Slaman Posted October 4, 2012 Share Posted October 4, 2012 Back when I first went into college after high school I took an auto body course so I could replace the quarter panel on my Monte. Being young and new to the process I listened to my instructor and followed his advice... Which was not that great. He claimed that the hole for the taillight extention was the same on all the Monte's, so just put a bolt through it and not worry about measuring anything at the back just worry about the front... Wrong! I never could get the deck lid centered up, it would actually over lap the quarter panel some. So during this rebuild I have been doing I am tring to make it right... I just wish he would have told me to seperate the sail panel at the factory seam as I had a whole one... Here is a few pics of my progress: Where I had cut the sail panel... A few cuts I have had to make to push the rear of the quarter panel section out about 3/4 of an inch... and: And since we brazed some of the lower window corner I have to redo it now since mig welding won't stick to brass. I made a patch for the filler panel section and will make another one for the sail panel side. Plus fix the rot that taking these peices out revealed. Home made patch: Granted I still have to trim it to fit and weld it in, but I am going to make the other piece first plus some more massaging of the window and trunk openings. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
black07ss Posted October 4, 2012 Share Posted October 4, 2012 Great job on the home made patch Steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted October 4, 2012 Author Share Posted October 4, 2012 Thanks. Going to work on making the sail panel side and fix the under structure today. I hope to at least get some of it done before going back to work tomorrow. I will try to take more pics of the forming process this time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted October 6, 2012 Author Share Posted October 6, 2012 I did not get the inner structure fixed yet at the sail panel/trunk filler area but I did make a patch for the sail panel. Here are a few pictures. Sorry my camera's batteries were dying so I did not get as many pics as I would have liked, plus I forgot to stop a few times to take them... Here is were I used painters tape to start a pattern for it. Then I marked my body lines and bends: Then I laid out the pattern on my sheet metal. Note I had to cut the pattern at a copy of the body lines since it would not lay flat due to the form of the sail area. Here is the sheet metal with the cut and bend lines marked. Note the one side has already been cut and a pair of bends made to set it down into the trunk opening. Here it is with a couple of the first bends made and the trunk filler fitted to it. Mostly done with the trunk filler panel clamped to it for fitting comparrison Clamped in place And a couple more of the almost finished product. Just have to finished welding in the windshield channel, dress it up and then doing the trimming and install. Granted it's not a professional job, but it is better than what I started with I think. I have done a lot of research on making panels and I think it is beginning to pay off. I tried to shrink the bend for the windshield channel using the "Tuck" method but got nowhere that way... All of this was done using simple hand tools, a 4" vise and an 18" metal brake from H.F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve G Posted October 6, 2012 Share Posted October 6, 2012 cool! And some FYI.... new fillers wont work over brass so get rid of as much of it as you can. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted October 6, 2012 Author Share Posted October 6, 2012 cool! And some FYI.... new fillers wont work over brass so get rid of as much of it as you can. That I did not know. Thanks for that info. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leghome Posted October 6, 2012 Share Posted October 6, 2012 All of the brass needs to be gone. I had a 1/4 replaced on a n car and they braised and pop riveted it on. In one year the pop rivets started showing cracking around them and then the brass was not as bad but it also was starting to show. It all had to be redone and this time a wire welder was used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MGD72Monte Posted October 6, 2012 Share Posted October 6, 2012 Good work with the fabrication, I've made some small patch panels with no where near the amount of complex curves and surfaces you have there and know it can get tricky to get a good fit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
70mcarlo Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 Wow! Nice work! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sam (Bones) Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 nice work! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted October 9, 2012 Author Share Posted October 9, 2012 Thanks everyone. I hope to get them instaled before soon, but it's not looking like I will get anytime off for the next couple weeks that will not already be accounted for somehow. My baby has her sweet 16 and her cousin is getting married the next day so lots of stuff to do on the couple days I will have off. Not a whole lot of time after work either when you work 12 hour rotating shifts... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted November 3, 2012 Author Share Posted November 3, 2012 Pretty sad I have not gotten back to it sooner but I finally got a chance to work on my Monte a couple time during my time off this week. I got the sail panel patch trimmed, and tacked into place, as well as some repairs to the under-structure from the orginal quarter replacement all those years ago. Sorry, I did not take pics of the structure repairs but I have a couple of the sail patch tacked into place: As you can see in these pic's I have also rough trimmed the filler panel patch I fab'd up and have it clamped into place.: And one more, I got basically stole an almost new pair of Toyo Proxies 275-35-18's off of CL that I mocked up to see how it would look. Yes, I'm going for the pro-touring look. Thinking about doing a s-10 rear brake swap in the future too. I think a 275-40-18 may fill the wheel well better and may even have room for 295's depending on the backspacing. I'll be getting the rims in early December hopefully. But as for this pair of tires I couldn't pass up the price... $50 for the pair... :)If nothing else they will just be the "Sacrafical Set" Steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigscaht Posted November 4, 2012 Share Posted November 4, 2012 thats some good fab work there man! and those tires fill that wheel well real nice..what rims are you goin wit? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted November 4, 2012 Author Share Posted November 4, 2012 Thanks Scott, but after looking at it a little last night I think Imay have been a little premature in tacking it in. I put the angle finder on it an found I am about 5* off on the angle from the cut on the window channel down to where it meets the top of the quarter. I hope to massage it some to fix it without having to cut it back off but I may end up doing just that, or I met a guy a couple weeks ago at a local cruise in with a nice 70 that said he had a parts car and that I would be welcome to anything he did not want. He did say it was a rusty though so don't know the condition of the quarter but it would be nice if I could get the quater up to the factory seam on the sail and tail panel to really do this right... But I really want to start seeing some serious progress, it seems to have stalled and is becoming a very slow build... For rims I am thinking about going with some Boss 338's, 18x8 on the front and 18x9.5 on the rear with the machine lip and black centers. Here is a link to some I'm looking at: Link to wheels Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monte70car Posted November 4, 2012 Share Posted November 4, 2012 Slaman have you though about building the area up that is off 5° with metal to metal and tapper it from 5° to 0? The patch looks good with the angle and body lines. I did notice in the second picture where the channel dives down then goes back up I'm not sure if that's the same area you are talking about and it could be the angle and light causing what I'm seeing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slaman Posted November 4, 2012 Author Share Posted November 4, 2012 It's actually sail panel is too long and needs to taper into the top of the quarter quicker. Its a 20* angle instead of 25* like the other side. Thanks on the praise though. I'm really an amature at body work and pretty much have been self taught through trial and error and reading forumns and watching videos on the computer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
black07ss Posted November 4, 2012 Share Posted November 4, 2012 It sure fooled me Steve, looks great! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.