The Swiss Miss ('64 C #126687)

[Phil Planck]

DG
Nice repairs on both sides. Closing panel contour at front of door looks good. Keep it up.

Phil

[John Pierce]

DG,

Beautiful work. You are making quick progress. Like you said, a lot of these parts need finessing to fit. I was wondering how well the LencoSpot welder works in comparison to a regular two pronged spot welder? There are a lot of places that you can't get the larger two pronged welder into. Are the welds as durable and penetrating? Drilling rosettes, MIG'ing them and then grinding is getting old

Thanks.

John

[JTR70]

WOW! As usual beautiful work David! Justin

[kkinzli]

Looks like you are making some good headway. Can't wait to see the progress in person!

[DG58INNM]

Been a while since the last update. Work has been progressing, but I lost the cord to get photos downloaded from the camera. I'm a little backlogged!

The Swiss Miss continues to be a strange one. Rust in odd places. Places that should be rusted are not. Nothing major, but lots of little spots. Very time consuming. Maybe I should call her the Swiss (cheese) Miss! Justin must have been right. An early life in Europe and all weather use on salted roads.

Well, I wrapped up the repairs to the left rear frame member, and moved on to the longitudinal. The usual repairs to the bottom of the inner longitudinal. And unfortunately there was a small strip of corrosion at the base of the hinge pillar support. Had to address that first.


The Problem


The fix


Welded in, now to replace the bottom of the support piece


And done!


Test fit of the outer long. Located the jack spur, so I could spot weld it to the longudinal before final assembly.


I've gotten in the habit on my projects of cutting three little slits in the flange at each end when I first fit the outer long. Then I fit it to the car and weld up the slits. This sets the curvature and when I go back and put it in place for good I don't have to force it. Works for me anyway.


Heat tube supports and heat tube re-installed. The heat tube was in great shape, except one end was scorched from a previous patch job on the longitudinal. To protect and re-inforce it , I wrapped it with 3M rubber tape. Probably not needed, but it made me feel better.



Outer longitudinal prepped and painted for install

[DG58INNM]

Jumping around a bit, here is the old longitudinal/heat tube/support. You can see that scorched spot on the heat tube.


Stitching in the long ledge repair piece


The little connecting piece for between the long and front short part of the inner long.


Attaching the outer long. with the spot welder


Finished product.


Detail of the spot welded jack spur. Probably stronger than the factory did it!


Prepped for front closing panel. Everything thoroughly painted inside the sections before they get closed up.


And the front closing panel fabricated and installed.

Thanks,
DG

[Carrera_The_Kid]

Great to see an update David. Looking good. Please keep us posted

[John Pierce]

David,
Your work looks fantastic! Nice idea about the slits in the front panel. Mine definitely shows a twist weird it was manhandle in place by the previous restorer.

Is the embossed panel in the front door well a handmade part, old piece or reproduction? The embossed section fits nicely.

Thanks for the updates.
John

[DG58INNM]

Thanks guys. Your words of encouragement really do help.

Here's some more views of progress







Before I could fit the outer closing panel, had to repair a few spots at the top of the hinge pillar/inner fender area. Easy fixes, but like all these little tasks, time consuming.




Preliminary trimming of the outer closing panel to fit the door curvature. I try to do this in several small steps. It has to be trimmed partially during the fitting, but the final trimming should best be left for after the panel is welded in place.


Fabricated and installed a new little channel for the weatherseal under the fender/cowl joint.


Ready for outer closing panel


Outer closing panel installed

Thanks,
DG

[Phil Planck]

Dave
Nice job on the closing panel.
Phil

[DG58INNM]

Thank you Phil. Heading out to the shop for more work this evening.

John, the piece with the circular indent you asked about was the original piece I cut out. I repaired the bottom rusted inch or so while I had it removed, then welded it all back in. Not the cleanest job. It looks better in the photo than in person. But it will do for my purposes, and not highly visible when the car is all back together. My goal with this car is to get it finished, not perfect.

DG

[tperazzo]

Beautiful David, I'm especially jealous of that spot welder. Looks so factory!

Question... How did you determine the vertical position of the jack spur without the rocker?

Thanks,
Tom

[DG58INNM]

Thanks Tom!

To locate the jack spur, I hung the door, temporarily positioned the new rocker panel, then positioned the jack spur. And people wonder why it takes so long to do this work. Take it apart, put it together, take it apart, put it together, take it apart.....

This is the first time I'd done the jack spur this way, welding it to the long. while the long. is off the car. Worked perfect and I'll never do it any other way again. So nice to be able to get to the backside with a dolly and really snug up the contours of the jack spur against the long. panel

Take care,
DG

[JTR70]

So glad you found your USB cable for your camera David! Your repairs as always are beautiful! I agree the spur has to go on before the rocker to get a clean shot at welding upper portions of the flange which means a mock up fitment (s) of the door and rocker. Like you said, mount it, take it off, remount it and so on time, time and more time... Glad to hear your back on this car again and looking forward to more progress shots. Thanks again! BTW: nice photo of the Mrs. in that 904! You're a lucky man!
Justin

[DG58INNM]

Thanks Justin! Didn't find the cable. Just broke down and bought a new one. The next installment will be......Frankenfender!

In the meantime, who can clue me in on the front fender braces for a C? These seem to be different from the A and B, which have a tab welded to the fender that in turn bolts to the fender brace. It looks like the C fender brace welds directly to the fender, but I'm not sure how it should be oriented. Anyone have photos?

Thanks,
DG