BUILD THREAD Project Olds Cool (Recognition!!)
- Thread starter Rktpwrd
- Start date
Hell no, he works all the time. Just check those hands... This man gets sh*t done! Thanks for the tutorial. I need to do this on my GN, and for some reason thought I was going to be "bolting" it in.
You’re welcome James, and thank you in return!
I’m glad you found that post useful, I was hoping at least someone would! That’s a little “Easter Egg” that only those of us who read the build threads will get. 😉
Not that it’s overly complicated to figure out, but sometimes it’s still nice to get the information from someone that’s done it before. I can definitely say that it made a significant difference in the stability of the window in the “up” position, and so far that evaluation is just with it sitting static in the garage. I’m looking forward to seeing what kind of difference it makes when spring finally arrives and I can start driving it again.
Thanks for reading and responding, I sincerely appreciate it.
D.
It helped me too Donovan. Thanks! I'm pretty sure my car needs that repair on both sides.
No problem Jared, my pleasure.
I enjoy sharing my progress with you guys, I know most of you appreciate it so that makes it all worthwhile.
It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if yours needed it as well, the original plastic after all these years is pretty brittle. Factor that in with the use and abuse these cars went through during daily driver use, and it’s not hard to see why they break.
I have this major irk about people slamming the doors on my G bodies, I get that they’re a long heavy door but I set my doors up to open and close like butter usually. Slamming them does all sorts of damage like breaking spot welds, those window guides, and tearing the sheet metal around the striker pins.
A little care goes a long ways.
Anyways, glad you found the post useful as well!
😊
Well it’s Sunday night and I should probably share this past week’s progress with y’all. It hasn’t been earth shattering, but I’ve been told some progress is better than none, so here goes.
After replacing the broken passenger side door glass guide last week, I reinstalled the glass into the door and tested it out to check my work. With the window rolled all the way up and the door shut, I wasn’t satisfied with the angle of the glass which caused it to sit out and away from the weatherstrip.
(Nothing to do with the replacement of the guide, it was like this before disassembly).
After consulting my 1980 Body by Fisher service manuals, I found the section pertaining to adjustment of the glass and made the necessary adjustments.
Fits and seals the way it’s supposed to now:
It’s nice to finally see glass back in this side again!
I had also sprayed the braces for the AstroRoof insert last Sunday as you already saw, here’s a quick look at it all unmasked now:
With the underside of the pan/insert assembly now finished, I turned my attention to addressing some of the smaller details.
I had previously media blasted the front roller brackets and hardware, so it was finally time to lay them out and get them painted.
A couple coats of etch primer followed by a couple more coats of satin black had them looking good and protected:
Once they were dry, I reattached them to the roof insert. Note the small holes drilled into the brackets, these also extend through into the braces. This was done by me prior to disassembling the AstroRoof. By doing this I’m guaranteed perfect alignment on reassembly. All I needed to do was align the holes with the same size drill bit I used to make them and tighten down the nuts.
The studs on the rear brace get attached to brackets as well, but these are part of the cable drive assembly and as a result are not removable, so I just ran the nuts down onto them for now.
As I had mentioned in the last update, Mike had made great progress in tearing down the cable drive and track assembly from the roof cartridge to treat the rust issues we found there. While I still haven’t got the pre-teardown pictures from him, here’s the cartridge now stripped down and laid out on the stand:
He had removed all but the deepest rust pits, and treated the remainder with rust converter. The four corners were the main culprits, the water that made it past the outer seal must’ve been sitting stagnant here for some time to cause the damage.
Here’s after the converter had cured:
I temporarily laid the cable drive and track assembly back into the cartridge so I could show you how this stud is used to attach it.
Unfortunately however, I had broken the one on the other side when I went to disassemble it.
Using a hole transfer punch, I marked the location and drilled a hole the same diameter as the stud.
Thankfully the end of the stud had just a little bit of wider material on the end of it, so after cleaning the stud and surrounding area of paint, I dropped it through the hole:
After welding it back in and metal finishing it out, it’s good as new and you’re not able to see the repair:
The business side, like nothing ever happened!
