badly fitting panels

[evilzee28]

The front of my '69 Camaro has original GM front fenders with after market inner fenders & an after market radiator support panel. I first fixed the fenders to the rad support & bolted up all of the rest of the sheet metalwork, but didn't fit the inner fenders at this point. Everything appeared to line up pretty much ok. On disassembling the front body panels & fitting the inner fenders to the fenders, I found that the inner fenders didn't fit too well at all, but manged to get them looking ok after a bit of work.
On fitting the assembled front fenders/inner fenders to the rad support I find now that there's a big gap at the bottom of the fender next to the door bottom, it's as if the front end needs to drop to fit properly & to close up the gap at the rear of the fender.
I'm sure someone had problems with an after market rad support, ( I think it might have been Scott?) was it found to be too tall?

What should the distance be between the point where the fender bolts to the rad support & the top of the front clip/chassis?? I can get around this issue but would like to know if anyone else has had similar problems & how they overcame them, unfortunately I have to use this rad support so it's not a simple case of getting an OEM part as I live in the UK. Thanks guys

ps it's got aluminum bushes on the rad support.

[Payton King]

But I believe in a bushing kit that does the sub frame and rad support. There are 2 different sized bushings (height wise) The tall ones go in the middle (mounting point at the firewall) the other 2 sets go to the rad support and the back of the sub frame. Check that out. If you have the tall ones at the back or in the rad support position, it will cause what you describe.

[evilzee28]

Originally Posted by Payton King

But I believe in a bushing kit that does the sub frame and rad support. There are 2 different sized bushings (height wise) The tall ones go in the middle (mounting point at the firewall) the other 2 sets go to the rad support and the back of the sub frame. Check that out. If you have the tall ones at the back or in the rad support position, it will cause what you describe.

I've measured the bushes & they're all 3/4" thick. They were supplied to fit a '69 Camaro, what thickness should they be? Are there any issues with the dimensions on the radiator support? thanks guys.....Nige

[jannes_z-28]

My alu-bushings that I got from SpeedTech all had the same height, the radiatorsupport ones had a smaller diameter than the others.

You probably got the same kind of support as Scott got.


Jan

[XcYZ]

I got a repop core support from Rick's 1st Gen and it was a complete piece of crap. And to top it off, Rick's just jerked Kurt and I around blaming everything else but their piece of crap product. Before they would even consider exchanging it for another one, they wanted Kurt to take all these measurements on the car... fenders, doors, support, frame. It was just a big game to get me off the phone as they didn't even want to hear what I was saying. Time is money and there was no way I was going to have Kurt do that (Autokraft is 2 hours away so I couldn't drive there and di it myself), so I took my lumps, racked it up to being played by Rick's 1st Gen, and was fortunate that I had Jim Hall (Ummgawa) to come to the rescue with a nice used one.

Cliff's notes: Rick's 1st Gen sucks balls and I'm no longer a customer. I threw my Rick's catalog in the garbage, right next to where Rick's put their customer service.

As for the problem Kurt had, the distance from the bushing flange to the top of the core support was too great and caused major issues with the fender to door alignment.

[Tom.A]

Originally Posted by XcYZ

Cliff's notes: Rick's 1st Gen sucks balls and I'm no longer a customer. I threw my Rick's catalog in the garbage, right next to where Rick's put their customer service.

Scott, tell us how you really feel...

[evilzee28]

Originally Posted by tom_a

Scott, tell us how you really feel...

Thanks for the advice, greatly appreciated. Looks like I've got a lot of tweaking to do

[Fluid Power]

Originally Posted by XcYZ

I got a repop core support from Rick's 1st Gen and it was a complete piece of crap. And to top it off, Rick's just jerked Kurt and I around blaming everything else but their piece of crap product. Before they would even consider exchanging it for another one, they wanted Kurt to take all these measurements on the car... fenders, doors, support, frame. It was just a big game to get me off the phone as they didn't even want to hear what I was saying. Time is money and there was no way I was going to have Kurt do that (Autokraft is 2 hours away so I couldn't drive there and di it myself), so I took my lumps, racked it up to being played by Rick's 1st Gen, and was fortunate that I had Jim Hall (Ummgawa) to come to the rescue with a nice used one.

Cliff's notes: Rick's 1st Gen sucks balls and I'm no longer a customer. I threw my Rick's catalog in the garbage, right next to where Rick's put their customer service.

As for the problem Kurt had, the distance from the bushing flange to the top of the core support was too great and caused major issues with the fender to door alignment.

Could not agree more. I was lucky to have purchased all of my stuff before they were sold....


Darren

[evilzee28]

Could any one please help & tell me what the distance is between the top of the front clip/chassis & the point where the front fender bolts to the top of the radiator support? Thanks.......Nige