[Dave R]

Originally Posted by Todd Kozak

I have about $10,500.00 in my 69 Cat Wagon and it's ready to drive and enjoy. If you want a wagon, I'll sell you mine and you can part your car out. Once the mice, mold and rot takes hold of a car, it's a long road to recovery.

Hi, Thanks for the offer. I'd love to buy it but I'm on a strict "no more cars" curfew having brought home a few too many. Fortunately, the mice never made a home in the car. They had a lot of other options where the car was parked at my parents. The rot isn't too bad but will require some patching and a new floor in the front. The biggest problem so far is getting everything moving.
.
My friend has let me use the shop for a few weeks in exchange for some welding so I'm going to give it a go and see what I can fix without spending a lot of money.

[Todd Kozak]

Hey, I can relate to the 'no more cars' thing! Good luck with your project!

[Dave R]

Well, after a week of letting it sit and soak. I've started to free up some of the moving parts. Now all the windows move but three only go down and won't come back up. The other goes down only with the master switch and comes back up only with the door switch. Does this mean new switches? Or is something else going on?

[Dave R]

Finally have all 4 doors working plus the vent windows.! I had to pull the panels off the two front ones and lots of penetrating oil.
I still haven"t figured out the tail gate. There is no way to access the seized areas. I may have to drill access holes. Also the window is still up so it's a definite no go at this point. Does anyone have a replacement tailgate? I'm assuming it is specific to a 68 Wagon.

[perryka]

I have been told that 65-68 tailgates are all the same. There's one on Ebay now.

Alan

[Dave R]

Thanks! I'll check it out.

[Ben M.]

The tailgate interior mechanisms should be accessible from the interior panel. It removes via screws and I believe you can get them all with the gate up. I had to do it on my '67 Catalina wagon and there wasn't any issue that I can recall.

[Dave R]

I tried that but I could only get the top screws. There is a lip that folds up and covers the bottom screws so that the panel can't be removed. You can see it in the picture. When the tailgate is open, it flops down and covers the gap between the tailgate and the car.

[Dave R]

Now that the doors are working I can check out the rust in the front floorboards. It's amazing how much easier it is to get into a car through the correct doors rather than sliding over the seats with tools in hand. Check the pics below. What looks like surface rust in the passenger floorboard becomes a big hole with just a little screwdriver prodding. The driver's side already had the carpet hanging through the bottom but I just can't get that picture to upload.

The good news is that I have a 4 door 65 Bonneville that can supply some sheet metal for this project. I'd forgotten about that car which seems odd but I've had a lot of cars over the years and some just end up getting parked and left for years. I'll start with the driver's side and update with pics as I go. My friend has loaned me his shop for the next three weeks so I'll see what I can get accomplished. The only caveat is that the car has to remain driveable so that it can be driven off the hoist at any time. Shouldn't be too hard

[Dave R]

I cut out the driver's side floor of the wagon and the corresponding piece from the 4 door.
After cleaning up the new piece, it has some rust as well from where rain pooled. At least that will be an easy fix on the flat. The rest of it is good.
There was also rust hiding behind the kick panel. I'll fix the floor first though. I hope it's not like this for the whole car 'cause it's Big Car!
Also during this process I found out that the parking brake is seized as well as the dimmer switch. At least the ones in the 65 looked good and similar. Hopefully they will swap.

[Dave R]

Here's the floor tack welded in place. It's lapped right now. I'm trying to decide if I should cut it as I go and butt weld it or just lap weld it (way quicker and easier) and then coat with seam sealer. I'm thinking I'll butt weld it as it does the best job. It's what I used to patch the patch, so to speak.

I'll paint it after I finish all the welding. Probably use por 15 but that requires taking everything to bare metal. The black piece in the center is already EDP coated but the rest of the interior has surface rust here and there. I have a gallon of zero rust black so I may use that to keep costs down.

My nephew helped me pull the seat out. The seat tracks (pictured) show why they are seized. I don't expect them to stat working again so I'll head back to the parts car. Hopefully there are some decent ones there.

