Yankee Express RestoMod Project

[Brandy]

Express update..

I spent today sitting both in the trunk and behind the rear bumper. Welding and fitting the light bucket panel up to the space there. I finished the lower lip that screws into the bottom of the light bar and is welded to the backing panel to form the other side of the square channel the light buckets reside in. I had to study it some because I needed to leave a way to get those screws back out to remove the buckets at a later date. I also needed to weld the mounting panel to each quarter at the inside edge of the trunk wall. AND I needed to weld the panel along the bottom in the trunk for rigidity. Not to mention the trunk seal frame and the lower lip of the trunk deck that was cut off and will be welded in place under the light bar. So..once I had all of the mounting holes punched and drilled out and the screws in place I tacked the lower to the upper to form the channel, I set it in place and got in the trunk to see what had to be done on the inside. Remember I don't have a trunk floor. So I marked the areas to be cut out for access to the lower edge screws and where I wanted to tack down the ends, and pulled it back out for umpteenth time and made the changes. I set it back in and got back in the trunk to see what else had to be considered. I ate my lunch sitting in there on a HD bucket while I thought it through.
Considerations to be made include the trunk lock bar placement, the close out of the top of the light panel between that and the trunk seal lip and the close out on the inside of the trunk seal lip to the mounting panel while keeping access to the upper screws as well. Fun.

After lunch I cut and bent a couple of angles to place around midway at the bottom lip of the mounting panel to weld that to the floor. Then I tacked in both lower ends. I fabbed up a couple of small plates to fill the gaps at the inside trunk wall and welded them to the wall and the top surface of the mounting panel and to the rear fascia. It turned out to be nice and solid. And now the quarters are tied together again.

I set the trunk deck in place to see where the seal was going to have to go and then stopped for the day.
Here's some pics..

 

[snakeoil24]

Ghost everything is looking very good very creative mind you have their!

 

[Brandy]

Update...

I spent the day welding and cutting and hammering and cursing....lol. I got the tail light panel off of the car, after I cut out 4, four inch long x half inch slots in the inside face to allow me to get to the mounting screws with a long screwdriver. I cleaned up the previously welded in trunk seal lip, and the body where it was placed before,and double checked placement with the trunk deck, and welded it up. Now that I have that done, the mounting holes for the light panel are off by 1/16th of an inch. Or, I have the thing in upside down. I'll be putting a note on there as to top and bottom once I find out.......damn it. Anyway, here's the results of todays effort.

 

[dieseldazzle]

Got the headlights and c chrome packed up and labeled. Ill do my best to ship it out tomorrow but been hard to do working 8am-7pm everyday

 

[Habib]

Those Taillights are going to look Sweet, Very creative.

 

[Brandy]

No worries bud.

Got the headlights and c chrome packed up and labeled. Ill do my best to ship it out tomorrow but been hard to do working 8am-7pm everyday

- - - Updated - - -

Those Taillights are going to look Sweet, Very creative.

There's 11 lights in that thing!. An article I read said that at night the 66 T-Bird lights put on a show every time they hit the brakes or turned a corner. I cant wait to put power to 'em. I'm looking forward to finishing the metalwork on the tail end so I can get the other mods wrapped up. I want to be priming and sanding filler.

 

[Homstead]

Going to be a lot of work but it will be worth it! Carry on!

 

[Brandy]

Update..

I noodled around with the extensions today, trying to figure out how to make them shaped like I need them to be, with the least amount of hassle.
I cut up the right side one since it is the most damaged, in two pieces, and fabricated the tail light slot to the right dimensions to fit the 66 T Bird frame and the arrow shaped end. I formed up a 2"x 21" piece of 24 gauge to conform to the arrow end of the trim/light and to serve as the inside housing in place of the white metal I cut out. I added in the piece I made yesterday to fill in the difference left by the short end of the lights. I set it all up on a board and used blue painters tape to hook it all together so I can get an idea of how it's going to look. I think i'm gonna have to glass it, let it dry, pull it off and coat the inside with foil and then glass that to get the piece i'll use on the car. I'm going to make a template of the mounting pins and instead place threaded bolts in the glass so I can tighten down on them. I can use the 24 gauge to add stiffness and mold in bracing anywhere. This way it's the shape I need, it will mount up tighter and not move around, and I can "fix" it anytime since it's glass. I'll gelcoat the outside and use a skim of filler to make it perfectly smooth and the all of the curves smooth. I cant think of a better way to get around the white metal. So here's a pic or two of the victim...

