Ford Blitz Restoration/Rebuild

[Private_collector]

Firstly let me apologise for lack of photos today. Yesterday morning I started marking the dents and rustouts on the rear cab panel. I needed to replate three areas. Two where holes had been cut for something to go through, and one along the bottom edge where rust holes couldn't be welded up without blowing the hole bigger and bigger, as a consequence of poor metal surrounding the holes. These were the easy part. The difficulty arose with rust scale between the angle iron frame and panel steel that had caused a bulging effect. I considered cutting out these sections and replating, but knew that if I started doing this I would have to follow through with every place this has happened. That would mean virtually cutting off most of the lower 30-35mm. My metalworking skills don't extend to this sort of job. As Dirty Harry once said, "A mans got to know his limitations", and I do!

This afternoon, I spent a leisurely two hours, laying the first application of filler to the curve on passenger end. This part received a lot of my attention yesterday with hammer and dolly. Someone had torn a hole through the area and despite a quite good weld job, there was much work & time needed to get the area to an acceptable state, where minimal filler was needed.

I HATE PANELBEATING, I REALLY hate panelbeating. And I hate sanding filler WORSE than that! Thats why I tried to have the metal as straight as could be, to minimise how much filler I had to use (and then sand). The result achieved on the end done so far, looks promising, providing I have succeeded in preserving the little vertical groove approx 1in in from the panels end. A coat of primer tomorrow will answer this issue, one way or the other.

I don't want to prolong this job one second further that I have to, and hope to have all repair work finished tomorrow. Body filler sanding is definately an OUTSIDE job. There was so much dust on me, I looked whiter than Michael Jacksons face. What, too soon? I was far too contaminated to touch the camera, hence NO photos. I will take photos tomorrow morning, before I kick-on with the rest of the repair work.

The bolts ordered for floor plates have not yet arrived, so no joy there. Tomorrow won't be as hot as today............apparently it'll be hotter, so that will be nice for working outside, applying filler before it goes 'off' in the moments after application. I could move into the workshop for this bit, but I am rather messy with the filler, and manage to drop the stuff all over the place. Suffering the sun and heat is my penance for being a sloppy pig!

My small angle grinder went west today, just as I was needing it for roughing up surfaces for body filler. This slowed things down considerably. Had to resort to scouring the metal by hand with 36 grit sanding disk.

Jeezus, I HATE panelbeating!

P.S: Terry, did you get my reply message?