Rusty Bowtie
General Category => Other Manufacturer Discussion => Topic started by: sammons on May 31, 2016, 02:06:40 PM
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Sorry fellas, I though I had better move this to "other" section. I didn't mean to hijack the main board with a Ford, it just kinda snowball'd. :o
Wasn't going to start a thread on this but....it might give other an idea on how to fix somebodys screw up..... or watch me screw up.
I really never liked the looks of the '41-48 Fords, with the exception of a well done convertable or a Carson top custom. Shane came up with another '48 business coupe, but too complete to use as a doaner. Recap: It was a bad attempt to do a hard 7" chop. The original butcher bailed and sold to a guy who didn't look close enough. That guy built a nice frame and incorperated a C4 Corvette complete suspension. He had a bodyman look at the mess and bailed, selling it to my buddy. I'm broke so I agreed to straighten out the rear of the top. The more I look, the more I find. :o So right or wrong, here I go. Hopefully it will be a save.
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I removed the bad rear top, finding cowl had settled back 3/8" due to no bracing when they cut the orig top off. Also the left side windshield open was 5/16" higher than the right, so whole top has to come off. I fabed up a trunk hinge rear support cause they cut it out. No 2dr donor car so 4dr sedan will have to work. Caught up, close enough.
Ok, today lots of thinking. I plan on useing the front section of the roof for replacement. I need to separate the three layers roof/ door jamb/ and the drip moulding which is sandwiched in the middle.
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It will be a bad ass custom when you get it straightened out, Thankfully you have that 4 door donor to help with the cleanup. GO SAMMONS GO SAMMONS HES OUR MAN. ;D
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Sammons most of us here know that the first thing that one has to do when one takes on a project street rod or a resto mod of some of these pre 1950 cars we have to take many pictures from many many angles and measure at least twice.Then we have to take the whole car apart especially pre 40's cars.We have to go right down to the frame then build the frame up with hydraulic brakes front and rear a more modern engine box the frame change the steering float the rear.When we have everything done the engine will start and the frame will move,Then is the time to do the body we have to mock everything up including all the brasing. once we have the sube frame built either new or modified to a steel structure then is the time to assemble the body.lots and lots of work I just seen a repo body in steel of a 1940's ford bare body 14 thousand bucks us.Your work is of the utmost and i sure am glad it is you doing the job and not me i have confidence in you lets see some more pictures and how you build this correctly your buddy has one hell of a good friens YOU and i don't care how much he is paying you its a job that few would tackle good luck my friend vette59jdwl
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I always thought these cars were butt ugly...it needed some thing to detract from the rear of the car and the height of the roof..looking at the chopped version of this car it looks better..it will be interesting to see what Steve can do to rescue this failed attempt of a chop and also to know the hours to bring it back correctly. Along with all those hours I would venture to say that a few cuss words will used :-\
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Whoa there fellas, thanks for the kind words and encouragement but I'm no metal wizard by no means. It's not rocket science, it's just sheet metal (as dad would say) ;D Although I have never chopped this style roof, It doesn't scare me. Maybe it should? I've always enjoyed a challange, but this shouldn't be to bad. I can't screw it up nearly as bad as it was. ;)
Had to quit early before I got the top completly split apart. I could no longer pull the drill trigger with either hand, and was really shaking. Try to give her another go in the morn.
Now here is way I picture this in my head, just a little lower roof. Note the rear drip moulding doesn't make the "S" curve following the rear roof line. Kind of fallows the qtr window. It's a thought anyway :)
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Yes, I see what you are talking about with the drip molding. Originally it looks like it sweeps back to the trunk line, so how would you finish it off? Would it just come to a stop? It is hard to tell in the last picture how they did it.
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Chopper, I think it just stops at the body line just like the front. I wish I could see a side/ rear view of that car. I probably won't do it, but I sent Shane the pic, it's up to him.
Well I over worked my hands. Woke up at 1:30 with really bad pain in my good left wrist/ fingers. Oxycodone didn't even make a dent in the pain. >:( One handed today for shure, I hope it goes away quick. Hopeing just a day or three. ;D I need to get back to it!
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YOU NEED SOMEBODY WHO LIKES TO HANG AROUND WITH YOU AND DO THE GRUNT OR ""EXCESSIVE USE OF HANDS"" WORK.
OFFER THEM A NICE LUNCH AND SOME COLD BEER AND COOL BREEZE AS AN INCENTIVE TO KEEP HANGING AROUND.
MIGHT WORK ?
