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Post by John Kanters on Sept 25, 2012 19:49:32 GMT -8
Ok, hinge rebuild time. All of my hinges were well worn out, the drivers door dropping well over an inch so time to put that right. Getting the hinges apart is often difficult as mine were, but with brute force, some heat and a press it came apart. 2 of my pins were worn as well so just a bushing kit wasn't going to work and to be honest I wanted to replace all the pins if possible. I found a Chevrolet Corvette hinge repair kit on Ebay for $16 and decided to see if that would work. In the kit was 4x pins (longer than T34) 8x bronze Chevy size bushes (too small for T34) and 8x oversize bushes (ones which I used) The oversize bushes also had teeth on the outside to help grip in the aluminum hinge which was perfect. First I sandblasted the stripped hinges and arranged them into sets, pictured is the Ebay hinge pin kit. First you must drill out the hinge (door side) where the bushes will go, I used a 12.2mm drill bit (31/64 will also work but not quite as snug fitting) Install the bushes next, I used the new pin to align the bushes to make sure they stay straight and pine up with each other. The washers you can see cover the serated end of the hinge pin and on the other end I just used a socket to protect the new bush. With both ends lined up you simply use a hammer to drive the bushes in, repeat on the other 3. Next is the pillar end of the hinge, the new pins are 8.6mm so I drilled them out to that size. The pin is a nice tight fit that way and the serated end keeps it locked in place. The next thing is to file the opening of the pillar hinges a little bigger (only about 1-2mm) as with the new bushes top and bottom they don't fit inside their counterpart anymore (you could file down the bushes a little bit but I didn't want to mess with them) Check the fit as you go and once fitting you can debur everything and measure the pin length, cut them to size and install them. I filled my hinges with as much grease as I could before driving the pins in. Job done, probably better than they ever were new. You can see how I drilled a hole in the center (did that at the start) so that I can pump them full of grease when on the car.
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Post by John Kanters on Sept 29, 2012 13:50:01 GMT -8
The door hinge rebuild done I could now fit the door to see where it would sit and look at making the front lower fender piece. Bolted the door on and although it sat at the right height I felt something wasn't quite right as the door gap at the front was quite a lot bigger than at the B post. Maybe they are like this factory (almost certain as there's no adjustment for this) but that's just not going to cut it here so I ended up taking the door off and massaging the metal in a little where the hinges bolt on. I now have 5mm at the A post and 4mm at the B post, can almost live with that but may try and get it better. Door lines up pretty nice and ghost line on the 1/4 I replaced seems good as well which is a relief! Happy with the fit of the door meant it was ready for its missing fender piece to be made this weekend so I moved on to making the replacement pieces for the dash. Used a contour gauge on the left side to determine what curve it should have then used the shrinker to replicate that on the patch panel. Quite a few interesting angles and curves on these cars, certainly don't see that anymore these days let alone a metal dash. Both pieces made, welded them and ground up the holes are gone.......... Filled some more random pin holes I found in the pillar and where it meets the roof finishing that for now. That brings us up to yesterday..........I try not to set goals / achievements with this car so that I'm not disappointed if I don't meet them but in the back of my mind I thought it nice to finish the whole right side of the body.................can it be done? Started off with attaching a straight edge to the bottom of the rocker to be able to judge where the lower fender should sit. Pretty quickly I had that section roughed out and sitting there. But...........that was the easy part............ Next comes all the tricky stuff like forming the wheel arch, folded edges etc. Hardest part was where the panel folds a full 180 at the A post, ended up clamping it flat to the bench to be able to hammer it over without distorting the rest of it. Took a little while to work out the best way to do this but it will make the other side a lot easier. Welded it on late afternoon............yes it took the most of the day to make Right hand side is D.O.N.E!!! Few hours left in the day I began looking at the mess on the left front fender and with Lars's panel from Norway turning up during the week I cut out a big section which was to be replaced. The donor section isn't quite the same profile but certainly close enough for me to modify and a whole lot easier than making it from scratch. With a big hole cut I filled the antenna hole some hack cut in there and repaired / metal finished the top of the fender as well as repaired below the cut out metal. Next week I can start looking at shaping up the new piece to go in there, will have to hang that door for that as well (which is full of filler too by the looks)
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Post by John Kanters on Sept 30, 2012 22:01:25 GMT -8
Quick survey of the LH door tonight revealed that in places its full of bondo, did a little excavation, quickly got discouraged and went home...... I'll stripper disc the skin tomorow and see how bad it is, will also need a new lower skin replaced as its pretty rotten and previously filled with bondo. (rust is from the bondo I'm sure as the other door is perfect) Gaps are not nice either so in all a LOT of work will be required to get it to a point where I'm happy but the door needs to be "right" first as the repair of the fender will be based on how the door fits the body.
