1969 Dodge Charger Restoration (General Lee)

Day 51 - Front clip

2011-09-17T23:36:00.000-07:00

Today, Travis and I attached the front clip to the charger to get a better Idea as to where the doors should be.

We found that we should start the alignment with the hood to cowl gap, then the fenders to the hood gap, then the doors to the fender and then we should be in a good position to verify the door jamb placement and quarter panel location.

Day 50 - Quarter Panel (continued)

2011-09-03T15:20:00.000-07:00

Today, we did several test fits of the quarter panel. we are getting closer each time but we still have a ways to go. The trunk extension panel is fitting much better after hammering on it for an hour. It looke the quarter panel is to high in the front and wheel wells still have a 1/4" gap between the panels. Back to the drawing board....

Day 49 - Extension panel and Quarter Panel

2011-07-02T15:11:00.000-07:00

Today we started by attempting to align the door to the door jamb just to see if we are anywhere in the realm of being accurate.

Next we cut off the rest of the old quarter panel and attempted to do the first test fit of the new quarter panel.

It looks good from a distance by the wheel well seems are about 1 inch off and it looks like it may be too far forward.

It also looks that the trunk extension panels are pushing down on the quarter panel. This took some considerable time with a hammer and dolly to get them even close. Lesson learned: never order parts from anywhere but AMD. I got the trunk floors from good year nearly 7 years ago and they suck. The stamp is crappy and requires a lot of manual work just to get them to KINDA fit.

Day 48 - Door Jamb and more rear window malarkey!

2011-04-09T15:02:00.000-07:00

Today, I went ahead and replaced the door jamb with the new one from AMD. This is an excellent part. Its super heavy duty and comes with the striker bracket on the back. I had marked where i removed the old one, however this one seemed a little bit shorter when it came to the lower part of the door sill. I took my best guess and spot welded it into place.

Travis continued working on the interrior lower rear window frame. This required a custom piece to be fabricated and fudged into place. I know this isn't the perfect way to do this, but I am not going for a show car here, just a daily driver.

We also attached the new door for a test fit.

Day 47 - More Quarter Panel Removal

2011-02-27T21:29:00.000-08:00

Today Travis and I removed the lead from the joints of the roof and quarter panel. Then I removed the rest quarter panel. Travis worked on the rear window frame trying to manufacture a lower corner.

Here is a video of the lead melting:

Day 46 – The dreaded rear window frame 2

2011-02-19T23:29:00.000-08:00

Okay, so the show has been on hiatus since the last post. I had a few issues with the welder we just couldn’t figure out. Now that has all been squared away we can get to rebuilding the rear window frame piece by piece. Each piece was made by creating a template with some poster board. Then transferring that template to metal and then cutting it out. We then had to fiddle with the fit for a while before tacking each piece into place.

Day 45 – The dreaded rear window frame

2010-11-13T23:13:00.000-08:00

Let me just start this with, I hate this rear window frame. On so many chargers this is the worst. This is mostly due to its poor design. The wings that anchor the roof down in the rear of the car on either side of the window tend to trap water in the bottom corners of the rear window. This leads to the sealant that is used to adhere the window to the car to stay wet and eventually rot away. This is where it starts to get expensive, once that has rotted enough to let water through, the water will eat through the paint, then the metal and trickle into the rear plenum which is right below the rear deck lid. Now the way the plenum is designed the water doesn’t stay there, it then trickles down into the trunk floor and there it falls into the crevasses between the trunk floor and the wheel house. So now you have a corner of the window rusted through, so that metal has to be cut, grinded, patched, welded, sanded, and painted. This happens to the corner, plenum, wheelhouse and trunk floor. This issue is pretty common with these chargers which are why most of them have rusted out trunks. So here we have cut away the old rear window frame and will welding in the new one.

Day 44 – Removing part of the quarter panel

2010-10-30T23:07:00.000-07:00

So it’s time to start cutting the important pieces off, like the quarters. There is a sort of nervous feeling at first when you take an air chisel, stab into the body, pull the trigger and 90 pounds per square inch of air pressure cut through your car like hot knife through butter. But after you carve off that first part of car flesh, you look at it and think, “well there’s no turning back now… “ and you become less timid with what can be scrapped.