MIKE
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I wish I lived closer, it would sure work on me!! ;D
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i think the hardest chop I ever did was 51 merc 4 door. yikes and never again. Sammons take it slow and easy because as you and your father have stated (it's only sheetmetal) I found a 47 chopped version that show the drip rail pretty good. I think if you worked it you could delete some of the drip rail and make it look good.
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Mike, I tried that even before I closed the business. Met with a couple young guy's, both car savy as far as r&r parts goes. Hell one I even offered to teach and pay. Seems they like cars, just not the time it takes to acquire the skill. Younger crowd 16-18, don't know. You can't find any out and about, guess they stay home on the computer. We used to get kids every year till they killed the "work study" program down at the high school. I hope my 11yr old nephew holds his interest, just wish he was a little older. He is a good hand.
Good news, I can move my thumb and wrist a bit this morn, just 4 more digits to go. ;D
Ghost I always thought them 4dr Mercs looked like a whole lotta work. Too many jambs!
I found side/rear pic of that black 46. Shure looked better from the front. Found a b/w pic of an old chop that has the rear flow I want, but I personally don't like the qtr window shorter in highth.
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Finally got back at it yesterday and got the donor front top/windshield pillar separated. Kinda going the long way about it due to it being a 4dr. Needed the frame work separated from the skin. I looked at all the surface rust under there and took the easy way out. Put some acid in the weed sprayer, whole lot faster/easier than sanding.
Hands still tender and swelled up on me over night. But, I think I'm about done with drilling spot welds now anyway. Should get easier from here on out.
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Finally got back at it yesterday and got the donor front top/windshield pillar separated. Kinda going the long way about it due to it being a 4dr. Needed the frame work separated from the skin. I looked at all the surface rust under there and took the easy way out. Put some acid in the weed sprayer, whole lot faster/easier than sanding.
Hands still tender and swelled up on me over night. But, I think I'm about done with drilling spot welds now anyway. Should get easier from here on out.
Damn..thought I had messed up fingers..you win "hands down". You're still an artist! ;)
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Haha, and that's my good hand. ;D
Well she's topless! Note the big gap (pillar post) they left in the inner frame. That's why I needed the substructure (frame). It was like this on all most all of their cuts. ::)
Tomorrow I will set cowl back up and weld up some braceing. (I hope)
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Steve...How many inches do you think the top chop will have??? the original was 7 inches.... you plan on raking the front a little bit?....and if that was your good hand I would hate to the bad one.....be careful man....
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Sammons that looks nasty (the hand i mean) OOUCH vette59jdwl
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OUCH! That hand looks pretty sore, :'( Take it easy on it for awhile. I think taking it all off and starting over is a good choice for that old ford, Not you hand. ;D
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A little out of alignment, it's got a we bit of a pull to the right. ;D
Ed, he wants to keep the 7 inch chop, so....I'm just going to bump up just a hair. Gonna try to keep the factory line on the top of the doors, so no rake. I don't think a rake would look good on this body style.
I got the cowl back up and got some bracing in it. Now the doors don't rub on the running boards and the body line is back up.
Ghost I have to get the thinking chair out to figure where to slpice in the front pillar structure.
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Dang it looks cleaner already Are you gonna try to lean the a pillars back a bit to get it to line up with the top, or move the top forward and down to line it up?
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Looks better already, Sammons. I wouldn't know where to start, that's what separates the "mes" from the "yous".
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Ghost, I'll probably do more top forward and down, of coarse pillars are gonna have to move a bit. Windshield is 1" wider at the bottom.
Man, I went over to get some more measurments, Shane had the donor car cut down to get the floor pan. I got to looking, heck it was an old hot rod. '56 Pontiac Strato Streak motor and 3sp manual trans, Ford 9", homemade traction bars, chrome rear nurfs, really old bucket seats. They look like bomber seat type but not. Big round holes and wrap around on the steel back rest.It might have scooted back in the day. ;D
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Wow, I'd seen this on the main page, but just found the rest here.
I hope your buddy's looking after you, you should be well compensated for the work, and the damage to your hands.
I'm getting arthritis in mine, so I'm expecting problems in the coming years.
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Jeff, I sure hope you aren't getting RA. :( Osteo Arthrtis (OA) is bad enough, but Rhumitoid (which I got) attacks all your joints and then some. See your Doc early with that stuff, sometimes they can slow it down.
I'm gonna have to pick on something a little easier on the 'ol hands next time. ;D Still plugging along, the posts are a real pain. I welded on an inner flange to help support (and to Cleco to) the outer post sheet metal. I had to slice the inner and outer to get everything in alignment. I pushed the lower inside edge in and the upper outside edge out. I believe all the lines are in alignment now.
