JamieZ's 68 Charger

[Ron 73]

Good to hear the shifter is good and good luck finding your electrical gremlins, been there myself and frustrating they can be!

 

[JamieZ]

Well the electrical issue turned out to be the new Voltage Regulator I installed. The one that was on the car when I got it, has an aftermarket look...but so does the alternator. Maybe they were matched? Maybe I got a bad VR. At this point I'm just glad it's working.

So with that resolved, I began to put the dash back together. I picked up the repop from PG Classics..and it makes quite a difference:

The only real complaint I have is the radio panel didn't have provisions for the rear speaker fader. I had to make a template from the one on the car, then drill holes in my brand new panel. In the end it turned out pretty good.

Hopefully by next weekend it will all be back together....like a real car

 

[JamieZ]

For some reason the charger fights me every step of the way, but I did manage to get her all back together. I swapped out all the lights for LEDs, replaced the relay for the courtesy lights, put in a new tach (2 of them if you count the one I smoked), cleaned and applied dielectric to all the connections, and changed the panels. I figured it would be a 2 week project.....It turned out to be a month and a half.

But today, I don't care because it is back in place, and it works better than it did when I started (looks better too!)

With the lights on:

 

[roadrunnerman]

Those blue LED's are a great match with your car.

 

[TekHousE]

Dash looks awesome mate!

 

[JamieZ]

Thanks for the compliments.

As for the electrical gremlin/voltage regulator, it turns out the new one I bought was over heating. My dad made a rig that would test it (using an electric motor and a spare alternator). With the cover off the VR it worked great. Put a cover on it and the temp would rise and the voltage would just climb and climb. It was even worse in the engine bay with the ambient heat from the motor.

 

[Budnicks]

I love the 68 Charger's, your doing a great job with the newer toy too... nice work, keep it up

 

[JamieZ]

The grill is one of the reasons I love the 68 and 70 chargers, unfortunately mine suffered some damage at some point (mostly on the driver's side). I figured it would be a good winter project to rehab it. I had a few days off work so I decided to take on the grill. Turned out to be way more work than I expected with having to remove the valance, the bumper, and then the grill frame.

I took a lot of pictures, mostly for reference:

By far the worst part is the driver's side surround, which is in 3 or 4 (fairly large) pieces:

I started doing some basic cleaning to see what I have to work with. I'll probably end up repainting the grill due to the repairs I'll need to make but the door cleaned up pretty well

I also started stripping the trim in prep for polish (stripped versus untouched in the photo):

And I also replaced the glovebox light and glove box liner, which finishes up the interior work I was planning on doing.

 

[Superfreak]

Your doing a great job that requires lots of patience. Keep at it and it will soon be all over.

 

[hunt2elk]

Great looking car. Those grills are time consuming for sure. I finished up my 69 a couple of months ago, but it wasn't nearly as broken up as yours. My local bodyshop had these plastic strips that are used with a solder gun to weld pieces together. I really worked good. I try to remember to find out what they are called.

 

[roadrunnerman]

Working on the grille has got to be one of the most time consuming repairs on a car to get it right and look good.

 

[detmatt1]

That's a nice car, been for sale for years. I looked at it for somebody on this site a couple years back. Very rare car!

 

[747mopar]

Yeah I agree "they are time consuming". I used the plastic weld on mine (a two part epoxy), it worked great but I'm really interested in what Hunt used. Glad you got those gremlins straightened out "electrical problems can be a pain".

 

[JamieZ]

Continued work on the grill. First I had to straighten/fix one of the long pieces of trim, then I had to strip them. I ended up loading them into a tube of PVC spraying it full of easy off and water. Soak, steel wool, respray, soak, etc. Took 3 or 4 sessions before I got the anodizing stripped off. Then I put all of the pieces through the buffing/polishing process. I didn't want a mirror finish so I didn't do much in the way of sanding. Once they were buffed I dropped on some clear coat just to protect them:

I spent a lot of time doing plastic repairs. Cutting V grooves, filling, clamping, sanding etc. My little grill repair work bench looked something like this for most of the week:

I repaired all the cracks/split on the passenger bucket. I still need to fabricate one of the tabs which is broken. The driver's side is a work in process. it was 3 pieces. Now once it dries it should be 2 pieces. The center has a lot of small breaks which will take forever to repair but they aren't structural so I'm less worried about them.

While waiting for glue to dry, I broke down the vacuum pods/actuators and stripped them, primed them and repainted them. They had a lot of crud/surface rust but were solid. I wasn't concerned about original appearance on these pieces so I just shot them with some gloss black I have laying around. They probably need another coat to get a few spots I missed.

 

[Ron 73]

Looking real good, Ive seen a few Chargers grills being done hear, they truly look like a whole project all alone with everything, patience is the key i guess and you guys here have it! very nice and i do like your buffing stand outfit there very nice!

 

[747mopar]

You guys are making me feel very fortunate, my grill was pretty bad but yours and Speedies were a mess "congrats on getting it all fixed up".

 

[JamieZ]

I finished repairs on the driver's side surround. This is the part I was the most concerned about. This is what it looked like once I got it out of the car:

And this is what it looks like now:

I also did a lot of repairs on the center section. The small fins that connect the grid work to the edges were the majority of the damage, the driver's side was by far the worst. In the end I repaired/replaced 19 of the fins on the top and 28 of them on the bottom. Big thanks to member 1970 RoadRunner for supplying me with several fins along that I needed for the repair.

I also did some work fabricating a repair for one of the tabs. Not sure if this is the way I am going to go. I might just grind up some ABS and liquify it for the repair. I'll try one of those next week.

Here it is test assembled on the floor (to make sure I didn't screw anything up):

And finally I removed the surface rust off the actuator arms/mounting brackets and gave them a fresh coat of paint.

 

[cdr]

LOOKIN GREAT !!! doin those grills is tough,but your are doing excellent work.

charlie

 

[Budnicks]

I finished repairs on the driver's side surround. This is the part I was the most concerned about. This is what it looked like once I got it out of the car:

And this is what it looks like now:
I also did a lot of repairs on the center section. The small fins that connect the grid work to the edges were the majority of the damage, the driver's side was by far the worst. In the end I repaired/replaced 19 of the fins on the top and 28 of them on the bottom. Big thanks to member 1970 RoadRunner for supplying me with several fins along that I needed for the repair.

I also did some work fabricating a repair for one of the tabs. Not sure if this is the way I am going to go. I might just grind up some ABS and liquify it for the repair. I'll try one of those next week.
Here it is test assembled on the floor (to make sure I didn't screw anything up):
And finally I removed the surface rust off the actuator arms/mounting brackets and gave them a fresh coat of paint.

great work on that grill, man you have some serious patients, do some nice repairs too... keep up the great work

 

[JamieZ]

Remember that headlight surround that was in three pieces?

I managed to get it painted between the rain drops