Now Complete Restoration / Pulling my 1969 'Bee down for strip and paint

[birdsandbees]

Hood release latch. Believe the bolts should be black phosphate, but I only have two blue ones left. Will correct later, but I want to get this latch on the car. Date code 0319 = 31st day of 1969, 25 days before scheduled car build.

Latch installed under the grill support.

Latch and hood "lift" spring installed.

Had a "Wayne" moment today, when my mind registered that a $200 NOS Pentastar had been listed in the classifieds last night and got to thinking.. where did mine go. The $10 reproduction plastic looks so fake beside a real die cast one.

It's not perfect, and the body shop lost my retainer speed nut it seems, but a quick polish and it already looks 10x better than the repro.

Repainted the perimeter black, that was missing, and retouched the interior lines.

I couldn't find some stuff, so I cleaned up my work bench. Just a BIT of the research I've printed out that I still need to use and the box is full of "done".

Found what I was looking for, almost panic'd because the plating house had already lost my OE and thankfully I was able to obtain this latch rod for a few bucks from the same lad (Steve) in New York State I'd bought my radiator from vs $300US for the full set in the picture. It had been the ONLY set I'd been able to locate and he would not separate and sell just the rod. My new friend in NY bailed me out, basically for postage costs.

[CDN72SE]

Cool that you were able to use your original pentastar.

[birdsandbees]

It's actually a used one I picked up at, I believe, the Oro Automotive Flea market in 1988 to replace my then beat up OE. Has a couple scratches on it that I don't dare try to sand out, but MUCH better looking than the plastic repop!

[birdsandbees]

The Sounds of Spring... well actually I had to swap car bays to get the Bee on the hoist, but the sound of music to me!

https://youtu.be/qsik1PVO6xY

[birdsandbees]

Vehicle bay swap so I can put the Bee on the hoist to do front fender shields and front bumper installation. Looks like I have more work in line.. Bird shut off everytime I let go of the key, until about the 10th start. Sounds like I have a ignition switch going.

Bee fired right up with choke on and one tap of the pedal, just like it always has for 40 years.

But we don't want to go out in the snow...

Nice snowscape..

..and another.

Carb rebuild kit and some smaller jets to try are on order for my 750 Holley. Idles way to rich and the idle mixture screws are almost all the way in.

Back on the hoist, so I don' have to slide around on the floor like a Harbour Seal.

Did a bit of dusting..

[birdsandbees]

Why you never let your kids out of your sight. Paint shop jack standed the car to polish it and peeled some of my cosmoline off the LCA's. A bitch to try and duplicate my original dipping...

Headlight water shields and rubbers.

Metal shield in place. I had to drill the fender hole. It was either welded up somewhere in time, or the car never had shields on it to begin with. If it was welded, they did a good job hiding it.

So happy that I left the bumper off to do the shield install ! OE Pentastar looks so much better than the reproduction.

Rubber seals all in place with the stainless "snaps".

You might wonder what the "electrical marr connector" is for in the install kit.

The shield attach screw goes into the area between the grill support and the radiator support.

[birdsandbees]

Fender splash shields ready for rubber seals and installation.

Frame rail and splash shield seal kits and hardware.

Splash shield vertical seals. There is a left and right, so before you start snapping them on verify hole location.

Where I purchased the fender splash shield seals, with GREAT service. I got the headlight shield seals from Classics in California, but wish I'd bought them elsewhere that didn't use UPS as their only shipping option.

My OE's to compare and get seals in correct directions.

Vertical rubber seal in place with it's attached push "pins". Shorter edge goes onto the shield, longer to fill the gap to fender.

Top rubber seals use plastic push pins. Surprising for the time period and considering all the other spots have metal retainer pins. When I first saw them I thought another repro "good enough". But they're exactly as per my OE.

Fender splash shield ready to install to the car.

[green69rt]

I'll be watching to see if you can get those rear splash shields in place with all the gaskets attached.  I couldn't make it happen.  Struggled and struggled.  I had to take the top gasket off, mount the shields then attach the gaskets.  On the bottom gasket, I ended up making a little hook out of some spring wire to pull the rubber into the correct position.

[birdsandbees]

Fender rim taped off and scuffed the clear coat on the tab that attaches to the splash shield.

Painted Black with some semi-gloss. Factory wouldn't have been this neat...

Ready for splash shield and it's black phosphate body bolt.

20 years from now, when the next round of restorers come on board they'll think they have all OE parts with these licensed reproduction bumper brackets. All part numbers and Chrysler logos stamped in by AMD, identical to my OE brackets. Not a good thing AFAIConcerned.

Inner brackets in place first.

And then the outers. Also installed the joiner bolt loose in each as there's not as much "play" in the mating holes as in the bracket slots.

All four brackets loosely in place.

AMD reproduction bumper ready to go, I previously painted the back, to prevent rust through, with Tremclad aluminum.

[birdsandbees]

How to work alone. Two bolts taped in place so I could hold the bumper and get a nut on each bolt.

