James' 72 El Camino

Finally an update!!

2009-03-31T00:11:00.000-07:00

Just not enough time to get everything done one desires.

It takes a lot of time to keep up a site on daily progress.

The entire front clip has been assembled and fit. New hood

hinges, bumper and brackets straightened, bumper was

riding against up against the lower stainless trim on the grill.

The doors and hood have been straighten, filled, and block

sanded. The underside of the hood and inside of the doors

have been painted with Por-15 for corrosion protection and

durability.

It was also discovered that the frame was bent on the right

front side.

The first frame of the 4 El Caminos on hand was

also bent on the right rear.

The next frame was very nice and has been cleaned up

and painted with Por-15 and assembled with new suspension

bushings front and rear, new ball joints, new steering gear

box, rear spring cushions, front upper stop bumpers, and

needed only one front mount hole repair.

The body will be set on it the 1st week of April 09 with the

best mount kit from OPGI.

The tailgate will be worked on in the mean time.

Also, thanks to Randy at Wyoming Tech, we have

right and left NOS rear quarter panels. Thanks Randy,

the reproductions that we purchased looked like a lot

of work.

They will be installed with new reproduction outer

well houses.

http://www.forplayonly.com/ and

www.4playonly.com/

will be forwarded to a regular web-site soon, the backwards

layout of the blog make it hard to log progess and it seems

to be confusing to new comers.

The site has been started at http://www.freeoldcar.com/.

As Close As It Gets.

2009-01-04T00:52:00.000-08:00

The gap seems to look bigger than it is in the pics.

It cannot be much closer without biting when the door is opened.

It is wider in this area, we will have to do some metal work if

we are going to get that particular.

We have 3 more of these 72 El Caminos (one a factory SS)

and they are all a little different.

It might be because of the 69 Malibu doors.

The bottom of the left fender literally sprang back into

it's original shape after we cut the scrape iron out, (next pic).

Why they brazed a bent up pic of junk in here? They probably don't know.

The right fender we hope to use has a piece of scrape iron

in the same place. Note how it flares out at the wheel opening.

The 2 body lines here should be parallel.

The fender we hoped to use isn't looking to pretty good.

Note pile of bondo dust on the floor.

Personal opinion of the 72 El Camino front clip: "The grill and

headlights are frenched in and are beautiful. The signal lights look

like someones son-in-law needed a job, what a piece of crap."

This El Camino is going to be a pearl white, we are thinking about painting

the trim around the front signal lights the same color as the body.

We would like some opinions about the white paint on the

signal light trim.

Gained Some Ground

2008-12-28T00:26:00.000-08:00

The Bolt holes line up pretty well after pulling the cowl forward.

The door latch is in, and a new door seal installed. Hinges haven't

been rebuilt yet, but this is the passenger side and is still in

fair shape, pin kit is ordered.

It still took close to 6 hour of work to get the fender and door to fit

this good.

The hood to fender fit is too close, the left door and fender

need moved out and should correct this.

The hood is just laying on the stops, there are no

hood hinges or latch assemblies installed at this point.

The body line reflections look pretty good.

This looks very encouraging, it has been a few days of pulling,

banging, cussing, etc. to get this to look good.

The gap looks wide in the pic, but it needs it for clearance when the

door is opened. We haven't seen any El Caminos

fixed up very well.

Perhaps someone could help us out here and let us

know their Chevelle, El Camino, or Malibu

door fitting experience.

This door edge is bent sight in the area marked.

2008-12-26T22:05:00.000-08:00

This is a beefed up version of a Kansas Jack.

My father made this one over 50 yrs ago.

It pulled our El Camino cowl back into place very

nicely.

It was necessary to pull from several different points while

hammering the buckles and creases.

A bolt in the fender mounting hole now stands straight and

it lines up with the fender much better.

The spot welds in the flat area were pulled loose, they

have been drilled and tig welded.

They are also pulled loose here.

Front clip is starting to look a lot better.

Have replaced the bent up radiator support

with a straight used one.

The left fender is a bent up, welded up piece of junk.

Also the hood has a buckle on the right side.

Here is why it is so important to fit everything before doing

any body work, this fender mounting tab is bent down

and has gouged the door.

There may be other surprises before this is straightened out.

This could have cost a lot of time and materials later

in the project.

Just A Quick "El Camino For Sale Note".

2008-12-22T00:18:00.000-08:00

You may have found our blog through a for sale ad,

it is obvious this one is not ready to be sold.

We do have a nice 69 hood and header panel for sale.

Also there are some very nice Chevrolet El Caminos

for sale at http://www.elcaminotrader.com/

72 El Camino Project, You Notice One Little Thing

2008-12-20T17:10:00.000-08:00

The last post we were trying to align the doors and fenders
after the paint had been removed or stripped from our

72 Chevy El Camino.

In our opinion this is a very nice 1972 Chevrolet El Camino.

We have 3 others and they are rust buckets.

