Restorating a P-15 business coupe.

[veterantechnic]

What do you use to form these pieces? It looks like you have a copy of the original stamping dies. It's certainly not done with the basic metal forming tools most of us have.

Merle

Many thanks to all of you for positive feedback!

Well, actually we do make most parts with more or less basic metal forming tools. Hammer is in our hands every day . We would be very appreciated if we could have the original stamping forms but I think they don't exist any more. That's why almost all of our work is hand made. Of course it needs practicing to make this kind of work correct. Bigger or more complicated parts we have to do from smaller pieces and weld the pieces together later. Welding must be correct also. Where possible we use gas welding because the welding stays soft as is the sheetmetal and can be worked more easily.

Of course we also use some special tools. One of the most used tool is this hammer-like tool we use to form many pieces. Combining different forms/plates, we make all the time, we can do various tracks, lines, curves, grooves etc.

The problem with making these pieces for sale is that almost all of the work is hand made and we make a piece according to the exact vehicle we make. So that means if we make a piece we make it fit to the car. But it would be extremly complicated to make a piece that fits to every car. That means we really have to have these press forms that are original. And even then it would be possible that the piece won't fit because cars that are so old (more than 50 years) may all be a little bit different, thus they are the same model. For example the frame of a BMW 326 can be different about 1-1,5 cm from some place comparing to other cars (the same model, maybe different years of production, maybe even not). That's absolutely normal.

Regards,

Mart Naagel

Edited November 4, 2012 by veterantechnic

[veterantechnic]

Hello again!

Maybe someone can tell us or show us the fixings of the seat on this Plymouth? The problem is that the original mounting is totally rusted away/gone and we don't know exactly how the seat mounts to the floor. If someone has some pictures or drawings/measures of it, we would be really appreciated.

Mart

[fstfish66]

subscribed,, great metal work

[veterantechnic]

Hello.

I'm adding a picture to illustrate how far we are with the project. We still have no idea of how the seat mounts to the floor. When we got the car, the seat was attached to the house-roof sheet-metal that was used to repair the car's floor. It was attached with some random way and now we don't even know where exactly the seat should be located and how it has to be fixed to the bottom. If anybody could be bothered to peek under or inside of someone's car and take some pictures or make some drawings of the fixings of the seat.

Mart Naagel

[Mark D]

The seat frame is mounted to the floor of the car in four locations, at the front and back of the slider mechanism on both sides.

The seat cushion is held in place by the two tabs that are shown on the stretcher bars on the bottom front of the seat. These tabs hold the seat bottom in place with friction behind the front of the seat frame.

I will try to take a couple more photos tonight of the floor mounts.

[mrwrstory]

Hello Mart,

You do really nice work. Wish I had the patience and experience.

Here are some pics that may be helpful to you. The first is the passenger side

looking toward the rear of the car.

These next two are from different sides. First is the driver side. The light blue areas indicate where the stock

seat was mounted.

The passenger side shows how I mounted a later model seat. I fabbed the base to use the stock seat mounting holes.

I will try to get you dimensions in the next day or so. Good luck.

[veterantechnic]

Restoring the floor continues:

Thank you Mr Bill (mrwrstory) for the great pictures! That's exactly what we needed. The floor of your car seems to be in a very good condition compared to ours. It is a little bit different also - maybe a different year of production (ours is 1948) or is it the version with the extra seat? Though it seems to be a coupe also.

In your first picture it looks like you have a new spare wheel box back there? Is it possible to get body parts like these for this car from somewhere?

The fixings of the seat is ready:

And we still are looking for a bulkhead for our car. If someone has some information about that, it'd be nice.

We also would like to know where we can get the body nuts. These kind of nuts go for example fixing the fenders. It looks like this:

Mart Naagel

Edited November 16, 2012 by veterantechnic

[Don Coatney]

McMaster Carr has captive square nuts. Pack of 20 for about ten bucks. Follow the link below.

http://www.mcmaster.com/#catalog/118/3213/=k6su51

[RobertKB]

Restoration Specialties has all kinds of nuts, fasteners, clips, and other goodies. Here is a link to their catalogue. http://www.restorationspecialties.com/Catalog-PDF.html

[mrwrstory]

The floor of your car seems to be in a very good condition compared to ours. It is a little bit different also - maybe a different year of production (ours is 1948) or is it the version with the extra seat? Though it seems to be a coupe also.

In your first picture it looks like you have a new spare wheel box back there? Is it possible to get body parts like these for this car from somewhere?

Mine is a 1948 Club Coupe,...which means (in the US) it has a back seat,....(different than a Business Coupe). I somehow have lost track of my original seat. However the mounting/locating details are still there if you need pics and/or dimensions.

I made my spare tire well as I wanted one that was not as deep as the original. I started with a trailer fender and then built the sides and flange to drop into the original hole in the trunk floor. I would be happy to post pics if you wish.

