'63 356B T-6 Rebuild

[JTR70]

Hey John,
I'll share it with you here as it may help someone else down the road.

Here is the flattener I bought several years ago. This stuff is cheap too I think it was about 8 bucks at the time. If you get into a jamb you can also use/add baby powder as a flattening agent as well. My mentor Greg shared that trick with me years ago.

I like to mix two ounces of color. (along with the standard catalyst and thinner)

And my general rule of thumb is a cap full of flattener. This ratio almost always gives me the 30% gloss I'm looking for.
I realize not everyone paints but if you can avoid rattle can paint do it! Especially on suspension components and surfaces exposed to the harshness of nature. Not only does it not look as rich but the finish just does not hold up like a proper catalyzed paint will. If you don't paint send the suspension components out for powder coat. I send a lot of small parts out to be powder coated; its more than worth it if you have a good shop to work with. Justin

[John Pierce]

Great advice and thank you. You and this forum are the new mentors for a lot of people that don't have anyone local. I'm going to powder coat the suspension components when I get to that part of the build, or may have to replace depending upon how rusty they are.

Is the whole bottom of the car painted black, including wheel wells, exterior battery box, sills, nose? What about the engine bay and trunk/interior battery box? I'd hate to spray on paint now only to have to remove it later. My car was so molested in these areas that no original paint was left.

[Phil Planck]

John
Will get the tunnel data for you, but need to remove items stored in the car first. Hopefully later today.
Phil

[bbspdstr]

......Is the whole bottom of the car painted black, including wheel wells, exterior battery box, sills, nose? What about the engine bay and trunk/interior battery box? I'd hate to spray on paint now only to have to remove it later. My car was so molested in these areas that no original paint was left.

John, the best answer is in "Made by Hand" and if you watch that you will see that a bare metal shell was undercoated, raw, on a rotisserie. Then it was enamel primered and baked. Then blackening was done as it was assembled, with a brush and/or spray....according to the individual worker's "sight line" or what was necessary to make the car look good.

It was hap-hazzard when made, but now people go for better than Porsche and do whole areas underneath (often on a rotisserie) and all of inside and under the dash. Nice-er, but not "original."
Rule of thumb if doing an overall paint job on a bare car; just paint it over your applied texture coating and don't mask or worry about overspray. Then mask the exterior paint and brush or spray the semi-gloss as much as you prefer...either all or "original."

The best thing done now that's "unoriginal" is epoxy primer on EVERYTHING! Especially if the car is upside-down, saturating original and new seams, inside and out.

BTW, for a very long time I used a Spies-Hecker product called Rally Black that was just right in gloss. A urethane that was predictable and repeatable as a factory pack product, but pricey and I think perhaps discontinued. A much less expensive alternative is a Southern Polyurethanes semi black. There may be an outlet in your area or you can find out by calling the owner of the company, a great tech guy, Barry Kives, at 404-307-9740.

[Phil Planck]

John
My tunnel still has the factory sound deadener on it so cannot measure to metal at the top. From the top of the flange on the floor to the top of the soundproof is 3 3/32" - 3 4/32". Soundproof appears to be 3/16 - 1/4" thick.
Phil

[John Pierce]

Summer is busy with the kids. I got some time this week to install the battery box. Lots and lots of practice spot welding and grinding.



Left battery box wall with flanges from the front longitudinal, which will be sandwiched between the battery box back wall and side wall. This really stiffens up the front.


Right battery box wall with the same flanges. The torsion plate flange is the outermost piece in the sandwich.


Before welding up the battery box I epoxy primed the metal and sprayed a flat black. There are a lot of areas that would be inaccessible once the battery box is installed. I'd hate to see it start rusting after all this work.


Rear wall installed.


The top of the rear wall is spot welded to the gas tank floor, which really tightens up and strengthens the front end.


Corner detail. The jack clip is not included with the rear wall. I removed it from the original wall and spot welded it in place.


Battery ground tube welded tight.


Front wall.


Inner floor.


Outer floor.


The back wall fits nice and snug in front of the torsion bar.


