57 356 A mild resto

[Red911]

Hi Mark,

Per your request, here is a photo of the Zim's rear front fender replacement panel.



I will be shaving the panel somewhat before installing.

Tom

[merbesfield]

Hi Mark,

I misunderstood your issue. I thought where you welded the lower door skin on, there was a valley. You clarified that the door bottom was in due to the door shims from the PO. Therefore, my recommendation is unnecessary. Sorry about my confusion.

Tom

Tom, you read correctly. I have/had two issues. Valley in door skin and bottom alignment. Bottom alignment was solved w shims. Valley is still there, but I will worry about that a little later. Thx for pic of fender patch panel. Is the thickness the same as our original German cars? Another words, thinner than the RD pieces?

[John Pierce]

Simonson panels are 19 gauge and very accurate.

[merbesfield]

Got another good 6.5 hours of shop time in. Got the DS door bottom roughed in. Time to break out the Dykum and do some detail marking.

First I had to cut out the old, which required spot weld cutting and removal of old rusty door bottom. Cleaned up all the rust and get the old door ready. Lots of measuring and recording of dimensions so new goes back the same is old. I had to cut the new door bottom patch panel open so I could add the 3mm that the piece was narrow. To make the patch easier to repair I first made the cut and opened the piece 3 mm. Then I cut back in the opposite direction from zero to 3mm and squared out the opening. Then I took some scrap I had from RD floor surround kit and made filler pieces. Welded it up and metal finished it. I also had to add 3+ mm to the tail end of the panel. Then I started the process of fitting it to the door bottom.

[merbesfield]

Does anyone know who sells door hinge shims?

[John Pierce]

It's very easy to make them yourself. Use the original as a template and make them in several different thicknesses. Below is a picture of what came with my car. I threw away all of the poorly made ones and used the one on the left as a template.

[merbesfield]

It's very easy to make them yourself. Use the original as a template and make them in several different thicknesses. Below is a picture of what came with my car. I threw away all of the poorly made ones and used the one on the left as a template.

Yea I figured I could make them, but they should be cheap so I figure I would order them so one less thing for me to do.

[Red911]

I got some from Stoddard.

[merbesfield]

[JTR70]

Looking good Mark!

[John Pierce]

Nicely done. Don't you love the look of clean new metal?

[merbesfield]

Nicely done. Don't you love the look of clean new metal?

Yes I do. I especially like the look of straight new metal. Metal working after welding is not always a lot of fun, but when the results turn out positive, it is very rewarding. I have been thinking of my techniques for how to attack the door bottom. I know Jason said there is not much room, but to me it looks pretty wide open and accessible, though certainly not for a hammer. I am hoping that my method of using s backing dolly and slapper will give me some decent results. After that it will be all filler. Lead or other, not sure yet. Open to trying lead, but we shall see.

[merbesfield]

PS, what am I doing wrong with posting my pics? They are all small compared to others that are full size.

PSS, I think I figured it out, but what size do most use? Large seems huge, medium too small. And on my phone when posting I am not sure I see these options. Also, strange is at the bottom, all the pics that I have loaded do not actually show up. Like shows 3 but says five! WTH?

[John Pierce]

Upload the images and hit "post reply," then go back and hit "edit" and enlarge the images to "Large" and hit "save."

HTH

[John Pierce]

I use large and it is resized on the screen to fit. It look good with that size without losing details.

[merbesfield]