67' Coupe First Project

[JCH67]

Hey all,
I posted awhile back about in the general discussion board about this project, I'll have loads of questions coming because I've never restored a car before, so I'd like to hear as many opinions as possible. The car was not complete when I got it, and is almost all the way torn down now. I took pictures of the rust I'm sure I'll need to address first,

I would've been slightly quicker with posting these but we've had more snow this year than I've literally ever seen in my life, the car is under a car port but it's not inside, makes it a little tough to work on. that and only being home on the weekends from school.

Here's what I have now,

Taken after the first big snow had melted.. not a whole lot to look at so The rest of these are just closeups of the very rusty places I need to fix

passenger side frame rail

pass. side again, someone else welded over top of the original? lazy attempt? looks kinda ugly to me

drivers side floor pan

passengers side floor pan

rear transition pan, has some small holes not sure if you can see from this but they're there

passengers side cowl under dash

drivers side cowl under dash (sorry about the weird angle)

underside of both doors look like this, though bet I shouldn't worry about those till later..?

random smash in the pass. side roof, gonna have to do something about that eventually

All these things seem like ideal places to start, which ones should I start on?
I have a welder and am capable of welding, in case anyone was wondering, I know this project could take a really long time on a college student budget as well, I plan to do ALL the work involved in this , other than painting probably
haha but we'll see. I look forward to reading everyone's opinions and guidance ! I know I wouldn't be able to this the right way without the right information, I want to do this right


Thanks, John

 

[tarafied1]

well you have your work cut out for you!
If it were mine, I'd start with the front frame rails and aprons and rad support. These don't have to be pretty but aligned, square and strong. It will give you practice on easier area before tackling the cowl and floor pans. I would focus on getting it structureally sound first. This way you have a good solid foundations and should you find something better, it would be easier to sell. IMO

Good luck and keep the pics cominf as you go along!

 

[janschutz]

Hope you can weld. I would also start on the fron tram rails and engine compartment metal. Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[tarafied1]

one point of advise, I would get the car sitting level (in space) and support it with lots of jack stands and braces. I did one side at a time as well on the front frame. That way you have the original to referance. When one side is complete, then do the other. If you can, build a jig to align holes. I was lucky the owner of the paint shop let me weld up some bars that I used to put bolts thru important locationes. Then when reassembling the frame I could bolt up the new parts before welding. Also pick up the repop manual, it has the frame dimensions in it.

 

[JCH67]

Alright, thanks for the advice, today I ordered the shop manual (which I had been planning on doing, but why wait). One thing I was wondering about is the dirt floor the car is on now, is it a huge deal that it's on a dirt floor? or should I just get the car as level as possible (obviously) and that would work well enough? because it is fairly time consuming to move the car, what major problems would the floor cause?

Thanks

 

[JCH67]

BTW on the floor issue I was thinking if I were to put good sized sheets of plywood under the car for the jackstands to sit on this would distribute the weight evenly, and keep the car from being to un-level. Does this sound reasonable?

 

[tarafied1]

if your welding you probably don't want plywood under the car (fire). I would only worry that the jack stands will sink into the dirt causing the car to move around over time. Maybe you could pick up some cheap paver stones at Home Depot or something, get the dirt flat in the area you want the stands and then set the pavers in place for the stands. They shouldn't settle as much as wood and won't burn either! I think it can be done.

 

[JCH67]

Good point, I'll check into that for sure, looking at getting some fine gravel to put down under there too, gets slightly muddy sometimes that would help I believe.

Thanks

 

[RyanG85]

Quite the project. Take your time and tackle one section at a time. I was going to suggest talking to Chris (vamustang) since you live close but I see he is already on your buddy list. He should be the first one to contact for parts and advice.

 

[JCH67]

Yeah, Chris lives not even half a mile down the road from me, He's the reason I started really liking these cars! That's part of the reason a big first project like this doesn't really worry me to much, I figure between this forum and having a neighbor that's very into these cars I have a pretty good shot at doing just about anything with the car, money would be the only difficult thing at this point for me, and being down at school all week really limits time for now but it's important.

 

[tarafied1]

...I figure between this forum and having a neighbor that's very into these cars I have a pretty good shot at doing just about anything with the car, ...

you have a good attitude!