As you can see the interior skeleton of the roof is going to need some rust treatment.

Day 43 – Undercoating the car

2010-10-16T22:57:00.000-07:00

Well it’s almost winter and time to do a few little clean up operations on the charger. One thing I wanted to make sure I did was under coat the car with something. Paint, Undercoat, Powder coat, it didn’t really matter. Since I got so much good use out of POR-15 (See earlier posts), I decided to use it to undercoat the car. Since the entire underside of the car was not primed with the rest of the car, it was still bare metal and highly susceptible to moisture and rust.

Day 42 – Outer Wheel house 4, Lower Valance and Taillight Panel

2010-09-18T21:29:00.000-07:00

Today Travis was back in the shop and we ripped through a lot of tasks today.

First off Travis and I assessed the wheelhouse and decided that we need to re-fit it, clean up some of the old welds and hammer and dolly the seam back together. We then turned our attention to the lower valance. We first leveled the frame by running a straight edge and level across the frame rails and using shims on the jack stands to adjust the level. Once the frame was level we took readings from a few places on the car and they all said the same thing, the rear passenger quarter panel was low. We then rolled a table over and used a bottle jack to jack up the rear passenger quarter panel and weld in the trunk-to-lower valance supports.

Once this was done, I got to work on removing the taillight panel and Travis got to work on the aforementioned wheelhouse.

Once he got the tack welds in for the wheelhouse and I got the taillight panel removed, we went ahead and fitted the new trunk lock bracket to hold the taillight panel in place at the top , and tacked it to the lower valance to hold it from the bottom. While these panels are OE replacements they still require some manual persuasion to fit correctly. As you can see, it’s starting to look like a back end of a car.

Cool Websites for Help with the Charger

2010-09-17T13:13:00.000-07:00

1. AMD (Auto Metal Direct) - "Nice Body!":
These guys manufacture almost every body part for the charger, While thier prices are bit more especially shipping, the quality is second to none.

2. EBay - "Need I say more?":
Sure ebay has a lot of parts you will need for a restoration... BUT, you can also find competive prices on AMD Parts as well. Just be sure to always factor in shipping when comparing prices. I also find good deals on grinding discs and other abrasives.

3. Amazon.com - "Tooling around":
I use Amazon for ordering tools, supplies and other essentials.

4. Cyberweld.com - "That's hot":
I find pretty good prices on welding equipment, hoods, glasses, aprons and other saftey gear on this site.

5. Jeff Lilly Restorations - "That's how you do that!":
This site has some pretty cool how-to s on car restorations. VERY informative.

Day 41 – Outer Wheelhouse 3

2010-09-12T11:13:00.000-07:00

Today I started the tedious task of removing the outer wheel house. This panel was sandwiched in some places between two other panels, removing it was a bit of a pain. I also had to cut away part of the mount that welds to the top of the wheel house.

I also fitted the lower valance. It’s clamped into place but, but I need to level out the car and then level out the rear valance.

Day 40 - Wheelhouse 2 and Rear cross member

2010-09-07T11:31:00.000-07:00

Today Travis finished up the Driver side wheel well while I fabricated 2 end pieces for the rear cross member.

The ends were pretty rusted so on the passenger side, I formed 1 piece by hand trying to get the contour right.

The driver side I used 3 individual pieces welded together to form the contour.

After we welded them into place; I ground down the welds and painted the rear cross member with POR-15.

As that was drying, I started on the outer wheel house. To get a better view of the wheel house, I cut around the wheel house to expose the welds. This is where it gets a little scary.

Day 39 Inner wheelhouse 2 / Tail section 1

2010-08-28T19:45:00.000-07:00

Today Travis got right to work on finishing the patching for the passenger side (see previous post). He did have cut a bit of the fender out of the way so he could access both sides of the wheelhouse.

