'64 Fury Pro-Touring

[carnalsupply]

Thanks Prop, I'm finally at a point where I feel like I can begin building the car as opposed to the constant repairing!

 

[carnalsupply]

Progress! I'm so glad to finally be building rather than repairing, and here's the last weeks worth of work.

I got the replacement cowl all cleaned up and in place then mocked up the wheel barrows I'm using for the firewall set-back. Although they're a little thinner than I'd like they have a great look, offering a much smoother and finished appearance as compared to using flat sheet and angles.

Once the wheel barrows were lined up and firmly in place I made some oversize templates I could use for lining up the outer panels:

Once I got the panels laid out I used my Plasma Cutter (AWESOME little tool) to quickly remove the parts from the sheet and began working the passenger side panel into shape, a process made all the more difficult because I don't own any metal shaping tools other than a 60" sheet-metal break. I decided to go old-school and broke out various size round and steel tubing, a rubber mallet, lots of clamps, some body hammers, and dollies, all of which worked great. The most difficult part of the passenger side was a compound curve in the lower section: the panel is about 10" wide at that point but has a convex curve on one edge and a concave curve on the other, which was a bitch to make by hand, but I'm really proud of the finished product.

Once I got the passenger side completed I moved on to the driver side, which by comparison was really pretty easy since it didn't involve any curves, just simple angles.

And here's a shot of the finished firewall:

An added bonus is the fact I'll be able to use the replacement floor panels I purchased, making for a much stronger and better looking finished product.

 

[HEMI-ITIS]

build looks good!
Are the hood and deck lid pin on?
can't wait to see how they fit.

I wanted to see the front reinforcement,had a problem with the front of my glass hood curling up at 45 mph.I glued an aluminum reinforcement in and it helped but did not cure it.I am still racing without the hood.

 

[roadrunnerman]

hey carnel supply,that's some amazing ingenuity,i would've never thought of that.

 

[carnalsupply]

Hey Hemi, I suspect I'll have to add some reinforcing across the leading and trailing edges as well to avoid the bowing problem you're describing.

Thanks RR'man, I only wish I could take the credit for the wheel barrow idea, but regardless it worked out great.

 

[Propwash]

Great Job!

Outstanding once again!!!! Good to see all this great ingenuity going on.

Awesome work Bob!

 

[carnalsupply]

Thanks Prop, I really appreciate the kind words.

As for the ingenuity, I have to say I probably have it easier than the guys trying to do 100% accurate resto's because I don't have any rules, guides, or judges to abide by. I found out when building my '70 LT-1 Vette how much people (who aren't spending their money on my project) hated on me for defacing such a rare and collectible car.

Regardless, thanks much!

 

[carnalsupply]

I just noticed the link to my original build thread on Pro-Touring was no longer working (they migrated servers) so just in case anyone wants to see the horror that's my Fury from the beginning here is the new link:
Pro-Touring Build Thread

 

[oneway71]

Nice job on the build!

 

[northerndave]

Wow! Awesome!!

I love the firewall idea!

Carnalsupply, man of man clecos... :grin:

 

[carnalsupply]

Thanks for the kind words, and didn't you know my middle name is "Cleco"?
Those damn things have to be one of the best things ever invented!

 

[northerndave]

I need some, I have no idea how I have got through life thus far without a set.

:grin:

 

[carnalsupply]

I'm telling ya, they're like crack; once you use 'em you can't stop!
I should just send you mine since I won't be using them for a while: my build has stalled due to an insane work/travel schedule.

 

[carnalsupply]

So it's been FAR too long since I've been able to get in and get my hands dirty on the Fury but this weekend was wonderful! I got to come in and spend both Saturday and Sunday working on the car and made some great progress on the floors, and while you'd think floors are a "nothing" job I'm hear to tell you they're anything but easy, especially when you don't have a slew of metal working tools.

I did purchase a 48" break (shown previously in the blog) but other than that it's all pretty much a "seat of the pants" gig so I needed a way to put nice, gentle curves in the sheet metal and came up with this:

I got various diameters of exhaust tubing (1.75" is shown in the picture), cut them to 48" lengths, drilled a hole at each end (along the seam to keep the holes in line with one another), and bolted the tube to my bench, then slid the sheet metal between the tube and the bench and molded the sheet to the desired shape around the various diameter tubes. Yeah, it took some doing but the results worked out really well (IMHO).

I did use some re-pop floor pans for the foot-wells but they had to be modified to work, then I fabbed up the mid-floor areas from scratch. The single most difficult part of the job was rolling the outer edges and getting them to match the rocker panels because the radius decreases as you move towards the rear of the car.

