Ryan, cool project how long have you been working on it? You seem to have a lot of the hard part done already.

Believe me there are way more home built cars on here the you think. And the more that are posted the more it helps the others guys that think hey if they can do it I can to!

Keep up the great work!

Hi Rick. I've been working on it for about 6 months. It's become my refuge. I wish I could work on it more but I'm trying to maintain balance so I stay married and my kids remember who I am. ;)

You have a good point. Reading others build threads has definitely been an inspiration to me not to mention a wealth of knowledge!

Put my son to work marking spot welds so I can match up the new to the old.

Went back over the car with 80 grit before the final epoxy on areas that will be covered up by the roof and quarters.

Stripped the inside edge of the drip rails and the edge of the roof panel to accept the 3M panel adhesive. I set the roof on blocks to give me room to apply the adhesive to both pieces before dropping into place and clamping. The AMD root panel fit great. Didn't require much fitting at all.

Pictures are a little out of order as I'm trying to catch up my thread.

Got the roof, tail pain, quarters on and welded. I chose to sheetmetal screw and clamp the roof to quarter seam while I skipped around plug welding one hole at a time. The quarter to under body was a little faster as I just clamped and welded.

Also got the trunk hinge supports reshaped and back on the car so I could remove the bracing. This took a lot longer than it should have but turned out ok. The supports tied into the original inner fenders at a different point on the curve so It took some time to reshape for the DSE inners.

Got the deck filler under structure prepped, metal on and what seemed like 50 plug welds. The trunk gaps are as good or better than the factory. Looks like the bracing and trial fitting paid off. Can't say enough about the AMD quality after seeing what some other guys have had to do and what I've done with other brands myself. The passenger side of the deck lid is tweaked and bent up extending past the quarter a little. I will replace the decklid later but wanted to keep the same one in place while the quarters were off so I could keep my measurements. All of the damaged metal (beside the temporary deck lid) is gone so the car is pretty straight now. The quarters, taipan, outer fender to quarters are looking much better.

Came back to the upper cowl area. I could have patched a few sections but couldn't live with the thought that theres rust between the panels in the seam area. I decided to patch the entire width of the windshield in 3 sections. I hammer and dollied it to match the curve of the factory metal figured out my shape, traced, and got to cutting. Cleaned up and primered the seam area as well.

Also filled in the dealer add on AC (Thanks Vince). Couldn't figure out what that hole was for. Was a bit of a challenge shaping the patch to simulate the factory rolled edge and match the curve. Things came together well as the replacement top dash panel fit.

Picked up a used Vortec 350 from a nice guy down in Napavine. I have a 4 bolt main block out of a 72 GMC if this block is bad. I mainly wanted it for the Vortec heads. I'll be changing most of the internals anyway. More on that later.

Took every clamp I own but I finally welded the passenger side cowl box on while I waited for the kevlar/fiberglass reinforced filler to dry on the trunk and cowl patch seems as well as the quarter to roof seems.