Fixing up a '71 Grand Safari

Aaaaahhhhh, darn you! Leave us hanging, some people's kids....

 

and now.....the rest, of the story.

The heater in the '57 has never worked exactly right. This car has the cheapest model heater, which is the non-deluxe option, called a recirculating heater. This heater only has two buttons, one that you pull to direct the air to the floor or to the defroster vents and the other is a rheostat that turns the heater from off to high, medium or low. It is called a recirculating heater because unlike the deluxe heater, this heater only recirculates air from inside the cabin. It lacks any ability to blend incoming air, however the car does have two vents in the firewall that take in air directly from above the headlights, so even though the heater has no blend provision, technically you can blend the outside vents in combination with the heater vent to get an acceptable amount of hot and cold air into the cabin. With the recirculating heater, if there is no passenger in the car you cannot safely reach the vent knob on the passenger side of the car. The deluxe controls have the vent opening knobs together where my two control knobs are.


In the past the fan control has only worked on high and sometimes on low, if you played with the button just right, and then sometimes it would turn off and when it was on low it was so quiet you couldn't tell that it was off unless you held your hand under the vent or began to get cold. I took the switch out expecting it to be bad or in need of cleaning. I noticed that the cardboard backing plate was not tight against the body of the switch because the tabs that are bent to hold it in place were loose.





I bent the tabs tighter and tested the ohms of the switch with the multimeter and found that the problem was fixed. It was about the easiest fix I've ever had. The only issue I had was that one day on the way back home from town the switch stuck on high and wouldn't turn off. I took the switch back out, adjusted it and it's been working good since.





April drove the Suburban on about a 300 mile trip. Right after she got back the check engine light came on. I ran by the local parts house and had them read the code from the computer and it showed a P0161, which is a bank 2 sensor 2 code. This means that the oxygen sensor on the passenger side, behind the catalytic converter had a heater element that was bad. Oxygen sensors must maintain a certain temperature to operate correctly. In order to get them to work before the engine heats up to operating temperature each of the four oxygen sensors has its own heater element. After looking online quite a bit to determine the best way to diagnose the issue, I tested the wiring harness. I had suspected that since I had just disconnected so many wires when I replaced the intake manifold gaskets that a wire connector was probably bad or a wire had rubbed through and was shorting out. It turned out to just be a coincidence and was unrelated to the previous work I had done. The heater element inside the sensor itself had gone bad. I ordered another sensor, rented a removal tool from the parts store, installed the new sensor and everything was back to good.



Upholstery shops wanted about $1,500 to install new, factory appearing seat covers for the '57. This wasn't even in the realm of possibilty so for Christmas Mother and Father, at my request, got me a saddle blanket seat cover for The '57. A 50/50 split-back bench seat has apparently become somewhat uncommon and had to be custom ordered. Mom and dad let me have it early because riding around on the towels and decaying eggshell mattress foam was very annoying, not to mention that installing the seat cover, which is time consuming, is much better in 60 degree weather than 20 or 30 degree weather. I had installed one of these years ago and enjoyed it for the first few days. I didn't realize that what I had bought was a very cheap brand and within about three months it began to rot and decay. It turned into a very fine granular material that began to come apart in your hands and blow in your eyes when you rode in the car with the windows down or vents open. Not only that, it turned into a very itchy substance that would not easily come off your skin even if you simply laid your hand down on the seat.



As you can see, the old seat is pretty much unusable. The brown seat material is like steel wool and if you try to sit on it, it will poke through your pants and into your leg. Also, the old padding wads up and falls apart and gets everywhere. Mice absolutely love this stuff. Every time I park the car for over a month I found about a square foot of this stuff in my trunk.





I bought a new sheet of eggshell mattress foam to help cushion the seat since so much of it had rotted away. I measured and cut it into three pieces and then trimmed the pieces to fit.









It took a while, but I like the end result. The process is kind of a pain, but getting the screws to line back up in the side and bottom panels was the worst part. The company sewed pockets into the front which is very, very useful since I don't really have anywhere to store my registration, remote for the radio or sunglasses. The color and design go very well with the original design of the door panels and rear seats.





After a lot, and I mean several days, of scrubbing and cleaning I finally removed almost all of the old woodgrain. My fingers were literally bruised and numb. I have yet to remove the woodgrain on the tailgate because I'm going to have to hook a car battery to the motors to let the window up and tailgate down, which is necessary to remove the woodgrain trim pieces on the left and right of the tailgate. One of the screws for the woodgrain trim on the gas door would not come all of the way out and I ended up having to drill it out.





