Glad to see you are getting to attack something that needs done! Once you make progress, you feel like making more progress. The old "things in motion" idea. Glad the hubby is being supportive and making steps to help you continue making progress. I am trying to get mine to certain point so I can winterize the garage. Just ain't gonna fight cold temps and cold tools, and can't afford to keep the garage heated. Keep going!

 

I feel your pain...I finally was able to do some non-serious work to my car.
It's rough staying awake 24hours for no reason and not be able to accomplish anything...it's called "adjusting to the new meds"
Enough about me...."Hang in there Priya".

 

last i checked you are a woman. you don't ask the hubby. you tell him. and his correct answer is "yes, dear".
i have to spend a couple months way up north here in S. Jersey to get house done and sold. after that every time i drive north it will be to Tampa...
i will be one of the guys complaining cuz the resin sets up too fast even in january...

 

Priya,
You are still years ahead of me and the fact you are getting something done, puts you even farther ahead.
I made the promise to my wife, and myself, to complete our home remodeling and landscaping projects before I start tearing apart the Vette.
I’ve kept that promise and we just completed our project with our new carpet installed a couple weeks ago.
I still have to tear down an old garden shed and build a new one in our back yard this fall and build a new patio cover next spring.
I am itching to get started on my restomod and I hope to be able to pull just one thing off it this weekend to mark the starting point.
Keep it up, even if you only accomplish a little, you are moving forward.
Post photos when you can!

 

lol, its more the other way around, he tells me and I answer "yes, dear".

 

We put up a shed recently too. We too have been more working around the house this summer although that doesn't mean there wasn't time to work on the Corvette more.

Thanks for the uplifting words

 

Thanks Andy. I wish you good progress on winterizing your garage, its a wonderful thing.

I'm sorry you're going through hard times doorgunner. We'll get back at it sooner or later

 

 

Good looking car!!!

 

I fab for a living...I use 1/8 tig welding rods and properly sized washers to make round brackets.

 

I read this entire thread today, amazing work and it's looking fantastic Priya! You made a sexy car even sexier!

I will be doing this to a 76 soon, and it looks like the biggest take-away is no aftermarket parts and the second biggest is how different the quarters are.

I think I have a plan.

 

i am pondering trying to do this by building the duck tail and tail panel onto a glass rear bumper cover. then just removing the rear side marker bulbs since they are now under the chrome bumper. maybe just hang 2 dot LED's to bumper to provide the needed side markers. it's not like we are ever gonna hide the fact that it is a 74-newer car. i guess you have also seen doorgunner's conversion? his is a 68 that somebody put 76 bumpers on. so he has no issue with un-butchering it back to real. between DG's and this thread, there is a LOT of info on how to do this. and also what NOT to do. a wise (wo)man learns from the mistakes of others. a good (wo)man publishes said mistakes to give others a chance to be wise...

 

Who would do that to a 68???

Yes, I read some of DG's thread, but Priya's is more closely aligned with what I'm doing, so It helps more..knowing how different the quarters are is a huge piece of information.

My 76 is an ok candidate for a mild resto mod since it's a base model L48 that needs body work. It would be a waste of money to make it concours original.

 

Iin the early 80s I found a wrecked 74 convertible I turned it into a 80 convertible with an LS-6 4 SPEED STEEL VALVE COVERS. engine painted blue. It was a beautiful car. People have been changing their corvettes for years.
Hmm maybe a 79 roadster would be fun.. now where did I leave that sawsall?

 

Don Anderson on this forum makes that as a kit and it works out pretty well.

 

i found don anderson in search, but no posts at all. my 3k totalled copart bomb.
gotta get it cleared salvage as a 75 before i start this...

 

Oh I know, stellar conversion work! I need his contact info

 

Mine should be obvious that it's a conversion so,aside from the title, some unscrupulous future owner will have a difficult time passing it off as a real chrome bumper car.

 

Dtamustang@aol.com tell him I said hi

 

So, here's what I've gotten done on the 79 since this spring:

I spent more time on the letters with the laser level and found the top hole on the last "E" was visible as well as part of the hole for the "C". I patched those up. For some reason the "E" looks really beat up, but its not.






It's time for the Vette panel adhesive/filler and to get the quarter panel straight. I had a boo-boo where the green arrow is on the lip of the wheel opening. When I bonded the 70-73 ACI rear clip to the 79's SMC I got some extraneous mat and resin on the inside of the wheel lip. I tried to remove it with the die-grinder and accidentally went all the way through the panel there. So, that's again added unnecessary work to repair a panel that was fine because I didn't take the time to mask off my work area on the inside of the quarter panel. I'm a lot more careful about that now.






More fill needed




I recently learned to help get a straight character line on the body by placing a piece of tape along where the edge should be and then sanding to the edge of the tape. As you sand above and below the line you need to put new tape on the top or bottom of the line. As previously discussed, this horizontal mid quarter panel character line varies between the chrome bumper cars and the rubber bumper cars with the character line rising slightly towards the rear on the rubber bumper cars while it is basically level on the chrome bumper cars.




This factory character line is rounded and kind of vague so I had a bit of a hard time finding the centre of the line to mark its position on the fender lip of the wheel opening. To get it properly positioned I sanded it to a sharp edge so I can more easily see where it is and when I'm happy with it I will sand off the sharp edge of the character line until it has the proper soft curve




I spent some time on the bonding seam with the die grinder grinding out some voids from the mat and resin work. When I originally did this the garage was at 40 Fahrenheit and the fiberglass resin was really thick and I added acetone to it to thin it up. That was a bad idea as it created a lot of little defects in the mat and resin work. This time I taped up the edges so there isn't so much excess filler to sand off where I don't want it.




I covered it in a layer of fill and here it is paritally sanded.




Tomorrow I need to add more filler to this and do it all over again. Hubby says I need to cover up all the fiberglass mat and resin with the filler or otherwise it will show through the paint no matter how smooth it feels to the touch. You can see the epoxy mat and resin showing through on the lower half of the quarter panel, its the pale yellow patches a few inches to the left of the lip of the wheel opening. I'm feeling good about getting back into and and right now anyway I'm confident I'm going to keep at it consistently throughout the winter. This is the hard part now, making it all flat and smooth. There's one window in the garage which I need to get some cardboard to cover up. That way I can turn off the lights in the garage and hold a light at a sharp angle to the bodywork and it will show up highs and lows better.