Results tagged “body” from Pantera #2245

We had a great time at the PCNC tech session on saturday. Ken Green met up
with me and we had spirited drive over to Roger & Pam's house. We were one
of the early birds and got started right away on installing my air dam.

The air dam didn't quite fit right. Basically it turned out too deep. So it
would sit out from the valance about 1/2 inch or sit flush against the
valance and we would have to cut off the ends at the wheel well to fit it
properly. We voted for the latter. So we first drilled the holes for the
valance and mounted it there. That gave us a reference for how much we had
to cut off on either end. Then first with a hack saw and later with the
bench grinder we smooth over the ends. I have been told there are better
fitting version out there, but I am happy with the results.

The car is painted as off yesterday! We had an old friend paint the car who is a fulltime painter with 10 years expierence, he said it was the hardest car he has ever painted! The DuPont three stage paint was very thin. The base coat is like water and very white in color. The mid coat privides a deep mustard tint with pearl and metallic flakes. The final coat is the indestructable DuPount clear coat. The diffuculty in painting was due to the nature of the paint, the lines of the car, and the height. It was a little too high on the homemade dolly to make painting comfortable.

All week I have been working late to get the car wet sanded with 400 for the paint job. I am a little worried that the door jams will not come out the same color as the exterior. The exterior was first coated with something like a tinted sealer to provide uniform color, however the jams were not. We will see on monday when we can roll the car out into the sunlight and pull the masking tape off. The car took seven hours to paint not including the masking and prepping we did. There is a very slight orange peel but its very reasonable. Every car has to be color sanded and buffed, we will make preperations for that task.

News on other fronts, I have sent all my motor parts to Al Liest who has built a lot of motors for the pantera crowd. He also is a member of NorCal Pantera Club and owns a pantera. I know the motor is in good hands. I have also collected all the suspension parts I believe I'm going to need. Either this week or next weekend I will have the car towed to my house where I can start the assembly.

Oddly enough the day the car was painted was also my wedding anniversary! This car has been a relationship of the marriage degree. I would be lying if I said it wasn't the cause of some friction in my relationship with my wife as well. However we were both very happy to see it painted and the progress we have made in the last two months has been great. I have owned this car for almost three years now.  Most of those three years the car has been undrivable in various stages of restoration. I know I still have a large amount of work to do but there is defintely a new energy in the air after car gets painted. The fun part of putting all the nice parts on and seeing the metal shell actually become a car, is about to begin.

If any of you are keeping track of the numbers here is the tally of time and money that it took to get the shell to this stage; 8 hours of paint work, $400. Over 10 gallons of painting material, $650. 100 hours of blocking and sanding and shaping, $5,795.  8 months of metal work, rust repair, and panel replacement, $6,000. There was one year of non-activity which accounts for the long timeframe. Despite the large numbers I got a really good deal on paint, retail would have been $1,000, and all the labor that was done on the car was outside legitimate "body shops". Three different people worked on the body of this car, painter Mark Kallagher, body man Cliff Sniatowski, metal worker Jimmy Stix. All of these folks worked on this car put an amazing amount of time into the car.  Most everybody that comes in contact with the car falls in love with it which helps. But most of the folks that worked on this car say they would not do it again. The pantera is a lot of work. Not only must you find somebody with the artistic talent it takes to work on this car but also the patience and persevernce. Thank you all. If anybody would like to contact these individuals please send me an email, they all are located near the Bay Area California.

If you aren't aware the links on the right hand side of the page are links to the history of this pantera log. You can trace this log all the way back to Jan of 2000 when the restoration was begining. Time to reflect and contemplate the future! Vrooooooooooom!!!

Last month when I went to the Precision Proformance BBQ I took several pictures that I wanted to share with you all ...

See the car has paint on it .. well some of it. We are making lots of progress now. Even after all the metal work had been done which took over 6 months, we still are putting many hours in the car to get the body straight. We have over 80 hours into it and may reach 90 after all is said and done. I ran into Cliff ( the body man ) from a mutual friend. After a few discussions and looking at his beautifully restored Healy 3000 we decided to proceed and have him get the car prepped for paint.

I just spent the weekend driving down to LA for the Precision Proformance BBQ. My father was on his way down to LA for his own reason and I tagged along to bring my ZF to Bob and pick up some other parts they had ready for me. I have most of my components for the suspension, including adjustable rear upper a-arms, busing kits, 1" sway bars all the way around, sphere bar sway bar bushings, solid axles, Precision Proformance 3-way adjustable shocks, 700lb rear springs and 450lb front springs, stainless steel bolt kit for suspension, and 4 piston caliper NASCAR brake kit from Precision Proformance. I am sure I am missing things from this list.

Just finishing up the blocking now. The body lines are getting cleaned up and the car is getting primered and ready for paint. It's been a long road. Six months of solid body work. It has been a year since I had the car media blasted. It was september of 99 when I bought the car. I am really excited that the body work is done. This is definitely one of the more time consuming parts of the restoration.

