket again. The end result is solid and will require only a very thin skim of body filler to eliminate the hammer and grind marks.

I also re-made the missing bottom of the latch post inner structure before moving on to replacing the L 1/4 panel itself.

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On to the 1/4 panel. The first order of business before cutting away the 1/4 is to ensure a good fit with the door. so first I mount and very carefully align the replacement door I will be using. Then I cut away all the sections of the 1/4 panel I will not be retaining during the installation of the coupe 1/4 panel. There are a number of ways one could successfully section the coupe panel into the convertible. Since this car is in excellent shape along the top from the door opening to the engine bay I chose an expedient simple splice area retaining original steel along this area.

I also installed a l outer rear panel lower corner for another car while I was doing the 1/4. Original was beat and rusty.

Now to address the rusty wheel houses at the rocker panels.

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Once the L rear 1/4 was in place it was time to address the L front 1/4 panel. After seeing how the complete 1/4 was installed I decided that total replacement was not in the best interests of the car or our budget. The little weatherstrip flange along the trunk side is not part of the new panel. The panel also sandwiches and under laps heavy steel inner structure approaching and at the windshield area. Luckily this car is very solid in these area, so, I sectioned this panel along the top as well retaining the excellent weatherstrip channel and joints to the lower windshield panel and post as well as retaining the excellent hood to fender gap.

Once again time for wheel house repair by the rocker panel. This time behind the L front wheel.

Well, the Left side of the car is in pretty good shape now. Time to move to the right hand side of the car.

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First I must have the R door so I can hang and align it before 1/4 panel replacements. This presented a little of an issue since my the door I got to use is not perfect and need my NOS skin installed. First to repair the door shell rust along the bottom flange.

At this point this Topic is caught up to current time. I have recently returned to doing my restoration business fulltime so progress will be faster and I will post it more often. Stay tuned:) Ted

[Jerry Whitt]

Hope you are keeping track of the hours and dollars spent.

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Hope you are keeping track of the hours and dollars spent.

This job is for a customer. I am keeping very close track of time and expenses:)


Edit: actually since you asked I had not totaled the time on the bill recently. You got me curious, so, I did that this morning and I have spent 90 Hours on the body work so far from disassembly to current status.

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Wife had to work today so I spent a couple hours on the vert. Aligned and installed the NOS R door skin to the R door shell then installed and aligned the door to the car. You must loosely mount the skin to the door shell and then mount the door to the car and align it to the car before finalizing the door skin install. There is some slop between the door shell and the skin. Often you find the skin needs to shift a little on the shell for best alignment to the 1/4 panels. Once shifted and aligned well all around I tack weld a couple spots to ensure the skin stays aligned to the shell when I remove the door to finish hammering the skins flange and add the rest of the welds to the skin. After the skin was fully installed I re-installed the door to the car and aligned. The car is ready now for tomorrows work which will be some R 1/4 panel sectioning.

[Jerry Whitt]

Your note that 90 hours have been spent so far is understandable. In this area, amounts around $100 per hour are common. Hope you checked the customers
ability to pay. I ran a shop for many years, once in a while, the customer could not pay. Selling a car thru the lein process is a real headache in California.