hemigeno's Daytona restoration - a few more tweaks... again!

[hemigeno]

More spoiler pictures/closeups.  David Patik was also interested in the shape of the holes and the bend at the center of the piece itself.  I don't know exactly how this one compares to a reproduction, but since he asked about those specific areas I snapped the pics.

[hemigeno]

Here's one last picture of the car from last February, from the rear. 

The next three pictures are from the way-back files.  Vance recently sent me some pics of the nosecone and front end of the car from right after I dropped it off.  They did take pictures to document what the car originally looked like, as part of the restoration process should be to restore the original unique characteristics of THAT CAR.  They weren't all built exactly alike, and one of the things I enjoy looking at is unusual (but verifiable) quirks certain cars have.  The pics here are of the nosecone before it was totally disassembled.  You can see the harnesses, tabs and wiring termination locations for starters.  Lots of good detail stuff here IMHO

[hotrod98]

Everything's looking great. I love it when people do things right.

FYI, tell the body shop that if they buy the amer-poxy by American Finish, it's the exact same product as DP40. Exact same product, exact same batch numbers, half of the price. It's made and packaged by PPG and even comes to us in PPG boxes. I've been helping a frend at his automotive paint store and we're discovering all types of products that are sold under various labels. The local PPG store is upset that we're stealing their customers with their own products and they can't do anything about it. We received a case of American Finish products a couple of weeks ago and one of the containers had the PPG label on it and it had the same batch code. The American Finish paint is a low quality product much like PPG Omni, but a lot of the other products are the high end PPG product.

[hemigeno]

These last four pictures are pretty neat, in that they show that my car was not given a blackout treatment that most other cars had applied.  Once the nosecone was mounted, Creative's guys were supposed to shove a paint gun in between the nosecone and radiator yoke - to the outside of the Z-bracket.  They were supposed to spray flat black paint around in this area to black out the metal and rubber splash shields/gasketing.  You can clearly see in these pictures that this treatment was never done on this particular car.  David Patik has said he's seen a few cars over the years (like mine) that did not have the blackout paint, but they are in the minority.

You can, however, still see the blackout paint that Hamtramck applied to the radiator yoke.

The last picture shows the original fender-to-nosecone seals.  We're planning to re-use these pieces, as they are honestly in pretty good shape.  The reproductions are reportedly pretty good, but are discernable from original parts.  Finding a set of NOS seals would probably have been difficult in late 1969, much less now - although I did hear Harry Lee Hyde, Jr. say that they threw a pickup truck load of factory nosecone seals in the dumpster when they stopped using them.  Almost enough to make you cry...

That's all the pics I have to post at the moment.  More soon, and hopefully some bright red pics REALLY soon!

[hemigeno]

Everything's looking great. I love it when people do things right.

FYI, tell the body shop that if they buy the amer-poxy by American Finish, it's the exact same product as DP40. Exact same product, exact same batch numbers, half of the price. It's made and packaged by PPG and even comes to us in PPG boxes. I've been helping a frend at his automotive paint store and we're discovering all types of products that are sold under various labels. The local PPG store is upset that we're stealing their customers with their own products and they can't do anything about it. We received a case of American Finish products a couple of weeks ago and one of the containers had the PPG label on it and it had the same batch code. The American Finish paint is a low quality product much like PPG Omni, but a lot of the other products are the high end PPG product.

Thanks, Larry - I think I'll print that off and take it with me.  Go figure...

[PocketThunder]

Ya know something..... if I didnt have the internet to see how some guys take a restoration to the next level, I would restore my car to the best that i thought it could be and the take it to a local show and maybe (probably) find out that i could have done this and that differently, more correctly.  It sure is a benefit to me to have this website and all your guys' knowlege to assist me in my resto of my car. 

Just felt like saying that i appreciate the pictures Gene, and i appreciate, (electronically), Vance's work!

Paul
in St. Paul (getting real close to starting my C500)  <<<  ala Bryan style

[hemigeno]

Thanks, Paul!

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing sometimes iddnit?  When I first got this car, my plan was not to do a concours-level restoration.  The more I learned about how things were done originally, the more it made me want to put it back that way.  That's just me though - not everyone's car needs to be taken to that extreme.  I'm actually a little apprehensive that the average onlooker will see the details that have been carefully replicated as just a shoddy restoration job.

[BigBlockSam]

It sure is a benefit to me to have this website and all your guys' knowlege to assist me in my resto of my car. 

no doubt. i've saved almost every pic from this thread . thanks Gene

[FJMG]

Great progress Gene, regarding that chin spoiler, it looks as though there is a layer of red on top of the black over green primer. I wonder if Creative received some chin spoilers in black over green primer and then painted them body color during assembly?

    Love the disassembly pics! What are those protrusions on the inside of the cone on each side? Almost look like studs of some sort.

[hemigeno]

Thanks, guys!  I'm especially glad that the pictures are of use to some folks, as there's no better reason to post something than that reason right there.



Robert, I think the studs you're asking about were vestiges of some mystery brackets that we found attached between the nosecone and the front fenders.  I never did figure out if this was someone's attempt to get the nose to line up better with the profile of the fenders, or if it was some sort of an aid during the nosecone fitment stage, or just what-da-heck those brackets/plates were.  There are a few pictures of the mystery metal on this thread:

http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php/topic,21150.0/all.html

[tan top]

more awesome pictures  ...making good progress now !  can't wait to see it in color

[Daytona R/T SE]

The car is looking great Geno! I do have one complaint, though..... My fingers are getting tired from right click, save as-right click, save as-right click, save as-right click, save as....

