[north]

I suspect that your convertible spent maybe one winter back east before going west. The clean dryness of all the unaffected areas look like a lifelong california car. But I've had many southwest cars that were rougher but yet didn't have those rot areas you had in flange seam areas. Maybe the car was leaky new and some salty water got into those areas way back 50 years ago. then every car wash in california would let in a bit of moisture, that the caulking would keep wet even in the dry western atmosphere.

Anyhow I love watching this thread, you work metal the way this guy I know back here can, you've got the timsmith gift! And all those minor rust spots mean nothing, when you're done they will have never existed thanks to the quality of your work and the dry dry cleanness of the rest of the car.

[roger1]

Originally Posted by north

I suspect that your convertible spent maybe one winter back east before going west. The clean dryness of all the unaffected areas look like a lifelong california car. But I've had many southwest cars that were rougher but yet didn't have those rot areas you had in flange seam areas. Maybe the car was leaky new and some salty water got into those areas way back 50 years ago. then every car wash in california would let in a bit of moisture, that the caulking would keep wet even in the dry western atmosphere.

Anyhow I love watching this thread, you work metal the way this guy I know back here can, you've got the timsmith gift! And all those minor rust spots mean nothing, when you're done they will have never existed thanks to the quality of your work and the dry dry cleanness of the rest of the car.

Thank you very much for the compliment. I don't know if I'd consider myself a "smith" but I do try to do things well.

You pretty much hit the nail on the head.
My car did spend it's early life in the east and then came west. I also think a lot of the eastern damage was mitigated by the undercoating as well as being taken care of and garaged. The undercoating was done pretty well.
I found this car to be something I hadn't encountered before in that there were some things rusted but almost pristine in other areas.

As I remember, the guy who sold me this car bought it from the guy that brought it west but I think had 2 prior owners before that. The story was that the guy who did bring it west bought it on ebay.

The guy I bought it from didn't do any and had no work done to the body. All the funny stuff was done prior to that. He had it for I think 8 years but didn't drive it a whole lot because he had trouble with the engine early on and pulled it for rebuilding and got it mostly done but never finished.

[roger1]

I started on repairing the inner wheelhouses at the lower rear of the wheelwells.
I cut patches for both sides and got the one on the d/s shaped and welded in.

Here are the areas that need patches. I showed photos of this area a while back when I made the cuts:





Paper templates:



D/S patch in place and tacked:



Ready for finishing off:



I also started digging in to the fender rust some. I removed the patches that were spot welded onto the outside of the rust holes. Looked like a good quality spot welder was used. That was interesting and so was the fact they mixed in small portions of the patch by brazing. Again, I wonder what body school taught those procedures!





I made cuts and wire brushed the braces.





As I had mentioned before, I bought patch panels for these areas.
Those panels included a section of the brace already attached too. The panels look pretty decent but the braces don't. They are a much thinner gauge than the original braces are and I'm thinking about not using them and make patches from proper gauge sheetmetal to graft into the originals where they are rusted out.

Here's the other side of the rusted out braces:

[dataway]

About to do the same job on my front fenders, although I think my braces are decent enough to use.
Do you have any bending equipment? I have a couple of brakes and a roller, they come in real handy for making patches.

I think the thicker stuff is easier to patch ... below is a control arm I repaired .. TIG welded a patch in. If you ever need a bit of thicker material and don't want to buy a whole sheet I usually have some 16 or 18 ga. lying around that I could send out in patch size pieces, for free. I usually buy it in 4 x 8 foot sheets.

[roger1]

Originally Posted by dataway

About to do the same job on my front fenders, although I think my braces are decent enough to use.
Do you have any bending equipment? I have a couple of brakes and a roller, they come in real handy for making patches.

I think the thicker stuff is easier to patch ... below is a control arm I repaired .. TIG welded a patch in. If you ever need a bit of thicker material and don't want to buy a whole sheet I usually have some 16 or 18 ga. lying around that I could send out in patch size pieces, for free. I usually buy it in 4 x 8 foot sheets.

Nice job on those control arms.
Thanks for the offer. I'll check what I have and what I may have needs for but I think good. Not too much patching left to do at this point.

So are you going to buy the patch panels for your fenders? Here's a photo of the insides of what I bought:



The brackets are the same gauge as the patch panels which I think are 20ga.
I didn't measure the original brackets but I think they may be 16ga as they seem pretty stout. So I won't use them and I'll just graft in new pieces.

And btw, I just did some trial fitting with the repro outer wheelhouses I bought and they are garbage and I wasted my money on them. They don't fit worth a darn.
I'm going to have to fabricate what I need to repair the rusted out areas in my outers. That is going to take me a pretty good amount of time but it's the only way I'm going to get everything to fit the way it should.

No I don't have any metal bending equipment and haven't used any before either. Also, this may be my last project car of this magnitude so not likely I'll make investments on them. Always thought it would be cool to have though.

[iceman411]

When I did my ‘69 I used the outer wheelhouses and they worked fine... way better fit than the panels that are offered for the ‘70-‘72 body style...

What part of the panel not fit right?
When I did my ‘71 convertible I had to graft the new metal, from the reproduction panels, in like this, since no outer wheelhouse is offered in convertible...

