The car has arrived, and we’re all set to get to work! – as soon as we can clear some other projects off the decks, that is…
Overall, the car is a little worse in person than I’d hoped, but the bottom line is that when you’re replacing panels, it doesn’t really matter how bad they are – it’s the same amount of work to replace them if they’re a little tired, or completely wiped out… Overall, the car is solid, and the cowl is in good shape, inside and out – and straight, so we’ve got everything we need here to end up with a perfect shell.
The bonnet is a different story – I seem to have a different opinion every time I look at it… There is a lot of lead filler in it, for one thing, that will take time to melt out before we can repair and re-shape the panels. The underpanel is totally shot – I can replace the rusted-out vertical support piece with a new panel (available in our online store), but the outer skin is rusted out, already has several over-lapped patch panels, is bent, dented, and filled with lead – I think I’m going to have to admit defeat on this one – and I hate that!
More bad news is that both the center section and wings have heavy corrosion in the “center-to-wing flanges” that run the length of the bonnet. We have the machines and skills in our shop to fix just about anything, but the amount of labor required on this one may make this bonnet too far gone, economically… Luckily, we have no less than FOUR spare Series 1 bonnets worth of parts in the shop right now (in varying degrees of condition…) that we can use to substitute on this project. Stay tuned for what we eventually decide to do on this one!
The backside of the suspect, lead-filled LH rear wing revealed a total nightmare of poorly hammered-out creases, overlapped seams, brazed-up holes, etc., and so we’ve already dug out an NOS replacement from panels we’ve stashed over the years to handle just this type of problem. Panels like the rear wings aren’t always available when you need them, so we’ve lucked out by having this on the shelf… In addition, underneath the damaged wing are crumpled front and rear wheelhouse assemblies that we will also replace.
