Mitch's 69 Charger restoration -sheet metal

[green69rt]

With the heat in Houston this summer, it's been a little slow going.  I have started the engine bay work.  I've been taking things easy as I wait for AMD to start producing the front frame rails, so I knocked out a couple of easy things.  The inner fenders needed replacing and the firewall needed a good cleanup.  It seemed the easy thing to do was to clean the firewall up while the inner fenders were gone.  I've only screwed the inner fenders in till I see how I'm going to put the new frame rails in.  I know there are several different paints in the pics but it'll all get primed later.

Pic 1:  The old engine bay
Pic 2:  Driver inner fender gone
Pic 3:  Firewall cleaned up
Pic 4:  Both new inner fenders screwed in place and firewall cleaned up.

[tan top]

   ..............

[ACUDANUT]

Please don't paint it green, after all that hard work.

[BigBlockSam]

 

[lexxman]

it's looking good ........

[green69rt]

Please don't paint it green, after all that hard work.

I know there is some concern about another green car....but this will be green.  I plan on the F5 semi metalic geern.  That was my former car and as someone said, this is a time machine for me.  

Buy the way I did finally get the front frame rails from AMD and I will post pic later.   Right now the wife has me doing a full rebuild of our guest bath room and it is eating my lunch!!!

[buckeyecharger]

Couldn't agree more with you Mitch! Paint it F5. Mine still has it's original F5 paint and when it gets repainted, it'll be F5 again just like when it came out of the factory! Keep the pics coming.

[red69superbee]

very good pics Mitch, i have a charger just like it and f3 color too, so its neat to me to see it that way.Cant weait till its done !

[green69rt]

Been a while since I posted anything.  I've been spending all my time rebuilding our upstairs bathroom.  Getting close to done.  No progress on the my car but I thought I would just add a couple of pics so folks can see what I'm up too.

First pic is my garage which is the staging space for the construction,  I can't belive what a mess I have.  It'll take me a couple of weeks just to clean up so I can get back to work on my car!!

Second pic is my workbench, you really can't see the work surface because of all the crap piled on it.

Third pic might be of more interest.  AMD finally shipped my front frame rails to me.  Notice that the shock tower is not attached when they shiped it.  I don't know why, the box was easily big enough to ship everything as one piece.

This is one of the first times I have been dissapointed with an AMD product.  Notice that the e coating is gone, I had to strip it off because it appeared to me that the rail had been laid in the mud or had been splashed with mud and then e coated over the top of the mud!  When I stripped everything the e coating came off as the black I expected and then a layer of brown stuff underneath came off, and the layer of brown was not rust, it was brown dirt!


Antway I think that as soon as the garage is cleaned up I'll get back to work.  More later.

[freddyd02]

You're doing an amazing job! Cant wait to see the end result 

[green69rt]

Wow, been a long time since I had any progress to report but I'm finally getting some time to work on the charger again.  The front passenger frame rail took some work and some thought.   Here's what I did.  First I made sure that the body of the charger was level and square.  I started by making sure the rockers were level on both sides.  Then I leveled across the body in several places (example in pic one.pic #1 and #2).  I also checked the measurements out of the FSM.  They all checked within 1/8 inch.

Now I checked level across the front frame rails (it was good), cut the passenger rail out and clamped the new one in and rechecked everything again (pic #3.)

Just for grins I also checked that the bottom radiator support was level (notice that the pass side panel is missing, it's being replaced with a 26" piece.)

[green69rt]

Now onto the thing that has been worrying me, installing the shock tower.   AMD ships the tower separate from the rail so it's up to the installer to get it right.   First thing is that I attached the k member to the rails (after I spent a couple of days trying to get the layers of grease and dirt off), pic 1.

I also screwed the inner fender back in just to keep things lined up (pic 2.)

Then I got the old control arms and spindles out and installed them and braced the spindles so the that the hight adjustment was in spec.  The I set the cam bolts to the middle of their slots and tested the level of the spindle faces to try to get as close to neutral as possible so the car would take an alignment for camber and castor when the time came.  (pic 3)   With everything set it was tacked in place, ALL the measurements were repeated and final welding begins.

While I had the rail out I took time to get in and clean up the pass side inner fire wall, kick panel and underside of the cowl and paint them (pic 4).