I began work on the rear tail section. I removed the lower valance by using a spot weld drill bit. I pre drilled the holes with a 1/8” bit, while this proved to be much faster, the pilot hole was too big so the bit would move around while trying to drill. This left for somewhat of a messy removal. I would not suggest this tactic if you plan on keeping either panel. I, fortunately, am replacing both so it doesn’t really matter. After the panel was removed I found some pretty serious rust damage on the rear frame on either side. I will have to figure out what I am going to do about this before I can move forward.

Day 38 - Inner Wheelhouse 1

2010-08-21T19:37:00.000-07:00

Today we removed the rear differential and leaf springs. Now we could take a look to see what needed to be done on the inner wheelhouse. The Chargers rear wheelhouse (or inner fender) is split right down the middle lengthwise creating and inner wheelhouse and an outer wheelhouse. Due to the water getting into the trunk, the rust climbed up the inner wheelhouse about 2 inches or so. I could get 2 new inner wheelhouses, but considering that 80% of the wheel house is still good, it makes sense to save the $250 and patch the hole with sheet metal. I am going to be replacing the outer wheelhouse on both sides as they are not only rusted through on the bottom but also along the outer edge that contours the Quarter Panel.

Travis was left to create 3 pieces to patch into the area between what was left of the inner wheelhouse and the new trunk pan. Travis first created a pattern out cardboard that would fit, and then transferred it to sheet metal. Once cut out of the sheet metal, he then cleaned up the edges on the grinding wheel, used the pneumatic hole puncher to create holes for plug welds and finally flanged the inner wheelhouse so the patch panel would fit flush against it. Travis will need to repeat this process 2 more times on this side to finish the patch work.

Day 37 – Trunk 3

2010-08-14T17:54:00.000-07:00

Today Travis continued working on the trunk welding the 2 pans together and to the trunk brace. I finished work on the front suspension of the charger. I was able to install the updated and powder coated upper and lower control arms. All new bushings and reinstall the steering box.

Day 36 - Trunk 2

2010-08-02T09:27:00.000-07:00

This weekend we worked on the trunk, By “We” I mean Travis. Travis got the panels fit and drilled them and also clekoed them in place. Clekos are those pins stinking out of the metal. They allow us to place a piece in place temporarily and remove with ease.

From 2010-07-31 (by Eye-Fi)

Day 35 Trunk 1

2010-08-02T09:20:00.000-07:00

Travis stripped out a lot of the trunk and cleaned up a lot of the rusted areas. Although half of the trunk extsion panel just sort of fell out.

Day 34 - Even Still More Floors

2010-07-06T20:53:00.001-07:00

Travis and I got the rest of the floor in, basically the 2 rear sections of the floor pans. With these installed the floor is complete. We still have to weld a few pieces from the other side and clean up the welds but its a big milestone. Now we are on to the trunk.

Day 33 - More Floors

2010-06-21T07:56:00.000-07:00

Today, Travis and I got the Driver side floor in. This time around it was a little bit more difficult the new floor pan required some…” persuasion” to fit properly. After some negotiating with a hammer, we got the panel settled in and began to hammer and dolly the panel to fit. Travis began welding and we were off. We did hit a snag where the pan wasn’t making contact with floor brace. So we had to grind and re-drill the pan, hammer it down then re-weld.

Day 32 - Passenger Floor Installation

2010-06-01T10:13:00.000-07:00

This weekend we busted out the welder and started putting the floor back in. We were using “0.23” welding wire which was pretty forgiving on the sheet metal but proved to be a bit more difficult welding the sheet metal to the frame. I also found I should have used many more plug welds to secure the floor to the floor supports. We will probably have to drill a few more just to secure the floor a little bit more. Travis cut out the driver side after we had the passenger side welded in. We just need to reset the Driver side panel tape line and then perform a few final cuts and it should be ready to weld.

Passenger Floor Removal pt 2

2010-05-25T12:27:00.000-07:00

Today, Travis and I finished cutting out the floor. We then grinded down all the welds and re fit the panel.

We then re-drew the line in masking tape for our final cut. We left about 1/2 inch of the original panel on the inside so we could flange it and have a small over lap. While the floor was in place, I went under the car with a can of spray paint and sprayed the edges of the support brackets. This gave us an exact placement of the supports so I could pre drill the panel for plug welds.

