Dave just sent me these photos of the new trunklid. Fits very nicely!

Happy Birthday to the purple project! Born today, fifty years ago!

Rust repair has started! I'm splicing in a new floor pan and after it's butt welded there won't be any seam and it'll look factory. This part of the floor has the speedometer retainer loop welded to it, so that's going to come off the old floor and will be welded onto this newer piece.

This next week I'm moving the folks up from Florida to their new ranch next door to us, so more updates later this month! The plan is to have all the metal work done and the car down to 180-220.

More to come!

Cheers
Dave

I got the new grill painted in the correct dark grey argent "sparkle" paint. The grill is manufactured in a light grey plastic. It took half a day to tape the whole thing off just to paint the center black grill portions from the front and back side. Then, the next day it took an hour to remove half the original masking tape and then tape off the black grills so I could paint the dark agent. I made sure the outside and back were completely masked off too.

Thankfully it was around 75 degrees out today so I could spray it in the driveway on a large cardboard box so it was at a high enough angle to get the metalflake to lie down right.

I did the headlight buckets too.

The only problem with the reproduction grills is that the stainless trim that goes around the grill and buckets is not very good. The two bucket trim pieces are 3/8" too long on both ends so that will need to be removed with a Dremel tool and disc, then sanded smooth. That's the next phase of the project. Oh, and they also don't snap into place like the originals do. They either are too loose or so tight that it risks breaking the grill plastic to get them in place.

Here's the grill after painting, with the red bar and "Plymouth" emblem installed.

Grill looks great!!

Looking good Steve-O! Production resumes next week!:burnout:

Cheers:beers:
Dave

According to UPS tracking, the front and rear elastomeric bumpers are due to arrive at Dave-Land today. Can't wait to see what those look like. They came all the way from the Great White North. Here's who makes them:

https://www.tommythechryco.ca/Elastomeric-bumpers.php

https://chryco.store/

Well, let's see. The past week was spent moving my folks next door to their newly completed house on 5 acres next to ours on 10 acres, so they're officially done with The Villages in Florida! I installed a wrought iron style gate on our service entrance, removed two large piles of dirt on their lot and graded it into our drainage ditch, and now I'm FINALLY able to work back on cars! So with that, it's Cuda metal time! Yesterday I spliced in the new floor pan, rear quarter and extension, and got halfway done with the trunk floor. A productive day! Here's a few of the rear quarter to start. After butt-welding the patches in and grinding the seams smooth, I covered them with USC's All Metal then started with Rage to get the curves perfect. Body line matches up perfectly, and the weird thing is the quarter panel lip remained perfect so I spliced the patch in to that lip. Wheel lip moldings will arrive today or tomorrow and I'll be able to ensure a perfect fit prior to paint!

More later today....

Cheers:beers:
Dave

Amazing!

Just out of curiosity, any idea how many layers of paint you found while grinding away? Not counting the white latex house paint they hastily brushed on to camouflage the car from the invading Soviets in Ice Station Zebra.

It almost looks like that purple is the original paint? Looks like red oxide dip, then grey primer, then assembly line purple. On top of that maybe some spray can black primer/purple?

Nice work, Dave.

Dave is the Tornado of Bodywork. He already has the trunk done, the driver's floor patch done, the frame rail dent repair done...and it's not even dinner time yet.

Dave, where have you been all my life?

I was out in the yard pulling shrubs and trees out of the ground with my Suburban and a long chain. In the time it took me to pull three shrubs, and two half dead evergreens, Dave had all this done.

Here's the dented frame rail repair:

And the trunk floor repair. He even saved the original sheetmetal date stamps, which are covered by the gas tank anyway.

And the brand new reproduction elastomeric bumpers showed up via UPS from Canada. Here they are. They are really nice.

Thanks Tim. Steve, too many layers! :frown:

Today I got the floor smoothed over and the trunk installed. The idea was to save as much of the original floor as possible. I also banged out some dents in the floor and fixed that jack damaged front frame rail. To do that, I cut the bottom out and using the hammer and dolly, massaged it smooth and flat. Once welded up and sanded down, I used filler to smooth over the rust pitting.

The trunk was the same way. I smoothed over most of the original floor with a skim coat of filler to fill in the pits. I'm happy with it, but still some more final work to do.

Tomorrow I'll get the interior primed along with the remaining trunk (I just epoxied the center of the floor) and the engine bay too. :burnout:

Getting closer.....

Cheers:beers:
Dave

Trunk work! Still final blending to do on some areas, but happy with the results so far! :scholar:

Cheers:beers:
Dave

That is just amazing, what attention to detail.

Thanks Tim. Means a lot that you guys appreciate it. Is Steve paying me for all this extra detail? Of course not! That's just the kind of guy I am...... stupid! :scholar::smile:

More tomorrow!

Cheers:beers:
Dave

Hmmm....I see your posting while I'm posting with double posts!! It's a double dose of Cuda!

Cheers
Dave

But think of the exposure you're getting!

From now on everyone is gonna want to buy a car that was half done by you!

But seriously you are doing an amazing job at an incredible pace.

I guess I'll have to start sending you money now, not just parts.

Shall we rename the thread CudaVirus? (insert snare drum sound effect here, please)

Amazing work and I cant believe how much he gets done

Or Cudies (cooties) for short. If Dave ever goes "live" with videos he could call this Cu(duh)vid 19. Just spitballin'..

Super Dave will need is own TV show

Incredible progress!