 

[JCH67]

Thanks!. oh and also when I got the car home there were a few new parts in the trunk, one of them is a new radiator support but there's a sticker on it that says "made in Taiwan" I don't have any experience with reproduction parts of any kind, but that kinda makes me wonder how much of a quality part that is, as far as gauge of steel used ect., opinions on that kind of thing? Kinda seems weird to put foreign made parts on an American made car, what businesses sell real good quality parts ? I was looking at VA Classic Mustang, they're fairly local and seem like they would sell good stuff.

 

[sigtauenus]

Your heart is in the right place questioning the use of overseas parts. Unfortunately that is the reality of this hobby. A significant percentage of parts are made overseas, and heck, the new Dynacorn bodies that are out, are 100% made overseas. Well, the metal is anyhow, the unibody may be welded up here in the US.

Looking at the pictures above of terafied's frame and shock tower work, there are now options to buy all of that as one solid piece, it comes with the frame rail, shock tower, and both aprons already welded together. This reduces some of your alignment and measuring issues. Same with the back of the car, there are a bunch of sub-assemblies like the complete floor pan and rockers, frame rails, complete truck floor, etc.

 

[JCH67]

Oh, I didn't know there aren't any companies producing parts like that here. It seems like somebody could easily start up a business here and produce high quality parts, I know it can be done much cheaper overseas but, maybe people with a lot of respect for who produced these cars and the parts to begin with would buy slightly more expensive American made parts to get better quality steel and a better fit, as long as the parts were actually made better. There are tons of capable people out there that could do this I bet, but I could definitely be wrong, cause I'm new to this

So I guess for now I'll just tear off the "made in Taiwan" sticker and go with what is available? haha

 

[JCH67]

Alright, just found some floor pans on a site that are made in Canada, and are 19 gauge steel. I feel like these might be better made parts, out of curiosity what gauge steel were the original floor pans?

 

[Horseplay]

Oh, I didn't know there aren't any companies producing parts like that here. It seems like somebody could easily start up a business here and produce high quality parts, I know it can be done much cheaper overseas but, maybe people with a lot of respect for who produced these cars and the parts to begin with would buy slightly more expensive American made parts to get better quality steel and a better fit, as long as the parts were actually made better. There are tons of capable people out there that could do this I bet, but I could definitely be wrong, cause I'm new to this

So I guess for now I'll just tear off the "made in Taiwan" sticker and go with what is available? haha

The cost to make the tooling to produce the parts is cost prohibitive I'm sure. That does not even take into account the higher cost of manufacturing here in the US. The sales volume one could expect is just not enough to compete against the import producers. Not everyone can or would pay a higher price for a part.
I am not an expert on the matter but I would suspect those who were smart/fortunate enough to get a hold of any original tooling can and do compete...and most likely deliver a much better part. Of course, it would still require a premium price to offset the greater overall manufacturing costs.

 

[sigtauenus]

I guess this could be debatable. I can tell you first hand that when I compared a Dynacorn floor to an American Designer (made in Canada) floor to an original floor, the Dynacorn floor was a better match, even though it was made in Taiwan. Be carefull though, some people like CJ's are selling off-brand black painted floor pieces that are not Dynacorn.

Lots of us, myself included, nobly talk about how we would pay more for high quality parts. Rick Schmidt, the CEO for NPD, sometimes posts in forums and addresses this. He has one of the largest classic car (Mustang, Camaro, Chevelle, etc) catalog companies in the US and their catalog often has multiple versions of the same part. He clearly labels them "cheap repro" or "best repro" so you can decide to buy the quality part or the cheap part. According to Rick, cheap repros outsell the more expensive ones 10 to 1 even though the more expensive one is the better quality, or typically US made.

 

[Midlife]

Alright, just found some floor pans on a site that are made in Canada, and are 19 gauge steel. I feel like these might be better made parts, out of curiosity what gauge steel were the original floor pans?

19 gauge. However, there are 3 different methods of gauge determination, depending upon cold rolled steel, hot stamped steel, etc.

 

[JCH67]

Thanks for all the info and opinions, I don't mean to ask questions that seem really obvious, I would just like to consider all the options and hear what you all suggest so I can make the best decision, and do this the right way. So I take it the most popular producers would be Dynacorn, and the parts sold by NPD?

 

[sigtauenus]

Oh no, don't let me imply that. Dynacorn happens to be what my body shop insists on using because he likes working with it. Others may have different opinions. Its sometimes like discussing politics and religion.