Pictures finaly...the good and the bad

[55 Fargo]

See, now its all better now,LOL. I have been in this position a number of times with my car, then you get down to it and it comes together. If you have a lot of excess money then you can send out the car to shops and pay someone to do the job, but it never feels the same as when you do the job with your own hands. Sometimes, I cannot believe what I can accomplish if I give it a try.............Fred

[PatS....]

What I'm going to do is try and rebuild my wheel well. Been scratching my head over it for the last few days but I think I have a plan. I will post pics. There are some tough shapes in that thing to try and recreate if you're not a sheet metal mechanic with access to shop equipment.

I have a 50 DeSoto parts car. I'm pretty sure the trunk lip and tire well are in good shape. If you send some measurements I can cut them out and send 'em to ya. No charge, just the shipping.

I'll post better pics tomorrow when it's light out.

[Joe Flanagan]

Thank you Pat, but as you can see from my previous post I managed to refabricate that whole area. The lip around the trunk opening was really hell to clean out. Blasted it for a long time to get it rust-free.

[Jims50chrysler]

Pat:

your parts car looks better than some of the start with around here....lots of rust in Ontario.

Jim

[PatS....]

Yeah, didn't see your post until after but if someone else is interested in the well or floor, it's available.

[Jims50chrysler]

Here are a few more pics that I took tonight

The first one is the passenger floor as you can see it has a few small holes....not a big deal

The second is the front suspension complete except for the shock relocation that is on the bench waiting for me to install it.

and the third is a showing how much tire will be exposed below the skirt now that it is lowered 3"

I am into wiring right now.

Jim

[Jims50chrysler]

Well it's been awhile since I posted here so I thought it was time for an update.

As you can see from the Pics I have came up with a solution for my floor pan issues in the trunk and I am very satisfied with the results...The wheel well is a little shallower than the original but the spare will still fit under the trunklid and I can now run my dual exhaust under the wheel well without concern.

The driver side of the floor was a bit of a challenge because it was worse than I thought but we just kept adding pieces untill all the holes were gone.

I have to get back to it and weld everything up solid this week.

I got a steering wheel that is good enough to use untill I can repair and paint it. This might not sound like a big deal but I was getting worried that I was not going to find anything at all and have to drive the car using the wire rim but thanks to the forums very own Tim Adams I should not have to where gloves while driving my car this year. Thanks Tim

Jim

[Norm's Coupe]

Looks good. As for the spare tire well that should have a couple of small drain holes in the bottom to drain any water that may get in there. I know you may hate to drill holes in the nice new steel, but really should be there so it doesn't hold moisture or water.

[49DODGEBOY]

Jim

can you shoot me some close ups of the floor repair, gonna do the same thing soon..

thx

Rich

nice spare well repair!

Well it's been awhile since I posted here so I thought it was time for an update.

As you can see from the Pics I have came up with a solution for my floor pan issues in the trunk and I am very satisfied with the results...The wheel well is a little shallower than the original but the spare will still fit under the trunklid and I can now run my dual exhaust under the wheel well without concern.

The driver side of the floor was a bit of a challenge because it was worse than I thought but we just kept adding pieces untill all the holes were gone.

I have to get back to it and weld everything up solid this week.

I got a steering wheel that is good enough to use untill I can repair and paint it. This might not sound like a big deal but I was getting worried that I was not going to find anything at all and have to drive the car using the wire rim but thanks to the forums very own Tim Adams I should not have to where gloves while driving my car this year. Thanks Tim

Jim

[mackster]

NICE ONE JIM! keep it up! summer is coming!!!!

Jim

can you shoot me some close ups of the floor repair, gonna do the same thing soon..

thx

Rich

nice spare well repair!

[Jims50chrysler]

I will post some pics tomorrow....didn't get to the shop tonight.

feels pretty good to get something done.

Jim

[Joel Torres]

I have a 50 DeSoto parts car. I'm pretty sure the trunk lip and tire well are in good shape. If you send some measurements I can cut them out and send 'em to ya. No charge, just the shipping.

I'll post better pics tomorrow when it's light out.

why not use a fender from a trailer or tow dolly its perfect curve just mount it upside down

[Jims50chrysler]

Here are some more pics of the repairs on the Pass side of my trunk, as you can see it is like a patchwork quilt. This is mainly because I didn't have a piece of steel large enough to cover the whole thing but doing it in pieces made it less difficult for me to see the shape of the next piece I had to cut.

(Bad case of attention deficit disorder )

I thought about the trailer fender but the size of the fender I measured was all wrong, so I made a "trailer fender" (see pic 4) but it was too ridged to work with.

Jim