Lucy: 64 Convertable build thread

[GriffinGuru]

Hi everyone, so it is time that I start a build thread for my car. I bought this car back in August '15 and I had posted two previous threads in this topic page. At the time and being new to car forums, I was creating my posts in chapter-like linear format. Most things in life are not linear, and certainly undertaking a resto-repair does not proceed in simple linear fashion. My first post was shortly after I bought the car which was in relatively functional shape, and I was working on sorting out the running and driveability issues. That was called "64 convertible- getting it to run right" or something like that. Long story short it was the usual set of circumstances with carb rebuilds, point setting, timing, and issues with my valve rocker arms adjustment.

After I had it running and driving, I created a second post in this board called "chapter 2 repairing the convertible top". Not much in that post since my original plan to patch and jerry rig the top did not go anywhere, and I am just going to have to replace the top once the body work in done. So I realize these things do not go in simple 1, 2, 3 step processes since there are always things that come up, and short attention spans have one doing many little things all over the car at various times.

So here it is my build page! It's the usual stuff I guess, but I think it is kind of cool to document the progress of this for myself and future generations... Perhaps a little too epic, I got carried away. So below are a few pictures so all can see what I have ahead of me. Lots of work, but if it was easy someone else would have done the body on this car years ago. Now it's my turn to have a swing at it!

[cad-kid]

Lucy will sure be a great looker when you are done

I look forward to seeing your updates.

[GriffinGuru]

It is about time for an update I think. I have been busy due to holidays, some projects around the house, and helping my brother fix his car, but
I have been making some progress however slow on the body work.

I have been trying to strip the paint on the rear half of the car. The stripping is done inside the passenger wheel well, and about half done inside the driver wheel well. I have also been working on the outside body paint stripping as well as seen in the picture. The engine lid is off and in the basement for now and I'll get to that after the back half is in primer. The stripping is slow for me. I keep getting asked if I am using "aircraft stripper", and I doubt that what I am using is actually "aircraft stripper". I am using paint stripper I bought at Tractor Supply and I am suspecting it is a safer low VOC (50%VOC) formula.

It is requiring 3-4 applications in a given area to get down to the fender metal. The first coat just bites into the paint and takes the gloss off (I don't think a car this old is 2 stage). With the second and third application I can usually use a putty knife to scrape all the color down to the primer. The primer however doesn't seem to remove so easily by scraping. Last night I put in my stripper on the remaining primer and ran a wire wheel across that while the stripper was still wet and that took it down to metal, but was very messy and I could only do about a square foot area at a time since the grinder would create wind that would dry the surrounding stripper off pretty quickly. Also stripping around the tight curves of the taillight area is difficult at best, and that I might try with the same wet-wire wheel process I used on the primer layer.

Is this how tedious the stripping process normally is, or do I need to find real "aircraft stripper" to ease and speed the process up? One good thing about what I am using is that it does not create a lot of nasty fumes in my not-so-well ventilated garage. We are coming into winter the need to open the garage door to vent the fumes in cold weather does not sound enjoyable.

Once the stripping and bodywork-fabbing is done I plan to prime with epoxy primer as from what I have researched is the better way to go since I can prime onto filler and also add filler overtop the primer again if I see other areas that aren't straight after priming. I can't wait to be finished with the stripping process and can start playing with metal and fire again. I am not looking forward to doing the front and sides of the car if the process will be this painful across the whole car.

[GriffinGuru]

Hello again, I was getting bored with paint removal and also running into areas that needed repaired anyway, which made said paint removal in those spots impossible. So the other week I started in on the fabbing and patching work needed on the rear of this car. I still have a long way to go, but at least I am starting to get the hang of "stitching" in metal sheetwork without burning through when welding. I have completed the under panel in the rear and have cut out what needs replaced inside the upper right rear fender. I have a strategy for how I'll repair that somewhat complicated area and will need three pieces made, assembled from inside first, working toward the outside as I go. Earlier I was wondering what caused this rust, but now I think the rust in this area was caused by water getting between the fenderwell seam that runs the inner perimeter and attacking the pinchwelds, rather than water coming from somewhere above (also on the left side in the same location). I don't even remember why I started to remove the inner wheel well chip guard coating, but I'm glad I did since I have found multiple areas where the seam sealer was failing and rust was starting to form in some other locations.

