~Back from the dead outlaw build~

[Rad-Ride]

11-30-2013

Put the motor in this morning and finished cutting the quarter panel off the Ghia rear clip. After that I had had my son help me set the clip on the chassis. Next I will start taking measurements and trimming off what I don't need.

[JTR70]

Thanks for the update Frank and glad to see you still chipping at it! As it sits here, are the new adjusters maxed out at the bottom and are the drop-flanges mounted on the spring plates? With all this effort in the adjusters I'm sure this won't be air bagged; great idea using the hose clamp for a straight cut. Looking forward to the body mock-up phase. Keep going! Justin

[Rad-Ride]

Some of my friends that saw a picture of the Ghia said, "Why did you cut up that nice car" Here is why... The passenger side quarter panel on the Ghia was hit at some point and bad repairs all over the car led to it's demise...

inch thick bondo



Here is a shot of the drivers side floor pan. Conduit, tar and some thin metal held it all together. The rest of the car had foil tape, rivets, spray foam and of course more bondo.

[Rad-Ride]

Hey Justin,
Still plan on getting dropped spindles for it but I can still go lower with the front adjusters. If you lower it too much with the adjusters your wheel moves forward in the fender well and your ride quality suffers. For the rear I do have the plates on, I figured I would be lower and have more negative camber though. May still have to drop it a spline or two.

[JTR70]

Good points concerning the trailing arm angles. You're right the bondo was too thick on that old quarter panel; that ghia had to die.
Keep up the great progress! Justin

[roy mawbey]

Some nice work there Frank. Really enjoy looking at your efforts on your thread. Nice neat welding too I noticed that!!!

Roy

[Cowboybob]

Frank,
I'm a new member here and was just reading through your thread...that's quite an ambitious project and I admire your dedication!

I'm glad that I found this site since there is such great information here (currently working my way through Justin's incredible rebuild of his Carrera too). The detailed pictures and write ups on this site will be a great resource once I drag my newly acquired '64 home.

Do you happen to have any information on a build thread of the 356 used in your avatar? I'd like to know how the owner of that car achieved that incredible stance. Any information would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Brian

[Rad-Ride]

Hey Brian,

Welcome aboard to abcgt.com.

Thanks for compliment and checking out my build thread!

Yes Justin's Carrera thread is the one to check out, lots of great information and pictures to help get you through the build of your '64.

The picture in my avatar is a photo shopped pre-A I found on the web.

As far as stance, for the rear you just re-index your spring plates on the splines. But with going lower in the rear you will get negative camber. There are a few other mods like trans raise but that requires a lot of fabrication.
For the front I know of some that used VW dropped spindles but you will have to use a different brake setup. Another mod is to elongate the holes in the beam.

http://lowbus.com/BB/index.php?topic=287.0
Here is the build thread for this car..



http://www.kustomcoachwerks.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=4676&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0
And the build thread for this one (my have to scroll down if the screen is blank)



Hope this helps,
Frank

[JTR70]

Brian, So glad you found us, thank you for joining and welcome to our forum! Nice to hear that you're finding the content here useful. Will be looking forward to your build when you get it home! My thanks to both of you guys for taking the time to read through my build thread!

Frank's right this is just a really slick photo-shopped image.

Here is what it actually looks like. I like the alloys much better!

Thanks and welcome once again Brian!
Justin

[Cowboybob]

Thanks for the pictures Justin.

I certainly concur about the alloys!

[Rad-Ride]

It's been awhile since my last update. Not much done since then either.

I cut the inner fender wells in half and cut the rear package area down.



Started cutting the rust out of the front portion of the Ghia. if you look close you can see someone used a vacuum hose to fix the heater channel...



I bolted the Ghia front section back on and set the body on the pan to see how much more trimming I need to do.

[Rad-Ride]

Since I didn't start with a whole car I need some advice how the door post area fits together.

Maybe some measurements from the bottom to the door guide (straight lines) those measurements should help with see how the corner fits together (circle) -sorry for the blurry picture-



Not sure how this area should fit also.

[Rad-Ride]

And some more fitting questions...
(quarter panel to door post) I see it fits at a slight angle, but then there would be a gap behind the entire area. Or should the lip of the repair section be trimmed down to fit the smaller edge on the door post?

[Rad-Ride]

Justin,
From your pictures it looks like you have a double step on your quarter panel and is spot welded to the post.
Do I have a cheap repo and only have a single bend?

[JTR70]

Thanks for the update Frank! WOW! Things sure begin to look promising once that rear clip was slid over your Ghia chassis. I'll bet you took a good long time and just sat and stared at it from all angles to soak it in. I know that I have to do that once reaching a certain phase that shows glimmers of what might be if I keep going! Definitely helps to keep the pilot light lit.
Let me copy your pics to go over them individually. Keep up the great work! Justin

I could give you the approximate distance from the embossment to the threshold floor but the ultimate deciding factor of where it should be positioned will be against your latched and mounted door. This will directly determine what distance you want your bottom door gap to be.
The inner corner channels do not attach directly. they are both mounted to the outer threshold hold longitudinal flange of the chassis. You'll have to create a proximate sub-structure for these two parts to mount on.

This old rocker is being seperated from that chassis flange here. This run is three layers thick including the mount flange for the rocker. The striker channel would be welded right on top here creating the corner.

This is a typical fitment issue with all of these repro parts. Take a look a Phil and Tom's post and you'll see all the cutting and splicing required to get these things to fit. The corner should rest flush if not almost flush against that initial flanged face. Again your going to want to fit all of these parts around your fully mounted door. Its much easier to build the body around the lid or door versus modifying them to fit the body. Also a good rule to follow is to modify the repro-parts to fit the original parts; not the other way around.

The 90 degree flap on your new quarter panel leading edge will be mounting just like you have on the photo below.

All repro panels lack that extra flange you are seeing on my car. However it's a blessing because without it you have control of the elevation of the panel when you weld it to the striker. Hope I did not confuse you more... Keep going! Justin