Driver Door - Short and Sweet

For the next few months I will only be able to work on the Corvette a few hours each weekend.  I should be able to post pictures once every couple weeks so keep checking back.  I am going to try a little less narrative as well.  Check it out below and tell me what you think.

Drivers Side Door - Sheetmetal Repair

The passenger side door repairs are complete, the primer coat has been applied and the door hangs ready for paint.  The drivers side door has been removed and is ready for sandblasting.

A 100 pound bag of sand was used to sandblast the drivers door.  A few areas were exposed that need welding, one of which is circled on the right side of the photo.

 

 Here is a close-up.

Using a pointed burr grinder the rusted area was removed then the hole was trimmed as shown.

A sheet metal patch was cut and held in place with a magnet.

The sheet metal is too thin for a continuous weld so a series of tack welds were used instead. 

Additional tack welds were added until the entire area was welded.

Using a thumb sized burr grinder the crowns of the tack welds were removed.

A sanding disc was used for final feathering of the repair.

Next I get to tackle this.

Wish me luck.

Post Script Picture:

Repairs were made followed by a coat of JB Weld to fill the nooks and crannies.

Passenger Door Rivet Replacement

While working on the interior side of the passenger door I spotted several bumps on the fiberglass located on the outside top portion of the door.  Double click on the photo for a close-up.  They were insignificant looking and could have been sanded flush within just a few minutes.  I decided to repair them instead.

A thumb size burr grinder was used to remove the fiberglass exposing an aluminum rivet.  The rivet is used to hold the fiberglass panel to the steel door frame.  It exhibited light oxidation but otherwise looked fine and the surrounding fiberglass looked fine as well.  Oxidation must have been the culprit.

It would have been easy to fill the hole and sand the other areas smooth.  I decided to grind out the other areas and remove the rivets instead.

New aluminum rivets were installed then buried in several layers of fiberglass matt and resin.  Green masking tape was used to channel the excess resin off the door.

Remember, our fiberglass is clear.  The rivet heads you see are buried deep, sandwiched in matting and are not exposed to air.  Chances of these rivets oxidizing are sip, zero, nada.

After the fiberglass set up the masking tape was removed.

30 minutes of grinding and sanding produced a very nice repair job.  We will shoot this with primer when the rest of the door is ready for it's second coat.  The drivers side door is fine.  There are no other similar repairs needed.

Passenger Door

As you can see this door has a colorful history. The blue on the face of the door is the original color of the car, Daytona Blue.

There are too many nooks and crannies on the door to clean it up with power tools. I decided to sandblast instead. It took about 45 minutes.

Both the fiberglass and the sheet metal cleaned up very nice.

One of the nice things about sandblasting is that it's aggressive enough to show weak spots caused by rust. If you double click on the photo you can see an area that needs repair. There were a few areas like this, all were minor. None the less, I ground out the damaged areas then welded them back up, and feathered them smooth.

I also found a couple areas of damaged fiberglass. Prior to the repair this hole had been torn out.

A couple broken bolts and a few damaged rivets were removed and replaced.

After the repairs were made the door was sanded then wiped down with a tack cloth.

The garage was heated to 70 degrees then primer was applied. This will dry for at least 24 hours then it will be sanded, blemishes will be corrected, then it gets another couple coats of primer.

This is a very solid door with a very nice primer coat.

The Portland Swap Meet is coming up. Hopefully we will find interesting goodies for the car.

Thanks for watching.