my partial resto work on the the runner

[rav440]

so i finnally started to work on the road runner again after about 2 years of doing nothing to it . turns out its not as rust free as i thought . friggn palm trees played hell with the cowl . i have no clue how im going to get in there to fix it .

the last 2 years have been more or less buying parts for the 440 still not even close to getting that done money is a big factor as we all know . but ill get done what i get done in the time being .

i got the radiator repaired , that was a $400.00 hit alone i learned do not pick up parts you got repiained in a hurry from the shop i didnt check the rad as close as i should have .

anyway i put the 440 uild on the back burner for the time being and stareted stripping the firewall and inner fenders plus removed & dissassembled the K frame . all i have to say is i friggn HATE underecoating



here are the pics of the slow going progerss so far



motor compartment before

progress ?

finnally got down to bare metal

and now for the coconuts , this is what i have to deal with

the cowl is in bad shape and i have no clue how im going to repair the air duct HORNS / INTAKE or what ever they are called



here are pics of inside the cowl IT AINT PRETTY

here is the wrought i found on the cowl in the inner fenders althought none of it is structural it still needs to be adressed and repaired luckily all the damage is at the top and not down at the frame

nasty undercoating i think they tried to armor plate the car with this stuff i swear some places were over a 1/4" thick but it did keep rust away for the most part so ill give it credit for that

inner fenders are down to bare metal and just some more prep and it DTM and paint

i got some donar parts for the firewall repair cut and ready to weld but yesterday my buddys mig crapped the bed so now welding is on hold .



here are some pics of the K frame & parts before and after but not reassembled im waint on $ for the suspenion parts

K frame after about 6 hours of scraping and scrubbing with kerosene

make shift sand blasting cabinet for the K frame

K frame and parts blasted and ready for paint

K frame painted in black satin it looks glossy but it toned down real nice

parts hanging and drying

lower control arms

and the road runner as it sitts now

 

[Donny]

Wow, lots of work! Looks like you need a Media Blaster!!!!! :tiphat: I know a good one!!!

 

[69 Runner]

sweet

 

[Aaron]

Awesome work! That K-Frame looks really really good. How did you remove the undercoating from the car? Also, on the cowl rust, you may need to find a donor piece from another car. I am sure there are wrecked cars with that part in good shape still.

 

[rav440]

Awesome work! That K-Frame looks really really good. How did you remove the undercoating from the car? Also, on the cowl rust, you may need to find a donor piece from another car. I am sure there are wrecked cars with that part in good shape still.

thanks , i used kerosene and alot of it :grin: i put it in a spray bottle & sprayed it on let soak for awhile it took along time to do but worked fine . im going to have to wing the inside of the cowl being there is now way to really get in there to do repairs as for the firewall i have the donar parts .

 

[detmatt1]

Keep up the great work and keep the pics coming.

 

[kb73rr]

Good Job! Looking great! That bad GTX is worth your efforts!!!!!

 

[alleyoopmgv]

Cool car! Nice work! Keep us posted!

 

[CtownChris]

What did you prime and paint the K frame with?
Very nice!

 

[rav440]

What did you prime and paint the K frame with?
Very nice!

etching primer and rust-olem black satin

 

[rav440]

got a little more work done on saturday we started fitting and welding in the firewall parts that generaljmwlee was kind enough to go out of his way and cut from a donar car for me . theres alot more welding and grinding and filling that needs done befoe paint but i think it looks %100 better than it did already .

my neighbor JAMES is helping out my friend JOHN with his 68 GTO resto and me with the runner for his class project in high school

firewall

my weld job its been well over 20+ years since ive welded :sad:

JOHN and JAMES welding the piece below the wiper motor

more to come

 

[sphipps]

great progress so far!

 

[rav440]

wow its been awhile since i posted on the slow progress of the rr . here are some pics . we onlly got to work on it a few weekends over the winter and the last 2 saturdays in march , well it looks like we didnt get much done but it sure feels like it the past 2 saturdays were spent welding and patching the cowl corners and smothing the welds im sure a pro could have had this done in an hour were as it took us 19 hours of course we stoped for a beer here and there but we are at the point where the fire wall is almost completely pacthed in and ready for ALL METAL filler the soon hopefully primer and blue paint

the firewall is pactched in and 90% ready for filler

interior gutted thank god the floors look perfect

after rooting around inside the cowl i discovered this isnt a factory part " the black spry foam "

so i dug that out and found that the corners of the cowl were toast , off came the frontend and doors to do a little bit more investigation i wasnt happy with what i found .

so it was cut form patch weld grind for a long time as i said we are not pros but im happy with the result

 

[detmatt1]

Congratulations, that looked like a pretty tricky repair, well done.
You might be able to get at those Air intake rings inside the cowl from under the dash, but you will likely have to remove the dash in the process.

 

[69 Runner]

nice work

 

[skymynx]

Very impressive work.

 

[Donny]

Yeah, that looks like a fun job! Remember, most of the fun is in just 'doing it'. I'm not too familiar with the 71+ B Body's cowel, it looks like it does not come off like the previous generation B Body cowel does. They all are rusted under there, except cars from the southwest, I got lucky with my donor front clip for my GTX, it came from that area of the country; no rust! Man, I can't imagine spending 6 hrs cleaning a K Member with Kerosene and all that mess; you're a better man than I! All in all, it looks awesome though, will be following this thread!

 

[rav440]

o.k. here are some of the progress pics .

all metal before filler on welded patches on the firewall






got back to work on the rr jan 2012 till now cut out bad metal weld in good metal on the pass side 1/4 and door and taking the rest of the runner down to bare metal still finding rust not a bunch but there are some hole here and there .the back glass was fun ! they sealed the whole thing with urethane then set the trim in the urethane i spent hours cleanig that mess up .







gross



- - - Updated - - -

here are some current pics of where i am on the runner . . i am hopeing that in about a month from now the motor compartment , underside and trunk will be in TRUE BLUE METALLIC .

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- - - Updated - - -

got some bit more done over the last month

painted the underside first in acrylic enamel the a week later we did the engine compartment in the base / clear

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[rav440]

OOPS 2 totaly diffferent colors about ten shades off !!!!

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so i had to sand down / scuff the under side and get more paint and re-paint the following saturday

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[73runner]

Looks great. I did the same thing on mine and ended up cutting the cover over the cowl out to make my repairs. Like you, i had rust on the air intake for the a/c , where the upper and lower cowl pieces met at the fire wall, base of the windshield and especially in the corners. I didn't have the benefit of a donor and ended up gabbing the pieces I needed.

Great post.