Moving on, I scuffed and prepped the treated areas with wax and grease remover, red ScotchBrite, and plenty of elbow grease:
After that, I mixed up some epoxy and brushed the first two coats on and worked it into all the little pitted areas. Once the second coat had flashed off, I poured some on the most heavily damaged areas, and manipulated it around so it was more or less uniform.
The purpose of doing this was to have the epoxy act as a thin bit of filler. By pouring it on a bit thicker than normal, it would fill in all the pits and low spots and remain level on the surface. I got a couple of spots where it solvent popped doing this, but overall it was worth the trade off. Epoxy or not, I didn’t want to have those pits in the corners to hold water in the event it ever got in there again.
Continued >>>
After replacing the broken passenger side door glass guide last week, I reinstalled the glass into the door and tested it out to check my work. With the window rolled all the way up and the door shut, I wasn’t satisfied with the angle of the glass which caused it to sit out and away from the weatherstrip.
(Nothing to do with the replacement of the guide, it was like this before disassembly).
After consulting my 1980 Body by Fisher service manuals, I found the section pertaining to adjustment of the glass and made the necessary adjustments.
Fits and seals the way it’s supposed to now:
It’s nice to finally see glass back in this side again!
I had also sprayed the braces for the AstroRoof insert last Sunday as you already saw, here’s a quick look at it all unmasked now:
With the underside of the pan/insert assembly now finished, I turned my attention to addressing some of the smaller details.
I had previously media blasted the front roller brackets and hardware, so it was finally time to lay them out and get them painted.
A couple coats of etch primer followed by a couple more coats of satin black had them looking good and protected:
Once they were dry, I reattached them to the roof insert. Note the small holes drilled into the brackets, these also extend through into the braces. This was done by me prior to disassembling the AstroRoof. By doing this I’m guaranteed perfect alignment on reassembly. All I needed to do was align the holes with the same size drill bit I used to make them and tighten down the nuts.
The studs on the rear brace get attached to brackets as well, but these are part of the cable drive assembly and as a result are not removable, so I just ran the nuts down onto them for now.
As I had mentioned in the last update, Mike had made great progress in tearing down the cable drive and track assembly from the roof cartridge to treat the rust issues we found there. While I still haven’t got the pre-teardown pictures from him, here’s the cartridge now stripped down and laid out on the stand:
He had removed all but the deepest rust pits, and treated the remainder with rust converter. The four corners were the main culprits, the water that made it past the outer seal must’ve been sitting stagnant here for some time to cause the damage.
Here’s after the converter had cured:
I temporarily laid the cable drive and track assembly back into the cartridge so I could show you how this stud is used to attach it.
Unfortunately however, I had broken the one on the other side when I went to disassemble it.
Using a hole transfer punch, I marked the location and drilled a hole the same diameter as the stud.
Thankfully the end of the stud had just a little bit of wider material on the end of it, so after cleaning the stud and surrounding area of paint, I dropped it through the hole:
After welding it back in and metal finishing it out, it’s good as new and you’re not able to see the repair:
The business side, like nothing ever happened!
Moving on, I scuffed and prepped the treated areas with wax and grease remover, red ScotchBrite, and plenty of elbow grease:
After that, I mixed up some epoxy and brushed the first two coats on and worked it into all the little pitted areas. Once the second coat had flashed off, I poured some on the most heavily damaged areas, and manipulated it around so it was more or less uniform.
The purpose of doing this was to have the epoxy act as a thin bit of filler. By pouring it on a bit thicker than normal, it would fill in all the pits and low spots and remain level on the surface. I got a couple of spots where it solvent popped doing this, but overall it was worth the trade off. Epoxy or not, I didn’t want to have those pits in the corners to hold water in the event it ever got in there again.
Continued >>>
Once the epoxy had cured overnight, I resumed work by sanding and leveling out the repaired areas with 180 grit:
I probably should’ve gone a little further with progressively finer and finer grits, but it’s really not required here as no one will ever see these areas again once it’s reinstalled.
Once the repaired areas were sanded, the entire topside of the cartridge was scuffed and then painted with several coats of VHT satin black Chassis and Roll Bar paint. Being that this is inside the car and protected from the elements, spray bomb paint was sufficient here. Plus, this particular paint is epoxy based, so that’s a plus.
No more damage or pits!