Don't know about you guy's, but I always slide a piece of tubing up inside the pillar post and plug weld them in. Dad said it was good practice on chop top or cut top replacements. This one I had split apart, so I bent up some 5/8" x 1/8" wall round tube, and burnt it in well.
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Sammons, you have a talent!!
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Sammons I was just thinking You have this all figured out in the back of your mind before you even started now did you not nice work....vette59jdwl
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Wow, major progress! You've got it under control!
Tom
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Looking good, looks like you're making progress...Take it easy.....
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Nice Job.
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Sammons, You are amazing. You are going to save this thing and 10 years from now no one who sees it will know what a mess it was. MAGIC!
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Thanks fellas.
Chopper I'm still learning, I don't think car guys ever stop. That's what is cool about this site, all kinds of different talent!
Vette, every car is different. I take a lot of pics and look at them at night to decide what to do tomorrow.
Sixball, I wish he had the money to finish this Ford right. I wish I had the ability to do it for him. It may turn out real nice, but chances are it will get passed on before completion. Your right, probably a year from now nobody will think twice about it, or how it came to be.
Well I spent most of friday trying to get the body lines I wanted, but now I have what I want.(to hell with everybody else, haha). ;D I kept cutting tilting and moving the top back till it went Bingo. Spent this morning getting the suface rust off the rear top, till it got hot. The center missing section(represented by cardboard template) will come from the original front section.
Start pic first to compare, reminds me of a Ute.
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Sammons...Don't you love it when a plan comes together........As for the weather.. it went from cool to plain ass hot here..
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Sammons, I envy your talent, your work space & how clean your work space is!
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I had to take some time off, over did it a bit. :( I decided the rear hacked up panel had to go, so I cut it out and made a new one. Wire brushed the inner and got a coat of paint on it. I overlooked the width of the center top panel, it was an 1 1/4" to narrow. >:( So I separated the rain gutter with about 3/4" of top attached. I'll just have to build two small filler pieces.
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SAVED !
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Wow, nice work!!!
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Yes very nice
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I wish i was around your shop Unfortunetly I am on the road vette59jdwl
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Nice..coming together
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I did get the front pillars and winshield opening welded up monday morning. Got started making patterns for the qtr window. Kept moving things around till the window open followed the curve of the drip rail. I just want to cut the real thing once! ;)
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Dang Steve that looks really good ...like your idea on the template for the quarter window...looks like it flows with the top..is that a larger opening than the one on the original chop
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The owner should be very pleased of the rescue job you did
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Ed, it's probably 6" longer than it was.
Thanks 62131. He was in monday morning, said he couldn't believe the difference it made in just the new lines. Said he was really happy with it, and hopes he can finish this one.
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Wow, looking real good. What a difference.
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That looks great, Sammons! I think elongating that quarter window was smart.
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Here are pictures of one I saw Saturday. It could have used Sammon's eye. It underscores his approach to the rear window. The door in this one looks narrow. Maybe from the size and closeness of the quarter window, the rounded door corner, or could this have originally been a 4 door?
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Ydy3ph6907c/V3BkiMzQJdI/AAAAAAAAJq8/qO_iTzLOIaQlFPRWGtOrEDTZwcWnVma6ACCo/s400/160625_0038.jpg)
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-hRE3_bDlK6U/V3Bkix_NyTI/AAAAAAAAJq8/lX4eeDAny_0uYBU0xoQiTVecCB3cpv1lACCo/s400/160625_0039.jpg)
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Sixball I really think that removing the drip rail was a bad idea on that car. The really short qtr window, and the rounded door edge that meets it really hurts another wise nice ride. Just my opinion however. ;)
You are on the right track, the business coupe shared the short front door length with the 4dr sedan. Ford offered two diferent coupes, Business coupe had no back seat, shorter door and top. Regular passenger coupe had a back seat, longer door and roof. Note how the pass coupe back window stands up straighter. That is what in my opinion is going to be wrong with this chop i'm on now, the long door would look much better! Shane came up with another business coupe, which is what i'm chopping and the pic of the lavender one you posted. pic below Business coupe 1st Pass coupe 2nd.
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I've been down again, so not much work done this last week. I did get the qtr window jigsaw puzzel cut. I did the left door this morning, tacked together anyway. Set the qtr window up there, so if i feel like it this afternoon I might go do a bit more fitting and tack it in. Here is a quick pic before I left, should give you guys a hint of what it should look like. :) Just in case any of you are curious as to the time... as of noon today I have 61hrs total so far on this mess. That's a one man show. Some one was telling me that they were charging 300 hrs to do these(rough out only) :o
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I knew you could save that car. Nice job
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That really looks good. The quarter window makes a world of difference. I see the difference in the doors. When did Ford start doing that? My '38 and my brother's '39 were business coupes and used the same doors as a 4 door. Did the passenger coupe have wider doors that early? I never noticed. I had some '39-'39 2 door sedans and those doors were big.
