The phosphate can that be done at home or does it have to be sent out ?

I phosphate right in the shop. You only need the solution at temp to do it, after the parts are cleaned.

Steering Column
 

These smaller restorations are just the bread and butter of a project.

Sourced a decent floor shift column from another 69. This piece is a series of small restorations like the neutral safety switch mounted to the column. Not sure what others do but I break all these smaller items down, clean, restore and reassemble. Column all layed out after alot of bead blasting and clearing, phosphating and painting. Found it so odd one of the metal pieces internal to the column was blue on one side and bare steel on the other.

In some upcoming photos im already recreating the column sticker on some software I used in my younger years. For my dad back in the early 2000s i recreated every decal on his yenko chevelle. Reminds me of my early days and passion for restoring things.

Had to order a few items like a new turn signal handle and a lower bearing.

Door Hinge Rebuilding
 

Hinges get fully taken apart. Most of the kits out there that include the bushings work well. I reuse the old pins as they have the circular marks on the pin that the replacements dont. This set was in nice shape and only needed minor filling.

Pins are reinstalled and pin ends swedged out with a die and press.

Got lucky on this set as i reused the pin at the roller. These are usually destroyed and i have to turn my own.

Steering column and spring decals
 

Finished decals for the springs and steering column. I used the spring chart and weights for a 69 to take my best guess at an l89 300 deluxe car.

Steering column was fun. I used a combination of known part numbers and a steering column or two that dad had laying around with the decal still present. One thing i love for detail here is getting the font and type size correct to match originals. There honestly are very few if any reproduction decals of any type that are even close. Soon i plan to do an exact copy of the emission decal that goes on the core support radiator top plate.

Picture order: Springs and Column printed, Original Column(Auto I believe), Orig column to the car, and Redone finished

Chevelle Decals
 

Thanks for sharing your progress. It is fun to follow along and I am learning a few things as well.

Have you looked at these: https://www.angelfire.com/rock/69ss/index.html

Thanks,
Marty

Hi Marty, took a look and not rain on someones hard work and effort but just looking at a few where there are originals next to the reproduced decal shows significant differences in font thickness, width and height. I picked the page for the 71 air cleaner decal as i have redone that one myself and even the symbols at the top are not accurate. I can only assume what happens is someone gets into say microsoft power point and just starts typing up the words without giving much thought to does it look correct.

It should also go without say that im sure between various plants the decals differed as its probably short sided to say there was only one supplier.

----I have to ask if you market any of your great decals? I may be out of the loop. And,,,Would you consider when the time was appropriate to do some other stuff? I really like your attention to correctness!....Bill S

Steering Column Complete
 

Mostly finished with the column. Had to put in a new lower bearing at the bearing cup is in the plating box so finaly assembly will have to wait. I also need to get in an nos igntion switch i order and rekey it.

I struggle with these, as i had the top section on and off about 5 times before it finally went into place.

New Skill, Key Cutting and GM Key Codes
 

After my dad moved we lost our chevy dealership person back in Dubuque Ia that cut and and rekeyed lock cylinders for us.

This meant dad and I got to research how its done. Not terribly complicated, but you need something like a Curtis key cutter, the right cams and carriages, the key blanks and most importantly the key code book to take all your old lock cylinder codes and have keys made for them. On this car I had all the original glove box and door cylinders. I had to rekey the trunk to the original glove box and rekey the ignition switch to the doors.

All pretty straightforward as long as you can read the 4 digit GM code on the side of the cylinders. This was alot of fun to read up on and do.

Pic1 Curtis Cutter
Pic2 Key succesfully cut(trunk and glove box for a 69)
Pic3 doors tumblers restored, polished, and keys cut
Pic4 Glove box tumbler, showing the code
pic 5, 6, 7 Rekeying the trunk lock, includes pulling the entire assembly apart and pieces of the tumberl to get to the individual tumblers. Redo the 6 tumblers to match the key, springs, spring retainer, and reinstall with new key face pieces, and done