Here are some shots of the foot-well and mid-floor pans, now all I have left is the small area running back and up under the rear seat:

Below is a small detail that took some time to work out and fab up. The floor runs flat along the chassis rails until it reaches the original rear sub-frame, where in the original floor there was a VERY small diameter radius up followed by a 90 degree bend towards the rear, thus allowing the floor to follow the sub-frame contours. I chose to eliminate the small diameter radius and use a 90 degree bend followed by another 90 degree bend, thus producing a floor that goes from horizontal to vertical then back to horizontal all within the space of 1". Then I had to meld in the rolled edge to blend in, making for a pretty decent amount of work.
I hope that all makes sense?

From the pictures it should be pretty obvious how much we've lowered the body from stock, what with the trans protruding so high into the passenger compartment. This presents a bit of a challenge in terms of the trans tunnel because I think a simple rounded tunnel would look boring and easy, and sticking a console on top of it would probably be far too high, so what I'm thinking of is a tunnel with 5 sides, vertical on the sides with a horizontal top plane and 45's joining the horizontal and verticals. It's just a thought.

Also just got word my seats should be done pretty soon. I have a 2005 Cadillac CTS-V and I LOVE the seats, so I picked up another set for the Fury. The problem is the seats have side airbags and I'm just not in a position to have custom seat covers made that eliminate the airbag holes so I had an upholsterer make up "blank out" panels similar to what you'd see in a radio or heater delete situation, save for the fact my "blank out" panels will be upholstered to match the existing seat covers.

That's it for now, and as always, thanks for the continued support!

 

[Propwash]

Good to hear you and your car got some needed "me" time Bob. Was wondering where you've been.

Looking great as normal!!

 

[carnalsupply]

Thanks Prop!
Real life called and some of the fun got sidetracked, but luckily not derailed!

 

[Coronet 500]

Looking good. I understand the real life calling, mine is dragging along. If you don't mind I have some thoughts on the console. I have the stock 70 and plan to keep it in with as much of the stock interior as possible. I prefer rounded tunnels or square with flat top and dislike the ones guys run up into the dash like the modern cars. All that said your modern seats and the 5 sides sounds good. I would look at the whole package and keep the angular look throughout so no one piece sticks out and catches your eye, if you know what I mean. I'd better get off my rear and at mine, keep it coming.

 

[carnalsupply]

Hey Coronet,

No, I don't mind your thoughts at all, that's why my Fury is out here, to garner feedback and input from others.

Knowing the '64 Fury has some pretty aggressive angles designed into the body lines makes the 5-sided console a pretty cohesive unit in my eyes. For instance, look at how the horizontal trunk surface blends into the "undercut" taillight panel, or how the C-pillar blends into the top of the quarter panels, those are some pretty acute angles I'm hoping to tap into.
That being said, I have not finalized my idea yet except for the fact I don't want a simple rounded top tunnel.

If I had a stock console I might consider making it work since I love the looks of them, but when you look at the cost of a refurbished one I just can't justify spending the money on something that just might not look right perched on top of what's going to be a pretty sizable tunnel.

More ideas, please, I love to hear them!

 

[carnalsupply]

The floors are done!

Well it isn't glamorous and it sure isn't easy but the floors of the Fury are now done! Granted, the tunnel isn't done but that will have to wait until after we get the rest of the drive-line mocked up (more on that later), but I can't imagine the tunnel will be anything nearly as difficult as the floors.

To help ensure the floors would be strong and solid I formed them out of 18 gauge steel and I am extremely happy with the results. I have every confidence when the tunnel is in place and everything is joined together the floor will be absolutely rock solid.

Below are some shots of the various panels:

The rear most pans, while deceptively simple in appearance, had their own little fabrication issues, most devious of which is the point where they meet up with the mid floor section. The original floor was a beautifully contoured, multi-level arrangement that presents all kinds of problems when you try and build a floor from scratch yet stay true to the various floor heights AND accommodate a chassis that wasn't there from the factory.

Here are the rear most pans:

The final panel to be replaced was at the end of the original tunnel where the pinion snubber used to bolt on. It appears the suspension compressed EXTREMELY hard at some point and literally folded the floor pan up, leaving a couple of creases I just didn't want to leave in place, so I cut out the entire section and fabbed in a new one. The panel will be modified to incorporate the tunnel opening once the tunnel is in finalized, until then I'm just going to leave it as is.

The next step will be mocking up all the suspension, front and rear. I got a call from Jimmy and he said the powder-coating looks awesome so I'm pretty excited to get all the pieces back and see how everything mounts up. At that point I'm not sure what I'll do since I'm getting ready to move my company (where my shop is located) to Vegas: time may not be on my side for getting much else done, but with any luck I'll be able to weld in the firewall, the "through the frame exhaust", then the floors before packing up for the move.

 

[Propwash]

Any new work on the Fury done Bob?