[gtx6970]

So ,,, Is the front clip actually going to match the rest of the car once it's painted   

[hemigeno]

So ,,, Is the front clip actually going to match the rest of the car once it's painted   

Hmm... I suppose that'd be a good thing, eh?    


Chris, I'll send you a PM here in a sec.  Can't have you ending up with Carpal Tunnel right when all kinds of good things are happening on your car, now can we? 


tantop, you and I both will be pretty happy when there's a whole lot of R4 to look at. 

[69_500]

Gene, whats the proportion of the car that will actually receive 2 coats of paint? Just curious if you've asked Vance that. Knowing that the entire car was painted R4 with 69 Front clip attached, then later on the new hood, front fenders, window plug, and nose cone were all painted R4 to match. How far up on the rest of the body did they go to blend the two paint jobs together?

[hemigeno]

Danny, the amount of the car that received two coats of paint totally depended on the mood of the Creative Industries paint guy and/or how much of the car got screwed up by the conversion process.  Sometimes the whole quarterpanels and roof got painted, sometimes it blended quite well and they didn't have to paint nearly as much.  Probably depended on what color the car was as well      Just about any part of the car could have been repainted if it got dinged up, but normally they wouldn't have painted the top of the cowl, the doors or the rocker panels.  Maybe the rear valance.  Almost every other part of the car was subject to being at least touched up if not totally repainted.

I got back last night at around 10pm from yet another trek up north to see the car.  It's almost ready for the paint booth, and I did actually see R4 paint on some sheet metal!  I'll try to get the pics resized and posted next week if I can, but it'll be a busy week at work for me too.  Both Dave H. and I were pretty excited to see the car that close to rolling into paint booth.

Some of the details they're working on that Vance pointed out are just pretty cool to see, and I learned a lot - as usual.

[Just 6T9 CHGR]

Pretty exiting detective work Gene   Amazing to see the little nuances each car has built into it...no 2 are the same.

Are you going to spray the area black that the "majority" of the cars received in the nose cone area or are you going back with the minority?  I would assume the minority no?

Chris

[hemigeno]

Pretty exiting detective work Gene   Amazing to see the little nuances each car has built into it...no 2 are the same.

Are you going to spray the area black that the "majority" of the cars received in the nose cone area or are you going back with the minority?  I would assume the minority no?

Chris

Thanks, Chris.  And you betcha we're gonna stick with the minority and leave the blackout paint off from the nosecone area.  I love being the oddball.... 

One old(er) business item here - FJMG mentioned seeing a layer of red over black over green primer on the chin spoiler.  From what we could see, there was really no red paint on the spoiler that wasn't overspray from some bodywork done to the nosecone.  Since the car has had some bodywork done to it, some might say that the spoiler's existing paint can't be trusted.  However, all of the post-Creative bodywork was done very crudely (see the pictures of pop-riveted sheet metal on the quarterpanel patch repair for Exhibit "A") so I see absolutely no reason why they would have carefully sanded down and prepped the nosecone spoiler when the sanded down and properly prepared absolutely nothing else that they touched.  I still need to call Owner #2 and ask him what he remembers.

[hemi68charger]

Geno...
Man,, I haven't said anything in a while.. But man,, your Daytona's coming together GREAT !!!!!!

Cheers,
Troy

[hemigeno]

Geno...
Man,, I haven't said anything in a while.. But man,, your Daytona's coming together GREAT !!!!!!

Cheers,
Troy

Thanks, Troy.  You gotta bring us up to speed on your '68 resto sometime, which will (hopefully) parlay itself into a Daytona for the Hawkes family yet again... 

[hemi68charger]

Geno...
Man,, I haven't said anything in a while.. But man,, your Daytona's coming together GREAT !!!!!!

Cheers,
Troy

Thanks, Troy.  You gotta bring us up to speed on your '68 resto sometime, which will (hopefully) parlay itself into a Daytona for the Hawkes family yet again... 

The '68 hit a dull moment again................ I hoping it'll get sparked off again this week.. I've called and inquired on it's progress........................  As you say, I'm hoping so....................

[XS29J8]

This is an awesome thread Geno!   What is the projected finish on your Daytona?

Steve

[Charger-Bodie]

  Anything new coming soon? 

[hemigeno]

Anything new coming soon?

Strange you should ask that question.  As I type this, the truck is all packed and I'm literally getting ready to head up north tonight.  I'll check on the car Saturday morning.

The reason I haven't posted the pictures from the last update is primarily due to a hard drive crash I had at the end of April.  THANKFULLY, Chris/(Daytona R/T SE) had asked me for some picture files which had prompted me to burn a CD with all of the restoration picture files.  Otherwise, I would have lost about 75% of the resto pictures.

I just haven't had the heart to load the pictures back on the hard drive, but this trip over the weekend should light the fires again.  There has been some progress made, although the car still isn't in the paint booth just yet (there are reasons why, which I'll explain with the next batch of pics).

More soon...

This is an awesome thread Geno! What is the projected finish on your Daytona?

Steve

Thanks, Steve!   The projected finish is somewhat of a moving target.  Initially, I had been told 8-9 months.  I knew that was way short of what it would take even before they started, which was back in November of '06.  My guess?  It'll be late summer at the absolute soonest, and probably sometime in the fall/winter.  I really don't mind, as my "deadline" all along has been to have the car done by the DSAC Talladega reunion in '09.  I certainly hope we can get 'er done before then!

[charger01]

Those are awesome pics.  They have helped me out tremendously on my own car.  One question though.  On the inside of the trunk pan.  The gap that you took pics of at the rear end of both trunk extensions.  How do those get filled in, or do they?