68 Charger R/T Resurection

[Tom68]

I've really enjoyed all the build threads on this site and elsewhere on the net.  So I thought I probably should payback a little and post on my build.

First a little history.  I purchased the car a little more than 20 years ago.  It's a 68 Charger R/T with a clear title but it had been mostly stripped down to the uni-body.  

Tail panel – great shape
Lower rear valence – rusted badly (a replacement from a donor car came with the deal)
Trunk floor – rusted badly
Rear frame rails in great shape (which was curious considering how bad the trunk floor was)
Quarters & outer wheel houses – rusted
Inner wheel houses – Ok, but needed a few patches
Floor pans – good
Rocker panels – rusted
Roof – had a vinyl top, but half of it is badly pitted with a few rust holes
Firewall – very good shape, factory paint looked quite good.

That brings me to the front frame, inner fender panels, and radiator support.  They had been grafted on from another car.  I was told a story about the car being in a junk yard and it was being cut up when the previous owner found it and bought it.  He said he had a front end welded on by a "professional".  Sounded like a fishy story, but the front was decent and the welding job seemed thorough.

The only problem is it was from a 69.  

I also picked up a parts car, so I had about 80% of a car.  It's not and never will be a numbers matching ride, but will make a nice driver.  I don't have the fender tag or build sheet and with the car stripped, I'm not sure what options it had.

When I first got the car I had very little experience welding, but I bought a wire feed welder, trunk floor, outer wheel houses and rear quarters and went to work.

My intent is to replicate the 68 R/T I had in high school (many-many moons ago).  It was a 440, 4 spd, blue, black vinyl roof, stripe delete, power steering, manual brakes and 4.10 gears.  Here's a picture from 1974.


Anyway, I got it all welded in;  not a very good job, but solid.  I replaced the driver's side rocker and didn't get it on correctly; that's when I got discouraged and gave up.

The car then sat in my garage for about 17 years.  Last winter I decided, that at my age, I needed to either "crap or get off the pot"!


So I decided to dig back into it and do it right this time.  So I started at front.  

I started soda blasting it, but found it was more work than it was worth.  Plus I found the inner fender panels had some swiss cheese areas.  Add to that the radiator support was from a 69 and would need changes and I decided to replace all three with new panels.  Less work than blasting.

So, early in January I ordered new AMD sheet metal.

A few more pics after soda blasting:



Notice the white powder everywhere.  What a mess.


I've made a fair amount of progress on the front and I'll post more as I time permits.

[Tom68]

I started on the right side.  I figured if I replaced one panel at a time I can make sure everything is in the correct place.  I took a ton of measurements as well.

Right inner fender removed:


Needed to patch the sheet metal piece that's between the firewall and the panel:


Here's the panel welded and cleaned up:


On to the right fender panel.

[gorum]

 

[Lennard]

Great job, get that beauty back on the road again! 

[Tom68]

Thanks.  Its gonna be a while.  There's not an inch of her that doesn't need work.

[Lennard]

Thanks.  Its gonna be a while.  There's not an inch of her that doesn't need work.

Quality takes time. If you do it right the first time,  you'll never have to touch it again.

[Tom68]

Agreed!

[cdr]

lookin great !!!!   

[keepat]

Nice work! Keep the pictures coming
Pat

[VegasCharger]

Great story, thanks for sharing

Also welcome aboard DC.com

68s are the best, will be following this thread.

[nvrbdn]

Good job 

[Tom68]

Thanks for the welcome, but I've been around a few years.  Just haven't posted much. 

When I first stumbled on this site I was actually thinking of selling the car.  A co-worker kept bugging me to sell it to him and I had posted asking about its value.  Man am I glad that temporary insanity passed. 

I sold my first 68 in about 1979 and have regretted it ever since.imagine if I bib that twice!

[darbgnik]

Thanks for the welcome, but I've been around a few years.  Just haven't posted much. 

When I first stumbled on this site I was actually thinking of selling the car.  A co-worker kept bugging me to sell it to him and I had posted asking about its value.  Man am I glad that temporary insanity passed. 

I sold my first 68 in about 1979 and have regretted it ever since.imagine if I bib that twice!

Haha, almost exactly 10 years ago you considered selling it here.

[nvrbdn]

You are correct. I can see me selling a lot of things I own, but just can't see selling the charger. Will enjoy following this build.

[Tom68]

I'm not sure what they're called, but the brace that goes from the upper control arm housing to the underside of the inner fender was pretty rusty.  You can see it in one of my earlier pics.  I sanded and wire brushed it with a 4.5" angle grinder the best I could.  It cleaned up fairly well but there was a some pitting and discoloration. 

I sprayed it with a rattle can etching epoxy and top coated it with a "gray detail" paint from Eastwood.  Unfortunately, I don't have any pics of it cleaned up; only once its been painted.  The copper colored paint is SEM weld thru primer with copper.

[crj1968]

Bringing it back to life!!

You'll need a vanity plate:  LAZRUS   

[Tom68]

"On to the right fender panel."  Oops, I meant left.   

Here's the starting point:


Inner fender removed:


Prepped and ready to weld the new one in:


In process:


And its in:

[tan top]

  

[Tom68]

A couple of updates.  First I stripped the firewall:





The engine bay is ready for primer.  I just need some warm weather.

So, while I wait I decided to start the next major task, replacing the roof skin.

[Tom68]

The roof skin came off a lot easier than I expected. 

Here's the starting point.  You can see it had a vinyl roof.  A lot of the roof is still decent, but unfortunately a lot was not:






And its off!





Just need to order a new skin, but they're out of stock at AMD.  Well, still needs lots of clean up before I can install it anyway.

[darbgnik]

Wow, you and that spot weld cutter are close friends now! The roof didn't look that bad in that picture. But I'm sure there was a lot I couldn't see.

[Tom68]

Yep, getting pretty tired of drilling out spot welds.

The roof wasn't really bad.  I debated trying to patch it up, but there was a fair amount of rust that was painted over.  The surface on a good 50% of it was pretty well "textured" from the rust.

I was afraid that if I just patched and put filler over it, that eventually ripples would be noticed under the vinyl top.

[charger chris]

  nice work. Lookin good. What is the copper Color stuff and  dose it help when when wielding?

[hemi68charger]

 

[Tom68]

nice work. Lookin good. What is the copper Color stuff and  dose it help when when wielding?

Its a copper based weld-thru primer.  The idea is so that you don't have just bare metal between a lap joint.  There's lots of discussion about it all over the net.  This is my first time using it.  My experience is that it makes welding a little tougher, so now I spray the entire lap seam then sand it out of the plug weld areas.

It does seem to adhere pretty good after welding.  Seems like it gets baked on from the heat.

Next time I do it, I'll try to take some step by step close pictures.