:-X06

Looks great

Thanks!



The passenger side pocket was a bit more work since the seam was crooked at the top. I rounded off an air chisel tip and used that to move the edge of the long panel over to where it should've been.

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After moving it over, still not perfect but much better than before.

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Patch made, determining the right spot to make the bend so the gap is even.

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Bent, fitted, and welded weld in.

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The front bed pockets were opened up to get back to flat metal, then were straightened, spot blasted to touch up missed areas of rust, primed, and welded shut.

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The second wheelwell came in so I started getting it ready to install. The shock notch was welded up first, then I had to narrow the mounting flange to clear the raised lip on the inner bedside.


I scribed a line on the patch, then trimmed with tin snips for a near-exact fit with no grinding needed. This saves grinding discs and makes less dust in the shop.

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Difference in flange width.

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I welded in the header panel using the original spot weld holes, but some of those were halfway off the edge of the panel so I used a copper spoon to keep the weld contained and the edge straight.

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The upper seams weren't pretty from the factory and they won't really be seen once the truck is assembled. I welded them up and ground down the welds so that all of it would look decent once seam sealer is applied.


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Been 15 days since you posted anything. On vacation? :) Those welds on the front of the box were ugly. I walked in the day the body shop started to prep my box just as he started grinding those welds down. I said what are you doing? His response was this was scabbed together and I am going to fix them. I said leave them as they are that is a factory weld. But they are ugly he said. But they are original I said. They are still there.

Still working at it, did some small detailing on the wheel opening flanges. I'm about as far as I can take the bed without having the bed floor ready to go in; I don't want to start correcting the overall shape of the bed sides until everything is welded in solid.

The bed floor will be making a trip to Maryland to McCartney Paint and Custom (MP&C on a ton of forums) to correct the irregular bed floor stampings. I'm going to Connecticut to buy one of my old Conquest TSi's back and will be stopping in on the way to work on the bed floor. I've already sent a sample section for him to make dies for his Lennox reciprocating machine to replicate the existing stampings in the blank areas.

The wheel opening flanges, before and after. Things like this only take a few minutes with a hammer and dolly and make the bodywork go much faster. The end result looks much better also.

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I stripped the doors yesterday, razor blade and DA sander on the outer skin and blasted the inner panel (no finished pics yet). Started by removing the glue residue with a wire brush since the blaster doesn't strip soft coatings as easily.

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gotta post some pics of it, I love those twins. they are the only imports I really like. awesome little cars

These are from back when I owned it. I sold it around four years ago and it's been garaged since then until recently. It had an accident with the driver side fender and headlight door that'll need to be repaired, but it still looks like this overall.

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wow, VERY nice. how many miles? that's probably the cleanest one I've ever seen.

It actually had around 176k on it when I sold it. It had been repainted before I bought it and the wheels had been refinished. But it had been kept up very well, the interior was all original and was also in great shape. The cars are solidly built, you'd never know it had that many miles; everything was tight and rattle/squeak free. The person I sold it to swapped in a rebuilt engine with 28k miles and bought all the parts needed to convert from the annoying tbi intake to a more modern and reliable multi-point style intake. I'm also getting an extra set of original wheels with it.

I''ve made a bit more progress, just haven't been posting. The hood, doors, and fenders are all stripped now. One fender is trashed too bad to fix, the other is in pretty good shape, both doors are pretty straight with the normal rust at the bottom edge, and the hood is really nice except the edge of the nose.

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I also started the bodywork on the upper part of the bedsides. I'll wait to do the lower section once the bed floor is welded back in, it's too flimsy as-is.


I always block the "flat" sections first, first the top and then the side, leaving the rolled area for last. The flats need to be established first before rounding the curved area. I stopped blocking as soon as I saw epoxy showing through, continuing to block will result in low spots.

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Once the flats are blocked straight I spray more guide coat on the flat areas then carefully block the curved section until it blends evenly into the flat areas. The guide coat shows how far you're blending the curve into the flats.

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All work up to this point is done with 80 grit on a 3/8" thick acrylic sanding block. The acrylic has a hard surface force the sandpaper to cut the high areas down quickly and 3/8" is stiff enough to not flex. 80 grit is aggressive enough to shape the surface without leaving excessively deep scratches. Once everything is shaped with 80 grit I clean the surface well and apply more guide coat, then block it again with 180 to prep for primer. This round of blocking will show if you blended the curves into the flats evenly.

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After spraying a couple coats of epoxy to seal the bodywork. You can see how straight the flats are, how crisp the edges are, and how evenly the curved areas blend into the flat areas. This will be further refined with polyester high build.

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Same process with polyester primer. Flats first, more guide coat, then curves blended into the flats.

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Same approach with the rear corner, except with thinner/flexible acrylic blocks.

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Astronaut: Sent you a PM re driver door. Did you receive it? Jeff

Just replied, haven’t been on here much lately, sorry for the delay!

Looks great. I wish I had someone around with your skill to offer guidance. I stripped my 65 F100 (99.5% solid metal) and now realize bodywork is whole different animal than mechanical and electrical. I think this is the one I will never finish. I am in New Hampshire if you know any one that can help.