Ha, thats a good one… but I bet shes not happy when you say that cause she wouldn’t like either one
Restoration Tip From Forum Members
- Thread starter Moparfiend
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Ha, thats a good one… but I bet shes not happy when you say that cause she wouldn’t like either one
As my friend found out with restoring his Mustang, and hes perfectionist when it comes to body and paint work. This is a repop bumper and look how it fits. The right side fits pretty much perfect but the left, not so great. I don’t know what he did with old bumper or even if the car came with one.
He tried to make it fit better for 2 more hours after he sent the pictures above! He swapped some brackets and did a little shimmying, heres the end result. A little better, but not much. He said hes done, and hes not messing with it anymore.
XS22J8R
Well-Known Member
Though there’s no excuse for poor fitting repro bumpers (along with the fact I’ve found some to be thinner and lighter than OEM), I’ve seen and heard of many issues over the years about rechromed OEM bumpers.
It was bad enough years ago when there were chrome shops in a lot of cities and you could drive there to complain when you found your bumper they’d done for you didn’t fit right because they hadn’t straightened it well, or you found flaws in the chrome, for them to redo. Now there are only a few of these shops left and you need to spend a bunch of money to send a flawed job on your bumper back to them!
Runcharger
Well-Known Member
AMD rear bumper for Challengers is no great shakes either. Common problem, so yeah fit everything before final body and paint, it's best not to fit this chineseum on a car with fresh paint and expect it to fit perfect. The original parts didn't fit like a Rolls Royce back in the day either.
I think everyone pretty much covered it, but may I add that taking pictures before disassembly and “bagging and tagging” everything are biggies and the most important so you know where and how it goes back together.
Yes every single screw is important, you can buy 2 or 3 different screw kits, and have to mix and match to get them all close to original
XS22J8R
Well-Known Member
When I restored my T/A I bought an interior screw kit for my car, and the most value I got from the kit was the fact each bag of screws in the kit was numbered and an included instruction sheet told which number corresponded to what the screws were for.
My fasteners were in disarray due to my not being diligent enough in organizing when I removed them, and ink on tags I’d put in my baggies getting unreadable due to oil etc.
Many of the screws in the restoration kit were such bad quality I couldn’t use them. The metal was so soft the heads would deform when I tried to install! But I could use them to ID the screws I’d removed from my car to put my interior back together using mostly my original screws, so the poor quality kit was actually invaluable to me for that job!
My fasteners were in disarray due to my not being diligent enough in organizing when I removed them, and ink on tags I’d put in my baggies getting unreadable due to oil etc.
Many of the screws in the restoration kit were such bad quality I couldn’t use them. The metal was so soft the heads would deform when I tried to install! But I could use them to ID the screws I’d removed from my car to put my interior back together using mostly my original screws, so the poor quality kit was actually invaluable to me for that job!
Rishi
Well-Known Member
For labelling parts, I have a few boxes of differently sized zip locks bags near my bench. I'm pretty fond of 3 by 5 cards for labels. They're cheap, and tolerate getting oily and still holding their content. They fit well inside boxes, outside boxes (taped), and inside zip locks. I have several examples where the (sharpie) writing on the outside of a zip lock rubs/scratches off the plastic pretty easily. A plus is one can retask a zip lock without the need to clean off (isopropyl alcohol) the older sharpie labeling.
Rebellion
Well-Known Member
Runcharger and I are of the same mind regarding restoration methodology.
Wow! I used to dump out a 5 gallon bucket of nuts,bolts,screws and fasteners from stripping cars onto the garage floor,and assemble a whole car from it!
Rebellion
Well-Known Member
I'm impressed with that, genuinely!
With my method, once the part is used, the tag is removed from the storage container.
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That is an impressive level of organization! I have NEVER seen a project car for sale that is organized like that. Kudos to you @Rebellion .
RT68440
Well-Known Member
If you can swing it financially, send your parts out sooner rather than later that are going to be worked on like plating, chrome, etc that someone specializes in. I was lucky enough to have Stephan Fournier do my plating right before he retired and Pauls Chrome did my plating and stainless polishing just months before they closed up. A lot of these outfits are calling it quits and the old guys that specialize in a particular service are dying off or calling it quits. Even if you're not at that area of the car yet to need whatever it is restored, do it ASAP while they're still in business!
Legendary auto interiors take over 7months! So yes planning on getting the work done in parallel will save lots of down time.
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I have tried to keep the where is it and what it is in a log book. Not the best. But I am muddling through.
So the one thing I noticed as I was new to Mopar's was how much re-use they used across all the B-bodies. Many of the tips here will work for any restoration. I however have a tip that is for B-bodies only FBBO =>
Use @dadsbee thread to help guide you through so much valuable information. It really has helped me significantly and Wayne is a top notch guy here!
1969 Dodge Super Bee Coupe Restoration
Use @dadsbee thread to help guide you through so much valuable information. It really has helped me significantly and Wayne is a top notch guy here!
1969 Dodge Super Bee Coupe Restoration
Nothing is more important than a good paint guy. Especially one who can touchup damage without having to repaint an entire panel, and make it look invisible. It is a talent rarer than anything else in the auto industry. These guys are usually very eccentric and don't advertise their services, like witch doctors or hitmen.
themechanic
Oklahoma is OK
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I ordered a pair of stock valve covers online. I called a week later to find they were on backorder for 6 months. So, don't assume just because you can place an order and they charge your credit card that your order will be shipped anytime soon.
Ok, so I'm fairly new at this. But I'll pile on to the tagging and bagging. I didn't label the container with each item; however, I did label the container as I1, I2, E1 (Interior 1, Interior 2, Exterior 1) and keep a notebook of which bags are in each container & description.
My tip is in addition to putting an index card inside the bag as people have noted, PUT THE DATE on it and the bag. It will save you from scrolling through hundreds of photos to find the related pictures. - you can jump to the right day. It's saved me a lot of time so far.
My tip is in addition to putting an index card inside the bag as people have noted, PUT THE DATE on it and the bag. It will save you from scrolling through hundreds of photos to find the related pictures. - you can jump to the right day. It's saved me a lot of time so far.
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