New Zealand 1963 T34

[John Kanters]

Had a play around trying to shrink the oil can effect on the rear panel with limited success, more than anything it seems to shift the high spot more towards the rear of the car rather than getting rid of it.
What did work fairly well was to mig weld a couple of blobs on the inside of the panel right in the middle of the high spot which seems to have pulled in most of it.
Also brought out the swage line most of the way with a very wide chisel and hammer which has brought out the panel above and below the swage with it.


It still needs a bunch more work before I'm happy to leave it be, as I don't want to just put filler back in.
Nothing wrong with filler in limited amounts but I'm trying to learn how to do hammer / file work so I'll try to get it as good as I can.
The drivers rear wheel arch had taken a nudge too at some stage so a scissor jack was handy in that area to push the fender lip back out to where it should be.
That brings me to yesterday, planned to do blasting again but really bit off more than I could chew and just worked on too big of an area to get completed in one day, started at 11 and worked through to 3-3.30 when I finished priming everything after which I still had 2 hours of sweeping up / cleaning to do
Our yard out back looked like a beach by the time I finished.
All in all a very exhausting day......
Sooooo lesson learned, do smaller areas next time!
Still its nice to go from a big rusty mess to clean primer, no more RUST!! Rust holes yes........

[John Kanters]

The fun continues, my shoulder is killing me from Saturday but that isn't going to stop me! The things we do haha!
Anyways I managed some more cutting last night and opened up the rear fender, most of the bottom section will be replaced with new metal as patching it isn't really a viable option.
While I have a big open hole like this I'll blast and prime the inside of the rear 1/4 as well.

[Richard Jones]

amazing work !
unreal buddy !

[John Kanters]

With the weather a bit iffy this morning I carried on repairing the rear lower corner of the body, started with making the new section for the inner fender and its not hard to see why these darn things rust
Perfect dirt / water trap between the 2 skins with no way out, I'll make a nice little drain gully in the new panels to avoid this problem in future.
Next up is the lower inner panel which I still need to cut a hole in for the drain pipe coming from the rear tray, starting to look a whole lot better.

A couple of these panels have some pretty complex shapes, easy enough to make in a dirty big press but by hand not so much.
Struggled quite a bit with the outer skin but here its roughed in and starting to take the correct shape.
Didn't help either that the other 2 panels I made are not yet welded so everything tends to move around a little.

Formed the wheel arch a little better, cut to size and little by little got it to fit pretty nice.
Its all just held with weld clamps and vise grips right now and once primed inside the 1/4 I'll begin welding them in.
All in all a great day to be in the shop working on the car!

[John Kanters]

Cut some more bits off...............Ohh lordy!!!
Rockers are coming off next.........


There are 5 bolts on the door edge of the front fender, once these are removed is there just mastic holding the 2 panels together?
Didn't force anything yet as it seems quite solid.

[Jürgen Klein]

These 5 bolts will be used when you install and adjust the (new) front fenders . Fix the fenders with this screws , adjust all and then weld the parts together . It was a great help as I disconnect my front of the 34 completely . Cutting under the front trunk rubber , at the front end of the rockers and in front of the windshield corners . So this screws are the last things to hold the front ...And the first !
Jürgen

[John Kanters]

Thanks Jurgen, as it turned out it was just sticky mastic holding the fender on.
Managed a very productive day yesterday and its true what they say..........cars rust from the inside out!
Rockers looked not too bad from the outside but in reality is rotten as a pear, tried to take it off as complete as possible so that I can copy it when I make a new one.
At the A pillar is where the real horrors are, everything pretty much rusted through, including the pipe for the heaters that goes up to the windscreen is rusted through as well.

Kept picking away at the front pillar trying to remove pieces layer by layer to understand how it all goes together once new panels are made.
I might change some of the construction in there is its just a huge rust trap the way it was from factory, not that my car will go out in harsh weather but still.......


