The New Project: Part Deux!

[napa68]

Looks great Steve. I've got a friend who purchased a steam cleaner a few years ago. The heat makes ALL the difference.

Tim

[njsteve]

I tried renting a steam cleaner: they wanted $275 for a day rental. Thats cazy! So a friend loaned me his pressure washer and the wife loaned me the washing machne hot water line for the day if I promised to do my own laundry after I hooked the hot water back up. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/grin.gif[/img]

[markinnaples]

Nice work, as usual. What is your plan once you get it all cleaned?

[njsteve]

Going back together. The first repairs on the horizon will be the frame rail sections that need to be attended to, then once the repro trunk dropoffs arrive I will have the inner quarter rear portion sectioned in to replace the homemade boxed dropoffs that were installed on the car in the 1980s, so it looks correct. Paint is much farther down the road. I will be driving this one for the summer. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/grin.gif[/img]

Of course while everything was out of the car, i noticed the heater core was leaking on to the pass floor, today. I ordered a new one this morning and the interior will wait til that gets done. Glad it happened now and not after i put it all back together.

[njsteve]

Today I tackled the trunk area. This car was Ziebart rustproofed back when it was new and that stuff is nearly impossible to remove. Solvents just smear it. It's almost like roofing tar and it's about 1/8&quot; thick. A different, and thicker, but equally adhesive version was over-applied later, on the GM replacement quarters and tail panel that were replaced in the 1980s. The hot water seemed to work but VERY slowly. Like around 5 seconds of close up blasting to remove one square inch. It was mind-numbing and carpel tunnel initiating to say the least.

Here's the before shots:

[njsteve]

And after about 6 hours of blasting.









I tried to save as much of the original splatter paint but in some spots it came off very eaily while in other areas, it was hard as rock. The Ziebart stuff worked as the only rust I found in the trunk floor were the four tiny pinholes in the lower right of this photo to the left of the drain plug. The rest of the dark areas are due to the surface not being completely dried off yet.

[njsteve]

When I was done with the trunk I spent an hour or so with a rag soaked in a little diesel fuel to clean off the underside of the floor pans. Here's what they looked like with a little elbow grease appled:

[njsteve]

In looking at the frame rail damage/rust it doesn't appear to be as bad as I initially thought. (I hope).

The undersides of the lowest portion of the rear rails by the front leaf spring pocket both have the outer layer corroded on the bottom and sides. It is also evident on both inner and outer sides of that area, next to the E-brake cable. There are three separate panels that sandwich together at that point and it looks like just the outer one held the crud and rusted, as this is the lowest point on the rail (lower than the drainage hole unfortunately). It also didn't help matters that the delivery truck driver used that spot as the hold down for his cargo chains. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/rolleyes.gif[/img]

Pass side:



Driver's side:

[njsteve]

The other rail problem was in the rear where the aftermarket exhaust had all it's weight on the tailpipe hangers after the crummy, universal hangers that were sheetmetal screwed into the rear bulkhead, ripped out. It appears that the reinforcement section of both rails were not properly tack welded in originally, as the pass side area pulled away and cracked the frame under the panel.

Pass side:



Driver's side:

[njsteve]

And the solution:

I bought a pair of the new reproduction frame rails to use for donor sections.





I also bought a set of the repro sway bar mounting brackets as the ones on the car have been welded so many times, they actually welded a bolt across one of them to keep it together.