All the flanges are nice and tight.

Thanks for looking.

[Phil Planck]

Beautiful job John. I find my plug welds vary some. Get some really nice ones, and then a few where I don't completely fill in the hole and have to go back and add another dab. Probably from going too fast and not always being able to see each hole as well.

Great progress - starting to look like a car again.

Phil

[tperazzo]

Really nice work John! Let me know when you are ready to rivet the tow hook on. David G shared a few tips that worked great.

I can't vouch for the product listed below but it seems like it would be useful. I will buy and try it on my floor welds!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7IXW9Alzkc&sns=em

What do you guys think of this? Maybe it should be on the tool thread?

[John Pierce]

Thanks Phil and Tom.

I know what you mean about the spot welds, Phil. Even when centered sometimes the melted metal doesn't completely fill the hole. "A little dab will do you" afterwards!

Tom: The Eastwood MIG spot weld product looks like a great idea, but there are so few areas that you can actually use the clamp. I've tried it. I ended up using lots of vise grips. The longest I've found is this 24" overall length (the throat is about 8" shorter). I wish someone would make a 30" model.

[Phil Planck]

Regarding the Eastwood plug welding aid: I dunno. You still have to know how long to weld, which is critical, along with the welder settings. Can't see what is going on very well with the clamp and standoffs on the tip. What if that tip does not screw on square to your gun? Suppose it does not matter as it is just distancing anyway. I was taught to start at the center of the hole and quickly move to the edge and go around the edge. Can't do that with this set-up.

Phil

[John Pierce]

I'm going to start working on the bottoms of the front longitudinals next. These are completely buggered up by the previous owner with a hand made reinforcement struts welded onto rusty metal that had lots of holes in it.


Driver's side front longitudinal after removing and cleaning up the reinforcement strut. Lots of weird welding going on here.



The pedal bulkhead is also in a sorry state. I'll be removing the bottom portion and welding in a patch panel.

The car doesn't have any original bottom metal to get accurate measurements. I was hoping someone could provide some reference points to help me locate these. Like where is the bottom flange of the front longitudinal in reference to the torsion column? Some references from standard locations like the shock mount or torsion holes would be good. Also, I need to get a distance of the floor from a reference point, such as the bottom of the dash. If you've got better reference points I'm all ears.

Thanks.

[Phil Planck]

John
If you can make a sketch, or photoshop a picture to show the dimensions you need I can measure them on Foam Car, as this area only needed the strut replaced and some of the metal behind the strut at the rear. The flange at the bottom that the strut(what I called it, your forward longitudinal) is overlapped by the strut flange and the edges are almost flush. I bought my struts from Stoddard and they fit pretty good. But that was way back at least 10 years ago or more, as some of my pictures are from a Polaroid.





Phil

[JTR70]

John, your battery box repairs really came out clean! I have high hopes for these ratty lower frame edges.

Been down that road too. It will all start looking very promising once you cut past all of the remaining cancer and fish-plating.

Tom, I got a plug-weld tip with my gun. I played with it only once with mixed results. Had a hard time getting the wire exactly in the center and would 9 times out of ten miss an outer lip section. What was nice was just holding the gun there and simply pulling the trigger. I prefer to free hand it even though they are far from consistent; especially in cramped spaces.

[John Pierce]

Thanks guys.

Justin, I've been reading and re-reading your and DG's rebuild of this area with their great pictures. Quite helpful.

I know my torsion tower is accurate now after its rebuild, but don't know where the lower front longitudinal flange butts up against it. I would think that it is even with the lowermost portion, but want to make sure before I start welding things in.

Also, there's a bend in the lower pedal bulkhead that is a good reference point that I'm going to use to weld in a bottom patch. I'd like to double check the distance from this point (or other points) to the side flanges that the floor sits on.

[Phil Planck]

John
I measured the front longitudinal flange on Foam Car. Both sides are 11/32"(9mm) above the bottom of the torsion bar housing. I put a level on the very bottom and set it parallel to the bottom of the longitudinal and the bottom of the longitudinal was the above dimensions higher.

Phil