Grendel lives...resurrection of a 1970 Charger 500

[Coelacanth]

Ahh, armrest bases...I have 2 or 3 sets, but why do they all look like this?

Since not all of us can afford expensive shiny plastic things to replace all the parts on our cars, I wanted to remove the chrome on these and paint them. I tried sanding off the chrome from one and what a righteous pain. I got about a third of the way done and gave up. There HAD to be a better way to de-chrome ABS plastic. I've easily removed chrome from nylon parts for RC cars with an acetone bath, but that won't work with ABS plastic, it'll melt the plastic.

I found a Youtube vid of some modeler who tried LA's Totally Awesome Cleaner to remove plating from plastic model parts, and since it's cheap as dirt--$20 CAD for a 64 oz (nearly 2 liters) jug, I thought I'd give it a try. I put a pair of small armrest bases in the bath for a few days--one day to do the tops, one to do the bottoms, so as not to waste too much of the cleaner. Lo and behold, nearly all of the chrome either was dissolved, or easily wiped away with my finger. What remained, I used some 0000 steel wool and it all came off.

Now the bases are ready for some SEM Trim Black for a satin finish.

Since chromed steel is a totally different process than ABS plastic, I didn't think the cleaner would harm the chrome, I thought I'd do a test and soak a "Custom" metal chrome emblem to see if it would remove all the crud and crusty, flaking-off black edge paint. A day later and the black paint was coming off with a fingernail. A soft brass bristle brush took care of the nooks & crannies. So, into the bath went my "Charger" sail panel emblems. 2 days later:

These turned out so nice, I don't even think I'll paint the black edges before I reinstall these. It seems a shame to hide that nice chrome. I know it's not original but less and less of Grendel is gonna be original, so no worries. I actually think the full chromed emblems will stand out even nicer on top of my black vinyl top.

 

[ckessel]

Before painting with the SEM, spray some adhesion promoter[ available in spray cans at autobody supply shops] on the parts. This will ensure the paint actually bonds to the plastic. Its like the purple primer used on PVC pipe prior to putting the actual glue on.

 

[Coelacanth]

I restored and reinstalled my nice gold Pentastar emblem. I degreased it and filled in the valleys with gloss black acrylic fine-tip paint pen. The next day, I sprayed 3 coats of Duplicolor Wheel Gloss Clearcoat to give it some protection before reinstalling it. I would've preferred to use Spraymax 2K Clear but I didn't want to crack open the seal for just this emblem, and I have no other items to clear at the moment, so the wheel gloss should be sufficient.

My car already had the mounting holes so installing it in the correct location was a no-brainer. I managed to track down the 3M Emblem Adhesive for $18, which is still ludicrously expensive for such a tiny tube, but at least it was better than the $50+ I was seeing almost everywhere.

 

[Coelacanth]

I got my freshly cleaned sail panel emblems installed on the vinyl top with the 3M Emblem adhesive. To get them to fit flush, they needed a bit of gentle bending to match the curvature of the roof, and I used some strong hard drive magnets along with masking tape to keep them in place until fully cured. I then scrubbed the vinyl top clean with a soft bristle brush and 303 Aerospace Protectant.

 

[Coelacanth]

Nothing ever goes easy with this car...

I was installing my front sidemarkers and for some reason, they absolutely would not fit flush when the retainers were bolted on from the inside. Even fully tightened, the front and rear corners were out a couple 16ths of an inch. Since the markers fit nice and flush without the retainers, I checked out my retainers. All of them were the same, but I tried others, with no change.

I read on here someone posting that '70 Coronet markers have the mounting studs slightly closer together. I compared the widths of my mounting studs on several housings and they were indeed SLIGHTLY closer, but maybe 1/16", not enough to make a difference. I then placed the 2 chrome markers I chose as the best pair that I already installed new lenses in, beside a retainer, and found something clearly more important than a slight difference in the spacing between the studs; the mounting studs on the best pair of markers were at least 3/16" below where they were located on my collection of used and damaged markers. This pic says it all:

Here are all my other housings & retainers:

Notice that one of my chosen pair in the first pic has studs below the big pigtail hole, but all my other crap markers have the studs above the pigtail holes.

So what I concluded is the best pair of markers that I chose to install my lenses in are actually Coronet markers, because they don't fit any of my retainers, and don't match my extra markers, 2 of which are my originals.

Here's how I resolved this...since I have the luxury of having 2 sets of retainers, simply drilling some new holes where I've indicated in red Sharpie marker in the first pic should hopefully let the sidemarkers and retainers bolt in snug & flush. That indeed did the trick...sidemarkers installed successfully, nice and tight.

So the big difference between Coronet and Charger sidemarker housings & retainers is the mounting studs and hole locations are below center for the Coronet, and above center for the Charger. You can make either work because either sidemarker housing will fit just fine in the fender, but the holes in the housings need to match or be drilled to match.

 

[Coelacanth]

Having acquired a nice antenna bezel and tube nut over the past few months, I was finally able to install my antenna base and fill the gaping hole in the fender.

With the door open about 3/4, my 14-year-old daughter was able to sneak her arm in between the door and inside fender and position the antenna base up through the bezel enough so that I could begin threading on the tube nut. I found a needle-nose Vise-Grip pliers was perfect, the nose tips perfectly fit inside 2 of the notches and with it slightly tightened, I was able to easily twist-tighten the tube nut to the base with no risk of slipping. I probably wouldn't recommend doing this with an ordinary needle-nose pliers, though.

My daughter was also able to pull the antenna wire through its hole in the sheetmetal ahead of the door.

I made sure I had the orientation right so the antenna was straight when installed.