Almost done! The hood scoops and battery box are in and flush mount windshield is almost finished. We are still about two or three weeks away from paint. I looked at several pictures of this type of hood scoop installed. There seemed to be two ways one way with the outer most edge of the scoop parallel with the hood line ( or hood/fender seam ). The other way with the front of the scoop parallel with the front hood line. There is only about ten degrees of difference between the two positions. It seemed that the former positioning was the most comonly used. Therefore that is the way we went. The outer edge of the scoop lines up and is parallel with the hood/fender seam.

The flush mount window kit has turned out to be more work then originally thought. You get six pieces a pair for each side of the window and a pair for the top of the window. However you don't get pieces for the bottom of the window. My body man made a bottom piece to move the windshield up slightly to achieve the proper gap between the window and the window fram so that the seal will fit between the frame and window. The lower portion of the window frame was rusted as well so it was better to replace it. It is a lot of work to hand form those pieces.

Winding down on the body work. Here are photos of the passenger side marker light section and the completed front valance. I chose not to put the screen back into the valance. I don't think this screen is necessary for cooling and seems like it might help divert from under the car without the screen. Also leaving the screen out of the valance makes it a much sturdier piece.

Next on the list is the hood scoops, the battery box, and the flush mount window kit. That will complete the body work and then I need to prep it for paint. I will try to remove most of the undercoating and clean up the fender wells for re-coating. Also the engine bay needs some cleaning and the body needs some more block work to be perfect.

I can't wait to get it painted. It seems once its out of paint then I have so much more work to do. But I know that that type of work goes faster then waiting for body work. The hardest part is going to be funding all of the new parts that I hope to get for it.

I also found another manifold for my engine combination. I got a Roush A351 on the way. This one is new and hasn't been ported. I had the seller take measurements for me to make sure, and it looks good. I now have 3 intake manifolds, an A331 for 9.2" deck height a Roush A331 for 9.2" deck height and now this A351 for a 9.5" deck height. As I wanted the A351 because I hope to use an SVO block. It's nice to have options and the intake is the hardest part to find these beatiful A3 heads.

This set of pictures show the finished version of the driver and passenger side shock towers after the rust repair. Also pictures of the rear section of the car. Notice the bumperette holes removed.

More body work continues. The cab section of the car is down and now the rear portion of the car is being worked on. Some of the problems being fixed are the rear shock towers that usually rust near the frame as the towers were never drilled for drainage. Also the rear deck lid has a minor ding and some holes need to be filled where the old delta wing used mount. There is also a rust spot in the roof of the car near the back hinges. The roof will be cut open cleaned out and coated then sealed back up with new metal.

Below is the work progressing on fixing the rear shock towers, drivers side, the worst side.

This next pictures show the passenger side rear quarter panel patch above the rocker panel, and the new front frender section near the rocker panel.

After this work is finished the rear section of the car is next with a rust spot in the roof fixed, the rear wheel towers, and misc holes needed be plugged where previous owners got "drill" happy. The whole cab section of the car is done. After the rear section is done then the front section of the car follows.

More progress is being made on the rusty bucket. I say that with the upmost sincerity. The driver side cab section is complete. The door has been mounted and all panels roughly shaped in. On the drivers side the inner, middle, and outer rocker panels were replaced, plus the floorboard. Also the door jam had to be fabricated and a small section of the rear quarter right in front of the rear tire. Additionally the firewall was replaced. The firewall wasn't really rusty but I wanted a stronger piece of metal there then originally came in the car.

So work has now started on the passenger side which is in much better condition then the drivers. The inner and middle rocker are salvagable. I already have a new outer rocker to replace the old rusty, foam filled one that is on the car. This side of the car actually had mud, dirt, and debris in the rocker panel and was still WET! Debris enters throught the hole in the rear of the rocker where the air conditioning lines go and floods the rocker. Its only a matter of time before enough silt gets into the rocker to plug the drain holes. A better design would be to route the air conditioning lines going into the rocker from the bottom up, not the top down.

These next pictures show the new floorboards and the new firewall. The floorpans are dropped floor pans but I wanted to be able to move the seat forwards and backwards so the floorboards are only slightly recessed.

There has been some talk on the pantera email list lately about saving rusty pantera's. I am guilty of purchasing a project but that was what I was looking for. A potential owner must be aware that these thirty year old cars are almost always in need of work. How much work your willing to do the car, and how much of a project you are willing to tolerate should be your guiding factors in making your purchasing decision. You can see my archives for the story of this car. For the medium level of rust on the car it was still a $17,000 car. Even after a year of ownership and all the work I have put into it I still believe it was worth $15,000.

Another update, and so soon as well. The body man has just got into the meat of it and is replacing the rocker panel on the drivers side as well as patching up other areas around there.

The rocker panels probably started rusting like most panteras because the drain holes got plugged with dirt. Once the drain holes are plugged the rocker retains water and rusts away. The interesting note about this car is that once the panels were rusted some body work was done where they patched up the rusted panels by filling them with expanding spray foam. This was probably done to get the rocker into shape again. Then the foam, rusty metal combo was bondo'd and painted. I am now paying for somebody elses sins.

I will try to get more pictures as progress is made. I am installing lowered floor pans, a new firewall and of course new rockers on both sides.

