Nice Start! What makes you think you'll be years working on it? Lots done in short order so far!

Fordy Acres Car Farm wrote:

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Nice Start! What makes you think you'll be years working on it? Lots done in short order so far!

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I meant the chop in a few years...........a chop is way beyond my expertise(or lack there of)......let alone chopping a 4 door! Lol 

Interesting project for sure, and interesting pics.

^^^ Thanks Rhys! Welder is a MIG, still getting the hang of it.

looks like a good start with a cool plan. There's nothing wrong with four doors mine has 2 on the sides and 2 at the back

Hey, I work in Port Perry, I think I drove by and saw your car on the way home last week! I imagine you'll see my truck driving around Port Perry once in a while.

Cool Beans! If Jay's cool with that I'll say hi sometime. Hopefully I'll be driving the truck.

Well,as many of you may know, Jay got very busy adopting a third child shortly after starting to build his first car. This also entailed him tearing his home completely apart and remodelling yet again for another bedroom,one with privacy in mind for the first little girl in the family so the Chevy sat for a while and about two months ago came to my place. First job at hand was to iron out a few issues with electrical and get it running once again so as to have it move in and out under its own power ( first stipulation of coming in to my garage,lol) then I proceeded to cut almost everything that poor Jay had lovingly fabbed on the LH rear quarter,there was a lot of great effort put forward in his first attempt,but wanted to eliminate the amount of work to make it nice and straight. Here is a pictorial of where we are at to this point I guess...

-- Edited by Chris Stapley on Monday 6th of July 2015 12:50:53 AM

Floorpans,Yes , even the good western cars rust when the vent window seals fail!

This was the "nice original floor" lol...

Thanks to Beans for dropping in and getting a chance to butcher someone else's car too,lol! Thanks again Nick!

Thank god for powering my bead roller last winter, that was time well spent. Makes such a nice job of creating panels like this.

Good old brush on seam sealer to prevent any water from seeping up!

-- Edited by Chris Stapley on Monday 6th of July 2015 01:12:55 AM

New quarter skin fabbed, inner quarter from floor to bottom made as well, nothing seems to fit a Chevy when you weld half of a 56 Caddy to the back,lol!

Actually used this first skin as a test panel, made one a little nicer again, stepped the upper flange for strength to weld rosette style through plug welds,and then stitched solid after the fact, added a slight compound curve to the entire panel on my english wheel too to help stiffen and ensure no oil can effects when welding.. left the spear element out of this panel that Jay had added to mimic the Caddy quarter because I figured that when the factory stainless spear was added it may end up looking too busy.. 

Functional Caddy style fuel filler is being used,had to repair the seemingly non existant unbroken Caddy lift assembly.

Quick detail shot of the inner panel,gotta look good from underneath too you know!

Bumper was giving me fits until I sat and thought about this easy solution to a daunting problem. Sawed the round profile off of my welding tank cap ( Sorry Canox)

one of those keep it simple design things I suppose.... 

-- Edited by Chris Stapley on Monday 6th of July 2015 01:23:37 AM

These  two have become Good friends the past couple months...

 

Cheapy Eastwoods bead roller ,powered by a variable speed 1/2" drill ,foot pedal operated with the variable speed switch out of the drill handle added to the Harbor Freight on off foot pedal. Reduction is a Chevy ring gear /flex plate and a Chevy starter drive gear welded to a 1/2" stainless bolt shank, being broke is the mother of invention in my house,lol! This setup will allow such a slow speed that I can feather and control so nicely.. I will be submitting some bead roller art when I have time to simply play with this thing and my tipping dies..

 

-- Edited by Chris Stapley on Monday 6th of July 2015 01:43:37 AM

Looks like a ton of work, but looking good too.  I have copied two pics that show quarter removed and new quarter installed.  How did you deal with all the rust that is visible once the outer panel was removed?  Sandblast, inner panel replacement, chemical treatment, rust paint, tar, wire brush?

 

 

 

-- Edited by Barchetta on Monday 6th of July 2015 01:29:41 PM

Rick,this was the best thing that ever happened to an Eastwoods bead roller man, struggled for twenty five years with my brothers first generation Eastwood hand crank and said no way when I bought mine. I am a one man operation too so I don't have the extra hands when needed for intricate stuff...car is currently in Campbellford, will end up back in Port when Jay recieves it back...

More re of the same typical rust when I started to dig on the RH side..

 

 

Took a bit of time away from this project to make some cash flow on quick easy jobs the past while so there had been no progress. thank Jay for being so understanding, back at it this week to try and get it ready for a trip back to Jay so he can carry on with his part of the build again....
Here you go for now'

-- Edited by Chris Stapley on Saturday 22nd of August 2015 03:38:09 PM

New skin kin on THE side just needs to be finish welded,ran out of juice for the welder.. I use 22 ga. Satin coated steel.

 

In the end our list of repairs and traditional fifties modifications go as this:
Rust replacement of both front floor pans
Replacement of both rear doglegs
Frenched headlights
Peaked and nosed hood
Smoothed and frenched grill surround
Shave door handles
Frenched antenna in RH rear quarter
56 Caddy rear quarter sections and hand built lower quarters
Extended lower edge of trunk lid to blend the Caddy bumper to the Chevy
Decked trunk lid
All in a first stage of primer so Jay can do the rest of his mods and learn about block sanding!