Passender Side B-Pillar Fiberglass Repair

A few weeks ago we repaired the drivers side B-pillar fiberglass.  Now its time to do the passenger side.

This is the panel that needs to be reinstalled.

Before the fiberglass repair was started we had to fix a damaged rivet hole located near the tip of the drip rail shoe.   A copper plate was positioned behind the sheet metal then the area was welded.  The copper plate acted as a mold because weld wire will not stick to it.

The area was ground and shaped then the rivet hole was drilled a little later. 

After aligning the pieces, fiberglass was applied to the backside, allowed to cure, then the front was ground then fiberglassed.  This sandwiches the pieces and makes for a very strong repair.

The repair was feathered and blended and the rivets were put back in place.  It's super strong and it's now ready for primer.

I think we will start working on the door jams next.  We need to install the rubber mouldings so we can confirm a good fit on the drip rails.  Because the only way to install the rubber moldings is to glue them in place, this will be the first place we paint Daytona Blue on the car.  Should be interesting.

Side Exhaust on a 1963 Corvette

I recently purchased an original 1965-67 Corvette side exhaust system on E-bay that included the exhaust pipes, covers, trim pieces, mounting brackets and all the hardware.  This set is exceptionally nice and I'd rate it an 8 out of 10.  These are perfect for our driver.

As you recall I had also purchased a new set of stainless steel reproduction exhaust pipes several months back.  Since I now have an original set of pipes I decided to do a side by side comparison.  The original pipes are in the background.  It's easy to see that the reproductions have a significantly larger exhaust tip than the originals and that tells me the repo's will sound different.  Since the originals are in such nice shape I decided to swap them out and go all original.

I was bummed when I realized a portion of the front wheel wells and all of the side brackets had to be removed in order to get the exhaust system to fit.  After a couple days of deliberating I finally decided to go ahead and do it.

I cut the fiberglass using my Fein Multi-Master tool as seen in the previous picture.  It's a great tool and it worked perfect.

The brackets are heavy gage steel and they are very close to the frame.  I decided to cut these brackets with one of the most diabolical tools I own.  The twin bladed, counter rotating, tungsten tipped Twin-Blade from Sears.  You can see it in the picture below.  This is a scary tool and it demands a ton of respect.  It will cut through anything... and I mean anything.  You turn it on and push it toward whatever you want cut.  No backlash, no jamming, no slowing down.  It took 1 minute to cut these brackets.  I could have cut the frame in half in the same amount of time if I wanted to.  It's a cool tool but very scary.

Done.

The exhaust covers and trim were installed first followed by the exhaust pipes.

The front brackets were sand blasted, painted and riveted in place.

The bolt that holds the exhaust pipe is suppose to go through a hole that I was suppose to drill in the frame.  I decided to weld the bolt to the frame instead.  It worked great and is very strong.  By the way, that's only surface rust in the exhaust pipe.  The pipes are like new.

They sound great and look awesome.  

Yes, I did both sides.

This completes our Era Modified changes.  Modifications include the Torq-Thrust D wheels, side exhaust, and the 67 big block stinger hood.  Not shown is the rear torsion bar.  I like it!

B Pillar Fiberglass Restoration

Last year when we repaired the B pillars we had to remove the fiberglass that covered the pillars.  It's time to reinstall those covers.

The drivers side cover was tabbed in place (two black tabs), riveted at the drip rail shoe, then fiberglass was applied after feathering all the joints.

I didn't like the gap between the top of the panel and the drip rail shoe so I decided to add a little more length to the panel.  Our preference is to sandwich all fiberglass repairs.  Because the panel is already fiberglassed into place I had to wedge open the gap at the top of the panel and place fiberglass matting on the backside.  Duct tape was strategically placed to capture all the excess fiberglass resin run-off.   

The back side was fully wetted with resin then fiberglass matting was put on the front side to complete the sandwich repair.  The duct tape worked great.  You can see the excess resin collecting on the paper towel at the bottom of the photo.

Here is a close up of the repair.  Remember that our fiberglass is clear so even though you see rivet holes the holes are long gone.

A tongue depressor and duct tape were used to make the resin conform to the drip rail shoe.

After 24 hours the duct tape was removed.  This picture was taken just before the fiberglass was trimmed to fit.

Double click on the picture to see how much length was actually added to the panel.  It's about an 1/8" overall but it matched the shoe very nicely.  This overall repair is extremely solid.  Just prior to painting this area the pop-rivets shown will be replaced with flush mount countersunk rivets and bonding agent will be applied along the panel and the car skin.  The same will be required for the passenger side.  

The next post should be about the side exhaust.

Thanks for watching.

Wheels, Tires and Alignment

The Uni-Royal Tiger Paw tires we had on the car were too large.  Although this picture of the left front wheel well shows clearance, we did have clearance issues with the front sway bar, frame, rear leaf spring and the rear wheel wells.

Before we mounted tires on our 15X7 Torq-Thrust D wheels we dry fit them on the car taking careful measurements at several locations.  We finally decided on 225-60-15 BF Goodrich tires because they are the exact diameter as the stock tires sold in 1963 and they are as wide as possible without having clearance issues.

In order to verify proper clearance both the front and rear axles had to be aligned.  This preliminary alignment was done using a level for the camber and a length of string for the toe.  The wheel dollies worked super nice during this process since they allow us to put the full weight of the car on the tires while allowing the tires to move during adjustment.

This is the left rear tire before the toe was adjusted.  On the left side of this picture the string and the tire should be touching.

After moving several shims we ended up with an alignment that's certainly good enough for us to drive the car to the alignment shop without tearing up the new tires.  Now we can check clearances.

This is a full right hand turn on the left front tire.  There are no issues with the sway bar.

This is the front right tire in a full right hand turn viewed from the rear.  As you can see we are very close to the frame but not touching.  The next size up would have caused issues.

There are no issues with any of the wheel wells.

The rear sway bar and the leaf spring clear the tires and wheels without issue.

And what about that potential clearance issue on the front fender?  No problem now.

I think the tires and wheels look great and I think we need to see them in action.  Check out the short video below.