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6/11/03
The first Million dollars worth of sheet metal arrived, I'm very impressed with the quality.
6/14-15/03
I Removed what was left of the drivers inner and outer rocker panels. I used a spotweld cutter to remove the front part and the rear just kind of fell apart!
You can see the round half holes near the left of the picture.
This is an eye opening comparison of the old and new piece.
The new piece does not come with the front fender bracket or the inner portion.
The new inner rocker clamped in place for alignment.
It also makes me feel good to see some new metal this near the old girl.
I removed the rear trim and cut part of the rear quarter away to see what was in there! (more rust......)
That's the new rear patch panel, good quality but I was disappointed in the door jamb area not having the proper contour.
The door jamb area is not bent as sharply as needed. I'll have to try and salvage the old metal or buy another part.
I moved over to the passenger side to see what I had to work with...
The passenger rear quarter was "repaired" at one time prior to the now available patch panels.
The panel was installed using pop rivets and then the heads were ground off. Actually the hand made part is kind of impressive.
Oooops! The "body man" forgot to remove the rusted metal before repairing.
I also got my mig welder and put another!!! order for parts.
My floor pans, and inner rear wheel wells should be here this week, then I can start a little reassembly.
6/21/03
My sheet metal I ordered didn't show up this week
so I spent the day cutting more metal out!
This is a invaluable tool for removing existing sheet metal that is spot welded.
It cuts perfect holes around the spot weld and releases it from the metal it was welded to.
The holes left over in the sheet metal can be easily welded to simulate spot welds.
The picture on the right shows the transmission tunnel from the firewall point of view. You can see how the spot weld tool was used to cut out perfect circles around the factory welds.
The drivers side floor pan and rocker are gone from the toe panel to the rear seat back support.
The rear floor support had turned to dust, I've removed the floor on either side of the front brace and left
some floor on the passenger side to try and give the body a little support.
6/22/03
The floor pan is officially gone, from the toe pad to
the rear seat brace.
This is the front floor brace, it needs a little repair and paint, but otherwise in very good shape.
I was amazed when one of the body mount bolts actually came out without breaking!!
I've cleaned it up a bit with a wire brush.
I hope my floor pans and rear support show up this week so I can do something constructive!
6/28-29/03
Well I learned a hard lesson, turns out Danchuk doesn't want people to buy their products, they decided to cancel my order and leave me hanging for two weeks. When I inquired about the status of my order their response was "RESUBMIT" No, I ordered once, and that will most likely be the last time.
I was advised to contact Ralph at http://www.56chevy.com by the wonderful folks at Chevy Talk.com . I E-mailed him Sunday afternoon and he responded Sunday afternoon!! Holy cow! He has all the parts I ordered from Danchuk and is much cheaper, he has all my business now.
I couldn't do anything on the Belle so I went flying.
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