My GY8 '71 Road Runner

[ct71rr]

Thank you!

I started on the driver’s side today. I got a bit side-tracked as I was not happy with the door fitment. After fiddling around with it for almost two hours trying to get the body lines matched up, with an acceptable gap at the bottom and trying to match up the top of the door with the top of the quarter, I almost gave up. I could get the body lines all set with an acceptable gap at the bottom but couldn’t get the top of the door to line up with the top of the quarter no matter what I tried. For shits and giggles, I decided to measure the rear window opening at the door on the passenger’s side. And, of course, it’s about 1/8” larger height-wise than the driver’s side. Crap! I had to slice the driver’s side opening just below where it bends and weld it back up. I also had to make sure I kept the angle of the bottom section flat with no aggressive dip. I had to grind a bit of the driver’s door and slice the bottom corner of the quarter and weld up. I also had to slice a bit of the rocker at the corner, as well. And, of course, I ran into the lead seam. Super! I’ll have to fix that later. I also had to grind a bit of the fender too.

Door to quarter all set. I pretty much had to weld the entire seam back up, fun!:

Fender to door all set:

Rear window opening fixed:

The opening was about 1/8” too short on this side (red line):

I had to make sure this angle (red line) remained flat after adjusting:

I still need to weld up the seams I ground back but I’m making progress, I guess.

Thanks for looking and happy New Year!

 

[ct71rr]

I had some time today so, I welded the driver’s side fender seam back up and part of the driver’s door on the front seam. I’ll have to finish those up when I take them off again…for the 100th time. I then had to address some fitment issues with the front of the driver’s fender and the header panel. When I welded the patch piece on the nose of the driver’s fender, I had to take a best guess on how the angles at the edge that go under the front bumper were supposed to lay. And, of course, I was off. Yay! I had to slice the fender in a few places, adjust and weld back up. I still need to add a bit of weld in a few places. I got it as good as my limited knowledge and skills allowed.

Not looking too good! Angles are a bit off, boo!! :

Gap is off too:

Welded back up, not very pretty:

I need to add some weld to a few spots to build up a bit:

This area’s definitely going to need a touch or two of filler. Nothing like the 1”+ that was smeared in this area before though. This was a huge PITA!! Most of this will be hidden by the bumper, thank you jeebus!
Thanks for looking!

 

[71Beeper]

Great work Chad!
The factory gaps back in the day were no where as precise as you are making yours, but the persistence will pay off once you get paint on it.

 

[ct71rr]

Thank you! I’m starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel, bodywork wise anyway.

 

[ct71rr]

After getting the front of the driver’s fender situated, some shrinkage occurred - a slight dip as the fender runs toward the front. I couldn’t planish this area while welding because the headlight bucket blocks access to the backside, and I wasn’t about to take that off, again. Although I did seriously consider doing it…To try to bring this area up a bit, I used the Pennsylvania Porcupine Technique. I used my stud welder to slowly pull the area up. It worked pretty well.

I then decided to tackle the rear valance which, I knew from fitting the quarters, that it was going to need some adjusting. The driver’s side was hitting the bend on the quarter panel from about midway down. It was also sticking out about a 1/16” from the quarter while looking at it from the side. I used a masonry chisel as a dolly and reformed the seam a bit with a hammer. On the passenger’s side, I had to slice it and add about 1/4” at the bottom to nothing about 3/4 of the way going up. This took a good part of the day, Yay!!

Fender is supposed to flow like this:

I forgot to take a before pic but here’s the Pennsylvania Porcupine Technique in action:

Much better, there was about a 1/16”+ gap at the front:

The driver’s side rear valance, a little proud of the quarter:

The bottom (silver line) is actually hitting the quarter panel:

After some hammer & dolly work, it’s a lot better (silver line is now on inside of seam):

Passenger’s side, a bit of a gap:

A bit of a slice and side pushed over:

Patch piece tacked in:

More next page…

 

[ct71rr]

Welded up:

Sits much better from the side:

Same with the driver’s side:

This was a lot of work for a relatively small piece. Thanks for looking!!