All of that work took me up to lunchtime so with the weather looking good I did some more blasting, mainly inside the right rear 1/4 panel and also at the rear air intake which had some serious rust at the bottom of it that was cut out during the week.
Problem with blasting the inside of the rear 1/4 is that you can't see anything at all so its pure guesswork, sand and dust just blows out of every orifice making it impossible to see anything.
You pretty much have to stop and let the dust clear to see what you did then best guess and carry on to get the whole area clean.
Got there in the end and primed it, also managed to blast / prime the inside of the rocker as well which was a bonus for today.
I'm currently debating wether to take that strengthening plate off too to be able to get inside the heater channel as there will no doubt be rust in there too

[John Kanters]

Been carrying on with repairing the rear fender and with my shrinking disc arriving from the States I put that to use.
The rear 1/4 panel that had previously been repaired poorly was of course wobbly as under all the bondo they smeared over the repair, with it all ground out the panel itself had waves big enough to sail a yacht on!
The shrinking disc is just a stainless disc for a grinder which you can use to shrink metal back to its original shape, have read about it many times and now finaly bought one.............WOW, just amazing how well it works!
Not often I'm impressed with tools I buy but this thing is amazing, in just a few hours I have the rear 1/4 just about finished, 95% of dents / waves gone..............little to no bondo needed
To start with I sanded the area to reveal all the lows, marked them with a magic marker and set about raising each low one by one with a dolly / slapstick.

itself makes the whole area a lot better but still leaves high spots so you then hit those with the shrinking disc which when rapidly cooled with water tightens up the whole area.
Also used it to straighten up the welded area where I welded the new fender bottom on with brilliant results...............well happy!!
Yesterday I carried on with finishing off the rear fender and installing the water drain pipe which turned out to be a complete nightmare to get in the right place so that the plastic hose would fit nicely, got there in the end though.

That took me most of the morning to finish off so next job was to start looking at repairing the rotten A pillar, mainly the rusted through heater pipe and its support plate.
The support plate which incorporates the end plate for the rocker was easy to make but the heater pipe not so much, quite a lot of fiddling around to get that to fit nicely.
With those made I primed the areas I worked on and also the plate which I will weld on next.
With this out of the way I can start looking at making a new outer rocker next! progress!!

[John Kanters]

Just a little update from the last few nights pottering away on the car, started making the RH rocker and after some trial an error we have a RESULT!
Which I'm very happy with by the way, had a lot of difficulty putting the step in both ends for the outer fenders to go over but with a little thought and the shrinking disc all came right.


Pitty my sheet of electro galv isn't wide enough to do the whole rocker but in some ways making it in 2 sections is a little more managable anyways.
Made the rear section and welded it on, still some fitting / trimming to do and drill the trim holes too before I weld it on.
Making these you realise what an absolute bargain Jurgen's rocker sets are, for me though its a little different as its just time and I'm learning something in the process.

[John Kanters]

With all that effort gone into making a new rocker today was the payoff with welding it on the body.
Quite a big step forward again in the fight against rust, a couple of days ago I painted the inside of the heater chanel with some tough chassis black and at the same time painted the inside of the new rocker panel so hopefully it should last longer than the original.
Started out this morning trimming the new panel to size and annoyingly cut off too much at the rear
With it sitting where I wanted it and carefull measurements taken front and rear I began welding it on, really slow process welding a panel this long having to let it cool right down to keep distortion at a minimum.


The temptation is just to go for it but that will bite you with severe warping due to the heat and since I can't get to the inside after wards I just took my time, the welding came out ACE!
Little to no distortion so no bondo will be required here!
Once the welds were ground up I moved on to capping the end of the heater channel at the A pillar, new section fabbed up that was pretty easy to weld on.
The factory has a real rust trap here with a gully of sorts at the end of the heater channel that fills up with dirt and water so I eliminated that and did it my way which should be a lot better.