We sanded down all the edges and spots that would be welded to ensure proper contact and fusion.

We flanged the panel on the inside and placed the floor pan for a final fit. Lastly, we riveted the panel in place. We should be able to begin welding next weekend.

Day 31 - Time to Rip, Grind and Burn!

2010-05-15T21:24:00.000-07:00

The front end still has a lot of work to deal with, so while I try to get more tools in working order, Travis stopped by and started the cutting. We first placed the new floor on top of the old one. A couple of brackets were in the way so Travis had to grind down the welds on each bracket and remove them. Now with a closer to true fit for the floor, we masked off a line where the New Floor pan will sit (beige). We then masked off another 2 inches below that for our cut line (blue). Once set Travis used the cut-off wheel to remove the center section of our old floor pan.

Here is the section cut out. Quick note, The air hammer was great at seperating the panels. Here you can see the section of floor pan we are seperating from the support:

Day 30 (Front End 2)

2010-04-26T22:41:00.000-07:00

I cleaned up the front end crossmember and engine bay. I then applied the POR-15. It looks pretty good now, but I will have to touch up some parts of it tomorrow.

Day 29 (Front End 1)

2010-04-26T22:24:00.001-07:00

Today I took apart the front end. I had to remove the upper arm first, then the four bolts that hold the front end on. Once I lowered the front end the stress was removed from the torsion bar. The front end just slid off.

Day 28 (More Primer)

2010-04-17T18:32:00.000-07:00

Today, Travis gave me a hand priming the car. I already noticed some rust on the car starting to accumulate on the charger. So we started by vacuuming the car out. The car was media blasted with wall nut shells so the stuff was everywhere. I would normally just blow it out with the air hose but I think that would have just spread it everywhere. Next time I am going to blow it off outside then vacuum it. I masked off the front half while Travis vacuumed. Since the front have is mostly going to be treated with POR-15, I didn't see the point in premiering it.

Once done, we wiped the whole car down with Lacquer Thinner, and started to apply the primer. We used the same Primer as before, just a lot more of it. We went through about a half gallon of the Primer. Anyway, here are the Pics...

Day 27 (Car is back from blasting)

2010-04-09T13:53:00.000-07:00

I got the charger back from blasting. Its not as bad as I imagined but its still pretty bad. Here is a link to the photo album of the pictures.

Car After

Day 27 (More Primer)

2010-04-05T22:07:00.000-07:00

I flipped the parts and primered again. Here are the pics...

Day 26 (Garage Modifications and primer)

2010-04-05T00:04:00.000-07:00

I had to make a few modifications to my garage to set it up as a paint booth...

I put the first coat of primer on the parts. The gun spatterd a bit but got better as I painted. I talked to my dad and he mentioned I may need to increase the PSI.

I used PPG DP40LP Primer with DP402LF catalyst. The mixture is 2 parts Primer and 1 part catalyst.

Here are the pics...

Day 25 (Parts back, Time to get started)

2010-04-03T00:39:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I swaped the parts for the car today. It looks like it will be a few days before I see the girl again so I have to get the parts done before she gets back. We can see the what the parts look like now after the sandblasting. Each part had some damage to it. Mostly minor except a few.

Doors Outside:

Doors Inside:

Door Handle Damage Outside Driver:

Door Side View Mirror Damage Outside Driver:

Door Skin Damage Outside Passenger:

Door Handle Damage Outside Passenger (minor crack):

How to F*$% UP A DRIVER DOOR STRIKER PLATE:

How to REALLY REALLY F*$% UP A PASSENGER DOOR STRIKER PLATE:

Hood Outdside:

Hood Inside:

Hood Damage Outside Driver Front:

Hood Damage Outside Driver Rear:

Fenders Outside:

Fenders Inside:

Fender Damage Outside Driver:

Fender Damage Outside Driver 2:

Fender Damage Outside Driver 3:

Fender Damage Outside Driver 4:

Fender Damage Outside Passenger:

Deck Lid Inside:

Deck Lid Damage Inside Driver:

Deck Lid Damage Inside Passenger:

Deck Lid Outside:

Now that the parts are back its time for some POR-15 under coating. This is somewhat of a super strong rust preventive paint. The best part is that it can be brushed on by a paint brush. This seemed easy in my mind, however, trying to fit a paintbrush in a door shell proved to be quite difficult. I went ahead and painted the inside of the 2 inner fenders and the inner doors. I did make a mess of a few areas. I should have maked off ALL the holes as paint seeped out of a few holes here and there. I will have to clean these up tomorrow before I shoot the primer.

Day 24 (Steering Gear and a blast)

2010-04-01T14:01:00.000-07:00

GOOD MORNING! I am excited, can you tell? Today I took the fenders, deck lid, hood and doors over to the media blaster this morning, which happens to be located about 6 blocks from my house. I know what you’re thinking, “but what about the car?” and I’ll tell you. This is by design. I am having the parts media blasted first, and then once they are done I am going to swap them for the car. This leaves half of my garage open so I can primer the parts first and let them set up. Once the car is back I can load into the garage and primer it right away with the parts already done.
When I got home today, I went straight to the garage to remove the steering gear and finish removing the brake lines. I called my dad earlier and ask for advice regarding the steering gear and said bolt it back on and hit it with a hammer. So I did but it didn’t work. So I did what any good mechanic would do … I got a huge sledge and smashed the living hell out of it. Turns out that did the trick. The bearing came loose and I could easily remove the steering gear. In my new found excitement I focused on the brake lines and had them removed in no time. The car is now ready for media blasting .. WOOT!...

Before the Blast:

Fenders Outside:

Fenders Inside:

Doors Outside:

Doors Inside:

Hood Outside:

Hood Inside:

Deck Lid Outside:

Deck Lid Inside:

Day 23 (Shocks & Lines and one stubborn wheel)

2010-04-01T13:49:00.001-07:00

Today Grant and Lenny stopped by and gave me a hand with a few things. Thank god they did, because I ran into a pretty serious problem that could only be solved by having all 3 of us there. It started out easy enough, Grant removed some left over rear trim, while Lenny and I started working on the removing the steering gear. Grant was successful in removing his part, Lenny and I, well, not so lucky. We decided to leave the steering gear alone and tackle the shocks.
I decided it would be a lot easier to remove the shocks if we removed the wheels first. In attempting to remove the passenger front wheel we had a small issue. Grant kept turning on the one lug nut and it just kept turning without loosening. We tried to tighten it, same thing. It just kept turning. This meant that the stud that was pressed through the axle plate was stripped. Also since there was no way to get behind said stud, we were stuck.
We tried pulling on it, pushing on it, turning the wheel each way. Then a Hail Mary idea, if we put tension on the wheel equally pulling in the direction of removing the wheel, we should be able to cause enough tension on the stud to make it to grab on the interior of the axle plate. With Grant on one side and me on the other we wedged crowbars between the wheel and the drum brake hub and pried for dear life while Lenny used the tire iron to turn the lug nut. After about 2 mins, we found some success. It was another 20+ minutes to get the rest of the lug nut off and subsequently the wheel and I then removed the bad stud.
After this colossal battle we got back to work, the shocks were removed as well as the brake lines, Grant cut out the manual/parking brake cable. The fuel line was removed along with some really old fuel that was still in the line. As matter of fact I think it’s starting to make me a bit woozy…. *WAM*.

Day 22 (Brake Lines and other Stuff Removal)

2010-03-21T20:29:00.000-07:00

I was able to tackle part of the brake lines today. I had to clean the brake line and the wrench then hammer the wrench on to line then broke loose the nut and had to pry the wrench off. I also removed the equalizer bar and a few patch panels.
Still left to do:
- Finish removing the brake lines
- Remove shocks
- Remove fuel line
- Remove any loose clips

Day 21 (Trim Removal cont.)