[Dave R]

I didn't realize at first how valuable the 65 parts car would be. Here's the passenger side front floor pan cut out of it and cleaned up. It's nearly perfect thanks to the car being from California and stored indoors for most of it's life. I was elated to find that the 65 Bonnie also had a complete power front bench with seat tracks that will go in the Wagon. In fact, the 65 Bonnie seat foam and metal was in such good shape I'm thinking I should use it and cover it with the black cover from the Wagon. I'll save that for later though as I've got to keep focused on the rust repair.
Speaking of which, I ended up zip cutting the drivers side floor pan and butt welding it as I went. I couldn't help myself. It took way longer but I'm super happy with the result.
The bad news and there always is some as I dig deeper into the Wagon, is that there is some rust behind the kick panels on both sides (pass side pic below). That means a cowl or window leak somewhere on both sides. I'm not sure what my next step should be now. Pull the dash and look or pull the window or maybe there is rust hiding behind the fenders. I'll have to investigate further and keep repeating to myself "I will not do a frame off restoration, I will not do a frame off restoration"...

[Dave R]

Finally! The penetrating oil has done it's trick and my seats fold flat. It took a while and it was quite a work out putting them up and down to really get them moving. Then I started removing the seats. Fortunately, my nephew helped with this as those bench seats are crazy heavy. It felt like we were removing about 600 lbs from the car. Anyone know what all three seats weigh?
And now for the bad news Yep, more rust. This time under the rear seat. Where the feet go seems to be mostly surface. I'll wire wheel it to be sure but it will be another trip to the parts car. Meanwhile, the pass floor pan is just tacked in since I ran out of welding wire. Check out the toys in the pic - they were under the rear seat probably since the 70's along with a bunch of those pink curlers. Yep, Momma had her hair in curls as she was driving along.

[blubomber]

The 400 cid motor was standard on Bonnevilles in '68. The 428 was an option. In '69 the YH block 428 #46 head (small valve) (360 hp) motor was standard on the Bonnevilles and the YK block #62 (large valve) 428 HO (390 hp) was optional.

[Dave R]

I'm pretty sure I just have the 400. I haven't even checked it to out to see what heads it has. It looked completely original and since I started it up after 5 years, the rear seal has developed a disconcerting drip. A 428 HO would be awesome but I'm building this for a highway cruiser so a 400 is OK. Can't wait to go on holidays in it.

[se428bandit]

It's cool that your going to save that wagon, i really like the 9 pass wagons being i'm from a family of 7 kids.

[Dave R]

Well, I'll give it my best shot. It needs more saving than I originally thought. Lots of hidden rust issues. My parents had a couple wagons but there were only 4 of us kids. One was a 9 passenger. There would always be a race for the far back seat. It seems odd now that a car manufacturer would make a seat that was only accessible by jumping over another seat or through the back tail gate.

[Dave R]

I finally have all the fold down seats working AND the tail gate opens. It took lots of penetrating oil and dismantling to get there. I've been patching up the rust but it seems to be increasing with every panel removed. Now I have the full interior out of the car except for the dash and I'm cleaning up the old seam sealer as it's drying out and smells like old car, not the good smell but the moldy one. I'm hoping to finish the floor patching this week and then paint everything with Por-15 so it won't rust again.

Can anyone let me know if the spare tire area is supposed to be dented in like that. I'm not sure what the stock configuration is supposed to be but it looks like the spare tire well has been pushed up from the bottom (presumably by driving over something) and then the previous owner made room for the spare by hammering in the sheet metal under the window. I can fix the wheel well but I'm not sure where the top sheet metal is supposed to be.

Oh yeah, the usual rust discovery - it looks like the window has to come out to fix the rust . On both sides. And there are holes in the quarter and wheel wells. Good job I like fixing rust.

[perryka]

Dave,

I'm out of town at the moment, but if you can wait til Wednesday evening I can take some pics of my 68 wagon for you. My spare well has been pushed up a little bit too, but the rest is pretty well preserved.

On the rust around your window - do you mean the rear cargo area windows along both sides?
Alan

[Dave R]

Hi Alan,

Yes to both questions. I have lots to do on the car so waiting until Wednesday isn't a problem.
As for the rust, you can kind of seat above the spare on the pass side. It's the same on both sides. There's a pinch weld there of what looks like three pieces of metal and as the window sealer has dried out over the years, moisture has crept into that area and started bubbling on the inside and outside of the window.

I'm thinking the fix is to pull the window, replaces any rusty metal, use some type of rust killer on any remaining surface rust, prime it and replace the window.