[green69rt]

I think the old lady is now sturdy enough to stand going up on a rotiserie or supporting an engine.  The driver side front frame rail is installed (pic #1) and to record it for the history books the old frame is gone (pic #2).  Still big hunks of rust inside when I dropped it on the floor.  Again, getting the shock tower tacked in was a labor of measuring, testing and a little prayer (I'm not above asking for help.)  Pic #3.  Just to show one of the tests -- I set the control arms up with the cam bolts set to the middle of their adjustment (after setting the suspension height) and then set the face of the spindles so they were straight up and down with a level.  (pic #4.)

[green69rt]

And so the front frame and inner fenders are done!!  (pic #1 and 2.)   In between working on the frame I spent time cleaning the inside of the firewall and repaired a couple of the floor braces that had seen better days.  Inside the firewall is all primed up (pic #3) and bracing is ready ((Pic #4.)  Now on to the floor, but AMD is out of stock of the piece under the rear seats so I'm waiting again.  Shipping them seperate is pretty expensive.  So I will spend some time cleaning up the passenger compartment ceiling and what ever else I can find to keep me busy (maybe I will break down the doors.)

[TUFCAT]

WOW!  Your attenton to detail on this build is amazing. Skills like this are usually reserved to pro shops. CONGRATS on doing it yourself!  

[Ryan]

You are going a great job. Keep it up.

[sardillim]

amazing the amount of parts that are available for the b body,  i'm starting to think you cold build an entire car from air!

[Ghoste]

It's a refreshing change from not too many years ago isn't it?

[green69rt]

Yes the amount of parts available keeps me guessing.  I just discovered that AMD has been making the braces that attach to the front frame for a few months.  Kind of would saved me some time but cost some money so a little of a quandery.

[green69rt]

Some good and some not so much.  I used the filler in the first pic on a recommendation.  I have to say that I would not use it again.  Not easy to sand and the fact that it has fiberglass in it ment that I wore a lot of protection while sanding.

Second pic is something that I think is a great tool.  Got it from Autobody toolmart.  A disc that mounts on an angle grinder using my existing sanding pad.  It applies a little heat to high spots of metal and as the metal cools it shrinks down closer to the surrounding metal.  Excellent!!.

Just a couple of more shots of the quarter.  The filler is all less than 1/16 thick but the filler I used was not the best.   Still works but I think you could come up with something better.  On the other side I think I will use something called "light weight filler".  We'll see how that works out.   The last pic shows just how loooooong the quarter is!!!

[Ryan]

looking good.

Now hurry up and paint it so I can see some pictures of the fresh F5 and then maybe I can make up my mind about painting mine f5 or not.

[hemi68charger]

With the heat in Houston this summer, ...

Houston !!!  This is in Houston? I need to come by and see this puppy !!!  I'll drive the Daytona over... 

[model maker]

keep up the good work.

[green69rt]

I kind of got side tracked while waiting for the floor parts.  I decided to finish cleaning up the k-member.   Firm feel use to do refurbs on the unit and then quit for a while(just sold the kit to DIY.)   So I bought the kit, really just a bunch of cut up metal pieces that you had to weld on yourself.  Just found out the Firmfeel is now doing k-members again.  
First pic shows the reinforcement around the stabalizer sockets and also where I rewelded some of the other joints around the stearing box mount.  I also welded the complete edge of the member and ground the welds down so they look nice.

Second pic shows the washer that gets welder around the LCA socket.

The kit comes with a skid plate, I paid for it so I added it on (pic #3.)
Pic #4 shows some of the reiforcement that gets added around the stearing box mount. A little blurry, sorry.

I don't know how much of this is really needed, can't hurt but is it worth the cost(?), who knows.
Anyway, the whole thing gets hot tanked and then sent off for powder coating along with all the other front bumper mounting hardware.

[green69rt]

K frame is all done and powder coated along with some other stuff on the front end (pic 1.)  I used a powder call mini-tex.  I like it because it looks a lot like under coating and is not shiny   I think it looks right on the under side of the car.  Pic 2 is of the front of the car after preping, lots of sanding and then wiped down with reducer to get it extra clean, maybe over kill but I didn't want to sand the thing again to get rid of mistakes.   Finally oa couple of shots of the primered front.  Now on to the roof.  Still waiting on  the rear floor section from AMD so I can do the floor.