[greg g]

Some pictures of the trunk to passenger compartment divider. Mine is original but is missing a fiberboard trim piece that goes on the trunck side to cover the structural members. the divider itself is plywood. It is located 10 inches to the rear of rhe rear door post. I will follow up with a couple pics of the support under the package tray. The front of the divider is upholstered with fabric like the door panels, from the factory.

1 shows upper and lower fixtures for mounting supports to body

2 shows a clip detail at the floor

3 is the bottom bracket for the vertical center support

4 is the upper bracket for vertical center support

5 shows the pass side upper crossmember support and the stamped support for the package tray

[greg g]

these shots show the cross members and the center support. they are spot welded together. Let me know what else you might need.

[veterantechnic]

these shots show the cross members and the center support. they are spot welded together. Let me know what else you might need.

Thank you very much "greg g"! It's almost all we need. If you could take a picture wich shows the entire bulkhead from the front side and one wich shows the entire trunk side, it'd be perfect!

And one question remained: how thick is the plywood of the bulkhead?

Mart Naagel

[veterantechnic]

The floor is ready. The round shaped and X-shaped grooves where luckily in a good shape and stayed mostly original.

Edited January 3, 2013 by veterantechnic

[greg g]

I will try to get a compreshensive view, or one you can piece together shortly. The plywood is probably 3/16's like the stuff used to lay flooring on. It is faced with a piece of upholstered fiber backer board common to automoive upholstery.

[Mark D]

Not sure this matters, but... When I took the back seat out of my car there was a 1" felt paper strip applied to the "X" brace on the seat side to prevent rubbing parts. Might also prevent an annoying future metal to wood squeak.

[greg g]

Here are the pictures of the full bulkhead.

[Dodgeb4ya]

All I can say is thanks for sharing your amazing ability and patience to replicate the floor pan sheet metal in your P-15 project car. Beautiful, beautiful!!!

Bob

[veterantechnic]

When finished the floor, we started with the doors. First with the left one. Somehow, it was significantly more rusty than the right one, although both doors of the car appear to be originals. After removing the layers of paint and fiber glass, the condition was such, as shown in the pictures below. The lower part of the frame and outer sheetmetal must be done new. Because significant damage is just a few inches from the bottom edge upward, dismounting the entire door wasn't reasonable.

We started from the edges.

When the edges were done, we cut off the rusty parts in the middle. First we replaced outer side, then inside.

Water drain holes and the seal attachment plug holes (small ones).

Edited January 3, 2013 by veterantechnic

[veterantechnic]

One door is ready.

As mentioned above, the right-hand door was in a better state. It wasn't "repaired" with the fiber glass. Outer sheetmetal didn't have any rust holes but it wasn't good enough not to replace it. In the inside frame there were a couple of smaller holes. We still had to replace both of the lower edges (inside and outside), otherwise the rust could possibly eat itself through the paint in a couple of years.

Edited January 3, 2013 by veterantechnic

[Andydodge]

Truly beautiful work, this is a real credit to you guys and many thanks for posting these pics...andyd

[Merle Coggins]

Simply amazing. My truck's doors weren't even that bad and I went searching for better ones rather than try to repair them. My sheet metal skills aren't anywhere near yours.

Good work,

Merle

[grady hawkins]

Amazing metal work!!

[Joe Flanagan]

How are you getting the metal so clean? Are you sandblasting?

[veterantechnic]

How are you getting the metal so clean? Are you sandblasting?

Hi!

It depends on what do you mean by clean metal? In our pictures the new metal is already clean and the old one we have cleaned with the "disc brush?" (attached to a drill, seen in the next picture). It doesn't clean the metal perfectly when the metal is very rusty but it will be clean enough for welding. After the welding we also use the same tool to smooth the surfaces. Of course it's after flattening/evening/grinding the welding with tools like hammer (when using gas welding) and "grinder discs"? (my vocabulary in english isn't very good) and tools like that (when using MIG welder). So the disc brush is usually the first and the last tool of the work.

If possible we do sandblast the car and details before getting started with the work. This Plymouth's floor was in so bad condition that the sandblasting would blow away what was left from the floor and the floor bracings. That's why we couldn't blast it before the work. We will sandblast and/or sodablast it when it'd be possible. The sandblasting doesn't remove the paint easily and if you do it too hard, it makes thin sheetmetal wavy! The sodablasting removes paint very easily but it doesn't remove the rust, so we have to decide which places/details we should sodablast and which parts we should sandblast. Maybe some places must have both. The sodablasting is about 2X more expensive too.

After sandblasting, the surface must be cleaned again with the disc brush because some of the sand is still attached to the metal and after painting the metal, the sand under the paint makes the metal rust more quickly again.

Mart Naagel

Edited March 3, 2013 by veterantechnic