By now it was around 2pm and the day had been fantastic so far so I just carried on and started to make the final piece of the front wheelhouse / A pillar.
Bit of messing around trying to get the shape I wanted but it came out really well and pretty much just like it was when new.
Still have some rust treatment to do there so didn't weld this piece in yet.

Final piece for the day was the inner fender at the rear where the torsion cover is, also rusted through so new piece made and fitting pretty good.
Will continue here next week by cutting the hole and final trimming it to size and probably start looking at making the outer fender panel which will nearly complete one whole lower side of the car!! YAY ;D

[John Kanters]

Just about ready to weld the next piece on, finished up the rear lower fender tonight.
Been working on this piece every night this week, bit harder to make as its a thicker gauge steel.
Started out cutting a rough shape of what I wanted and then rolled the lower edge to match the new rocker, made a good cock up folding the edge which I hadn't realised tapered off towards the back of the car so had to flatten it back out and re do it
At this stage its being trimmed to fit the hole...................quite a big hole too


Happy with the fit I cut the 1/4 panel further above the swage line so that once welded I can work on the weld from both sides.

Next job was the torsion housing cover plate, the old panel has a recess for the cover plate and if I attempted that by hand you'd make a meal out of it so I made a really simple press tool to do the job for me.
Just a lump of steel with the right size step machined in to it and a male plug for the other side all located with a pin in the center.
First test piece was a little deep for my liking so after a couple of adustments I got what I wanted and was ready for the big moment!

You only really get one shot at this sort of thing hence the test piece!
With everything lined up and double checking the step was going inwards not outwards the press did the rest, easy peasy.



Last thing was to drill the trim holes, drain holes and make the recess where the jack point is so everything is primed now ready for welding tomorow so with a little luck that will complete the whole rear fender area.

[John Kanters]

Spent most of the day welding on my rustbucket, couple of visitors during the day made a nice break too.
Anywhoo the repair section is on for good and looks awesome, took ages to weld it but still distorted a fair bit so with both sides ground flat I used the slap stick and dolly to straighten it out some.
Found that this thicker material needed to be smacked a bit harder so I quickly made another slapper (no smart arse comments please! ;D) out of a bigger heavier file which worked a treat and soon beat it in to shape.
Plug welded the wheel arch and filed it to shape by hand completing that side of the body...................for now......................

Last job for the day I took the rear part of the rotisserie off to gain access to the rust hole in the rear apron, bare metaled the whole thing first get a better idea of what I'm dealing with.
Few wobbles in the lower part of it too which will need attention at the same time.
Its interesting how much wear there is in the rotating part of the rotisserie from all the sand that's got in there, thankfully its not a critical part

[John Kanters]

Bit more progress this week, with the rear cradle removed I could finaly repair the rust hole in the back panel.
Patch made, welded it in and ground up and also knocked all the dents out as well as straightening up the lower edge of the apron which had seen some abuse over the years.
Just the inner piece at the air intake to finish off tomorow but I'll put it back in the rotisserie first making life easy again.
Hopefully I can make a start on doing exactly the same thing all over but on the other side :roll:

[John Kanters]

Had a bit of a lazy day today, finished up welding the patch in the air intake this morning and decided that I should finish stripping the remaining paint off the rear cowl area and also the left rear 1/4 panel.
With the work on the apron complete for now the rear part of the rotisserie could go back on to make the body mobile again.
Weather was pretty nice considering its winter so wheeled it outside and tore into getting the paint stripped off completing the paint removal of the whole rear section of the body.
Once that was done I did an acid wash to make sure that any rust was dealt with and epoxy primed it wrapping up another day! Home early for a cold one!

[John Kanters]

Not much to report lately, bought a new company vehicle (2010) which I've been busy pulling apart to "improve" :lol:
So while thats been going on the Ghia has just sat in a corner, managed a couple of hours on it today but only drilled out a bunch of spot welds on the drivers side rocker.
have sourced a 912 electric sunroof clip which is on its way over here, most parts look the same as T34 so that should do the job hopefully.