 

[ct71rr]

Today I had some time to work on the front valance. My original one, like most things from this car, is trash. It’s twisted, dented and showing signs of Bondo - big surprise there. I purchased a replacement many years ago. I can’t remember if I got it from a member on here or from Ebay. Initial fitment was pretty good. The passenger’s side looks acceptable. The driver’s side needs a little tweaking at the bottom edge where it meets the fender. The fender was about 1/16”+/- short at about the midpoint where they meet. After some stud pulling and hammer and dolly work, I got it the best I could.

Original valance, twisted and dented:

A little twisted:

And Bondo, of course:

Front valance on:

Passenger’s side ok:

Driver’s side not so much:

Panels not lining up at the mid-point:

A little pilling and banging:

Much better:

That’s all I had time for today. I have a few more areas to weld back up on the driver’s door and fender but i need to take them both off to do that. Then, with a little luck, re-prime the areas I fixed and on to body work!

Thanks for looking!

 

[ct71rr]

Well, I ran into a bit of an issue today and can’t figure out for the life of me how to fix it. I remounted my trunk today and good not get it to fit. I spent about 4 hours f’ing around with it. When I have it mounted, there is about an inch gap at the filler panel and the trunk sticks out about an inch at the bumper side. I’ve pushed the trunk as far forward as the screw mounts will let me. The only thing I’ve noticed that looks off is that the plastic pivot piece (or whatever it’s called) is sitting further back on the pivot cam of the arms than it was before. I can’t figure out what is wrong or how to fix it. The trunk fit fine before when I added the tig rod to close the gaps up a bit. Anyone have any idea what I’m doing wrong?

WTF??!!

This is how the white plastic pivot piece sat before:

This is how it’s sitting now:

References show it sitting like it was originally:

Torsion bars and trunk arms look pretty good. One arm is about 1/16” longer:

I hope someone can help me. Thanks for looking!

 

[ct71rr]

I probably should have made it a little clearer. The white plastic pivot piece is circled in red. It looks like it should be about an inch further down on the flat part of the pivot on the trunk arm:

 

[ct71rr]

Disregard, I”M AN IDIOT!!! I figured it out. I was mounting the arm onto the torque rods instead of the pivot point on the mount.

 

[ct71rr]

I guess when you install things correctly, they fit much better. Success! But, I pretty much wasted the entire day…idiot!!

Fitting correctly (almost, still need to adjust a bit):

Pivot piece fitting where it should:

Success!!

 

[ct71rr]

I got all the gaps as good as I can and everything welded back up. I now need to get everything coated in epoxy. Before that, I had to drill the hood for pins and the trunk for the go wing. For the go wing, I followed the instructions that came with my new repop, I used the original one for fitment. The original wing is pretty messed up, like most things were on this car. I found the center of the trunk and measured from there. I then used the mounting gaskets to locate the second hole. The directions call for 1 23/32” center to center for the holes. I don’t have a ruler that has /32’s. I then made sure the mounting bolts lined up with the circles I traced with the gaskets. I then drilled small pilot holes to make sure I was on track. I then used a step bit to drill the holes the rest of the way. After mounting the wing back on, I was convinced it looked wrong. I was thinking that it should mount the other way around - sharp angles at ends facing forward. After looking at about 1000 images on line, I think I have it right. I then moved to the hood. I mounted the pins into the fenders and placed a dab of black spray paint on the tips and closed the hood onto the pins. This left a good reference mark for me to drill. Needless to say, the hood pins were much easier to install.

Tape for reference lines:

Making sure I have holes marked in right location:

Installed! :

On to the hood, paint on tips:

Reference mark from paint:

I drilled a small hole to make sure I was in right spot:

Success! I drilled the hole slightly larger after this pic:

I have to strip the hood and get it into epoxy. Decent amount of debris under both boomerangs:

After I get the hood stripped, I’ll coat everything in epoxy again and then onto bodywork!