 

[Brandy]

"YANKEE EXPRESS" progress

Today I mounted the light panel for the last time. It is in where it needs to be now and nice and solid. I still need to add two more stiffening plates. I cut some pieces to fill in the area below the panel and worked on finessing them to fit exactly. I picked up some new bolts to mount the panel with. I sliced the right extension up to fit the new light shape and fabricated the interior walls and the end plate filler piece. Next is a bit of fiberglass to tie it all together. The new to me extension had some busted off mounting pins so i'll cut them flush and drill and tap for the new hanger bolts I got today. It's coming along nicely and I hope to be done with the tail lights and extensions mods by the end of next week.
Next up is the left wheel tub and then spring relocation followed by the left front fender nose mod. After that comes the passenger floor pan, the trunk floor, closing out the backseat panel, mounting the bucket seats and then the rear roadster panel behind the seats. Then comes doors/door panels and get the hood scoops finalized. Front grille next then i'll think about tackling the Audi interior and dash.....lol. BTW I found a company that makes a solid state box that replaces all of the old sequencing parts for the 66 T bird lights and is set up to hook right together wiring wise. Also makes a box that allows you to adjust the blink-blink-blink rate to slow it down. The way they made them keeps the draw from frying the turn sig switch's. I pulled the bulb sockets and wiring today so I can rewire them with new wire and get them marked.

I got the 66 Charger front grille/headlight cases/turn signal housings, "C" trim and lower connecting trim for the front today. It's going to look good with the way the fenders have been modified. The trim fits very nice on the one I did already. Excited to get to work on them. Here's some pics.

View attachment 292636View attachment 292637View attachment 292638View attachment 292639View attachment 292640View attachment 292641

 

[Brandy]

I just had an epiphany....I have been wracking my brain trying to think of a way to seal the tail light panel to the car. While eating supper just now I had a random thought about soft rubber with a flat section that could be sandwiched under the red lenses all the way around and an angled strip that would bend towards the body and rest upon it all the way around. Like a window rubber that rides against the glass as it goes up and down sort of thing. Now I need to find such a thing.

 

[Brandy]

"YANKEE EXPRESS" progress

First of all, i'm going to stop posting the same stuff in three places. I will only update this thread from now on.

Here is the finished fabrication of the tail lights. 1966 Thunderbird lights. There is still much to do to get it laser straight, to get the curvatures to match, and to weld the extensions together. After that a little filler to shape the extension faces and finish the trunk lip and it's essentially done till I get to the bodywork phase. I have lots more sheet metal work yet to do. BTW, the drilling and tapping of the extension mounting pins went so well, and works great, I think i'll cut the rest of them off and do them too. Nothing like positive fastening power. Still need to cut a slot in the right tail extension bottom right corner so I can fold the edge in about 3/16- 1/4 inch so the curve matches up with the bumpers curve coming up. Might have to shift the bumper over to the right a bit or add some more width to the middle. The sharp edges of the new extension shapes will soften up with filler. They stand out right now.

View attachment 294304

 

[Homstead]

That looks awesome! I can hardly wait till you start on the front. Keep up the good work!

 

[Brandy]

You?! me too! Ever since the '66 Charger stuff arrived I have been forcing myself to continue getting the back end done, I want to get to the front in the worst way! One issue is that the car is nose first in the garage bay and I didn't leave enough room behind it to really work comfortably so I need to get the major parts of it done before it gets too cold out to have the garage door up. Mother nature has been cooperating nicely but it wont last much longer. The birds are eating us out of house and home in the front yard feeders, that's a bad sign. Winter is coming!. We had a few cold days earlier and I used that to do the right front fender.

That looks awesome! I can hardly wait till you start on the front. Keep up the good work!

 

[Brandy]

Still have not gotten back to the front end. I did however, finally take the sequential turn signal controls out of the factory wrapping and inspect them. Turns out they are like new still. Usually the package has failed somewhere along the line and water has gotten in but not this one dry and spotless.

 

[Brandy]

Progress

I cut the stiffening bars for the hood frame and welded them in place on the edges of the frame. I set them on a couple of chunks of 4"x4" and then smacked the middle with a 4 lb sledge hammer to get the gentle bend to match the hood frame curvature. Came out ok. Now what I'll do is drill holes to mount the front tilt hinges that go through these bars into a welded in place nut. Once the outer skin is back on this wont be seen again.

