[sixball]

More good work! You just keep nailing it.

[Essex_29]

Thank you, sixball!

In any case, this is much more work than I had expected. I put in waterproof plywood floor in my Essex,
and I think that was less work, still for a very tidy result. Speaking of which, I found a couple nice
³/₄" plywood offcuts that will be used for the running boards. I think they will be very stiff and robust.

I fitted the little floor piece in the front, tacked it in, and continued with the middle part. Since I'm
plug welding through fairly small holes, I cranked the voltage up pretty high, and drilled and stamped
the holes about 1-¹/₄" apart.



Tonight I welded the front part of the right hand side floor in, and ground off the tops of the spot
welds on the driver's side.
3M Cubitron fiber discs on an angle grinder makes short work of knocking down the welds. They're expesive, but worth
it every day of the week. I have tried several other makes of sanding discs, but these 3Ms are outstanding.
I had a new 24 grit Bosch disc, and counted seconds, as I ground the welds. Ten seconds at least, per
weld. The 36 grit cubitron took them down in four seconds or less, and that disc was slightly used.
That's my tip of the day.



The driver's side is  the far side in this pic. The near (right hand) side is just adjusted to fit and
screwed in with a couple selftappers in lieu of clecos.

[sixball]

 

[62131]

Floor pans are coming along nice

[TFoch]

Really moving along!  Nice work!

[chopper526]

Those pans look too good to put carpet on

[Essex_29]

Thank you all!
In all honesty it feels a bit like treading water at the moment, maybe it's a good thing christmas
is coming, so I can take a couple days off from the project.

I had to cut the bottom edge of the wheel tubs along the frame to give the rear axle space to get
it lifted up so that it bottomed out against the frame. The cut is the rounded edge inboard of
the brake drum.



You may notice a wheel stud is missing. I just removed it to use as a template for ordering new
studs. My new Moser steel axles will get drilled to 4-¹/₂" to fit the slotmags

When checked that the prop shaft will indeed fit under the frame loop, I could start cutting out the
material for another piece of the trans tunnel. I bent the sheet around a too small diameter tube,
so it took a lot of finessing and a few harsh words, when nobody listened, to get it acceptable.
What I call the "frame loop" is to the right of the new piece of tunnel. It's part of the frame, and
the trans tunnel will curve around it, not touching, to avoid rattles.



A couple floor pieces welded in and ground on the right hand side now too. The shifter will come
up through the new tunnel piece just a couple inches from the front, so there's a bit of planning
and doing still before it can be welded to the floor.

[Essex_29]

Happy new Year!

It's now already 2023 here, 13 minutes into the new year.
Last thing I did last year was getting the floor ready. The wife's away, visiting our son and his
daugher. He works most days now (200% pay on sundays and general non work days), and
his wife is at her parent's place.
So here I am, home alone, spending quality time in the garage.

The middle body crossmember got a center brace. It's really only needed to stiffen the body
while it's off the frame.



It's 5mm plate, a bit thicker than ³/₁₆"

"A few hundred" holes (every 1-³/₁₆")punched and about the same amount of plugwelds later the rear of the
floor and the rearmost piece of the transmission tunnel are welded in. All kinds of grinders and
rotary files I own got used knocking down the welds, and of course grinding the humps for the
 rear axle four links, as I had to weld them with visible welds, which of cours is a pain to grind. I
made them from 3" exhaust pipe, it seemed to be the easiest way to get a nice shape to them.



The center piece of the transmission tunnel is just mocked in, as the shifter will be attached
to it before it can be welded. So that aside, all that's left is the rearmost 18 or so inches, which will
be under rear seat.

[TFoch]

Happy New Year!  The floor is looking great!  Nice progress!

[sixball]

Happy New Year! Looks good!

[62131]

The floor turned out nice

[Essex_29]

Thank you TFoch, sixball and 62131.

Continuing with the look of the car from the outside, but still kind of connected to the floor:



The beads along the bottom of the body are supposed to coninue under the doors. One of these
parts are missing entirely, and the other one's so rusted, it's unusable. I figured I can make
something similar looking from 1" dia tubing. I rolled the tubing with my tubing roller/bender, and
got a slightly curved tube, then cut it in half along its length. I then cut the floor, which I previously
had made a bit over size in the door openings, to fit the bent tube.



I welded ³/₁₆" end plates to the half tube, so that I could grind a bit of a rounded edge to it, then welded it to the floor.

Surprisingly, this simple way to make the bead part looks pretty decent, even if it's just a piece of tubing.



You have to really bend down to see that the bead is a couple sixteenths too shallow (against the apron),
but everything is likely going to be black, so nobody will probably notice.

[sammons]

Looking good!  I also use tubbing, (actualy electrical conduit) for rocker below the door.

[Essex_29]

About 233 days of work in fifteen months between thses pics. The result to the most part is... New wheels???
Funny how sometimes one's work doesn't show very well. At least if you don't look closer.



I keep track on the days in the garage. In 2022 onehundred and eighty five days were spent in the
shop, working on the Buick. I never counted the hours, but an educated guess would be an average
of maybe 480 hours per year, but then there isn't an hour in a day, when I don't think about
my current project.
I'm lycky enough to be happily married to a wonderful woman, who makes it all possible.

So there's todays musings about the year that went. Who knows, maybe in another fifteen months we'll
see a bigger change.
I wish you all a fun 2023, wishing that we all may get do what we like the best!

[sixball]

Very few people who see your car will have any idea of the time & skill invested. In many ways it is like building a house. When finished the foundation, framing, wiring, & plumbing doesn't show. Cars without a good foundation can be built and they might even LOOK good. We and you will know the difference here!