I still think the go wing looks backwards…hopefully I’m wrong!

I have a question; I’m going to drill 1/8” guide holes in the door and hood hinges to mark their alignment. Does it matter where? Do these holes get filled prior to painting or does it not matter? I’ve read that a lot of people do this but have never seen it done.

Thanks for looking!

 

[71Beeper]

Chad, I thought 71's got a gull wing not a go wing.
Or is it personal preference for you?

 

[ct71rr]

Crap. I had no idea that they were different. I thought it looked weird/different from the images I was seeing on line. The one that came with my car is definitely a Go Wing. I have no way of verifying that it’s original to the car though. I’ve read that some ‘71’s did come from the factory with Go Wings. Looks like I’ll be purchasing a Gull Wing in the near future. I’ll have to sell the Go Wing I have. I bought it several years ago so I can’t return it. Damn!!

 

[ct71rr]

While drilling for the hood pins, I noticed surface rust in the ribs on the underside of the hood. My OCD would not let this stand! I thought about separating the skin but, it looks pretty complicated and way more work the I was willing to do. So, I decided to flush the ribs with Rust911. But how, you ask?? I ran small sections of sprinkler house inside the ribs utilizing the factory holes and hooked them up to a sump pump submerged in a plastic bin. I then wrapped everything up in a plastic tent - like I did for the fenders and hood. It worked pretty good. When finished, I flushed everything out with a hose and used my torpedo heater and blow gun to dry everything up. I then striped the paint from both sides, FUN!, and sprayed about a can and a half of Eastwood’s frame encapsulator paint into the ribs as best I could. I also epoxied the areas I fixed while gapping the car.

Surface rust inside ribs:

Hoses inserted:

Ran into this varmint nest while running one of the hoses:

Spa treatment:

Pretty good results:

 

[ct71rr]

More:

This was covered in rust:

Sanded, this sucked! Took forever:

Holes tapped up to contain spray:

Sprayed:

Epoxyied:

Thanks for looking!

 

[HawkRod]

You are making good progress - keep it going and you'll be bolting stuff back on the body before you know it!

 

[ct71rr]

I wasn’t able to get as much done this weekend as I wanted. I did get the hood in epoxy though.

Thanks for looking!

 

[ct71rr]

Hi all, this weekend, I stripped my front and rear valances to get them in epoxy. Due to all the bracing and angles on the rear of the front valance, I blasted it. I used my contour SCT to strip the front. Of course I ran into filler. Not as bad as I’ve seen in the past but still a pain in the arse. Looks like the PO attempted to fix some dents but made things worse. Lots of pick and chisel damage, not to mention the heavy grinder marks. I had to remove one of the braces to get at some of the damage. I also leaded over the spot weld dimples left from the factory where the braces were attached to the front valance. I got it fixed to the best of my limited ability. The front valance is still going to need a touch of filler but no where near as much as before.

Blasted:

Two low spots (circles) on the center of the panel:

Spot weld dimples and a long low spot:

I had to remove this to get at the damage:

Dimples on the other side too:

And pick damage:

Center better:

Right side better:

Left side better:

Epoxyied:

Thanks for looking!

 

[ct71rr]

I’ve been completing several small touch-ups, fixes, etc. in preparation to start on the final bodywork (filler, 2K high build, sealer, etc) and then on to paint. I didn’t take a bunch of pics. My car is now completely in 2 coats of epoxy. I wanted to get the inside of the rib that is on the underside of the hood just below the vents in some epoxy. I had to get a little creative with an acid brush to reach it. I also epoxied the torque boxes and had to re-lead a small area at the bottom right of the driver’s side door opening where I had to adjust for the gap a bit.

Custom brush:

Lead fixed and epoxied:

Torque boxes epoxied:

Thanks for looking!