Safely in place with two bolts.

Flat washer, lock washer and nut. Item count is correct, but not OE correct for colour or quality. Don't crawl in there and look... [​IMG]

What worked for me... I snugged each of the inner brackets down to the frame rail... with them slid out full so I wasn't worried about the bumper hitting the nose of the car.

I centered the bumper to get even "overlap" on each side of the car. My buddy lined it up perfectly!

Pretty darn close. I then snugged up the bumper to bracket bolts on the inner brackets ONLY to keep the bumper on center.

I then played a bit with gap distances using my fingers as a gauge (there's a joke in there somewhere). Once fairly happy I snugged up the bumper to bracket bolts on the outer brackets. Only then did I snug up the rear bracket bolt that pulls both brackets to the frame. If I had of tightened the bracket to frame first, I could have bent the bumper as the bumper bolts pulled it back to the bracket.

Checking for even bumper distance out from headlight buckets. I'm not measuring, I'm seeing where the ruler hits vs the bumper detail. A bit of playing on the left and right bracket assemblies "in and out" and I called it GOOD and tightened everything down!

[birdsandbees]

Doesn't get much better than that, not on this car anyhow!

Reproduction signal lights that I painted the housings flat black previously.

Bit of dielectric grease on the connectors.

Had to tweak the mounting ears just a tad so the signal lights would sit correctly. Very slightly I must add, amazed at this AMD bumper so far.

Bumper on, signal lights in.

Clip nut on outer bumper bracket to attach the fender brace.

Fender brace in place.

Rock shield hardware and I found that there's four extra bolts there. Perfect, as I need two for my hood latch!

[birdsandbees]

Rock guard. Another AMD reproduction that we stripped and painted with Black epoxy semi-gloss in the paint shop booth.

Four clip nuts go on the rock guard, where it attaches to the bottom of the bumper.

One clip nut goes on each of the inner bumper brackets, for a total of six.

Rock guard in place.

Down to rear fender well splash shields and LCA strut shields to install.

The only thing I'm not happy about on the AMD bumper. They punched the licence plate screw holder holes the same size as bumper bolts. Too big for the nylon screw retainers, they just fall out. Guess I'll have to do some shopping to see if someone sells a larger size.

[birdsandbees]

Drivers side splash shield up into place.

Top bolt in first, then work your way down.

Glad I fitted the shields before the fender was on, as I still needed a helper to coax it up to get the lower bolt in.

Now we're where we need to be.

And a bit of cushy hammer work to get the fender "boss" over into place.

One down and 20 minutes gone.

Passenger side went similar but no way I was getting the lower bolt slot in place without pushing the fender out and no way I was doing that.

Marked the distance..

[birdsandbees]

..and marked the shield accordingly.

Unibits rock!

Passenger side in place.

I previously cleaned up my OE K frame / strut shields by soaking them in 100LL Aviation fuel. It took years of goo, undercoating and the likes off of them and then I used a heat gun to reform them straight.

Interesting thing on my car, the passenger side was riveted on and the drivers side was bolted on with factory self taps. They are usually one or the other, but not BOTH! Head markings are correct for factory install. I found that my E track bolts, from my enclosed trailer, were as close to correct as you could get without waiting for reproductions. Head marking, from a distance, even looks right.

Passenger side and drivers side installed.

Looks like Steve at ECS missed a spot, but I can fix that...

Quick hit with the MIG and we should be good.

[birdsandbees]

Had oldbee on FBBO ask me if my new signal lights worked before I buttoned everything up. Why wouldn't they, I had rears working previously with the harnesses all in place. All that is new is the installation of two reproduction signal light assemblies. Park lights worked, left signal fine, hit the right signal light and it blinked quickly and blew the fuse. So I disconnected the light from the harness and blew another fuse.. both lights disconnected and blew another fuse. Time to start looking around...

That can't be good, headlight adjuster spring screw right into the harness.

Right into the signal feed wire, missed the park light wire.

I get that fixed and now I have no signal lights at all, yet using the switch I can make the rear brake lights alternate from side to side. Can't be the switch... so time to trace for power. Power to the signal flasher unit and out the other side of same. I then found power at the red feed wire on the steering column.. on the column side, not the dash harness side and that only meant one thing.

One step forward.. TEN steps back. Pull the steering wheel to get at the switch assembly.

Popped apart and I can make the signal lights work by jumpering power to each contact.

The wire popped off my $10 repair plate.. . that'll teach me to save $250 on a mega dollar restoration. Can't believe it would decide to fail, right after it was working before I blew the fuses. I thought maybe a wire blew apart.. but no, the switch fell apart.

FAAWWWKKKKK !!!!

[kent]

Ah too bad Wayne. You'll get it. Lucky no other damage though. Great detail! Love it.

[birdsandbees]

OE hood latch that was cleaned, blasted and plated. It was built about 9 months before car build date. Assume same latch was used on '68's.

Release to latch rod and it's two retainer clips.

