Not surprised your keen eye had already been there done that,
And have been planning the attack...

 

So, I have the bumpers fitting in a manner that is acceptable to me. They're not perfect but I'm pretty sure its the best I can do. I didn't really keep track of time but I guesstimate 15-20 hours to get these sorted out.

 

I was just looking for your thread........the bumpers look great.....

Maybe the angled character line is "messing" with our eyeballs!

Remind me to fill in the inside of the quarter panels so I can sand that line away.

 

It looks great. I guarantee from the factory chrome bumpers weren't any better.

 

Yes, that angled character line is pretty far out. The end of it that starts at the wheel well is about 3/4 of an inch higher than the end of the character line at the rear of the door so the whole thing needs to be removed and lowered. On my car, if I make a mark at the character line at the wheel well on the quarter panel 3/4 of an inch down and hold a string there it seems to line up right with the character line on the 70-73 ACI rear clip although its hard to tell exactly where the character line is on the ACI rear clip as its much more rounded than it is on the 79's quarters.

 

Yeah, your bumpers look as good or better than any others from the factory, heck, many if you scrutinize them they look like doggy doo compaired to yours.

 

Bumper/s positioning looks real good.
Now you can concentrate on the filling/blending of the clip.
Progress, a good thing.

 

Do ya' need a quarterpanel line rearward of the wheel well?.

 

Do you mean on a factory chrome bumper car? There is one on a factory chrome bumper car parallel to the ground but its much more rounded than the one on the 79 so its harder to see, particularly near the back of the quarter panel. I haven't seen a factory chrome bumper car up close recently but I think the line on it is rounded similar to the one on the door. The quarter panel line on my 79 is much sharper than the horizontal character line halfway up the door.

 

Let me rephrase that.......Do you need the sharp/noticeable character line, or could you make the mod look more like the 68-73 rounded "level" line in order to save yourself some time/headaches?

 

No, I don't need the sharp/noticeable character line and its in the wrong place so I'll be shaving the quarters to give them the 68-73 rounded "level" line. I'll be doing like you suggested and adding fiberglass to the inside of the 79 quarter panel at that character line so I can shave it away and still have some thickness behind it.

 

they look great, now you can blend everything together

 

I wasn't happy with the fit I had on the quarter panels so I spent several hours trying to come up with a way to improve on it. I was able to get it pretty close by inserting a 2X4 inside the 70-73 ACI rear clip on both sides and pushing up at the point where the arrow is. The quarters line up better now and are pretty close to flush except for a manageable gap where the oval is. The driver's side is actually even closer. I can pretty much just glass from one quarter to the other now and there isn't too much of a difference to make up.



I also competed the modifications to my first pair of brackets.

Before:


After:

 

Looking good! You are about to pass me up

 

Don't be modest, you've accomplished far more than I have!

 

I will try to attempt to clearly explain this and use it if you like... or.... don't and do it as you see fit.

Knowing that you are going to be doing serious laminating. Do not try to keep your laminating to a minimum. Doing so can cause you more problems and effort later on in the modifications.

I would decide what panel I am going to try to keep in the radius I want. And this also means the body contour in the factory quarter where it is more defined than the rear clips and it not being in the same areas due to body design changes.

So..if you are wanting to keep the factory quarter as it is and try to get the rear clip to mate up to it..I would make a cut or cuts in the rear clip to relax the panel so I could use the method of wood and bolts to bring the panels together and getting them FLUSH as possible....Just like you did across the top of your rear body area.

Now...If you want the rear clip to stay the same and try to get the factory quarter to fit up better and flush.....I would cut the quarter and use the wood method you are using and get the panels to be flush.

Keep in mind that this may not sometimes be possible to get it all perfect at this time. So it depends on how much stress is on a panel when you are trying to draw it up to meet another and get it flush.

Making these cuts can aid you later on in this area so you do not have such a deep step that you have to deal with. I prefer..at all costs...to not have my panels be so far from flush that I have step that I have to try to build up ....when I know I can relax the panel and get them together and speed up the repair and get my lamination to go faster and look better. Just my personal preference on that. It is not like I have had to do a lamination where it is stepped and not flush...but if I can get around it..I do so.

Make sure that the wood that you use is not too long and cause for a problem due to the inside curves these panels have. The wood may need to be slightly shaped.

And if you do all your prep and plan on lamination it up from the backside...makes sure you taper your edges very well like how I showed it in the thread on the John Lingenfelter thread showing how I filled in the heater core box hole and how tapering it correctly does aid in the repair after the fact. Or don't do it and prep it as you fell like it.

And also understand that in a scenario like this...as you may ahve already figured out....you might have to laminate up the ares between your wood blocks and then remove them and prep it again and then fill in the areas where the wood blocks went.

DUB

 

Compressor is down again and so is Priya.

 

Take a break is the message being sent.

I took a week off and went fishing last month. Came back recharged.

Best wishes Priya.........

 

Thanks Dennis. Take a break, yes, that's the one

 

Let me throw this out there , if I were to undertake this project would it be easier to bond on new quarter panels and a new back panel on the car? I've thought of using the custom image L-88 quarters and using an early back panel. It's been several decades since I changed a quarter panel and do remember it wasn't one of my favorite things.I thought since we had some great minds on this project this would be a good source.