 

[Brandy]

Express update

Last night i worked on the inner fender to clean it up and to bang out the biggest dents as well as straighten the front corners out.
I managed to get the passenger side done and coated with rust converter and self etching epoxy primer. I will still need to place a thin skim of filler in various places to smooth things out some.

Today i worked on finishing up little tweaks on the tail light housing both inside the trunk and outside. I got it primed as well.
Then I got busy cutting out the passenger side floor pan in a couple of spots. Worked out great. I kept as much of the original floor as was practical so it will retain it's stiffness. I'm going to just fab up the pans I need to fill in instead of buying pans. This car will have the bottom completely covered in undercoating anyway. The frame and cross members look okay too. Here's some pics.

 

[Brandy]

Doors...

Today I got busy with the door panels since i'm temporarily out of welding wire. I studied the fitment of the entire Audi door panels to the '67 doors and quickly realized that was not going to fly. I flipped the panel over and determined how to get it all apart and did. With out the panel i'm left with an armrest/door pull handle/window switch assembly/lighted ashtray. Also a wood grain insert, another door opening lever(Audi), and two speakers, and the CD remote control buttons and flip out storage glove box. I started with the Audi door pull assembly, holding it up to the '67 black door panel, then added the '67 lever mechanism, the armrest base, and the chrome handle. The inside width of the Audi armrest just so happened to be the same as the outside width of the '67 armrest base center section. So after a study of just what and how to trim i got to cutting with a 4 1/2 inch cut off wheel. I ended up slicing 1/4 inch off the top and bottom inside edges of the Audi part to get it set right on the trimmed '67 base plate. I have not decided what to do with the rear end of the armrest base yet, ( where the blue tape is). I put the door handle in upside down so I can grab the Audi door pull handle and slid my hand around it and two fingers behind the chrome piece and pull it towards me to open the door. Seemed to work okay and i made some small adjustments for clearance. I will be painting the '67 base black instead of chrome. Down below there's a hole where the window crank goes but i'll place the 5 inch Bose speaker there and the 1 1/2 inch speaker up top left just ahead of the wood grain insert. Also the Audi door had these small 1x4 inch courtesy lights, a red and a white one. I'll be cutting a slot for them on the back inside face of the door and down on the bottom face too, facing down for the white one to light up the ground. So, all in all I think it's going to look great, a mix of old and new that will tie into the Audi dash and still look right as far as the door overall goes. Oh, and the windows and locks will be power.

 

[Budnicks]

Wow, love the side scoop mods....digging the gas cap too!!!!! This is going to be a killer Coronet when it's done.

I agree with 747mopar
after reading most all the posts here now too...

I like the styling & custom stuff your going after...

dare to be different...

Build it how you want it....

keep it up
I'll check in on the tread from time to time,
must have been moved here, from a different section, 1st I saw of it thou...

 

[Brandy]

Thanks Budnicks, yes i had it moved yesterday. It used to be in restorations but it's more of a resto-mod. I like to make changes that make sense to me from an aesthetics standpoint, ones that blend in more or less seamlessly. I had hoped to use the complete door panels as that would have been quicker and much easier, but no dice, they are too thick/wide and I would have to cut into the door shell and that would interfere with the window cranks. In light of that I chose to not scrap them but to take them apart and incorporate the pieces if I can, so the rest of the cabin will tie in to the dash and console. I'll change the style and material on the door panels to update them a bit too. The seats still need to be re stained a different color as well, more of a medium chocolate color. I want the seats, dash, and door trim material to be lighter than the dark chocolate carpet. I'm using a couple of shades of those colors. I need to figure out what to do to the rear end of the armrest bases that sticks out at the back. I think I might slice the base and take out 3 inches or so and then melt them back together. I can clean up the joint with sand paper and filler. That way the rear end of the armrest body will line up leaving only the outer rim of the base showing just like the other sides.

I agree with 747mopar
after reading most all the posts here now too...

I like the styling & custom stuff your going after...

dare to be different...

Build it how you want it....

keep it up
I'll check in on the tread from time to time,
must have been moved here, from a different section, 1st I saw of it thou...

 

[Brandy]

Express update

After cutting out two bad spots in the pass floor pan I formed a new pan out of 20 gauge and welded it in place for the rear foot well. Next up is the front foot well.