1964 RHD Impala Wagon - Australian Delivered

Thanks for the comments and pvan, I'm eagerly watching your build - great work.

So...Lots of painting before the car gets.....umm....painted (!)

First up was the rear floor pan which houses the luggage compartment and the spare wheel well (in behind the right quarter panel). They were both in reasonable shape but there was some rust pitting in the floor. I had painted it with POR15 back in 2007.... only to have it flake off where it wasn't rusty. I decided to take it all back to bare metal but after 20 minutes with the rapid strip disk, it was actually holding on extremely well in most spots. I cut my losses, re-etched the bare metal sections and hit it with some texture coat.








Gave it a quick 2k prime...



As per factory, interior colour is fawn metallic. In this instance I wanted a bit more paint durability than what I did on the dash as luggage and spare wheels would be tossed around on them. Therefore I mixed 50 per cent base coat (Cobra) and 50 per cent clear (Autothane) before adding hardener and reducer (4:1:1) to create a basic single stage paint. Not as shiny as separate base/clear which is ideal and it's plenty durable.



Floor Finished



Then it was on to the jambs. A wet sand with some help from some little hands.



And some extra attention on the door jambs. As much as the factory paint runs in the jambs are authentic, if I painted over them it would look like I did them.....so off they came!



Then it was a sea of plastic, sheets, paper and masking tape...



...Saddle Tan metallic base coat





.....and the Autothane Clear.



I decided to guide coat the panels off the car to save me a little bit of masking of the jambs



Flipped the doors over and then 2 lots of painting on the insides. First up was the satin fawn on the door tops...



..and then Saddle Tan base/clear on the rest, including the tailgate and bonnet edges.







Doors, Tailgate and bonnet back on...





..and here's the subtle colour change from inside to outside. It was an extra day to get this right but another one of those small factory correct things.

 

From there it was 3 solid days of lining up panels and getting the gaps as even as possible....which once again highlighted the ballooning in the doors as they taper inwards at the edges.



Out with the slide hammer again to try and improve the fit. I wasn't able to completely get rid of it but it's better.



...and finally a quick celebratory drive before getting stuck into 2 solid weeks of blocking.

 

Looking good, and outstanding attention to detail. This is a great read and inspiration to those who are making big projects out of their rides.

 

more like a dbl 1/4 pounder and supersized fries

Im convinced that youve actually been at this for years and are now just making it look like you just did it....if not....then dam Im jealous

 

Hmm, what side of Canberra are you in? I'm pretty sure I've seen either this or a similar one around Belconnen many moons ago. Can't wait to see it when it's all finished.

 

Wow, what a phenomenal job and so detail oriented. Amazing, it truly is and what a labor of love. I, too, can't wait to see the finished product.

 

Oz64, fantastic workmanship and a very talented guy and it shows with awesome pics to boot . :2_thumbs_up_-_anima from what we see it wont be long till and a

 

Inner south - there's a few about in Canberra. I've owned 2 in my lifetime and I know of 2 others. A maroon one in Belco and a matt black one in QBN. Nice looking Citroen by the way.

Dennis and Snooter, thanks for the comments. You will see in my next update that there has been a setback. It's essentially fixing what the factory got wrong and unfortunately I didn't pick it up when I had the doors in metal.

...so, 10 steps backwards and another 60 to 80 hours of metal work and filler work. I'm actually typing this while watching some filler cure!

 

Inner south eh? I may delivered your Eckler's stuff then, I work for FedEx.

 

Really happy with everything I have got via FedEx - great service but then again you do pay for it!

 

After the excitement of getting the car back together and to the block sanding stage, I unfortunately took a few very big steps backwards which has cost me a month.

If I wasn't such a perfectionist, I would probably be showing you pics of it being wheeled into the paint booth....but unfortunately it's been another 100 hours of grinding, welding, filling, sanding and re-priming.

Essentially I wasn't happy with the doors. Despite staring at them for the whole year and fixing the ballooning at the bottom of each of them, I just plain forgot to run a straight edge over the top trim line. It became very obvious when I started blocking the guide coat that all was not well as you can see below:



A quick check with the straight edge and the centre of the door swelled outwards by 3/4 of an inch. My heart sank as I realised how much work was still in front of me. As a last ditch effort I taped the upper mouldings on to see if this would somehow be a miracle cure but alas no - it made it worse.





I posted on the Chevytalk forum in the US to see if anyone else had the same issue with their doors and most reported that they did. One suggested that there wasn't alot of precision back in the day with the die stamping and pressing the door skins onto the frames and that they were most likely too big for the frames. The consensus was to just leave them as no-one would really notice it.

Well I noticed it and just couldn't live with it.... so I rolled up the sleeves.

The bulge was too big to shrink using the shrinking disk and not big enough to cut - so I decided to shrink them with the mig. I removed the paint along the trim line and another strip a few inches higher. I then put the mig on the lowest setting with lots of wire speed and laid a line of weld, quenching every 3 inches and using the hammer and dolly to control the waves. I left it slightly high and then ground off the weld, quenching again with a wet rag which pulled it in flush.





From there it was a case of re-etching, laying down some tape lines and skimming it with filler.



After about 60 hours I was well and truly over it...



But the trusty Dura blocks are fool proof when it comes to long straight panels:



Another re-etch...



...and a reprime with the Hi Build Primer:



...and back to where I was a month ago (but straighter!)



I spoke with the painter 2 days ago and we are good to go in about 2-3 weeks so on track for a Xmas completion.

 

Neato trick. Must remember this one.

 

Fantastic! A very neat trick indeed. One thing for sure, she will be much better when you are done than she was ever before in her life! Certainly miles better than the factory ever thought of, that's for sure.

 

Nice job!!!

 

Outstanding work!!! I have done two frame off restorations. And your detail is incredible. I just Loved how you did the steering wheel restoration (I paid big bucks for mine). You are very talented and your car is going to show it. Can't wait to see it done!! Take care Dan