Thanks guys! Another productive day! I may or may not have decided to add the missing spot welds to the trunk pan . And I may or may not have laid them out exactly like the originals using measurements I took before I filled and sanded the trunk smooth. Why? I'm not sure why since you're not going to see then anyway! :dunno: But now the pan looks factory correct. Once everything else got sanded and the old seam sealer replaced with new, a final coat of epoxy and she's ready for some 2K primer, sanding, and some FC7!:laugh:

Ditto on the interior. Tomorrow I'll hit the engine bay along with the few remaining rust spots!

More to come...

Cheers:beers:
Dave

How do you prepare the areas around a repair?

I see the repairs are done perfectly, and wonder how you make the areas around it ready for primer..... seems like you are not media blasting the car...

I want to know so someday I can follow along!!

Ryan W31

Hey Ryan!

The area around my repairs are all down to bare metal. It's hard to see in the pics, but all repairs are down to metal and then the bodywork starts. I'll be stripping the exterior of paint next week, then once bare metal, epoxy. I just decided to dive into the patch work before I made a huge mess of everything stripping and sanding the old paint off!

Cheers
Dave

Another day of sanding, welding, throwing tools, getting welding slag in my shoe, performing the "What the Fffff#%&" native Super Dave pain dance, then spilling DP primer all over the place..... and voila!!:bs:

Ugh, well I must say, it's getting nice looking at a not-so- crusty anymore Crusty Cuda! Still a few minor rust holes to patch, then this weekend it'll be off the rotisserie, assembled, and paint stripping begun! All the bolt on parts will be dip gray on the inside so when assembled and painted, any exposed areas will show correct gray. Of course the fenders will be undercoated, but they still need to look nice!

And then after all that, a drive in the F-Car. So much freaking fun! :biggthumpup:

More to come!

Cheers

You are obviously having a Super Dee Duper Day! Enjoy the ride.

I recently told my 87 year-old Dad about getting the purple Cuda. He has always wanted a purple car but a wife and five kids got in the way over the seven decades since he got his drivers license. The closest he got to ordering a car in a color he liked was back in late '71 when he bought us a new 1972 Satellite 9-passenger wagon in FE5 Bright Red with a black racing stripe down the center of the hood, black interior, Rallye wheels, and a Mopar "Tuff-Grip" steering wheel. Mom would never let him get a purple car. When I told him about this and sent him some photos he said "I LOVE IT!".

So, thanks to Dave's ongoing efforts, we are making my Dad happy!

I am asking how you prep the areas down to bare metal (wire wheel? sander? Grinder?) and what primer?

Your progress is mind boggling!!!

Ryan W31

That's good stuff Steve-o!:biggthumpup: It'll be a kick when he's behind the wheel of this purple car!

Gotcha, Ryan. For those patch areas, just a grinder with an 80 grit pad on it is all you need. Now, bigger panels, like the doors, I use paint stripper followed up with 80 grit on an orbital sander.

Take this upper part of the door from the body line up that I just did this evening. Step one, lather with stripper (oohhhhhh....yeeeaahhh....baby!:biggthumpup:) then scrape away! After that, 80 grit makes quick work of the remaining bits. The very faint red you see is the traces of original primer which will all be gone by the time the epoxy gets sprayed. Once totally bare, I coat with DP Epoxy which is a PPG product. I use gray or black depending on the project. The epoxy "seals" the metal and then on top of that I use DPS3055 high build primer to start the sanding. You can use any primer you like. Areas I can't reach I use a spot blaster gun with black diamond or similar coarse grit. That's handy in areas on the undercarriage like floor to rocker joints where you can't reach.

Remember, ask 5 body shop guys what they like to use and prepare for 22 different answers! :cool2::hmmm:

Cheers:beers:
Dave

Got it.

Thanks!!

Ryan W31

A monutabulous day! Off the twirler she comes! All the major metal work is done. Although I missed two spots on the fenders, so I'll hit them tomorrow. But it's another big step forward toward Purple!:biggthumpup:

Passenger side quarter needed a small patch and I was able to patch the trunk extension with only very small patching needed there. Very pleased, very excited to start paint stripping this week! I'm hoping by Friday to have the exterior down to bare metal, epoxy primed, and two coats of high build primer to start the bodywork and blocking out the panels.

Of course in addition to that, 250 more fence posts just showed up to add another pasture for the horses along with fencing my folks property next door. Oh, and then there's the stone columns on the driveway I need to finish. :rolleyes2:

More to come next week! :3gears:

Cheers:beers:
Dave

I'm sure that you and your Dave elves will get everything done in no time. All I managed to get done today was to install the rear main seal and oil pump.

The progress on this car is mind baffling.:biggthumpup:

Heck, that’s one more thing off the list, Freddie!:biggthumpup:

That’s the spirit, Jonesy! The movement on this is colostimal!:thumbsdown:

Cheers:beers:
Dave

Looking great...and back on four wheels already!!!

Are you using up all the extra leftover metal from the full trunk pan we had to buy?

USPS tracking radar says you have two inbound (wheelwell trim screws and the rear bumper guard filler & door/hood/trunk cushion set). They should drop off the radar and be lost any minute now, since they are in your area.

And he still has time to work on the calendar.
Dave how much coffee do you drink??
Ohio is starting to open up restaurants again. Hopefully airlines get busy and you get here for a craft brew night!!

Also if you have spare time in Toronto LMK!!!

Ryan W31