"Lazer Straight" body work just a myth?

DATEC;n78033 said:
Are you going to be responsible for completing the assembly? (I assume you received it tore down).
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The picture as shown is how it arrived and probably pretty close to how it will leave. I'll hang all the panels and align everything. I make sure everything that is going to touch paint or even get close to it is fitted at some point before final paint though (bumpers, trim, weatherstrip, emblems, etc.). Take the door trim for instance. When I first got the car, the door gaps looked pretty good. But I put the window frame door trim on and it it didn't line up at all. The previous shop skipped that step apparently.

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[QUOTE='68 Coronet R/T;n78040]Once you remove the bondo sculpting you may find the actual crown not all that bad.
The sad part is the owner paid for that and now he will have to pay you to remove and fix it.[/QUOTE]

Seems to be a recurring theme, the last few projects have had issues caused by others that I had to redo. Again, I don't want to knock what was already done, I wasn't there and don't know the circumstances. Heaven knows I'm no metal shaper, but there is a lower level to what's acceptable in my book. Thick build of filler on the edge of a door is a no no.
 
We have been discussing pre-assembling everything on the 57 we are doing in the shop, I am strongly not looking forward to doing this as in many ways it seems like wasted time but I feel it's necessary to know it's going to fit on final assembly, it's just hard to explain to customers sometimes, especially when you can spend weeks test fitting things.
 
Arrowhead;n78042 said:
I don't want to knock what was already done, I wasn't there and don't know the circumstances. Heaven knows I'm no metal shaper, but there is a lower level to what's acceptable in my book. Thick build of filler on the edge of a door is a no no.
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Is it possible that the shop was trying the only way they knew to give the customer what he wanted, by raising the end of the panels with bondo, instead of shrinking the center?

Chad, we have all seen many cars that didn't have that pre-assembly check and the first thing that comes to mind is, (didn't he pre-fit everything before painting).
 
chevman;n78078 said:
Is it possible that the shop was trying the only way they knew to give the customer what he wanted, by raising the end of the panels with bondo, instead of shrinking the center?

Chad, we have all seen many cars that didn't have that pre-assembly check and the first thing that comes to mind is, (didn't he pre-fit everything before painting).
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I had a lengthy discussion with the owner last night. Just to recap - he never said anything about "laser straight" body panels, that is just me wanting to push the envelope of my abilities. But he does want a show car so that's what that means in my mind.

He told me he saw the car after the original quaters were removed and the next time he saw it it looked like it does now. So I don't think there was any direction from him on how to do it.

I showed him the areas of concern and he didn't even flinch. Disappointed yes, but totally agreed with my point of view and said do what ever it takes to make it right - even replace the quarters and doors if need be. So I'll be spending a few hours digging out filler to see what's really under there.


I have the privilege to pick and choose my projects as it's a hobby for me on top of my day job (boring desk jocky). I don't take on just any project and I consider the owner and project a complete package. So if either one of them don’t look like a good gamble I pass. So far I’ve been very lucky but eventually that will end I'm sure.
 
Chad.S;n78070 said:
We have been discussing pre-assembling everything on the 57 we are doing in the shop, I am strongly not looking forward to doing this as in many ways it seems like wasted time but I feel it's necessary to know it's going to fit on final assembly, it's just hard to explain to customers sometimes, especially when you can spend weeks test fitting things.
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I know there are cars with more, but holy cow there is a lot trim and chrome bits on these things!
 
As far as pre-fit, yes you guys are both right, it's something that has to be done and if not it shows, but with all of the chrome on this car that is going to be a weeks bill just for test fitting things. I hate going through these stages because it's a pretty big bill just for test purposes. I've done it both ways and have had it bite me before, not that I have had to repaint but making some thing fit that is already painted can sure take a lot more work.


And going with what Arrowhead is stating. Most of us with the bug for craftsmanship have a hard time here because if you know you can do something better, how do you not do that. It's hard to work on something for so long and to walk away from something with a feeling of disappointment, even if it's something as small as one body line being 1/32 off in one spot.. However when you start getting that picky you really have to have a client that is searching for that detail or you need to not get paid for the whole job.. Either option is bad, as most clients can't afford that level of quality. There are a handful of shops out there that do that level of quality on everything but it's taken them years to get that reputation, and they are all mainstream companies.