Also I have started pulling and hammering around the left back-up light bezel. The car must have backed up into something because this lamp circle area was pushed inwards and was creased and dented at the lower edge of the rim. I still have a little way to go here, but it is almost back to where it needs to be. This area is certainly a tricky spot to work the metal and there are some complicated shapes to try to re-bend!

I still have a long way to go, and I did not know how time consuming all this patching and fab work is to do. The welding is necessarily slow , so progress is slow, but once the back end is done, the rest of the car is not nearly in as bad shape!

[1949chevy]

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55 before b and w.jpg (45.73 KiB) Viewed 2085 times

Body work is sometimes a nice break when you have spent a lot of time doing the mechanical's with all its problems with any car but especially on a corvair. ...so look at it as once you start the mechanicals you will be very happy for a while anyway, then the body work seems like it was so nice and easy....but none of it is easy. The first car I built was a 55 ford f100, I paid $75.00 for it and it was a mess as you will see the photos. I even braved taking the frame off and starting it all from scratch...had very little money so I had to do all the work myself....suspension was first...I put in a crappy no good Mopar torsion bar system at first...eventually removed it and I welded in a 70 Monte carlo subframe ( 30,000 miles without alignment even), etc. Long story short, I have built 2 basically frame up since then and then this terrible corvair I have now...the longer you work...the more you feel comfortable and pleased in the garage.

Here is what I started with and what it finished like...so, hang in there and you will be a very pleased corvair owner.

[cad-kid]

Good update

[GriffinGuru]

It is time for an update: Over the cold weeks of winter it was difficult to find time to work on the car. Mainly, it takes a while for my heater to warm up the garage, and also the welding (flux wire), and paint stripping work generates many fumes which require me to open doors to vent. Not the best thing in January, who knew?

Anyway I did manage to finish repair in the pass rear wheel well, and just yesterday as the temps warmed up a little I started on the drivers side. I removed the previous battery box repair and have so far patched the lower side "rail" area. I plan to use heavier gauge metal for the battery tray bottom than was previously used in the repair. I am getting better at the patch/repair welds as there was very little that needed ground and re-welded in this first piece. One big reason for this is that I am cleaning up the metal better of paint and rust where I am welding and that REALLY makes all the difference. I know, it seems pretty self obvious, but after cutting and shaping the metal patches, I was overly ambitious and just wanted to start welding and fill those holes!! I am learning that a better weld to start with saves ALOT of time in re-work. Also. the auto-darkening helmet is a world of difference.!!

[GriffinGuru]

As with many things, the current process of finishing the back of the car is a bit all over the place. I want to get primer on the car, but in order to do one thing, I have to do something first, and to do that something else needs first prepped etc. The process is slow and a bit all over the place right now, but at least in a month or two, I think I'll actually be priming the rear. For now I am pushing myself to finish the battery tray area so that I can start the car and get those fluids moving again. The gas at least was drained back in the winter when I realized it won't be driving so soon.

I have welded in the drip rail that was missing above the battery tray with a repair patch and patched the hole cut out between the tray area and the hood prop mount. Halfway through this process I wished it had just removed the repaired area that the previous owner started as the metal was a bit too thin gauge and the patch was not square with the rest of the tray. By that time, I was halfway into finishing the section and it is an unseen area in the engine bay anyway, so I will just work with what I am given.

I made the tray base with proper heavier gauge steel and have it mocked up into place. I will spot weld it into the box and then on the outside I will sandwich in the original cut places with L shaped sheet metal around the corners of the box. There are still a few other areas in the driver's side wheel well that also need patched at the top like on the pass. side I did earlier. This will all be sealed up with seam sealer then before I eventually spray underbody coat in the wheel wells. There are all sorts of seams that I will re-seal before painting.

[cad-kid]

Nice update! As my welding knowledge is pitiful at best - please explain the holes you drilled in the battery tray patch

[GriffinGuru]

That battery tray is not actually welded yet. The holes are where I'll weld into and fill to make my "spot welds". I think in the welding/auto body world they are actually called button welds.

As far as patching goes I'm still not sure in some places whether it is better for me to spot weld or run continuous beads. In some repairs I have seen it seems that they spot weld patches in regular spacing and just fill un welded the gaps in with bondo? That seems half assed though and would cause the filler to crack over time I would think. ...Or in those pictorials they only just show the initial tacking up, but gloss over the process of finishing the welding.