I took Adam, the body and paint guy, the hood. Let me be clear. Not the first hood that was wrecked, or the second hood that I bought on the parts clip, but the third hood. The one I had to buy after Adam saw the other one and said it was so bad it wasn't worth fixing. Adam said all the panels on the parts-clip hood were wavy and would cost a fortune to get straight, and even then there was no guarantee it would stay straight after all the materials shrank and flexed. I had to find another hood. I remembered that somewhere around a year ago I had talked to a guy about two hours from Nashville that had a huge stash of demo derby cars and in those cars was a 1971 Pontiac Wagon. He wouldn't sell the car as a whole and at the time I was looking for a full parts car. Also, the front passenger fender was dented, which was a big part of why I needed a parts car. He had sent me pictures of it. I spent forever combing my old and deleted emails and forums posts but couldn't come up with anything in the way of correspondence I had with the guy. In desperation I posted to all of the appropriate places on the internet a very general description of the guy I had talked to: Two hours from Nashville, lots of demolition derby cars, 71 Pontiac wagon. Eventually, someone on a demolition derby forum posted the name of a guy that could be the man I was looking for. I contacted him and sure enough, it was the same guy. He checked the hood and called me back and said it was straight and would be suitable to use. That next Saturday I borrowed Dad's truck and small trailer and we headed down South.



When we first pulled up to the place, in the middle of nowhere, there was a shop surrounded by some older cars. As we got out a little kid about 3 years old, with a Batman jacket, came out of the door of the shop, snot running down his nose, and ran by me and ran up to dad and gave him a big hug like they'd known each other for years. We walked in the shop and there was a guy working on restoring a 1971 Kingswood clamshell. He looked really familiar but I couldn't place it. Dad and I talked to him and I was looking at one of his cars while he was talking to dad and suddenly his voice hit me. It turned out that this guy was Tommy from the TV show Muscle Cars, which is now called Detroit Muscle. It was so unexpected that even after I was pretty sure it was him I was afraid to ask because it seemed so random and unlikely. After talking a while, Tommy showed us a couple of his project cars that had been on the show and we made our way back to where the '71 wagon was. Unfortunately, of all the times, I forgot to take my camera. To my surprise, it was actually a non-woodgrain Grand Safari rather than just a Safari. I'm very thankful to have found the car, but if ONLY it could have had the woodgrain trim. It did mean, however, that the grill would work with mine. The hood was in excellent shape and so was the grill and header panel. The driver side quarter extension was great, but the passenger side fender and quarter extension were dented beyond practical use. The bumper was also dented. They were damaged because Tommy had bought this car to demolition derby so when his friend that he bought it from loaded it he did so with a bulldozer, thus ruining the front parts I mentioned above. That was really, really unfortunate. I not only got the hood but I ended up getting the grill as well, and since the grill was bolted to the header panel I went ahead and got it to because when the sandblasters had stripped the previous header panel it had made the plastic somewhat orange-peeled in some areas. It was able to be repaired, but I thought just in case I better get another one while the getting was good. Tommy was also able to give me the contact information of a great airbrush artist that will be able to paint the woodgrain.



I loaded the new hood and took it to Adam. He gave his approval of the great condition of the new hood, which was a relief.





Since the parts-clip had a Safari grill instead of a Grand Safari grill, I was going to have to find a passenger side grill. Fortunately, this parts car had the right grill and it wasn't broken at all.





I also got a completely intact and unbroken fan shroud. I got the parking light lens and reflector for the passenger side and since the quarter extension was busted all to pieces Tommy just gave me the whole piece. The front emblem is also much nicer than the other two I have, so I'll use it when reinstalling everything.





When I dropped the hood at Adam's he said that the other pieces were primed and ready for paint.





It's hard to tell from the photos but Adam's shop is on top of a huge hill. The view is great but getting up there on the gravel road can be difficult. I have to borrow dad's 4x4 to be able to pull a trailer up it. The '57 won't make it without a good running start thanks to its narrow tires. It doesn't translate into photo but thew view from the top is amazing.

 

Today, it was time to tackle some rust issues. First up in the passenger side drip rail area. These cars are prone to issues in this area. Starting on this is a huge mental hurdle, but the only way it gets done is to jump in and do it. Here is the afflicted area.





The first step was removing the drip rail moldings.







After taping off the surrounding area for protection I cut open the tin can.





Here's the rust on the inner structure that caused the problem





Here's a wide shot of the area





I used a couple different wire brushs on the drill to clean the area thorougly





Then I covered everything with weld-through primer, making sure to coat everything I could reach inside the roof area. I let it dry while I went to lunch and when I came back I coated everything with the paraffin wax rust preventer.





I used the old piece to make a template and cut out a new piece.





Test fitting the new patch





After I welded the top I rolled the bottom lip so I could weld it as well.





To weld the bottom it was necessary to open the door, which means I had to make sure I protected the original seats and door panels.





I ran into a problem on the left side. When I attempted to weld the metal on the car would instantly melt away like butter and made a very different sound than it normally does. The problem was that this area was full of lead. This was the area the factory attached two panels together and they used lead as body filler to smooth the transition.





