Fitting a Hood

[Rimcanyon]

I made some progress, but not enough. I cut the frame in five places, clamped wood forms that matched the contour I wanted, then tack welded the frame cuts. Now the rear corners and the left side fit fine, but the twist was reduced only about 50%.

[JTR70]

Really nice profile jig. Interested to see how it worked out for you.

[roy mawbey]

Dave, I have read your thread more than twice! I can follow the considerable effort you have made to try to correct it so far. The wooden former you made I presume from the left side of the car seems to follow the lid of the bonnet very well when you clamped it. So when you welded did it follow that shape when unclamped? Was the car in a right side impact to do that damage and are you sure the right side front wing ( fender ) is perfect for shape where it meets the lid? I guess with that considerable error of kink it must be clearly possible to see by eye?

Trouble is photos are good but not like actually seeing it . In other words was it just the front bonnet lid that ended up damaged with that kink?

Roy

[Rimcanyon]

Justin and Roy, thanks for the nice words.

Roy, thanks for following the somewhat convoluted path I have been on. I am learning as I go, so the path so far is two steps forward one back. The repairs to the hood are a consequence of repair work done back in the 80's, when a front clip was installed and hood and cowl damage were repaired. Evidently the shop did not know how to weld, so they used bondo and pop-rivets to fix the hood kink. The front end looks ok, but it is not symmetric from side to side (hard to see). I would love to remove the front clip and correct everything, but I want to actually get the car back on the road in a finite amount of time, so my approach is more pragmatic. I am trying to do fix everything I can short of major surgery.

Since the photo above the jig underwent a transformation. Originally two pine 1x6x42" (25x150x1066mm) templates were made, one for each side, since the sides are not the same and the contour goes the opposite direction. I made the rough template by tracing the outline of the fender (right at the hood opening) onto the board and cut the board with the bandsaw. Then I put the hood in place and set the template on the hood and adjusted the template using a sander so that the bottom of the template matched the slope of the hood (the slope varied from front to back).


To use the templates, first I cut the metal support frame of the hood as shown in the photo above and clamped it to the templates, then tack-welded the cuts. The first attempt was encouraging, but the hood had some twist. Next I tried two things: I added wood supports to join the templates into a cradle, put a clamp on the hood diagonally to counteract the twist, and went through another iteration of cutting the tack welds and re-tacking. This time the results were really good but the twist went the other direction and the right side needed some correction on the contour . Had to find the sweet spot for the diagonal clamp.



So I modified the right template to give more clearance in front and rear, and did another iteration, this time with the diagonal clamp barely clamping. It came out perfect, or at least as good as I was going to get it so I decided to fully weld the cuts in the frame.

But when I fully welded them, I had problems. The welds shrunk enough to lift the hood off the form when the clamps were removed. I'm currently re-welding and working on techniques to minimize and compensate for shrinkage. Here is a photo of how I prepped the original tack welds. The new batch will have full inserts in each slot. It seems to help since I can get away with lighter welding.

[roy mawbey]

Well there is a lot of thought going into this repair and I like your approach. I think with those inserts it will work. Its amazing how a welding torch can affect things. I look forward to hearing how you got on with this final approach. As I have said more than once before, to see a perfectly prepared and ready to weld item looking perfect can change beyond belief with heat distortion.

Hope its solved !!

Roy

[jjeffries]

If I may make one respectful suggestion, it’s that I’d take the time to fully and exactingly strip all those areas where you’re welding; it would make the welding so much easier. That said, you’ve probably already finished this brave repair by now. I thoroughly admire your “external buck”.

Great job,
John in Conn

[Rimcanyon]

Next chapter is beginning. I was not happy with the fit of the hood after doing all the massaging. It was still too high on the passenger side.
After consulting with some pros, I am going to have the front clip r eplaced. The passenger side of the trunk is about ½" lower than the drivers side, the result of collisions and sloppy body work at some point in the past. The existing front clip was replace some time in the last century, and it was seamed with bondo rather than butt-welded, so a secondary objective is to redo that repair correctly. The headlight buckets were not installed correctly, so that problem will also be corrected.

