Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 1969 Roadrunner revival

self taught, as with everything else.

I'm sorry, but I really don't see the problem there.

Glad to see you back in the groove, Dave. Another good Mopar needs to be on the road.

That's quite a compliment and I appreciate that.

But I am envious of the guy that can just buy one finished or pay someone to do what I'm doing lol!



I didn't put any words with the mobile phone uploads I posted yesterday.

So I'll try to explain a little this morning.

You can see the large floor piece removed from the driver's side. There's a crossmember and a forward frame rail under the floor pan in that area along with a couple of splash shields just behind the firewall to toe board seam. The floor pan was joined to all of this under structure at the Lynch Road Chrysler plant in MI in 1969.

They used spot welds at the factory, and when you take this stuff apart you need to split those spot welds and peel this stuff apart. Most welds I drill, some I just split with a chisel on an air hammer. Then I drill the overlying panel and plug weld where the factory spot welds used to be.

I decided to do a puzzle fit butt weld on these patches so that when it is finished there will be no visible seams from under the car. the longest seam to weld goes from the rocker to the trans tunnel. I was able to place that seam directly on top of the crossmember weld flange so the seam is completely hidden from the underside of the car.

The pan turned out really well, I painted the insides of the frame structure before putting the new pan on.

The passenger side needed a small patch, this is the rectangular 4"x6" patch I showed in the pictures. Again I went for a puzzle piece fit with butt welds. The patch was also right over the forward frame rail so I needed to drill and plug weld where it was originally spot welded from the factory.

After the welding was done Pam helped me scrape a bunch of old undercoating off the top side of the floor pans and I brushed on a rust encapsulating paint from eastwood. I like this stuff because I can brush it into all the factory seams and let it creep into the seam before putting new seam sealer back in.

I�m really glad to be done with the floor, now I need to cut a bad area out of the driver�s side rocker and repair with new metal, and I need to weld the sub frame connectors into place. They will help to stiffen up the car and reduce twist/flex which causes cracks in these bodies over time.

That twisting increases over time as some of the body panels rust out. With this late 60�s B-body having all those areas restored to original condition it is going to be a nice stout body/chassis once again.

God I am sore and tired, that was a lot of damn work for the little that got done.

(it always is)

And we appreciate all you're sharing with us. The majority of us don't have the space, time, or (most importantly) the talent and know-how to do the work you do. It's a thing of beauty to see abutterfly emerge from it's cocoon. Cary on, sir.

Dave's 'revival' threads are rough on my self-esteem. I'm mystified by a flippin' rock chip.

I'm gonna eat a cookie.

Floor pans are always a PITA
My BIL just did an entire 3 series BMW ( one of the X 4X4's )
My Sonett was your typical '70's sheet metal from Ohio and Michigan!
Patches on top of patches.
One of the reasons I sold the tub and framed it.

Got any more of those cookies?

Lookin' good Dave, keep up the fight

Gunner

Trying to fall back into the groove.

Making a hard run at a June 9 deadline.

10-4, iffin you find yourself in need of some inspiration or parts, PM me

Gunner

I need a RH fender lol!

Is there more body work than you expected?

All I have are fiberglass fenders

Gunner

Lookin good buddy!

There always is.

Well, that's not fair actually. Sometimes you can be pleasently surprised. This was not the case with the roadrunner though.

I did think the floors were good from inspecting the underside before purchase of the car. That and the drivers rocker, and passenger fender were surprises.

Everything else I expected, I could see the trunk floor was junk, trunk to quarter extensions, outer wheel houses, quarters...

I took a chance on the roof, especially around the front and rear glass (trays) and the roof overall since it was a vinyl top car. I won on those gambles and lost out a little on the floor, rocker and the passenger fender.

Not a big deal really.

I won out bigtime with the discovery that the car still had it's original engine and transmission verrified by VIN stamped on them.

Overall it's a good car that needed what most need, a little more than some and a little less than others.

I don't like picking up repaints as projects because they can hold secrets under that paint. But this one was unique in that it had a repaint with some crazy artwork that was dated 1976.

How many secrets could be hiding on a car that was repainted when it was only 6 or 7 years old?

Plenty.



But now I know what I've got. it's too bad I'm not really a mopar guy at heart.



(that's gonna drive the mopar guys NUTS!) Lol!!

Honestly I CAN work with what I've got but a little nicer RH fender would be nice. I might snag one off a parts car I learned of that's about an hour and a half drive from home.

A 4 door 69 satellite.



thanks holmes.

Oh, the humanity!

Ever consider just starting with a roll of sheet metal? Heck as much of that car as you will replace, seems like it might be a bargain.

PS. You should get into rebuilding rifles some day. I suspect you would be good at it.

I tore open the bad rocker tonight.



I have some trimming and straightening to do on the inner, also need to pick up some weld through primer as I ran out.




I also need to bring this rocker repair panel in to work and stick it in a press brake to correct a couple of bends. You can see the profile difference between the original slice and the profile of the repair panel.