Latch installed and all hooked up. Always mystified at how Chryco painted the bolts loosely in place for the trunk latch, yet not the hood latch where they got plain black phosphate bolts.

Spent a bit of time and got the latch set just right..

Installed the trunk lock tumbler assembly. You can see the mess from where THREE body men in a high end shop, with a picture in hand, still installed my trunk seal in the wrong place AND upside down!

Trunk latch already in place with body colour bolts.

I learned years ago, if you've got a stickly latch/lock this is the answer. NOTHING else works like Gun Oil. If you own a Chevy Trailblazer, you should know that already!

[birdsandbees]

Cleaning off the black goo that the guys used to install my trunk seal upside down with! Not sure what it was, but thankfully it didn't stick worth a damn and the seal peeled right off and goo came off easy with laquer thinner. Pointing to the "hidden" VIN stamp.

Hidden (by the seal) VIN stamped on the trunk gutter.

Detroit Muscle is generous... 6' extra.

Scuffing the clear coat so the adhesive can bite.

Adhesive I used, but I think it's just contact cement in a tube. Same process, same yellow colour.

Apply to both surfaces...

Let dry for 10 minutes

.. stick together. You get one shot and it's STUCK. Couldn't figure out why other guys were using clothes pins in their resto threads, it's not going anywhere.

[birdsandbees]

I did a straight stretch and then a corner. Repeat. Be careful not to stretch the seal as you work.

Corner bonded in place.

Spreading an even layer of glue with finger. Same deal on the rubber seal.

Rounding turn 3.

Seal first cut clean for a nice tight fit.

I then carefully trimmed a little channel out of the bottom. This is incase water does get in behind the seal, along the rear of the trunk, it can drain out.

Last section tacking up, ready to put in place.

Seal totally installed.

[birdsandbees]

Fit is beautiful.

Shows the overlap and the drain channel out the bottom. The factory did not do this.

Rear trunk lip to tail panel bumpers. About 7/8" in diameter and 3/4" high.

Drivers side in place. My car hasn't had these bumpers in place for over 40 years.

How to get them in.. punch inside to stretch the lock tab into the hole.

I had to take about 1/8" off the passenger side rubber to get a nice even trunk fit.

I need to make one final trunk lid check and a minor in/out adjustment prior to floating the stripe decal into place.

[birdsandbees]

Washer pump that I'd cleaned up way back to install to a new reservioir. Installing in correct orientation, with "lock tab" into tank detent. I've seen many with the pump turned 180 degrees!

Sliding the inside washer in place

7/8 deep socket to put the strainer/nut on.

Tightened snub by hand.

Brown wire from the harness and the correct ribbed tubing to the windshield squirters.

Tank fastened in place. Filled it with fluid and it leaked out through the pump shaft seal. I quickly siphoned the contents back out. Back to square one, I need a new pump. Pressure check yours before you get this far!

I'd dropped the weatherstripping adhesive cap yesterday and of course it went right down the fender extension! Figured I'd vacuum it out and see what else I could find.

Only way to see in while moving the suction hose along.

[birdsandbees]

Got my cap and a few extra trinkets that the paint shop dropped, I guess while test fitting my quarter panel rear escutcheons / caps / end pieces.. what ever you want to call the finish pieces.

Spare tire bolt installed with it's original OE hardware.

Figured it was time to wipe 2 years of dust out of the car before doing the body plugs.

Ready to sort out plug placement.

I see these missing on so many cars. Don't forget your fender extension plugs under the car. Great place for mice to crawl in.

Plug in place

Never thought figuring out plastic vs rubber plugs, even using Justin's pictures and Top Tans lay out diagrams would take so long. Had to do some juggling on rubber to plastic plugs due to part count in the kit. My OE's were beyond reusing, except for 2 of the smaller rubber ones (thankfully) as the kit was 2 short

Trunk plugs all in. The small rubber ones will test your strength!

[birdsandbees]

I now know why AMD stamps bigger licence plate holes in their bumpers... it matches current day repair kits. Wish they weren't beige colour, but they'll have to do.

They snapped in nice and tight, unlike the "proper" sized reproductions of the original equipment. You can also see the rubber bumper that holds the plate off the steel bumper.

Always hated the trunk arms hitting steel on steel. Fixed that today by gluing in a rubber spacer or each arm while I still had the weatherstrip adhesive out

Taking rebuilding every piece of this car way too far....

If you've been looking for the date code on a windshield washer pump, it's on the end of the motor.... between it and the pump housing. 285th day of 1968

I've changed a few impellor seals in my life, but none this small ! Looks like a water tap washer.

When you can't get the correct Black zinc phosphate bolts you make the shiny ones you have look like so. Quick dusting of flat black so they are different than the semi gloss black grill. That way it doesn't look like I painted everything in place.

[CDN72SE]

Interesting tip for the "steel on steel", back when I treated my car as just a car I had a lot of that banging going on. I would always cringe just a little bit.

[birdsandbees]

Funny what we didn't care about before being $150K + in..