We're bringin' back the Flat Tops!

[motorman7]

14 hours ago, Gav240z said:

Looking forward to seeing how the powdercoating turns out, how many coats will they do?

With the powdercoating, I am pretty sure it is just one heavy coat.  I like the powdercoat for the durability and it's protection from fluids such as gas and oil.

[wheee!]

So you might want to get a powder coating kit and try using the infra red lamps for curing. It works wonders for large, irregular items.

[motorman7]

A lot of progress with the body work removing rusted out sections, dogleg repair, aligning the rear hatch lines and bumper attach points.

[motorman7]

Got parts back from the Powder coat shop.   I love working with fresh clean parts.  The shocks arrive tomorrow, Energy suspension kit will be here Wednesday, and my zinc plated parts should be here by Friday.  Nice to have all this coming together.  I will do a little suspension pre-assembly while I wait for the body.....which will be a while.

The splash pan is a little pock marked but not bad.  Fortunately it is not a highly visible part.

On 9/4/2018 at 9:33 AM, wheee! said:

So you might want to get a powder coating kit and try using the infra red lamps for curing. It works wonders for large, irregular items.

I will have to look into that some day.   Although, I really like taking the parts to powder coat shop because they degrease and sand blast the parts clean.  Plus they are relatively cheap given what they produce.

[wheee!]

Looks great! You are lucky to have a good powder shop nearby. My experience was not so good here. I paid hundreds of dollars for two exhaust tips to be powder coated. I never got a quote under $200 for any one piece... way too expensive for all powder work I have done. My home kit cost under $500...

[motorman7]

The plated parts arrived today, all 44 pounds worth.  The parts look great, not sure if the pictures do them justice.

I got the shocks out of the struts...finally.  Actually the rears came out pretty easy.  The fronts were not so easy.  I soaked the left front strut for about a week in Kroil and PB blaster before finally tapping the strut off of the shock.  Can you guess which two shocks were in the front from the picture below? ?

The nuts that held the shocks in were also a challenge.  I ended up heating the strut with my map gas torch and then putting ice on the nut, then loosening.  That seemed to work pretty well. 

Also, note the 'Mulholland' shocks.  Those are pretty retro.  Not sure if they are around an more.  Anyway, I will now clean up the struts, paint them, and then assemble with the nice new parts: KYB's, Energy suspension kit and newly plated fasteners.  This is the fun part. 

Edited September 18, 2018 by motorman7

[motorman7]

On 9/10/2018 at 9:33 PM, wheee! said:

Looks great! You are lucky to have a good powder shop nearby. My experience was not so good here. I paid hundreds of dollars for two exhaust tips to be powder coated. I never got a quote under $200 for any one piece... way too expensive for all powder work I have done. My home kit cost under $500...

The cost for the powder coating is roughly $15 per part.  When you consider that they de-grease, sand blast,  cover threads and bearing surfaces, and then paint each part, the cost is pretty reasonable here.

Edited September 19, 2018 by motorman7

[jayhawk]

On 9/17/2018 at 8:53 PM, motorman7 said:

Also, note the 'Mulholland' shocks.  Those are pretty retro.  Not sure if they are around an more.  Anyway, I will now clean up the struts, paint them, and then assemble with the nice new parts: KYB's, Energy suspension kit and newly plated fasteners.  This is the fun part. 

 

According to my logbook, I installed those Mullholland shocks in August 1980 (odometer then was 118,717 miles). So they are only 38 years old with only 70,000 miles on them.  Gee, are you sure you can't just rebuild them?  <grin>

[motorman7]

3 hours ago, jayhawk said:

According to my logbook, I installed those Mullholland shocks in August 1980 (odometer then was 118,717 miles). So they are only 38 years old with only 70,000 miles on them.  Gee, are you sure you can't just rebuild them?  <grin>

Actually, I did a quick check on eBay to see if we could sell them as 'antiques'. ?

[motorman7]

I disassembled the bumpers this evening and tapped the two of the rear bumperettes into shape.  The center section of the rear bumper is a bit tweaked, so hopefully the chrome shop can clean that up. They do some pretty impressive repair work. 

I also straightened up the one rear support bracket.  I will probably send the brackets out for powder coating a little later.

[jayhawk]

That rear bumper took the only hit (other than door dings) the car ever suffered.  I was stopped at a stop light on a rainy day, when a fellow came up behind me too fast, and he braked too late in the wet.  Bang!   Insurance paid me in 1987 or ''88 for the repairs, so now I'm finally getting that done! 

[motorman7]

I adjusted the valves on the motor and added a few more of the plated parts.  Started working on the suspension assembly.  I should have all of the suspension pre-assembled before the body gets back from the paint shop.  Ordered some new ball joints today along with the shock/strut bellows,  rack and pinion bellows and tie rod ends.