Flipping the whole cartridge over, I had also treated and epoxied the repaired stud area and a couple other spots that looked suspect. Here’s a look at the overall underside. The crap all over it in the foreground is spray glue, it’s unclear whether this is factory or was done by someone trying to possibly repair a sagging headliner.
The epoxied areas:
Following the same procedure as the topside, today I got the underside sanded and painted.
Looks 100% better!
In other news, I’m a little hesitant to share this with you because I know some of you won’t like or agree with it. But at the end of the day, it’s my car and I like ‘em, so tough t*tties!
I kind of “impulse purchased” these beautiful valve covers at my local speed shop Saturday:
Last night, I removed the stock 350 truck valve covers that I had painted Corporate Blue, and installed the new ones on the car:
Now I know many of you won’t like this particular change, but I wanted an upgrade over the stockers, and to add a little bit of under hood appeal. The challenge was to do this without sticking out like a sore thumb or overwhelming the rest of the engine bay. I think it’s about the best I could do given the circumstances.
The exhaust manifolds I blasted and repainted are starting to look a little raggedy, so also slated for this year is to remove and replace them with a set of headers I picked up a while back. So keep an eye out for that upgrade soon too.
I can foresee under the hood becoming more and more serious and less and less stock looking as time goes on!
That’s all for this week gents, now that the cartridge is repaired and repainted and the insert is nearly done, I’ve got to give the cable drive and track assembly some attention next. Then try and find some undisturbed time to epoxy and high build prime the insert. Then a bit of paint under where the seal has to go, glue it in....
....and so on and so on.
But that’s for another update.
Till then, keep the shiny side up!
D.
I probably should’ve gone a little further with progressively finer and finer grits, but it’s really not required here as no one will ever see these areas again once it’s reinstalled.
Once the repaired areas were sanded, the entire topside of the cartridge was scuffed and then painted with several coats of VHT satin black Chassis and Roll Bar paint. Being that this is inside the car and protected from the elements, spray bomb paint was sufficient here. Plus, this particular paint is epoxy based, so that’s a plus.
No more damage or pits!
Flipping the whole cartridge over, I had also treated and epoxied the repaired stud area and a couple other spots that looked suspect. Here’s a look at the overall underside. The crap all over it in the foreground is spray glue, it’s unclear whether this is factory or was done by someone trying to possibly repair a sagging headliner.
The epoxied areas:
Following the same procedure as the topside, today I got the underside sanded and painted.
Looks 100% better!
In other news, I’m a little hesitant to share this with you because I know some of you won’t like or agree with it. But at the end of the day, it’s my car and I like ‘em, so tough t*tties!
I kind of “impulse purchased” these beautiful valve covers at my local speed shop Saturday:
Last night, I removed the stock 350 truck valve covers that I had painted Corporate Blue, and installed the new ones on the car:
Now I know many of you won’t like this particular change, but I wanted an upgrade over the stockers, and to add a little bit of under hood appeal. The challenge was to do this without sticking out like a sore thumb or overwhelming the rest of the engine bay. I think it’s about the best I could do given the circumstances.
The exhaust manifolds I blasted and repainted are starting to look a little raggedy, so also slated for this year is to remove and replace them with a set of headers I picked up a while back. So keep an eye out for that upgrade soon too.
I can foresee under the hood becoming more and more serious and less and less stock looking as time goes on!
That’s all for this week gents, now that the cartridge is repaired and repainted and the insert is nearly done, I’ve got to give the cable drive and track assembly some attention next. Then try and find some undisturbed time to epoxy and high build prime the insert. Then a bit of paint under where the seal has to go, glue it in....
....and so on and so on.
But that’s for another update.
Till then, keep the shiny side up!
D.
I finally caught up with reading the latest updates from the last few months. As usual, fantastic work!! Impressive!
Question: What type (brand) of epoxy filler did you use (the "whitish" stuff that was used to fill the pit marks)?
Thanks, and good luck for the next hurdle.
Question: What type (brand) of epoxy filler did you use (the "whitish" stuff that was used to fill the pit marks)?
Thanks, and good luck for the next hurdle.
Awesome work Donovan! I like the valve covers. They provide a nice contrast. They would look good in Corporate Blue with natural letters as well.
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