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 3, 2012 0:51:51 GMT -8
Looks like this project has taken another turn, ground all the layers of paint and bondo off the door and in some places it was 1/2 inch thick. Funny thing was when you hold a straight edge against the good door its pretty flat where as the bad door has a huge bulge in the middle so now that all the bondo is gone its back to being quite flat again. To sum up 3/4 of the bondo did not need to be there!!! Guy must have been blind.
I've started removing the skin from the frame as the bottom of the frame is pretty rusty as is the lower skin plus more drilled holes than you can poke a stick at. Its a lot of work to repair a door but this way I'll be able to repair the frame nicely and replace the lower part of the skin as well, repairing the top of the skin around the razor edge will be a lot easier too with the skin off.
Once that is done I'll figure out how to correct the tight gaps and try to match them to the other side, for me gaps and panel fit are as important as authenticty is to others.........each has their own " thing" I guess.
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 4, 2012 22:51:41 GMT -8
Managed to split the door apart the other night, slightly nervous as to wether it will work out but that door wouldn't be any good to me the way it was so can't really make it any worse by trying to repair it. Quite a mission to peel the outer skin off but finding the right tool for the job made it a litte easier. The frame isn't too bad at all but the skin is another story, Daylight saving started last week so tonight after work I sandblasted both the inner parts of the skin and frame epoxy priming them before going home. Hopefully they will be dry enough to start work on tomorow, the frame needs a few patches in the lower part and the skin needs a whole pile of work top to bottom. I'm feeling a bit more confident now that both parts are clean and I can see whats involved to make it right.
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Post by Jürgen Klein on Oct 6, 2012 8:18:21 GMT -8
rare views , for sure . I`ve never seen the inside of a T34 door like this . Nearly all doors from the big Ghia are rusted down - most bottoms are gone to tin-heaven ..... Have I seen lately that the german dealer Wagner offers the lower third part of the skin as a repair-part ?? See this link : www.karmannghia.dk/downloads/Wagner_news.pdf45€ a side . He , John , today the spare wheel cover from Matthias / Berlin arrived here and now the luggage-compartment mats are also in the parcel . Please send your postal-adress via PN or by email to me so I can start the long journey of the parts ... I whish you a lucky hand for the welding job at the doors . I also have 6 and a half doors waiting for welding jobs to start a second career at other T34 !! Jürgen
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 6, 2012 14:14:03 GMT -8
Yes its quite interesting isn't it, thats part of my intention with this build thread to show how these cars are constructed so that it may help others in the future as there's not much in the way of detailed pictures on the internet. So yesterday the repairs on the door began, starting with the frame which was the easy part! Always start with the easy parts, gives you more time to think about the difficult parts to come Cut out 4 sections of the frame and replaced them, thats the beauty of blasting first.....allows you to see exactly what needs replacing and what is just surface rust. The door frame took most of the morning to weld and grind up but it came out pretty good. While the door is apart it made sense to drill out the rusted screws for the rubber wedge and 1/4 vent frame as these didn't want to budge anymore. After a nice Cafe lunch with a buddy of mine I started on the outer skin in the afternoon, well!! what a mess.............. Suppose its start at the top and work down............... Most of the accident damage is above the razor edge so I started the panel work there, with a quick guide coat of fast drying paint and then block sanding revealed all the lows to be brought up by dolly / slapstick method. The next picture I'm about 3/4 done with the top section, checking the profile as I went with a profile gauge and the finished job after that. With a little time left I worked on re shaping the razor edge and welding up all the holed drilled directly in its flat face, ground those back and got the face a good as I could. Now its a case of deciding what next, do I cut the lower skin off and repair it off the door or mount it back on the frame and repair it that way...........not sure..... Both solutions are fraught with their own problems........
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Post by Lee Hedges on Oct 6, 2012 15:54:15 GMT -8
I'm mesmerized by the level of detail in the body work ... it's like a drug! Give me more!
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 8, 2012 22:03:43 GMT -8
Haha Lee, more pics tomorrow with a bit of luck...... Its too late to turn back...............cut the bottom off the door skin in the guillotine tonight, removed all the rust in one go Also did some measuring of the door openings and have found the reason for the discrepancy in my door gaps, door opening is 3mm shorter on the left side (exactly what I'm missing, 1mm at B post and 2mm at A post) thats the downside of a hand built car although a few Superbeetles I have owned had simmilar issues. Soooooo what to do to rectify, my preference would be to correct the body but that's just not feasible without major surgery so I'm probably going to adjust the door length to suit. Started on making the new lower skin which is going pretty well all things considered, certainly up there on the difficulty scale for me.
