Use cold galvanizing spray from Home Depot. It has a very high zinc content similar to the original paint. This will help with lubricity between leaves and as a bonus it closely matches the original light gray color of the spring.

When replacing the liners (plastic) all I did was move all the original liners up one and replace the bottom liner only. Use the old liners as templates to cut them to size as you move them up one location. Save the longest (bottom) liner as the template for the new one.

Differential was natural from the factory and rusted quickly. I bead blasted mine and used a product call RPM Rust Prevention Magic to protect the bare casting. Seems to work well. Most folks that want to prevent rust use a cast blast spray bomb. Some use cosmoline. Cosmoline changes the appearance which is why I choose RPM.

Sounds like fun!

Bill

 

So tonight's task! Take out rear leaf springs. I got great instructions from 71scgc and following them made the job fairly easy.


Per his instructions (posting incase anyone else needs to know) I put a big C clamp on the spring just as a precaution to keep the jack from being able to slip. Then jacked to spring up just enough to take pressure off the spring bolt then loosened the nut off and lowered the jack slowly.

Worked perfectly!!!!
Spring out, shocks off and struts off. Tomorrow night we will start the process of pulling half shafts, checking for play in the diff and then pulling it out as well. We are also goin to check the trailing arms, pull spare carrier, clean paint and replace everything that needs it.
drivers side strut is bent so will have to be replaced.

Man it felt great to get rolling!!!!!!

 

So I decided tonight to not lift the body but here are a few pictures for your enjoyment of the rear body mounts.




Not too bad...

 

Are the liners something I should be able to get locally and where do I get RPM?

Scott

 

Not bad at all

I highly recommend a dial gauge to check the trailing arms and rotors for run out.

Be careful when you pull the half shafts so that the end caps stay on and you don't have needle bearings all over your garage floor.

Soak all the bolts with PB Blaster or something similar. Same with the trailing arm bolts. Getting the half shaft bolts off the trailing arms is a LOT easier with an impact wrench or gun.

Lookin good!


Bill

 

I ordered the liner from Quanta in Maryland. Their liners got the best reviews and are closest to the originals but still not the same as OEM.
They are not over the counter.

Ordered the RPM on line. I have not seen it in parts stores. Can not remember where i ordered it from.

Bill

 

Thanks Bill! Can you give me a little more on the RPM so I can goggle it.

 

RPM is the acronym for Rust Prevention Magic. It is made by a company called ECS. http://www.classicindustries.com/cam...ts/rp1001.html

I may have ordered it from Classic Industries.

Bill

 

Thanks!

Man, I was really surprised with the rubber on those mounts, it isn't hard like I figured it would be after 40 years. They are still actually very soft.

 

Scott, I finally got a couple minutes to take a look at your thread. Actually, that car is in pretty similar condition to what mine was when I got it, and I think you can make it into a really nice car just leaving the body on the frame. If you go through the car a section at a time you won't get overwhelmed by the big picture...

I noticed you had mentioned the sill plates; those things are anodized with a very hard coating from the factory and it's impossible to restore once they get scratched, so it's best to just replace them.

I removed all the suspension pieces from mine and had them blasted, then wire-wheeled the frame everywhere I could reach it. Without removing the body that's really about the best you can do, but you can still do a pretty good job just by doing that.

I made a lot of the same discoveries you're making during my last paint job....stripper won't touch most primers, etc., but since your car's paint job is essentially an amalgam of three different colors (and possibly types of paint) stripper is probably going to be the best way to get a large part of it off. Very messy and a big PITA but still the best way to go unless you have affordable access to a soda blaster (I sure didn't). Even once I had gotten through most of the previous paint jobs with stripper I still wet-sanded the OE primer away with 320 grit paper. If you look at Rogman's '73 rebuild thread he used lots of lacquer thinner, scotch-brite, and tons of paper towels to get the red factory primer off. Probably better for the fiberglass than my method but one hell of a big chemical mess. Also, if it's not already too late, be VERRRYYY careful with metal scrapers, razor blades, etc.- EVERY gouge that you put in that glass will have to be addressed before primer and paint can go back on the car...

I do know this- you are one incredibly energetic dude so you won't come up short on whatever effort is required for the job. The hardest part with many of these little projects is when you have to shift your focus from no-skill-required heavy labor to very delicate, skill-intensive work. That's when expensive mistakes are easy to make, so beware and listen to all the expert advice you can get.

Take care Brotha!

 

I got mine from Corvette Central and had my old liners to compare.
They matched and when I replaced them, they looked like the originals
to me and were made in USA.


This is the part number #582057
http://www.parts123.com/parts123/yb....Z5Z5Z50000050G

Donnie

 

Thanks Donnie, not too expensive either!

 

Hey Dave! Good to get your input. The problem I have on the paint is 1 layer of factory primer, 1 layer of factory paint, I layer of laquer (very similar to factory) primer and a top layer of white paint. I am looking for a way to cut through all of the 4 layers at one e of possible.
On scraping, after scraping te 78 with a razor blade it's like I am an old pro! Lol

 

Scott, I think you will invariably discover
that almost any fiberglass-friendly stripper is only going to attack one coat at a time, and as you indicated...they won't cut primer. The porosity in the primer will allow the stripper to soak right through where it settles on whatever's underneath. I resorted to stripping a layer of paint, sanding the primer underneath it with,like,80 grit paper, stripping the factory paint underneath,then finally wet-sanding the red factory primer off.

The advantage of manually sanding the OE primer off was that I could apply pressure where the primer was thickest, so that when all the primer was removed it was a nice, even, level surface.

With my car I had done a lot of experimenting on the back half, and when I moved to the front half this was the method that I settled on...strip, sand, strop, sand, strip, sand. And in reality, the WORST part of the job was the door jambs...horrible!

BTW, I think I'm experiencing seller's remorse...might be hangin' onto the old girl after all!!

 

Keep it!!! I think you are right on the process. I am going to go ahead and do the underneath then engine compartment the outside.
Can you give me any idea on how long it takes to wet sand the factory primer?
Scott

 

What takes time is carefully digging the old paint out of all the tight corners around the door jambs and the hood sill. Once you get down to the factory primer it goes pretty quickly...just use 320 paper and stop sanding as soon as you're through the red stuff.

 

I actually think there will be less mess with lacquer thinner and gray scotchbrite pads. Also less opportunity to sand off some fiberglass. I had great luck using 000 steel wool and lacquer thinner. It was not too messy and left the fiberglass spotless.

In terms of paint removal down to the primer, the stripper works pretty well. I used a bondo spreader to scrape the paint off as it bubbled up. Just work on small sections at a time. Maybe a foot square. It goes a lot quicker than you think it will. I kept lots of newspaper handy to plop the paint on to as I scraped it of with the plastic spreader. It was not nearly as messy as it could be once you get used to it.

Bill

 

Thanks for the input guys!!! Perhaps I jumped the gun a little on the paint removal questions but it will acondenser soon enough. I was working in it and thought wait wait Scott! You need to do several oth project before you get all the paint off and are touching the bare fiberglass with greasy hands...... Hahaha

 

I'm along for the ride to see how your project evolves FC. Best to you Scott

Pete

 

Thanks Pete, I look forward to your input brother. This should be a fun one.