After two weeks of no pantera work, I as finally able to get the car primered this weekend. I feel much better knowing that I dont have to worry about the car rusting anymore. I got most of the metal parts for the body work and got the body man started. So we should start seeing more progress sooner then later.

I am going out of town for work and vacation time so I wont be able to update the log for a couple of weeks. Next weekend will be my last entry until the second weekendin april.

I got the car back today from the media blasters. It is better then expected. It is hard to know what is lurking under the 50 coats of paint over 30 years. There turned out to be no suprises. I did have a problem getting the car over the hill. I was hoping to beat the weather but it started raining on my perfect metal cat as I was driving back to the shop. DOH! When I got to the shop we dried the car off and turned on the heat. Fifteen minutes later the car had a definite "rust" hue to it. I will use an abrasive to remove the surface rust and primer it with epoxy primer this weekend.

I also talked to somebody about doing a little body work for me. I will have him get started on the rocker panels and floor board next.

The car went off to the paint strippers wednesday. I rented a trailer and trucked it down to the place. The owner of the shop said he is going to take his time with this one. He is afraid of cutting through the sheet metal with the plastic media. I have time to wait though. I don't to rush anybody.

On other fronts I have puchased my valves, guideplates, and keepers. Also studs for the rocker arms. These items are necessary to assemble my A3 heads. I found a in A331 intake manifold that I should get next week. The manifold was $575, rather pricey but hard to find. I may have been able to get one cheaper if I was able to wait. I also found a Scat stroker crank that has been used but only on 10 runs supposedely. It doesn't need turning just polishing. The other benifit is that this crank maybe balanced well enough that it may save me some money on balacing, anyway the price was $375.

I dissasmebled the A-arms today. I removed the bushings by cutting off one side of the metal inner collar then burning out the rubber with a propane tourch. Then I pressed out the outter sleeve. The upper front A-arms were the toughest as the outter sleeve had no "gap" between the sleeve and the A-arm bushing hole. I had to grind down the sleeve collar until it was fairly thin, then I used a screwdriver and hammer to pry the collar away from the A-arm hole. Then I used a bearing holder in the press to get enough "grab" on the A-arm to allow me to press out the sleeve. I used a 1/2" ratchet extension to allow me to press all the way through the A-arm. Now I know why you pay people to do this work :)

I have a couple of options for body work so I will wait until the car comes back from the strippers to see how bad it is before making my decision.

Over the weekend I stared pulling apart the front end of the car. This included lights, radiator, headlight motor, and grill work. Really pretty easy stuff. I made sure to take pictures of the wiring diagrams for the fans and the headlight motors.

I had trouble believing that the bar that rotates the headlight assembly up and down didn't come out of the car. My bar is fairly stiff to move and needs to be cleaned up and have the plastic bushings replaced. I guess I will have to fudge up while still in the car. If anybody has hints on getting the thing out and back in, I would love to hear it.

I also started getting prices for all the metal parts I need for the car. I need to put together all the parts to supply to the body man.

Still looking for SVO heads. If anybody has any I would appreciate you dropping me an email.

Power Heads -- Your Only Source for CNC Ported Factory Heads. I found this link today. They have a set of ported aussie 2V heads complete for $975. That is pretty cheap. If you were going to rebuild your 4V heads this would be a good  way to go.

We are almost upto date folks. The backlog of information is almost finished. So the car is back on the road and we celebrated by getting a G-Tech to see if we could measure some power. We still had the problem of the car dying when coming to a stop after a hard acceleration. The reason is because when you apply the brakes you lose some vaccum. Since the engine only had 3.5 Hg applying the brakes lost all vaccum and the engine dies. So we were messing about with some more carb settings trying to get it dialed in a little better when we noticed a faint knocking.

What's that a knock? Oh shit, valve train, not a rod too quiet. Wrist pin. DOH! The bottom end is giving up. Sigh.

So we decide we need to rebuild the bottom end of the engine, and we should have done that anyway. But I knew that I would have to pull the car apart in May anyway. So I talked to my accountant, ( wife ), and we go over what would be required to build the engine. Well best case senario dreamland, lets see fontana block, svo heads ... $10k. Worse case senario spend about $2,500 to rebuild it.

But honey can't we just start the restoration now so I don't have to keep pulling this car apart? Well we went over our long term $ goals and short term needs and actually came up with the money to start the restoration. So now I have $ to complete the body work. And by the time that is complete I will need have another installment to finish the engine properly.

So now I am putting together a plan to get the necessary body work done. I do have some rust problems on this pantera, here is the short list;

Inner and Outer rocker panel replacement, both sides
45 degree Hall vents for the hood
Rear quarter panel patches above rocker panels
Sunken battery box installed
Front valance replaced
Fix up front fenders, small rust spot, fender rolled for 17" tires
Roll bar installed and painted
Flush mount windshield kit installed
Stress cracks fixed
Floor pan crack fixed
Wheel tower brace cleaned up and reinforced, both sides
Install rear louver vent panel
Install lower air dam

Well that's a start, if any of you have suggestions please email me. I have a body guy setup already I just need to disassemble the car and get it media blasted. Yeehaw!