Crumple zone, #4 Options

[930cabman]

Don't ask, but project #4 is underway. a decent 1974 model without mountains of rust. More pics to follow, but I discovered this yesterday



and this



So goes it. The floors are very good (appear to be), the longs need some small patches including the jack posts,.......

Good winter project

[Superhawk996]

Yeah - sketchy but it isn’t terrible for an east coast car. Worse have been saved . . . At a cost.

Measure the tub carefully before you invest lots of time or $ into this chassis. I can’t imagine it having been hit that hard and not needing a pull on a frame rig to square it back up.

[930cabman]

Yeah - sketchy but it isn’t terrible for an east coast car. Worse have been saved . . . At a cost.

Measure the tub carefully before you invest lots of time or $ into this chassis. I can’t imagine it having been hit that hard and not needing a pull on a frame rig to square it back up.

We have seen much worse (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

I took a couple basic measurements and things look not terrible. As time allows I will open it up more and see what I am dealing with. Wondering if I can remove the creased portion, straighten it out and weld it back in place?

[Superhawk996]

Wondering if I can remove the creased portion, straighten it out and weld it back in place?

The problem is that buckle indicates metal has moved substantially. Not just there but across the whole truck and probably in front of the buckle as well.

You’ve got to figure out where it moved before you can just hammer it out and expect to have it be square. Remember you’ve got to work in and measure in all three dimensions.

Somehow if you get exceedingly luckily it was crudely pulled to some degree on a frame rack when the did the lap repair.

When I had my 1st teener I had an incident that bent the front. If I remember right it was about $900 to pull it back around 1988. That was big $$ at the time! Though it was almost repaired perfectly there was still evidence of stretch and a minor buckle down in the bottom of the frunk.

Point being they may have pulled it already but didn’t take care of the buckled area due to time / cost. The only way to tell for sure is measure, measure, and measure some more.

[930cabman]

Wondering if I can remove the creased portion, straighten it out and weld it back in place?

The problem is that buckle indicates metal has moved substantially. Not just there but across the whole truck and probably in front of the buckle as well.

You’ve got to figure out where it moved before you can just hammer it out and expect to have it be square. Remember you’ve got to work in and measure in all three dimensions.

Somehow if you get exceedingly luckily it was crudely pulled to some degree on a frame rack when the did the lap repair.

When I had my 1st teener I had an incident that bent the front. If I remember right it was about $900 to pull it back around 1988. That was big $$ at the time! Though it was almost repaired perfectly there was still evidence of stretch and a minor buckle down in the bottom of the frunk.

Point being they may have pulled it already but didn’t take care of the buckled area due to time / cost. The only way to tell for sure is measure, measure, and measure some more.

Yes, this repair will have some different challenges. I will be proceeding slowly and having made a career as a carpenter for many years, measure several times prior to cutting is the rule. Hoping to find another thread or two with a rear end impact.

BTW, update with your new digs?

[Superhawk996]

BTW, update with your new digs?

Not really much new yet to be worth a post and photos. Permanent roof is on. Windows ordered - maybe arrive around Thanksgiving. Garage doors in December sometime.

Just endless small details that don’t result in anything looking complete.

Look up Jeff Hails bring out the dead thread. He has a good underbody measurement template that you can print out and use to compare to your tub. Photos of it on my build thread too (post #51)

That really looks like it’s going to need some hydraulic pulling even if the suspension locations weren’t affected.