I have a feeling on this project you are taking the approach of not getting paid for every hour you are putting into the car. However, I am very anxious to see the outcome.. It's turning out exceptional so far.. Keep it up!!
 
I think subtle changes are best, the kind that makes people know that the car looks better, but they can't figure out what was done. But like you said its not always practical, and some just can't be justified in my mind.
A lot of good work was put into one of those subtle changes on this orange car, and you can hardly tell the difference in my opinion. The body on the red car is unmodified---or at least as far as I know.
 
If you can't see it, or you want to know the story, its in the link. The picture goes to his photobucket album on the build

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All it takes is time. This is a 55 210 car we done for one of our customers and delivered earlier this year. It is not show quality perfect, but a nice driver with all original panels except the driver side quarter that was damaged in 1970 by a utility pole. No need to skim coat them, just needs a few rounds of primer and some blocking. We used less than 2 quarts of filler on this whole car, and as you all know 3/4 of that ended up in the floor. 011 (3).JPG

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Well i have the quarter panels roughly fitted and they actually fit pretty good. But the crown on them is massive. They come into the door jamb at a pretty steep angle. I have a hunch that when they were pressed, the flange and reveal around the wheel opening is causing a large bow to the panel. But even trying to push that in there is a signifigant angle meeting the jamb. Not sure how I'll fix this. You can't really tell from the picture, but the door is very flat and lines up pretty straight with the front fender.

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That body design and most every car made in that era are like that. Each panel has it's own crown and it makes for A LOT of work if you're trying to get them all flowing together for perfect straightness down the side of the car. You can shrink the center and move the panel ends outward but plan on spending a ridiculous amount of time. Chevman can give you some pointers for sure. If you break the welds loose at the rear of the doorskin it makes it easier to make some adjustment.
 
Looks like you have the same body lines that we had to start out with on the 57 we are doing. maybe you have a better start than us but not much.
 
Chad.S said:
Looks like you have the same body lines that we had to start out with on the 57 we are doing. maybe you have a better start than us but not much.
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So how did you go about getting things to line up? Did you try to take some crown out of the quarter panel?

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We didn't get it all out but we did get quite a bit out of it. We got most of it out of the door but not as much out of the quarter panels. To make it as flat as I really wanted it to be it would have become more expensive than the customer would like to pay. It's already snowballed to a point way past any of us ever anticipated. Also if you go back to my tips thread you can see where we did a bunch of door edge work. this actually makes the crown worse as it pulls the door edge in.. Basically at that point we just dollied it back out. until the straight edge was fairly flat on the door. It came out much better than I was initially expecting. I was worried I was going to go far and create a low spot but I found a happy medium. To get it all out of the door would be a huge task. I would probably start with a shrinking disc to tighten up the panel some, however you can also cause yourself a lot of grief doing this if you are not a expert with the disc.. I think I could get it but it would take a LOT of time. I was worried it was going to be a issue but after getting the door in good shape it all just looked much better.


I did run a few passes over the quarter panel with the shriniking disc but not enough to make a huge difference.
 
The door skin is a new one that we make in Wray's class, so it's flat as a pancake front to back and the crown top to bottom is plenty to keep it nice and stiff. I've been working the quater panel and making pretty good progress but I'll wait to post any pictures until after it's more presentable :)
 
Am I to understand the goal is to make these panels as ruler straight from tip to tail with NO crown whatsoever, or to try and remove any crown there may be, or to make each panel flow in a fair curve from front to back?

Marty
 
Make each panel flow with the others from front to back-always a challenge, especially when some cars were spec'd from the factory to have as much as .120" fender misalignment for door clearance LOL
 
Marty Comstock;n80497 said:
Am I to understand the goal is to make these panels as ruler straight from tip to tail with NO crown whatsoever, or to try and remove any crown there may be, or to make each panel flow in a fair curve from front to back?

Marty
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Yes, I'm just striving for that smooth flow from panel to panel. A gradual crown is ok with me, it's just thses panels are very steep. In fact, they sit about 1" away from the inner wheel well gasket at the top if that makes sense.
 
Arrowhead said:
The door skin is a new one that we make in Wray's class, so it's flat as a pancake front to back and the crown top to bottom is plenty to keep it nice and stiff. I've been working the quater panel and making pretty good progress but I'll wait to post any pictures until after it's more presentable :)
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I'll be watching!!!! How far away are you from Wray's shop?
 
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