[roger1]

Originally Posted by iceman411

When I did my ‘69 I used the outer wheelhouses and they worked fine... way better fit than the panels that are offered for the ‘70-‘72 body style...

What part of the panel not fit right?
When I did my ‘71 convertible I had to graft the new metal, from the reproduction panels, in like this, since no outer wheelhouse is offered in convertible...

It's in the lower rear part that they don't fit. Yours do not look like mine do there. I'm guessing there must be different manufacturers for these. I got mine from OPGI and they are black e-coated.

[dataway]

Roger ... I bought the Goodmark patches that are just the skins without the brace. Bunch of people were sold out of them, found a pair at Mill Supply. One fender has a good brace, the other .. we'll see, looks like it might just need an oval 16ga patch in the center of it. I'm going to give it a shot TIG welding them on the bench.

You SAY it's your last major project

Realistically ... bending equipment like I have is less suitable for body work than it is for the mostly industrial type fabrication I do. Now an English wheel, you could probably make use of .... I have zero experience on one of those. Not to mention how cool it would look in your shop.

[iceman411]

Originally Posted by roger1

It's in the lower rear part that they don't fit. Yours do not look like mine do there. I'm guessing there must be different manufacturers for these. I got mine from OPGI and they are black e-coated.

Here’s some pics on my actual ‘69 that I redid and then sold... one place makes the panels and all the companies select from the pile...Mike

[roger1]

Originally Posted by iceman411

Here’s some pics on my actual ‘69 that I redid and then sold... one place makes the panels and all the companies select from the pile...Mike

Maybe. But the photos of the ones on the OPGI site looked different and were not e-coated. The ones I received look more like the ones that Ames carries. Ames states this on them:
*QUALITY: FAIR OUTER LIP NEEDS RE-CONTOURING FOR TIGHT FIT.*

That is true but they fit even worse in the lower rear sections.
It will be easier for me to make my own grafts to repair what rusted away on mine than it would be to modify these off-shore made repros.

[n20ta2]

I replaced both my outer wheel wheelhouse and they were garbage, I had to do a lot of work to make them right. I would have fixed mine if they weren't completely toast, can't remember where I got them now but they were ecoated as well. I think the drivers side was worse then the passenger, not even close to good

[roger1]

Originally Posted by n20ta2

I replaced both my outer wheel wheelhouse and they were garbage, I had to do a lot of work to make them right. I would have fixed mine if they weren't completely toast, can't remember where I got them now but they were ecoated as well. I think the drivers side was worse then the passenger, not even close to good

I haven't tried to match up the passenger side yet but we shall see.

After a 4 day break, I went back at the car today. I have made some progress on building the lower rear section on the d/s outer wheelhouse.
These are 3 pieces I have tacked together and into place so far.



It's not going to be shaped exactly like factory but I'm going to have it fitting nicely when I'm done. Here it is with the rear section of the quarter panel patch panel mocked up:



I have not made the final outer skin cut on the quarter panel but I do have the lines drawn on it.

Here's inside as best as I could take a photo of that spot:

[Greg Reid]

That should work out fine. I had some issues in that same area with mine. In fact, I wound up cutting the entire outer edge off my replacement inner and tacking it onto the factory inner. Then I made my wheel lip patch, which was cut off of a quarter panel skin.

[n20ta2]

That inside area was a pain in mine, the junk outer panels I bought didn't even extend all the way down like they were supposed to. I ended up having to fabricate an extension to get it like factory.

[roger1]

This is definitely a pain and time consuming.
But I believe as stock there was a little bit of exposed area of the inside quarter skin at the very bottom. Did you leave any exposed on yours?

[north]

If this helps here are some pics I took years ago of the rear of the drivers side rear wheel opening. This is all untouched original paint and never undercoated. What looks like some undercoating on the wheel opening lip is actually some factory overspray of the Shutz coating of the wheel tub, it was applied after the car was painted but before the wheel opening moldings were installed..

[north]

If you want any other pics of these areas let me know.

[n20ta2]

Yes there was a spot open there,
I left the bottom corner open between the quarter and the outer wheelhouse. The factory stuffed that with seam sealer. Mine might have been a little tighter but there is seam sealer in there now too. I epoxy primed it after I was done installed urathane seam sealer then sprayed it with undercoating.

[roger1]

Originally Posted by north

If you want any other pics of these areas let me know.

Thanks for your help! Cool you have such a pristine original car.

[roger1]

Originally Posted by n20ta2

Yes there was a spot open there,
I left the bottom corner open between the quarter and the outer wheelhouse. The factory stuffed that with seam sealer. Mine might have been a little tighter but there is seam sealer in there now too. I epoxy primed it after I was done installed urathane seam sealer then sprayed it with undercoating.

I readjusted what I had yesterday and finished this part up today. Here's the inside:



I've got that bottom part of the area fitting pretty tightly against the mocked up quarter skin. Sounds like our process of finishing off is similar. I will blast this all clean then coat with epoxy primer. I'll then add the urethane seam sealer and then coat it on top with another coat of epoxy primer.

Here's the outside:



Next, I will add metal to the rest of the wheelhouse perimeter where it is gone from the rustout.