Family Tradition

[Propwash]

Got a little work done this weekend and the hot/humid weather finally subsided today......75F and breezy..What a relief!!!! Hopefully the "dog days" are over!

Started sectioning out the rocker. I'm not lying when I say it is a real pain in the rear to remove the rocker area from the jam back. The upper lip of the outer rocker is sandwiched in between the interior rear panel and the inner rocker panel lip. it's spot welded, double spot welded and goober welded from the inside out...Tons of grinding, cutting, and drilling just to get the small area I removed. And trying to remove it without destroying apposing metal is another treat.

After opening up the rocker, looks like this was quite a "mouse house" for a while. Filled up almost half of my 30 gallon shop vac getting it out of there.

I decided to avoid the whole sandwiched area and cut out on the side edge down to the bottom seam on the rear repair. The rotten chunk removed typical to "rustbelt rot" came out pretty easy

The section cut out forward of the rear was the pain in the rear......Since the outer rocker is good north of this section, I will acid etch inside the rocker, rust proof, coat with rust bullet and then undercoat inside and call the right side rocker done as soon as the fresh metal is in.

 

[MarPar]

I gotta hand it to you Prop, and Donny and Matt, you guys are freakin' wizards with saving our beloved MoPars...


I've been learning a lot with you tearing into that runner there, guy...keep it up ya know!!! :grin:

 

[Propwash]

Wizard eh? They took my magic wand away cause I was playing with it too much :rolling:

Now................................Just a Pinball wizard!!

Glad yer getting some insight on da RR der guy. Hope it helps out some day hey.

 

[Propwash]

This is the old rear chunk of the rocker I cut out.

After cleaning up, treating, and coating rear repair section area, I cut out a section of new metal from a AMD set of new rockers. Still trying to save as much "original metal" as I can.

Rough finished product for rear repair area

Done Deal!

 

[detmatt1]

Well executed my friend.:grin:

 

[Propwash]

:tiphat: Thanx brother! We keep up this pace, your "Junkyard Dog" and old Skeletor here will be meeting up on the pavement in the not so far future.

Have a good one Matt

 

[Propwash]

Some pic's of tossing in the forward patch section:

The little torque box that's tied into your interior panel structure and on the bottom side, welds to the rocker panel.. Used a plum bob to the floor to mark location for the mating surface. Temporarily installed the patch, used the marks off the floor and the plum bob to mark locations on the patch where I need to drill the holes.

Fit up was going good, 75% perfect line up with the AMD section until I noticed on the 90* down the side, the AMD patch section is not quite 90* like the factory and the step down from that has a little too much of a pitch as well

I used a Dremel and a very small cut wheel to cut in a relief cut so I could work the metal a bit closer to interact better with OEM.

After tenderly working the metal/cut with a body hammer, dolley and a vey small screw driver, I got the new to old to line up

Just a pic of getting close to metalwork completion. Front weld ground flush, then a few tac's to fill in a several pits. Back needs to be ground down flush yet.

This is just a taste of what's on my plate for the drivers side...Good old Rust Belt Rosie.. A bit worse than the passenger side, so I will be pretty much be replacing the whole panel..

Stay tuned for more panel slicing, hammer beating, oxidation elimination fun at your station playing the most degraded metal on the air!

 

[detmatt1]

I am glad mine were nowhere near as bad as yours, you should have just junked that heap!:rolling: It was a good thing that the "DOG" spent most of its years getting thrashed on north Fl racetracks.:grin:

 

[northerndave]

I been away for a little while but I had to log on to see how this was going. It's going GOOD!!

Looking really good!

Hey prop, when yer done, do you think you could straighten this out for me?

should just buff out huh? I'd like it to look like this again please:

No rest for the wicked I tell ya.... My family wrecks chit faster than I can restore stuff

But hey, your stuff here is looking awesome!!

I just wanted to try to explain my absense here.

Rock on with your awesome project!!

 

[moparstuart]

wow bummer , at least mustang stuff is cheap

 

[northerndave]

And nobody died. So it's all good.

I don't plan on letting this delay my 69 RR project this winter.