My flux welder doesn't make the cleanest welds, and in certain places the rusty condition of the metal tends to cause some difficulty making clean beads. Spot welding is easier, quicker, and less likely to cause burn through for me. In the case of whenever I get to replacing a section of fender between the B pillar and the rear wheel well though, I think I want to do a continuous bead since the car is unibody and that is part of the structure there.

[cad-kid]

Thanks, good explanation.

[GriffinGuru]

Overdue Update:

Much progress has been made. Although I am not as proficient in body work and turning around projects as quick as some others, I have been quietly making progress over the last few months and today I just got over a huge hurdle. I have attached my replacement fiberglass panel for the lower rear valence. This piece was holding me up from getting moving far ahead on my bodywork. Actually, I noticed a few weeks back that the areas I sanded were starting to surface rust, so I used naval jelly rust dissolver and then sprayed the car with etch prime for the time being so my hard work doesn't rust away. It also showed all the imperfections so I started doing the bondo on the rear quarters a while.

Attaching the fiberglass panel had many components that needed to come together at the same time, including trimming and sanding the panel (this took forever mostly because I was having trouble figuring out how it was going to mount at the body seam below the inner panel where there was nothing to attach to...)

Anyway, I borrowed a dual tube caulking gun from a friend, glued the panel and then riveted it around the edges and bolted through the bumper holes to hold it in place. The epoxy panel bond luckily has a 90minute working time which was nice since there was so much area to cover. It will need to cure for at least 24 hours and then I can finally do the bondo work on the rear panel. And there will be a lot of filler needed for this area with many tricky curves to sand- most likely by hand as I can't get a tool in around the taillight bezels very well My goal is to hopefully have the back section sprayed in urethane epoxy primer and driving for 4th of July weekend... That may or may not happen depending on if they fail my truck for inspection and I have to focus energy on that to be legal.

[GriffinGuru]

Well I almost made a HUGE mistake. About 3 hours into the curing time I remembered that I got a little epoxy onto the threads of the middle bumper bolt holding the panel in place and I thought it might be a good idea to back that bolt out before the epoxy cures... Man am I glad I did that. That bolt was really starting to tighten up, and had that fully cured, there would have probably been nothing I would have been able to do to remove that. I would have been totally screwed and had no choice but to grind flat and not have the bumper bolted in the middle. That would have been a total disaster. I checked the other 2 bolts but they are through bolts anyway and were not trying to glue themselves in place.

So remember kids: don't go glueing things you don't want to your car!!

[cad-kid]

Thanks for the good update

[Corventure Dave]

Keep us posted. Remember.... even a little progress, is still progress. Just keep at it. Eventually you will really
enjoy the accomplishment. Especially all that you have done yourself. Looking real good. Great work!

Corventure Dave

[GriffinGuru]

Update on the project:
I have really been itching to drive this again and I needed a break from the body work. So, I sprayed the rear with a urethane epoxy primer and put the taillights and associated bumper and trim back into place. Tried to sort a few other things like my fuel guage not working. I only have 6volts at the brown wire on the sender instead of 12v. The input at the dash guage black wire is at 12v, but even measuring voltage right at the brown wire on the guage itself I have only 6v. It looks like my guage is at fault with a poor internal connection or something along those lines...for another day I may try to source another guage.

In spraying the rear, I apparently had the wrong size paint gun needle (I have a 1.4, but I am told I should be using a 2.0 for primer). Also the gun had too much pressure and my primer came out a little like truck bedliner. I had a regulator and dessicator at the gun, but my error was that I had the regulator at the compressor turned down to about 60psi. At this low pressure, the regulator on the gun was giving me all sorts of weird readings, and as such it was turned all the way open...60psi at the gun? Also I did not have the engine bay masked as well as I thought I did and I have paint overspray all over the engine. That part annoys me the most.

At least it is not like I am trying to bring this car to a concourse level of repair. I am just trying to get it to a presentable driver level and I know my bodywork will likely not be perfect, but hopefully should present good at a 10 foot distance.

Anyway I have the car together and drove it around town a little, and I now I can drive it for the holidays and nice summer days. The rest of the bodywork will resume at some alter point in the fall.