I used the wire brush to remove the paint and primer and see what areas were coated with lead. You can see lead here as the area with scratches. Lead is soft and the wire brush scored the area.





The angle of this picture unfortunately doesn't show the depth, but I used a grinder to grind away the lead down to bare metal which gave me something to weld to. The actual metal was about 1/8th inch deep so I had to slowly build up weld material to the right height to connect the patch panel. Then I put the end of the spray tube into the holes at the bottom and filled the cavity with the paraffin wax rust protector.





I covered everything with primer to protect it until I'm able to get back to it.

 

Man, you never stop do you?
So, the little boy who gave your Dad a hug, was he Tommy's son? Did he think your Dad was someone he knew, or was he just a friendly little guy?

 

Arrrggghhh, lead. Cool when it makes a superior surface on a panel, especially where it attaches to another panel, but it certainly gets in the way. Are you going to re-lead the area?

 

Yeah, it was Tommy's son. He didn't think he knew my dad at all, he was just a really personable little dude. I'd be laying under the car taking some bolts out and he'd run up and lay down next to me and act like he was helping.

I'm not planning on releading the area now, just because so few people actually know how to do it and I certainly don't myself. I'd prefer to have it redone that way, but it seems impracticable. I would probably have to carry the car a long way just to get that one part done and then have it hauled back to Adam's body shop. I've ended up getting sick, so I haven't been able to work on it all yesterday or today, plus the wind was blowing so hard yesterday welding outside would have been impossible. I think I'll be able to build up the weld and blend it into the metal so create a smooth enough transition that a skim of bodyfiller will make it perfect.

 

That's really neat. I have two little boys of my own. They are always eager to help. It's a lot of fun having them around and letting them "help" with stuff. I figure it's a great way to get them interested in the hobby and to teach them things along the way.

I may be alone in this, but I tend to go out my way to include kids in anything I'm doing if they show an interest. Kids are amazing little people, and though they may not realize it until years later, the kindness of adults including them in tasks can make a big difference. I hope he was a very "helpful" little helper.

 

I don't mind taking the time to help them learn if they're willing, but I'm not going to force them. I have two daughters. I'm hoping for a son one day, but my 3 year old already knows the difference between a 31,37 and 57 chevrolet and love's Cadillacs.

I haven't gotten any more work done due to the Thanksgiving holiday, getting sick and I'm helping my friend sell his Z3 to try to raise some money to help fund The Great Wagon Reconstruction (and a '57 carb rebuild is in dire need)

 

That's the best way to go about it. Forcing a kid to do something is a quick way to get the opposite of your desired result.

I hope you get to feeling better soon.

 

Thanks. I'm getting there. With two sick little snot nosed varmits constantly coughing in your face and runny noses so bad a Charmin factory couldn't keep up, I don't have much chance of staying well.

Due to the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, having Thanksgiving dinner at our house, being sick and a rainstorm, progress on the patch panel has been slow. It was unusually warm today and I had to go outside to try to make the best of it.



After a lot of welding, grinding and shaping the panel finally began to resemble a window corner. One of the difficulties was the fact that I couldn't weld anywhere close to the lead or it would melt so I had to create a divot to be fixed later at the bodyshop. Originally lead was used to build the panel up be smooth and the height it should be. I welded the patch panel in and then had to grind away all of the lead down to the metal underneath. Then I had to fill the height difference between where my patch panel was and where the metal was underneath. Then I had to taper that metal down to the base metal. Then I had to grind the lead so that it also tapered down to the metal also. Since I couldn't get close to the lead with the welder, the only way to fix this area would be to re-lead the entire area, or leave as much lead as I can and fix the rest with body filler. This is why there is a divot on the left side of the patch. At the bottom I ground away all of the lead and built the area back up with weld. The bottom of the patch was very difficult because that was an area where two thin pieces of metal came together and had to be welded into one piece. All I had was a large angle grinder and getting it into the corner and under the lip proved to be a challenge. One day I hope to have a proper air compressor so that I can use smaller, pneumatic tools that will allow shaping and accessing areas like this much easier than a cumbersome angle grinder.





The areas with the scuffed marks are where I used the wire brush to remove the paint and primer and lead. This will be feathered later during the bodywork. For now I just want to get everything coated with primer and protected.





The pictures were making it look better than it was. I wanted to get a picture that represented how the panel actually turned out. I prefer to have panels that require almost no filler afterwards, but in this case it was almost impossible. Some of the uneven surface is the sharp transition of the old primer and paint, as well as the indented, L-shaped body line. Next will be the lower dogleg in front of the passenger rear wheel.

 

Wow. Does this lead on the body apply to all Clamshells of the era possibly short of Cadilac conversions?

 

All cars of this era have lead in them. Even the sedans

 

Yep. I didn't know where the body seam was. I had hoped it was further down the C pillar a ways, but unfortunately for me, that was not the case.

 

Thanks.