'83 Cutlass Cruiser Build Thread

[Longroof79]

Blake,
you mentioned acquiring another donut spare. What car(s) do these come off of? My current spare is a stock 14" wheel originally from my car. The well doesn't seem to accommodate a full size 15" wheel.
I eyeballed one a while back from an IROC Camaro, but someone else grabbed it. It looked like a full size alloy rim. I think they came with a can of tire inflator.

 

[Blake442]

One is from my 442, one is from my old Malibu wagon.
My buddy had one laying around from something and the guy I got the last one from didn't know what it came from.

The size is 125/70D15.

 

[Longroof79]

Thanks man!
I'm going to try to find a 15" donut spare. My car never had one to my recollection. Time for a junkyard crawl.

 

[Blake442]

I didn't take any in-progress pictures of my patches or the process of glueing them in place.
My phone was dead and I didn't have my charger with me...

But here is a picture of it sitting on all four donuts, Jack!
It gets the car pretty low, which is what I was after since I have so much work to do on the roof lol...
Not to mention it leaves plenty of space to work around the wheel wells without having to remove the wheels.

 

[liquidh8]

Blake, looking good man! I feel your pain on doing the roof work, I m glad I have the rotisserie now. 😀

 

[Longroof79]

Blake,
That's a good idea using the donuts to lower the car, yet keeping it mobile and also allowing you ample room around the wheel wells. I ended up using a few wooden pallets to be able to reach most of the roof, especially when i was painting. It was still a bit awkward, though.

Thanks for showing what those particular donuts look like. It looks like you're making headway on the car. I guess the roof was the worst of it, aside from swapping hoods and header panels. The car is going to look good.

 

[Blake442]

Well I ended up sleeping in on saturday so I didn't get anything done on the wagon.
Tuesday morning I went out and checked out how my glued-in patches turned out.
There was almost no clean up needed because I didn't over do it with the adhesive, and right after I clamped everything I wiped off the excess that pushed out with a towel and wax and grease remover.
Everything looked great, so I gave the patches and all the other holes a smear of duraglass.
I got it all sanded down and then gave it a quick second swipe to fill the pinholes...
Tomorrow morning I'll head out and start the filler work on the rest of the roof.

I was searching around for good pictures of the color that I've chosen and stumbled across this gem...
Apparently it's been floating around for sale online for a while and this is the first I've seen of it.



Exactly how my car will look when it's done! Almost...
I wish I knew how to photo shop so I could trim up the woodgrain on the sides...

I've been thinking more about the rear air-deflector and blacking out the window frames like I mentioned a while ago.
I decided I want to keep the wing since I don't like looking at the gap between the top of the lift-glass and the edge of the roof.
My hinges are nice but the chrome is dull. I'll have them rechromed when I get my bumpers done.

And for the windows I decided to go body color instead of black.
I found this picture from a dealer brochure that shows my color with the black out, and I don't like it...

 

[Longroof79]

Blake,
I'm usually not a huge fan of green cars, but that color is niice. Were you still considering the woodgrain look?
I remember seeing that same car on Ebay, I believe. What a super nice example.

Yeah, I know what you mean about seeing the gap between the glass and the roof. I did my frames black, so it probably helps hide the gaps somewhat.
I never realized that GM blacked out the window frames on some of the models. It doesn't seem to do anything for the wagon in the sales brochure.

 

[Blake442]

Actually my '81 Buick Century had the window frames blacked out.
There was also a plastic cap that slipped over the B and C pillars and were pop-riveted in place.
I imagine they were to make it look more squared off, since the caps had real clean edges and the sheet metal is kinda round.

It's tough to see in this lighting, but you can kind of see what I'm talking about on the Buick...

Certain color combos it looks good, others it doesn't...

 

[Longroof79]

Yeah, I see what you mean. So the B and C pillars on the Buick wagon have the plastic caps on them. Another thing I've never noticed before.
Thanks for pointing that out to me.

That Buick wagon was a pretty nice car...still is, I guess.