V10 Charger (Update 5/25/21)

[GT]

Time to get back on this project.  First a couple of catch up photos. First couple were prior to the Epoxy primer, then followed up with seem sealer/black SPI epoxy and rhino liner under the car, the interior and trunk areas.  This is where the car sat for 18+ months.   The quality of the pictures from my old phone are not the greatest.

[GT]

Here is where "we" are at today.  Body work stage.  It is amazing the amount of work goes into straightening out essentially new panels.   Started with the right rear quarter area first.  Plan to try knock out a section at a time.  Then will move onto the blocking/etc. portion.

[sardillim]

 

[GT]

A couple of pics of the on going bodywork.   Smoothed out the factory spot welds on the door jambs.   Should have the car panels reinstalled and the entire deal ready for poly and next stages of block sanding before end of Sept.

[GT]

In the meantime, had lots of smaller rust repairs / etc. on the fenders, doors, etc. to knock out.

The car had the drivers side fender replaced early in its life with a "NOS" unit.  Whatever body shop did it took some shortcuts and hacked the upper bracket that attaches the fender to the cowl.  I had to remove it and move it back and in 1/4".  Here are some before and afters (I had already replaced the missing back section that was cutoff by the bodyshop):

[GT]

The bottom rear edge of the drivers fender had some rust.  Cut it out, removed the rust and tabbed a replacement piece that had a challenging curve to it.  Not shown here, but the rust holes in the support brace were also repaired.  I think it turned out OK in the end.

[GT]

The passenger fender had its own challenges.  I think i have 4 passenger fenders, each one with its own issues.  The red one had some bad cancer in the rear section.  I had a replacement rust repair panel from YO which absolutely sucked.  So I elected to hack that section off of a spare green fender that i had been hanging on to (it was crunched in the front section badly).    The red fender came from a car with the chrome trim, so i had to fill all of those holes in the process.

I've dubbed this my Christmas fender 

If you look closely, you'll notice that i also modified the inner fender brace to clear the front tires on the car since it will be lower than stock.

It was then completely cleaned, and Epoxy coated.

[GT]

On to the drivers door - had a small spot of rust on the front.  This repair turned out really well.  What i really hate about these rust issues is all the hassle of removing the rust hidden behind the panels.

This door (and the passenger) came from yet another 70 charger. 

I've added a closeup of how many layers of paint this door had on it (.

[GT]

Last update for now.   Between the different door and aftermarket quarter panel, i had some nasty alignment issues.  The top edge of the quarter and door were off about 1/8" if i lined up the body lines.  Then the gap between the door and the quarter were all over - too tight, crooked, and too wide.   Had to slice the quarter in several areas to make minor adjustments.    I still have some finish work to do to it yet, as well as get behind it and clean/epoxy where i welded.

[sardillim]

same issue here too

[TexasStroker]

Nice work!

[keepat]

Looks great! nice to see you back at it!
Pat

[Stevearino]

Nice to see you are finally back at it.

[200MPH]

great Work good to see the project going !

[GT]

Update time.  I've been alternating between the body work on weekends, and the hundreds of small items to clean/restore/etc.

First up, the main shell of the car has the body work completed with two iterations of block sanding. The final coat of poly is applied and will be block sanded again after the doors/etc. are installed in order to perfect the body lines. At this point i am working the other panels (body work, etc. etc.).  Probably a month or so before i am ready to mount for block sanding.

[GT]

One of the weekday projects was to work on the door scoops.  They had about 10 layers of paint on them and it took a while to clean them up.

Initially i was not planning to re-use the originals as one has some plastic damage that i will still need to repair.  I bought some repo ones from a major vendor (not gonna mention names because they likely source them from the same place everyone else does) and, well, they suck.   

These did not even come close to fitting the stock locations.  There are multiple problems with them... First the bolt spacing on the repo scoops are off by 1/4"-1/2" so the holes don't line up.  Worse, the factory units have pedestals for the bolts to point straight into the door; but the repo ones are just glued onto the curved scoop so they point in at an angle.  Either you need to bend the scoop or bolts to install them or cut slotted holes in the door...  They went back into a box for return.   I suppose if you have nothing else and don't mind welding up existing holes in your doors and performing other hackery you could use them...  RUN AWAY.

[GT]

Sorry for all the pics - hopefully others benefit:

[GT]

Another side project - been rebuilding all of the components within the doors (guides, rollers, etc.).  There are lots of reference pics by other members here (thank you member Shakey - found great reference pics from Jan 2008 in your thread).  Of most use was source and part numbers for the rubber/felt liner(AS990033 from restoration specialties).

I think its easier to rebuild an engine vs. all of the door/window guts.  A couple of pics of the front door window channel that was in exceptionally poor shape:

[GT]

Last bit for now.  If you look in the interior section of the forum you will find a longer write-up i posted on rebuilding the rear quarter window roller guides.  I had to machine some replacement parts due to unavailability.  No one makes the smaller roller wheels that ride along the window guides:

[Ghoste]

Nice work.

[sardillim]

very nice !!

[GT]

Man time flies.  Another 7 months have passed with lots of challenges for us all.   Project was put-on hold for about 4 months due WFH, Covid & etc. 

My 80 Gal compressor also took a dump with the compressor seizing and taking out the electric motor.   All worked stopped and it took some time for a new one to arrive due to shipping challenges and such.

Picked up a nice IR 80 Gal unit with an auto drain and after cooler.  Its very nice.   Since the old compressor was well taken care off, with a perfect tank, i stripped it down and used just the tank as extra storage capacity.  Back in business again:

[GT]

The body work and block sanding takes forever.  Prior to the compressor fun, the doors, hood, and truck were all worked on.  Once block sanding on the engine compartment is done, i'll mount the doors and fenders, align, and knock out the side body line. 

The hot Texas weather isn't helping, but I can most definitely see the end in sight.  I am hopeful we will see paint when it cools down, maybe Oct.

In the meantime, here are a few pics of the comments pre-compressor meltdown. I'm doing crisp body lines on the car.   I like the last artistic photo where my daughter rubbed her fingers on the primer-surfacer dust:

[cdr]

What Part of the great state of Texas ?

[GT]

OK, now for the long and likely controversial part.  While the garage was out of commission, i turned my attention to the dash.  There were several modifications that were needed to hold all of the gages, switches and indicators.  Plus i wanted a double din head unit as well as new central A/C ducts and controls.  I must have drawn up 20+ designs trying to fit it all together while taking into consideration all of the electronic do-dads and computers that will be behind the dash.  It's gonna be very tight.

Here is where i centered up on the mock-up drawing.  The left gage (speedo) and switches on the right will be slightly tilted in to fit it all.

I cut 6061 aluminum sheets and used a boring tool to cut out the gage holes.  It took very precise measuring and careful drilling.