2010-03-21T20:28:00.000-07:00

Travis once again came over and removed parts with the speed of a mongoose. He was removing parts faster than I could tag and bag them. He removed the front and rear windshield molding clips which we were all rusted. In addition, he was able to remove the exterior window trim on both sides, as well as drill out a few screws that were so rusted, that when a screwdriver was applied, the screw started to disintegrate. We also removed the trunk hinges. We did get stuck on the brake lines. I hope to tackle this tomorrow. I cleaned up the garage a bit and took a load of stuff to the dump including the exhaust pipes we removed the week before.

Day 20 (Trim Removal)

2010-03-21T20:25:00.000-07:00

Travis came over today and we started removing many little parts for the sandblasting. Travis and I were able to remove the rear windshield, and cut out the exhaust pipes.

Day 19 - Engine Removal

2008-04-20T18:00:00.000-07:00

Ok ok ok… I get it … its been a while. A long while… but anyway… Today my dad came over and we pulled the motor and transmission out.

We had to first disconnect the driveline from the rear differential by removing the universal joint. We then pulled the driveshaft free of the transmission, letting it drain into a pan. I went ahead and removed the distributor and sealed the intake with masking tape.

I then removed the lines running from the transmission to the radiator and then removed the radiator. With the Radiator removed I was able to easily remove the fan, fan belts and disconnected the power steering lines.

My dad removed the 4 bolts holding in the transmission mount in and disconnected the 3 prong electrical plug which ran to the windshield wiper for some reason, not totally sure what it is. He then used a cut-off wheel to just cut the exhaust pipes instead of trying to fiddle with rusted bolts.

We then removed the motor mount bolts and hoisted the motor up and out of the engine bay.

Next time I am going to build a cart for the engine as well as removing the rear window and trim.

Day 18 - Dash removal and engine labeling

2007-03-13T20:08:00.000-07:00

Today, the A-Team stopped by (Mike, Paul and Tami) to give me a hand removing the dash components. We labeled the wirirng and removed the wind shield. Then after moving the steering wheel down and disconnecting the heater vents the dash came out. Up next will be the engine and tranny removal.

Day 17 - Field Trip #2

2007-03-13T19:32:00.000-07:00

This time Paul, Mike and I went to the 51st Annual Portland Roadster Show, take a look..

Day 16 - Fender removal, Rear glass and hardware

2007-02-25T17:50:00.000-08:00

Today my good friend Tami came over and gave me a hand with the car. She removed the front passenger fender and the rear glass, regulator and hardware from both sides. We also compression tested the motor and I found 1 cylinder a little lower than the others. So we will have to look into that later.

Compression test results:

Cylinder --------Pressure
1 ------------------105
2 ------------------105
3 ------------------103
4 ------------------102
5 ------------------100
6 ------------------115
7 -------------------90
8 ------------------105

For reference a diagram of the motor is below:

Day 15 - Field Trip! (Rod and Custom)

2007-02-18T21:20:00.000-08:00

Today was a field trip; my friend Paul and I went to the Rod and Custom Show at the Expo Center. I was mostly looking at interesting color combonations. Some notable cars:

This one was a very Interesting color combonation. Just Unique.

This a brillant shade of orange

Another good combonation.

Other Photos:

Day 14 - Front Valance and Grill Removal

2007-02-18T20:47:00.000-08:00

Today I was able to remove the lower valance and grill. This took some work, it seemed after every time I thought I had it all disconnected there would be more hidden bolts.

Day 13 - Front Bumper Removal

2007-02-18T20:18:00.000-08:00

Today, my good friend Mike came over and helped me remove the hood and bumper. We had to remove the 2 center bolts and then the supports that ran to the frame. Once the support bolts were removed we were able to slide the bumper forward enough to remove the other bolts.

Day 12 - Driver side door

2007-02-11T20:11:00.000-08:00

Today I removed the driver side door. After removing the passenger door hardware I realized there is no freaking way I am going to remember how all this crap went together. so I took a few pictures of the inside of the door, before dissaembling it.

So then I went ahead removed the hardware and the door. It really is amazing how much of the body is the door.

awww.... there doors! ... how cute....