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Sixball I did some looking on the web, found a disscusion on the subject. Wow, talk about a bunch of rude arguing no-it-alls. Anyway the just I got weeded through was that early '37-40 short door. '38 Merc put out one that was what they called "hardtop like" shareing the side body stamping of the conv. Which had the long door. '41 up common 2-body style coupes. The difference in length was 6".
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Thanks for doing that. That is why I didn't know about the different door lengths. Other than a '51 Woody I've never owned a Ford newer than '40. Well my tractor is a '60. ::) There are few groups on the internet that treat each other like we do.
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Well front back left side done. This will be the last pic post unless it gets finished out and on the road. I won't bore yall with the right side. Probably be another 2-3weeks(as slow as I am) to get done with my part (alot of dolly hammer bump work and garnish moldings).
I had one of them "watches tv to much" guys stop in this morn(off the hiway). First 5 mins I could tell he hadn't done anything himself. "You're going to metal finish all this and not ruin it with bondo...right"?
::) "My friend never uses bondo" ::) I told him his friend must have customers with really deep pockets. I told him nobody around here had that much money to spend and have a good day, I needed to get back to work. ;)
Sorry I put you fellas thru a Ford fix, but all are similar when chopping. Thanks for the kind words and encouragement. You guys are great.
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Steve....I like it....turned out great..1/4 window looks fantastic...good job, flows with the top ..makes the chop look good
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Dang that ford flows great thanks to you. You have skills my friend, I have been taken to school again.
John
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WOW what a transformation looks great nice job
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I'll look at every picture you take of it and I'll read every line you write about what you have done here. This group of Fords have nice round butts that are best shown of with a proper chop. You saved this one!! One of the best Chevys is a '41. I'd like to see what you would do with a '41 Coupe. Thanks for taking this on and showing us that messes can be fixed. It's only metal. ::)
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Great lines! You're the man!
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Thanks guys, I sure miss doing this stuff. Wish I could turn back the clock 15yrs(I was better then) and do it all over again. ;D
Sixball if I did a '41 Chevy coupe, this car has the lines I like. Paint it all black put some chrome trim back on, level it out and no big wheel tubs or aluminum wheels ;)!
I had to borrow a friends phone to charge my batt, (charge port taking a dump on me), so I may be out of touch for a while. Gonna have to sell something and get a new phone probably, or try and replace myself. If I'm not on here for a while, that's why. Take care guys!
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That '41 does have nice lines. The paint and painted trim items make it hard for me to look at. The chop is good.
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Well you certainly saved that.
I hope the owner carries on with it.
Chopped tops is one of my favourite body mods.
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Sure wish you'd get that new phone so we could see an update............. ::)
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Speaking of buying a new phone, I had to purchase a new phone today. I use mine for work and receive emails on it. It was a Apple I phone 4 thanks to AT&T upgrade to their service I could receive my emails and I could not down load the upgrade or my phone would crash. I think they just figured out a way to make people with older phones upgrade to a newer phone >:(
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Thanks Jeff, I hope he finishes this one also.
Chopper, a new phone isn't in the cards right now. They want $250 deductable on the insurance to fix. Buddy got me an external batt charger, but it takes three hrs to get 11% charge, that's 6mins of internet time >:( >:(. Here is a pic of the right side, not much different from the left. ;D Sorry for the shakey pic, best out of ten today. I got the shakes today.
62131, them cell phone plans are saddly just set up like that. Every month my phone insists on an updated upload. I unplug the batt and it goes away, I fell for it once and ended up just as you said and had to upgrade to a new phone and contract. Crooks!! >:(
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Looks like a totally different car with the chop corrected and fantastic metal work......good job Steve ;)
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Damn Sammons that looks awesome! You truly have talent to take something someone butchered and turn it into a bitchin' ride!
Tom
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Speaking of phones a couple weeks ago I bought two of these Tracfones:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Alcatel-Sonic-LTE-4-6-Android-Smartphone-with-Triple-Minutes-Tracfone-New-/131638176035?hash=item1ea63f2923:g:KqIAAOSw~bFWLoNA
They were only $15 each then, transferred my AT&T number and paid $20 for triple minutes 180 data, 180 texts and 180 data card. The plans work for me and it's my first smart phone.
Then I downloaded the talkatone app via http://www.talkatone.com/ They give me another number to use, so if I have WIFI I can send and receive phones calls with no charge to my tracfone.
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Here is a pic of the right side, not much different from the left.
That is some incredible work in such a short period of time! Amazing!