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 10, 2012 23:31:48 GMT -8
Worked on the door a bunch this week, tried the frame back on the car and the news was all bad as it had distorted quite badly from all the welding. Didn't fit the body well at all so that was first on the list to correct because if thats wrong then everything will be wrong. With a few cuts, tweaks and welds the frame sat where I wanted so using the old piece of the skin which was cut off as a template I made a new bottom section. All things considered it was pretty easy only taking about an hour to make and came out pretty nice! Test fitted it on the frame to double check. In the middle of the door it didn't meet the frame quite right so a few shrinks in the shrinker of the lower frame edge corrected that and fits really well now. Fitted both skins on the frame to trim them to size and also to tack them together in place, I knew welding this on was going to be tricky to say the least but never thought it would go this badly Last night I started welding them together clamped to the bench but very quickly realized that the joint was pulling badly and distorting completely out of shape (was trying a new method of welding) Thankfully I pulled the plug early and went home before making a mess out of it, thiking about what to do next I came up with a new idea and put that into action tonight. Using the airsaw I cut down the length of the seam inc the welded sections from yesterday and then went back to using my trusty weld clamps. Those things are just the best thing out there, very patiently welding the whole seam over the course of a couple of hours letting it cool between every 5-10 spot welds. Kept distortion to a minimum that way and 1000% better than where I was headed yesterday. Ran the skin through the english wheel a few times which put a bit of a crown back into the panel and clamped it on the frame to see where its at. Still needs a bunch more work to get it straight but its not looking too bad right now, certainly a vast improvement on what I had........ Hopefully sandblast the repairs tomorow and get it ready to install the skin / hammer over the edge this weekend.
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 13, 2012 14:35:13 GMT -8
Door assembly time!! Finally........ Managed to blast and prime the parts on Friday which was lucky as it rained all day yesterday. Started out fitting the skin to the rebuilt frame making sure it was lined up at the bottom so that my previously cut lines are back to where I started. Took some further measurements of the razor edge height to double check things were going to line up. With it all looking ok I started folding the edge over little by little and got a good upper body workout from that swinging a hammer RESULT!! Proof you can make something out of nothing. Mounted the door on the car and was surprised just how good my gaps were, with a twist here and there I was ready to plug weld the skin to the frame as its still moved around a lot at this stage. Welding complete and metal finished the lip I went around the door straightening the edges as good as I could made easier by having the door on the car meaning I used the body as a reference. Me very happy at this point At last back to the point I was at 2 weeks ago, looking at repairing the fender with the piece Lars sent me, now that the door is done I finally have a reference for the fender repair. The shape of the razor edge is surprisingly different front to back (donor piece is from rear fender) but some hammer work on the bench slowly changed the shape to suit. Once happy with the curves I began cutting it to size and final fitting to the body using the door as a giude to make sure the razor edge is straight. It was getting pretty late in the afternoon by the time I started welding but after an hour or so the lower half was done and ground up, last thing for the day I started metal finishing the patch and will complete welding the top half next week then moving on to setting the door gap at the A pillar.
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 17, 2012 23:46:38 GMT -8
Got a bunch more stuff done this week, last few things on the door and finished off the upper fender repair. Last piece of rust repair on the front of the body was the lower fender piece on that side which I made up and welded in. Changing the door gap at the A pillar wasn't easy at all but I'm 90% there now after having the door off and on like 20x Still a bit of fine tuning to do on it but its looking better all the time, also cut the hole for the side marker light at the same time. The front 1/4 panel still isn't quite good enough for my liking as its got a bit of oil canning going on and just doesn't want to play ball right now. Saturday is supposed to be a fine day so I'll blast all the repaired area's on the front and epoxy them as some of it is going surface rusty......the joys of a damp climate :roll: Yay nearly there with the rust repairs, just the LH lower rear fender to make and weld on then on to sealing the seams and block sanding.............oh and cut a hole in the roof!
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 20, 2012 13:11:23 GMT -8
Bit of a milestone for me yesterday completing all the rust / body repairs on the front half of the car. Made the last patch panel for some rust in the inner roof frame and welded that in along with a new foot plate for the jack, had a fantastic day weather wise so I sandblasted all the previously repaired areas on the front as well as the tyre well and door which I've been working on. Next week I'll start on the remaining 2 rear panels to be done completing the rust work on the body. Might be able to drag the floor pan out of hiding to start working on that. Sure looks a lot better now than when I started, sometimes I have to go back in this thread to remember just how bad it was.
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Post by Jürgen Klein on Oct 21, 2012 3:56:56 GMT -8
John , the parts are here now and I will bring the parcel to the post office next week . Jürgen
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Post by John Kanters on Oct 21, 2012 18:34:01 GMT -8
Ok thats great thank you for all your help, just take it next time you go as there's no urgency for the parts..........I still have lots to do!
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