Day 11 - Passenger side door

2007-02-10T21:14:00.000-08:00

Today I disassembled the door glass and locking mechanisms and removed the door hardware. I then removed the door from the car. In doing so, I cut my freaking thumb. That's it for the day ... Time for a soda.

Day 10 - Window Moldings

2007-02-10T21:01:00.000-08:00

Today I went ahead and removed the front and rear windshield trim. along with the upper window trim on both sides. This took a long time because the PO poured a clear silicone over the windshield trim. This took a lot of cutting and work to remove the silicone and clips.

Day 9 - Rust Mort the floors

2007-01-29T17:34:00.000-08:00

Rust mort is a rust inhibitor, it converts rust to black or grayish, hard, insoluble, protective coating.

Then just applied with a small brass wire brush. I applied about 2 thin coats and I will let it sit over night.

Day 8 - Doors and Floor Pan Rust

2007-01-27T19:17:00.000-08:00

Today we wanted to tackle the driver side door and the floor. My friend Paul came over once again to give me hand. WHAT A SUCKER! Lol jk.

Paul went ahead and removed the door panel and hardware.

We went over to the home depot and picked up a few things:

A wire brush attachment for one of the grinders. (This is for getting into the groves of the floor pans)

A few wire brushes of various sizes (This for any detailed cleaning that needs to be done)
A box of dust masks
- For those of you who don’t believe in the use of dust masks, here are ours after just a few hours.

The top one is a new one, the lower left one is Paul’s and the lower right one is mine.

Lacquer thinner (This is for cleaning surfaces just before painting.)
Masking tape (Masking off any areas you don’t want paint on.)
Welding gloves (The wire brushing attachment for the grinder is dangerous and hell
on the hands, so I got these to protect the hands and help with the vibration.)

This took some serious grinding to clean up these floor pans.

When using the sanding pad you will notice it sparking when you hit seams or rust, nothing to worry about, just keep going.

Here are the floor pans ...

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

Day 7 - Clean Up and Seat Stands

2007-01-22T22:30:00.000-08:00

Today I just tried to clean the garage and build some stands for the bucket seats. Because the seats seem to be in pretty good condition, I wanted to protect them. These car seats bolt right to the floor I made some stands so the studs wouldn’t get damaged.

First I took a piece of plywood and cut it to the length and width of the foot print of the seat.

I then set it on the studs then marked where the studs are on the wood. I drilled out the holes and made sure it fit.

I then attached a couple of 2X4 s to the bottom so that the seat can sit on the floor without sitting on the studs.

Day 6 - Interior Removal

2007-01-21T01:17:00.000-08:00

Today my friend Paul came over and helped me remove the interior. The seats seem to be in pretty good condition as does the center console.

That’s about where the good news ends. The floor as you can see is rusted in a couple of spots. I am going to have to cut those parts out and weld in some new floors. Most of it does seem to be surface rust so it’s not that bad.

We also removed all the door hardware off the passenger side.

I am bit concerened about the door striker and stirinking unit. It looks pretty mangeled but I won't know anything till the paint comes off.

During this part of the project we found countless screws that weren’t the correct ones or they just used self tapping screws to fasten what ever they needed to. This was not a very stellar job done by however we tagged and bagged everything.

Day 5 - Research

2007-01-20T22:30:00.000-08:00

We put the charger on the trailer and took it to a body shop and got a quote for how much it would be to do all the metal work and paint on the outside (excluding the trunk floors). Jeff and Randy at Womack Auto Body at 9831 SE Powell Blvd. Portland Oregon were great. Jeff had explained that the entire passenger rear quarter panel that was pictured on day 4 would be about $2,200 dollars to fix. Yeah, that’s just the metal work. He also mentioned that the way the doors are put together on these old cars it will eventually rust through on the lower part of the doors. What they do is cut the corners off of the bottoms of the door to get inside of it and treat the rust and replace the corner with a new piece of sheet metal. He also could just tell the front part of the driver side fender was bondo under the paint. He then stepped back and said for all the exterior metal and paint work, it would be about $15,000 to $20,000 depending on much more metal damage there is. I then asked him “what about just the Primer and paint?” He said if you get the body all straightened out it would be about $4,000 - $6,000. He then proceeded to describe their primer/paint process. It is as follows:

Primer Car
Block Sand Car at 180 grit
Primer Car
Block Sand Car at 320 grit
Primer Car
Foam Block Sand the Car at 500 grit
Primer Car
Foam Block Sand the Car at 800 grit
Base Coat (this is usually the color of the car)
Clear Coat ( I didn’t’ ask how many clear coats)

We then took the car over to my dad’s friend who is also does bodywork and paint. He said that if I buy all the sheet parts for the car he would do all the metal work and paint for about $6,500. This of course sounded more reasonable. I then asked how about if all the metal work was done. He said about $5,000. There were only 2 problems. First, he didn’t know when he could get my car in. He had a crap load of cars in the back that all needed some body work. The second thing was his process was a little different. His was as follows:

Primer Car
Block Sand Car at 180 grit
Primer Car
Block Sand Car at 180 grit
Primer Car
Block Sand the Car at 320 grit
Primer Car
Block Sand the Car at 400 grit
Base Coat (again, this is usually the color of the car)
Clear Coat (again, I didn’t’ ask how many clear coats)

So those are kind of my choices and its a lot to think about. Since my car won’t be worked on anytime soon I think my next step is to get the car media blasted and see what I really have to work with, metal wise.

Day 4 - Rear Quarter Part 2

2007-01-10T23:28:00.000-08:00

Today I cleaned up the rest of the bondo and primer and got the quarter panel down to the metal for the most part.

I then just wiped the dust off and applied some automotive spray primer from a spray can.

Day 3 - Rocker Panel

2007-01-10T23:24:00.000-08:00

Today I just continued to grind the rocker panel all the way to the lower section of the fender. There is one bad spot just passed the driver side door on the rocker panel.

Day 2 - Quarter Panel Part 1

2007-01-10T23:12:00.000-08:00

The next thing we will be doing is getting quotes for how much it would be to do the body work on this charger. To get accurate bids, I will be removing the paint and bondo layers to reveal any troubled spots. This will mostly consist of sanding down the rear section of the vehicle and exposing the rusted areas. My good friend Paul came over to help with the sanding. We will be concentrating on the driver side quarter panel. The car seemed to have a few layers on top of the metal, you had the metal then a red primer (possibly from the factory) then a pale yellow then a gray primer then a vibrant yellow, bondo, then the silver paint you see on the car

Upon closer inspection you can see where they used fiberglass once again, this time to create a look of the lower quarter panel. This piece will have to be replaced.

The Rear Valance also has some bad spots as you can see.

Day 1 The Project Begins, Trunk Floor Rust

2007-01-10T13:04:00.000-08:00

So I have started an endeavor to restore this charger and Make is a General Lee replica.

When I got the car, I knew it was leaking gas from the tank. I happen to have another tank for a charger so I began to remove the original tank from the 69. After disconnecting the sending unit, fuel line and tank straps, I found that the tank that should have fallen down, just sat there. I then noticed that some type of nesting material was poking through the bottom of the trunk floor. I then opened the trunk to find the trunk solid but with some type of coating kind of like a rhino lining or something. I took a hammer and crowbar and chiseled a piece of the coating off to find that the whole trunk was coated with fiberglass. That was the nesting material that was peeking through the bottom of the trunk floor. Someone had fiberglassed the entire trunk floor. Now, I should explain that these cars are known for rust in the trunk floors and what you typically do is replace the trunk pans. Which are parts that you can get from Year One©. Now what these guys did was fiber glass over the old trunk without treating ANY of the rust, so that trunk continued to rust even under the fiber glass. After removing the fiberglass I found the trunk pretty rusted out, here is a pic of a similar trunk

We went ahead and cut out half of the trunk floor as to not weaken the body too much while we are replacing the trunk pans. Here is the half of the trunk we removed.

We will probably have to build up part of the wheel well that connects to the trunk pan. As you can see there are some holes there as well.