39 Ford Project

[busterwivell]

I think it came out fantastic! Nice work, Brian!

[Belair-o]

Agree! Nice work!

[Custer55]

I think it came out fantastic! Nice work, Brian!

Thanks, I am happy with it being a 1st attempt at welding stainless steel.
Just my nature to want things to be perfect though. Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Brian

[Custer55]

Agree! Nice work!

Thanks, Room for improvement but it turned out 100% good enough for me.

[Custer55]

I haven't been doing to much work lately but I did manage to get the last fender cleaned up and in primer.


All cleaned up and ready for primer. I did find a couple of deep rust pits on the inside after cleaning it up with wire wheels so I did weld up the deeper ones.


View from the outside ready for primer.





After a couple of coats of high build direct to rust primer on the inside and outside. After letting this cure for a couple of days I block sanded with 80 grit and then 180 grit before spraying a couple of coats of epoxy primer on each side.


The inside then got a coat of rubberized undercoating.


View of the outside in epoxy primer. My plan was to get the dash and windshield frame in epoxy primer primer next but I am completely out of room to store parts. So the plan changed had to be revised a bit.


Just to free up some space I started bolting as many parts back on as I could.


Nice to see it looking like a complete car again as well. Also probably a good thing to do this now to make sure everything lines up fairly close before I have any more than just primer on everything. It did take quite a bit adjusting to get the hood lined up since I had the hinges off when i did the firewall so I am sure things may have moved a bit. I have a a few adjustments to make yet but it's probably as good as it ever was from the factory at this point.
Brian

[TrifiveRichard]

That looks awesome Brian. Great job.

[BamaNomad]

I totally agree... super job on reworking old metal...

[bigblock]

Man what a difference from when you started.

[Custer55]

That looks awesome Brian. Great job.

Thanks Richard!

I totally agree... super job on reworking old metal...

Thanks Gary, as I have said before this has been a good car to learn on!

Man what a difference from when you started.

Thanks, I agree it looks way better than what I started with for sure!

Brian

[WagonCrazy]

Thats got to be a big inspiration to finish it, after seeing it all put together again. It looks great. You have a nice cruizer coming together here. Cheers!

[Custer55]

Thats got to be a big inspiration to finish it, after seeing it all put together again. It looks great. You have a nice cruizer coming together here. Cheers!

For sure, really nice to have it looking like a complete car at this point. Still lots to do yet though.
Brian

[Belair-o]

Brian,
Beautimous! What a great job you have done!
Gotta love all those complex curves.
Regards, Doug

[chevynut]

That looks awesome all put together. You've sure done a lot of metalwork on that car. I notice there's no drivetrain in it yet....what's the plan?

[Custer55]

Brian,
Beautimous! What a great job you have done!
Gotta love all those complex curves.
Regards, Doug

Thanks Doug

That looks awesome all put together. You've sure done a lot of metalwork on that car. I notice there's no drivetrain in it yet....what's the plan?

Thanks Lazlo, I just have a few things left to get in primer. After that the plan is to start working on making it a running driving car. I want to get a set of upper and lower A-arms that eliminate the strut rods for one thing. I have a used engine that I am pretty sure will run for now but need a transmission and drive shaft. The rear end is a 57 Ford 9" I bought many years ago at a swap meet. It needs brakes and new seals but hopefully not much more than that. Still lots to do but at least most of the metal work is done at this point.

[Custer55]

My latest project was making a front fender brace that was missing and replaced with a piece that was functional but no where close to what the original brace was.
I know they should be the same because they do sell reproductions that are for the left or right side, no difference from side to side.


The top of the picture is what the brace should look like, the bottom one is the mangled rusty piece that replaced the original at some point. As I mentioned above you can buy reproductions of these for about $30. plus tax and shipping it ends up being about $45., so I will give it a try to make one.


The first step was to bend up some 16 gauge to the U shape of the brace and tack weld them together. The original was about .005 to 007 thicker than the 16 gauge I had left over from the running board repairs so close enough. Making this in 3 pieces due to the limitations of my bending brake on 16 gauge. Good excuse to get some more practice with the Tig welder though.


Here I have the 3 pieces fully welded together. Starting to get a little better at tig welding but still need lots more practice!! The nice part is no weld spatter like the mig and a lot less weld to grind off.


Here the welds are finished out (not perfect but good enough since this part will not be where they will be easy to see at all) and ready to start forming to shape.


Pretty much done at this point and pretty close to the original part. I just started at one end trimming and bending the end to match where it bolts the the lower part of the fender at the back of the wheel opening. (left side of picture) Then used my kick shrinker to form the curve to match to original. The only tricky part was shrinking each flange as equally as possible so the brace didn't end up with a twist in it. Sharpie marks an inch apart on each flange in the curved area helped with that.


And finally here is the new one next to the original. The flange is a bit wider than the original but that will not cause any clearance issues and will make up for it being a bit thinner metal.
Brian