So a new front clip and headlight buckets were ordered from Trevor, along with the inner front trunk wall. I do not have a reference car to check, so I need some help with what the inner trunk should be on a 59 Conv. D. Here are some photos to show both the existing trunk and the replacement panel from Trevor:



Straight edge added to show the curvature in the flange between the upper and lower inner trunk panels.


Replacement inner trunk panel:


There is a straight edge in the second and third photos. Is the curvature of the flange in the existing panels correct, or should it be a straight line like the replacement panel from Trevor? Is the flange in the existing trunk a single thickness of steel, or double, or a seam?

[roy mawbey]

Dave, my goodness you really tried you best to resolve that problem. You probably learnt a lot from it such a pity it did not work out for you. I will drop an e-mail to my friend Dick Pitman who I think you already know has a Roadster like yours. He might be able to answer these last questions you have regarding the flange.

Keep smiling its the only way!!

Roy

[JR]

RimCanyon,
I'm glad that my Roadster didn't need that work but while it was in the shop a doctors SC Coupe got rearended and had to have lots done. That included a new hood and front and rear clip. It is finally done and the body painted. He did much the same as you have done. I no longer go to the shop and the father who did my Roadster only goes on afternoons now.
Good luck.
I'll try and put some pics in here but I'm not a geek.
Dick Pitman
Roadster 88971

[JR]

[roy mawbey]

Dave, I have looked at the area of the flange on my still original 1959 356A Factory area you show with a 'kinked distorted ' flange. The flange on my car is flat when measured with a straight edge just like your new panel you have bought. BUT the front panel that is directly underneath the perfectly flat 'flange' is curved. When I place a rule on the middle of the flat flange to the curve depth is about 15mm. This lower front end panel has the two welded on 'jack' location spring type holders the that jack is secured to. The 15mm was measured between those two holders. I think its possible the lower frond end dished panel is welded to the top flange part. Mine is still covered in the factory black rust preventative. but it feels double thickness not really thin.

To get that flange so distorted it must have have had a bad sideways collision . Have you seen further damage near the front suspensiion areas?

Hope this helps sorry if my explanation is difficult to possibly understand . I do think my 59A chassis front structure is the same as yours.

Roy

[JTR70]

Hey Dave, I had installed that upper nose closing wall some time back and I'll be doing it again on the coupe I'm currently working on but not for a while. T1 and T2 cars are the same in that area. Here's a link to my first attempt to give you an idea of what is involved. Maybe you might find something of use there. Runs from pages 81 to 90ish
Coupe into Speedster Conversion - ABCGT Forum

HTH

Justin

[Rimcanyon]

Hey Dave, I had installed that upper nose closing wall some time back and I'll be doing it again on the coupe I'm currently working on but not for a while. T1 and T2 cars are the same in that area. Here's a link to my first attempt to give you an idea of what is involved. Maybe you might find something of use there. Runs from pages 81 to 90ish
Coupe into Speedster Conversion - ABCGT Forum

HTH

Justin

Justin, thank you for the link. It helped me to come up with at least a partial plan. My goal is to install the replacement "A" hood I bought from Jonathan Schneiderman. It needs some work due to rust, but it has never been hit or repaired, so it will be a guide to the front end restoration.

I think the steps I need to follow are these:
1. remove the front clip
2. remove the trunk upper and lower closing panels
3. slice the right fender along the trough to allow a weld in insert to raise the fender to match the hood (and provide space for a hood gasket)
4. fit new panels to front hood, incl. both trunk closing panels and a new front hood trough
5. fit new front clip, repeat step 4 until it works, then weld
6. fit new headlight buckets

Then I will need to deal with the hood hinges and the front latch, but that plan can wait until 1-6 are accomplished.

[JTR70]

Hi Dave,
I am in the middle of this exact stage of repair on this coupe: 1959 356A S/R coupe project chassis # 108625 - ABCGT Forum
Once you begin removing all of that old steel like the fenders and upper closing walls it is going to get more complicated than you can anticipate. I strongly recommend making all the repairs to your new hood first so it is in final form to construct your new front end group around. If you have repairs to make to either the hinges or the hinge pockets make them next if not first. The hood should be hinged, gap adjusted off of the cowl with a fully operational latch; Then build the body around it. Much more fun and interesting to mess with the big parts first and leave the annoying things like hinges until later but its always the small details that will come back and make your life miserable if the fundamentals are handled first. Best of luck with this repair.