However, it is nearly a 37 year old automobile,

a classic, maybe even old enough to be an antique.

We had noticed the tab in the pic was bent slightly earlier.

Didn't think much about it at the time.

Then the right fender bolt holes would not line up.
Also, note the seam pulled apart.

The support for this nut plate is pulled loose from the firewall.

Now we finally see the big elephant in the room.

The radiator support is bent just forward of the radiator cap

and the radiator is not standing straight.

With the front fender removed from the El Camino, the other damage

shows up.

It has had collision on the front end, it took most of the hit above

the bumper, buckled the fender, and shoved the cowl back.

In the first pic of this blog you can see the bumper bracket mounting

holes are slightly distorted and that is the extent of the frame damage.

One more little buckle below the hood seal.

Strip Tease Is Almost Over

2008-12-17T21:32:00.000-08:00

It has been a while since the last post.

Work has progressed with a few interruptions.

Pretty much all the paint has been removed, we haven't

decided which hood to use yet.

The hood that was on it is a very nice hood, however,

we have a SS hood.

It is time to assemble the sheet metal and align doors,

fenders, and hood.

The box is in super condition, we are leaving the most of the old

bondo in place here, it was applied correctly.

Although recently we have been informed that you can apply

plastic filler over expoxy primer. The MSDS sheets for Evercoat

Rage body filler approve of this method.

If the filler is applied to bare metal, and a scratch

penetrates the surface coating down to the filler, moisture

will work through the filler down to the bare metal and then

corrosion will begin to spread.

We have seen areas rusted through because of corrosion

between the paint and the metal.

Self-etching primer will inhibit this.

Door jams are clean, just need to hit the small area with the

portable sand blaster.

Hinges have been removed and sand blasted.

There will be new pin and bushing kits installed.

Left door and tailgate are cleaned up and ready for

body work.

The tight corners and areas have been blasted.

This side need touching up.

The portion of the fender in this pic has been poorly

repaired. It has been cut in a couple of places and then

reinforcements spot welded on the back side. The bondo was

deep. It would have to all be undone to straighten it.

This the fender that will be used. It is caved in, but we will be the

first to straighten it, and it really isn't too bad.

Floor boards are very good considering the back window

was leaking.

Right now it has a 305 and a 700R for economy.

Hence the hood indecision, SS hood looks cool, but not

over this.

The plain jane hood would look better, it would look

better than the SS hood if it had a 454 or 396 under it!

Nov. 2, 08 to Nov. 5, 08

2008-11-08T07:54:00.000-08:00

Both rear quarters, the top, and the right front have the
old paint removed.

The rt frt fender is in very nice shape except for a little
repair in the lower rear corner.

The top and the right side got hailed badly, this corner is stretched and
caved in severely, it may take a little heat to repair it.
There has also been a CB antenna mounted on it in the past.

We have some very nice doors from another car, this is the front inside corner
of one of them after power washing.

Since Friday Oct. 31,08

2008-11-02T20:38:00.000-08:00

The rear quarters are bare, both look good by comparison.Most 72 el Caminos are rusted off from the wheel opening down.The left front fender has been repaired and has a lot of bondo.The right front looks pretty good so far.We have both doors from another car that are exceptionally clean, the doors on this car have rust issues in the corners and hail damage on the right door and trim.

In spite of a few small rust issues and a horrible repair, this qtr. panel is remarkable.

No rust through here at all, we will clean up, inspect, and treat the inside.

This is the left rear opening, amazing!

This portion of the opening was a plastic sculpture.

The bottom portion of the repair is pretty good, the upper portion--well, he got 'er done.

The right side has been damaged on the corner and pulled out, so-so job.
Lots of hail damage, we will probably just bondo them, doesn't hurt anything,
leaves it for someone else to make worse.

Top of the opening is excellent, a lot here to work with again.

It still looked good where the bondo was deep.

Over all, we are very pleased with the condition of this car, much more rust was expected.

You just don't know until you are to bare metal.

Further inspection revealed

2008-10-31T22:11:00.000-07:00

Entry for Oct. 31, 08

This is where we stopped yesterday, right rear quarter.

Bondo was a coupe of inches thick and a patch scabbed in, this is an old paint job,

the bondo held up very well.

The wheel opening is only rusted through at the front and rear.

Looks good over the top, even after sand blasting.

Inside the fender opening reveals only minor rust.

It has been lightly blasted.

Again only slight rust through ahead of right rear wheel opening.

The same area, forward of the right rear wheel opening, from the inside.
This looks very good. At least not near as bad as other El Caminos.

2008-10-30T21:59:00.000-07:00

Just started a quick paint job, Oct. 30 2008.
Looks like a pretty clean 1972 el Camino.
It is going to be white with black strips on the
hood, just like it is.
It was white from the factory.

It has gotten hailed severely on the right side.

This is the right side of the top viewed from the front.

This is the worst corner in the preliminary evaluation.