In August I got back the four fenders, hood, trunk lid, doors and the nose piece for the car from my media blaster. All were in need of further repairs, some worse than others. I'll let the photos do the talking. The process took on and off about 4 months to get the parts into base primer, working at my pace which is basically get to it as I can. Usually not more than 10 hours a week.
The hood was pretty straightforward. There was some hammer and dolly work to do to get what looked like hail damage smoothed out a bit, but overall I think it came out ok.
Primed and ready to block.
The trunk lid was really easy, no major damage or rust of any kind. So easy in fact I forgot to take any pictures of it. :(
Passenger door was in pretty good shape. A shame really because I have two more passenger doors in storage in my attic. Here are some shots of me trying to smooth the filler out using a bit of guide coat.
Driver's door was a bit more work.
A hole/dent along the bottom side of the window opening that required welding a patch, and reconstruction of a rusted out weatherstripping channel. To repair the channel I cut a chunk of it out of one of the spare doors I have in the attic, re-shaped it to make it fit and welded it back on. A bit of a hack job (I am not a pro...) but should be fully serviceable.
Patch tacked in
Donor door for the rubber channel.
The driver's door after the new channel was grafted in
All the channel areas got a coat of POR15 followed by a tie-coat of etching primer to help keep any rust the blasting did not get at bay.
The nose piece which holds the rad, supports the front bumper, holds the grille and supports both front fenders is a critical and tricky piece to work on. Some patching of rotted metal was required, and was my first real challenge in fabricating. I think it turned out ok. Through the process the important thing was to keep test fitting the fenders on to the nose so that (hopefully) it all fits together properly.