Nice mouse nest you found prop! Big one! lol!! I bet that smelled nice!!

 

[Propwash]

Holy smokes Dave! Wondering were you've been. Wow, you come back with a bang! Was your daughter driving? Anyone get hurt? Man....that sucks! Glad to hear no one died. What did the car hit? It's sad to see any kind of classic car in that condition. I imagine especially for you after putting in all that hard work. Well, it's just a car, no one died, and it can always be rebuilt!

I know my old rustbelt rosie needs some work, but that could use a magic wand my friend. You thinking of staigtening out what you got left of the frame or tossing on a new front clip/stub?

Ya the mice sure had quite the old rodent hotel going there in my Pass. Rocker. From what I can see, the left side is about the same. Looks like your 68 Coronet rodent crew had some cousins in Alexandria MN., where I picked the car up. You're right, it was quite the smell. The worst of it was, I routed the exhaust from my shop vac out the garage door when sucking it out and I didn't notice the wind was blowing it directly at my neighbors sitting next to their pool. Needless to say, I'm officially now the new neighborhood a**hole. LOL! Well, maybe I already was anyways.........:rolling:

Looking forward to the Hippie-Bird project hitting the airwaves. Judging by some of the prior work you posted on here, that really is going to be a great resto to follow. The daughter gonne be on your back for pushing the stang out the door before the Plymouth?

Great to have ya back buddy. And thanks for the compliments..I always try the best I can at making people believe I really know what i'm doing :grin:

 

[Bens69PlymouthSatellite]

I would cry if that was my car! Glad nobody was hurt. Your a wizard prop! I Hope my rockers are'nt that bad when I get through them,just gonna take my time and try 2 do the best I can,hope to have my own progress to post soon. Nice work!!

 

[Propwash]

Howdy Ben. Thanks again for those side marker housings. They are gonna work out great. I hope your rockers aren't as bad either buddy. I wouldn't wish having to replace rotten rockers on anyone. The wierd thing is the inner rockers are in pretty good shape :edgy:. Needless to say i'm pretty glad.

Hope to see your project soon, take care

 

[northerndave]

Yeah prop, my daughter was driving. She rear ended a grain truck on the hwy with it. Goofy accident, I'm not going to go into details other than to say harvest season can be dangerous.

Subframe is bent behind the strut towers, firewall pushed back... the salvage "buy back" amount came back too high for me. I gotta let it go.

I'm not sure what we are doing yet to replace it but nothing is sliding in front of the bird in the waiting line. I have a 70 F250 & a 77 F150 that are ahead of the bird but they will be done before the snow flies.

Prop, you are a mopar surgeon.

Funny about the vac exhaust!

 

[Propwash]

Sorry to hear you gotta let her go Dave. A grain truck eh? Wow! Maybe if you get her another Ford it should be like a 1976 Lincoln Continental Town Car. We'd be looking at a totalled grain truck right now.

Gotta love those old Ford trucks from the 70's. Tough as nails! Sounds like you really got your hands full with projects.

Pretty sticky situation for front frame work. That would be a ton of work, but definitly possible. I don't really surf for Mustang parts :edgy:, but i'm sure most are pretty easy to come by.

 

[Propwash]

Finally got my rear end back from the speed shop. Fresh Detroit Locker, Auburn 3.91's, Strange Engineering 35 spline S/S axles, Green seals/bearings and a 1350 series 10 spline pinion/yoke.

After some tedious work, got the lower jams welded up to the rocker.

 

[wannadrag]

Looking good.Someone local do the rear?Got some gears coming and looking for a good place to get them put in the carrier correctly.

 

[Propwash]

Jay,

Wouldn't recommend the place I took mine.. Not gonna waste our time going into it, but let's just i'd go somewhere else. Automotive Supply on Lynnwood St. in appleton use to do a great job for gear changes for a really decent price. You might want to call first though, they downsized a bit back and i'm not quite sure they still offer that service. I'm guessing they still do.

 

[northerndave]

Wow it sure is nice checking in on this thread. There is always progress and new stuff to see. Looking good!